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My view may be biased but Freo is setting themselves up to really [censored] the bed in their persuit for Jackson. Forcing favourite sons to retire, giving up draft picks, letting good players walk.... This has Tim Kelly written all over it.

I am disinterested in these findings

Standing in a circle yelling obscenities at each other not having washed for days. I've sat in the Collingwood cheer squad before, they've been using this technique for decades.

For the love of god, do NOT lose to these clowns. I want to bury them and make them realise what a truly mediocre side they actually are and how lucky they have been to get an easy draw and get away with so many close wins. I also want to see Howe and Ginnivin cry. Ugly cry.

Freo’s pursuit of Jackson seems incredibly short-sighted to me. Freo are a young team with huge upside for the next few years. They’ve already shown that they can compete with the best teams and, personally, I see them as one of our biggest rivals over the next few years. Why you would want to jeopardise this - by forcing out players and forcing them onto smaller contracts - just to land one player in the infancy of their career is beyond me. Jackson doesn’t even fulfil a list need for them. Could be a culture killer if guys like Darcy feel like they’ve been taken for granted. As of right now this is all hypothetical, but geez it makes you glad to have Tim Lamb and Jason Taylor at the head of our list management!

I think there might be quite a few high quality young Fremantle players wondering why they're bringing in a 20 year old backup ruckman on significantly more money than any of them are on, especially someone like Sean Darcy who's super popular in the Freo squad, would have to be thinking, why am i getting paid much less as the number one ruckman than the bloke who'd come in and back me up?

I thought he was close to their best player on Friday night.

I'm sorry to hear that OD I hope your son recovers soon and starts following the Dees

Jeff White in full flight was very exciting to watch. Let's not forget for a guy that was only 195cm he would easily jump over guys like Peter Everitt, Shaun Rehn, Brad Ottens, Paul Salmon who were well over 200cm plus. White was also well ahead of his time with his ball use and ability to get around the ground. His kicking was pretty elite for a big bloke especially in an era where ruckman were more known to be the lumbering types. Also, Jeff could take some serious hang time. His leap was insane. The problem with Jeff was his shin problems and then also when they brought in the centre circle rule which limited his biggest strength and that was his run and jump and ability to just thump the ball forward.

I wouldn’t disagree and I know Sam quite well. What disappoints me is that I know there are people that would read all that and be like ‘so what, mate. Suck it up, it’s not like they hit you.’ They were disrespectful to his culture, betrayed his confidences in front of his colleagues, berated him, and his club thanked him for leading and standing up for his brethren by demoting him and pushing him out the club. What a culture. And not to say how great are we but we were close to going down this path and instead went down the path of embracing uniqueness, respect, and having trust in your teammates to let them be if they do the work. I’ll take our PC woke culture any day of the week and twice on the last Saturday in September…

Our target should be Haydn McLean. Victorian boy. Big aggressive type. Go play forward or relief ruck. Squeezed out and behind Buddy, Reid, Amartey and McDonald. Swans have Ladhams and Hickey as ruck options. McLean would come at reasonable price and with plenty to show.

Agree. It's a bit weird because I think their biggest need, by far, is a couple of high quality big bodied midfield bulls to compete with the bontempellis, cripps and Oliver types. And they don't really have an equivalent to extractors like viney and libba. Their other big need is one or two decent key forwards, particularly given lobb is likely to leave. Jackson would have to improve his forward craft a fair bit to fill a key forward role. They have a number one ruck, and a bloody good one, in darcy. So what need would Jackson fill? Unlikely i know, but maybe they are thinking of him playing as a mid?

Watching one of the footy shows last night the hosts (mighta been Lyon, Riewoldt and Brown) were wondering if Mundy has had his hand forced. They thought his numbers were still worthy of another season.

I'm sorry if this has already been mentioned, but do you remember that we also had a camp issue during this time? Our players went to the club and was like this isn't on, and the media attacked us because the club allowed the players to say they were uncomfortable with the camp and didn't want to participate? Then compare to what the Crows did to Betts who raised his concerns. If this is how they treated a champion of their club no wonder more players haven't come forward. I have no idea how a workplace can get away with treating their employees like this, and still refusing to acknowledge any wrong doing.

The closest thread I could find on the Collingwood fan forum was one which discussed the benefits of false teeth. On the Richmond one, they have a thread on the attributes of various knives. There's an old thread on the Geelong site which refers to handbags, but it's been superseded by one about aged care facilities.

Lol. Eddie says that was the rehearsed line they fed them. Different experiences indeed. One person has shown leadership on this.

It's a culture killer, especially when as much as i rate Jacksons talent, you would normally see this sort of thing for a Bontempelli/Oliver level player, Jackson isn't really close to that yet so a lot of it is projecting.

It's got Junior Mac feelings about it. We know too well what happens when you cull too many leaders.

That's why its still lingering because he is still there. He's the last major domino to fall.

Grundy hurt his ankle in training and sent for scans. doubt he'll get up

How is Ricciuto still there?

When they undertake "counselling" sessions and then break the confidentiality by using someones most personal thoughts and feelings against them in front of their teammates as a form of abusing them to teach them "resilience" I'd say that crosses the line. Absolute wankers who think they know what they're doing but have no idea.

His best game for the year hands down.

I'm in Adelaide right now (over from Perth) and my flight home tomorrow was just cancelled. I'm wondering if it's a sign I should just pop over to Melbourne for the game instead 😂

Making Don Pyke lose his mind and walk around silently eyeballing players is one of the great, underrated MFC highlights.

When it comes to buying clothes my first preference is Yves Saint Laurent, which I like to obtain from their Australian distributor, the Brotherhood of Saint Laurent.

Don't want this to get lost in the airwaves. He really is one of the more laser-like focused footballers I've seen. The shot after the siren in the GF, the mark on the line from Harmes' shot against Hawthorn.. These are small examples but his ability to block out background noise and focus on the task at hand is exemplary, it has shown me that when Tom sets his mind on something he really goes full bore at it. This has to be a great thing when it comes to this recovery. He'll give himself every chance possible.

Francis Bourke?

We’re all looking for the right mix up forward and our woes up there have been much talked about (again) this season. Came across an article today about certain stats. Here’s a bit about us. Pre-bye, the Demons were the hardest team to score against inside 50, but they ranked 13th for scoring from their own entries. Since the bye they rank fourth for scoring from their own forward 50 entries which is a crucial increase given their noticeable forward 50 woes

Imagine having Mark Riccuito as a Senior Board Member Eddie should have sorted him out in the Carpark. The people responsible for framing the Template for this “Camp” should be charged and put in jail. The fact that this occurred 5 years ago and people within the AFL bubble still hold jobs from that time is an absolute f@&$ing disgrace

Worthy of another year for sure. At 37 unlikely to be that expensive either. Strange decision

I cringe at "I could care less", which indicates that the speaker has at least some level of care. Surely "I couldn't care less" (I have no care) is what they mean.

You’ll notice that the non ex-football commentators aren’t quite as rigid in their opinions, whereas the ex-players are. I think some part of it is their ego. They think that they swung the result of games with sheer desire and force of will, rather than training, natural ability, and emotional health in their outside life. No one is saying that it’s the only reason a team will lose but that it’s a key factor in performance (NOT result). But they see things more rigidly and think that the few % points lost in performance from loading won’t make a difference and to admit that it does dismisses how awesome the players are. But at the elite level (in any sport) it is only a few % points in performance between winning and losing.

Now that is a team Freed From Desire… And people laughing and ridiculing Taylor Walker over this are right to do so; what a weak leader he was at the time. He was one of those that didn’t listen to Eddie. When someone reveals themselves over and over again as the POS they are - you’re entitled to believe them.

It’s pretty funny. They are our bogey side and I’m always concerned when we play them but the confidence is strange. In the last six weeks Pies have beaten GWS narrowly (11), beaten GC when they should’ve lost (5 points), just beat North when they were losing the majority of the game (7 points), just beat Adelaide (5 points), beat Essendon after the siren (4points) and narrowly beat Port when they easily could’ve lost (6 points). That’s six teams outside they 8 they struggled to beat. Meanwhile we beat two top 4 contenders by 7+ goals each (Brisbane and Freo), Beat Adelaide and Port pretty comfortably, lost to Geelong in Geelong after leading by four goals, lost to Bulldogs narrowly after leading the whole game. On form I’d take ours over theirs, we’ve been in tough games against real contenders or pushing away lower teams, they are scraping to beat the worst teams in it. It saddens me to say it, the pies are a good team, but I’m hoping they’re in for a shock as their form hasn’t been up to it the last 6 and they’ve got away with a lot of ordinary performances against very poor opposition.

You might well be right. But one of the things I really dislike about not factoring in the impact of training regimes and preparation on a team's performance is how, in the absence of doing so, often the footy media's and fan's default explanation ends up a variation of mental weakness/soft/got ahead of themselves/didn't turn up type rubbish. It's just so mind numbingly simplistic and lacking any nuance.

Definitely not. A massively strong brand owned by a South African company now that also owns Witchery, Mimco and a few other brands. This is a great partnership for all the MCC high brow fans of Melbourne and also for those of us who enjoy 20% off… If you don’t own their towels you’re missing out 😂

Not the same market. Friday night is two horse race while the Premiership still has many contenders.

Not grammar, but I suspect those paying attention to this thread might be intrigued by this language quirk noted in 'Elements of Eloquence' by Mark Forsyth.

Culture. I guarantee you if Eddie was still playing for Carlton and he lined up against the Crows at Adelaide Oval this week he would be booed mercilessly. Culture.

The funny part of the whole debacle.

These are the games we live for as supporters. 2nd v 3rd. Prime time home game. Against an arch enemy. Let's pack the G in red and blue. If you don't you'll be sorry you missed it I guarantee.

I agree but considering how many people are working from home there aren’t that many people that will just pop across from the city. for me I’m leaving the office at 5 on the dot to start the pre game experience. Not sure I’ll be upright come 7:50….

Watched his son Kalani play for Qld in under 15's championships the other day. Goes alright the kid.

They're not clubs, they're franchises.

Freo demanded and got pick 2 for Lachie Weller. That would value Jackson as the whole city of Fremantle.

Exactly, if you can go to games like this and don't I don't know why you bother following at all.

That's how he earned his nickname "Notso".