Leaderboard

Good news that Lockhart is good to go.

Mattys Bar and Bistro in Crib Point are having a Corona Virus promotion. Buy a Corona beer and get one dunny roll free.

The boys are loving the new training regime, not as much long distance running and more time with the ball. They are used to doing an 8k run and then start training, now they are using the ball a lot more and love it. All players are given a job and they just have to do that, not just stand in a spot, but a specific job and if every player does his job they should perform well as a team. The club is quietly confident about the coming season. I spoke to Richo and told him the supporters are proud of the club for taking the chance with Harley and he was quite surprised at the level of enthusiasm his signing generated, quite happy about it though.

Who Hawthorn go with doesn’t really matter. The Eagles are likely to have Kennedy, Darling and a resting ruck (Vardy or Hickey). Unless we think Hibberd or Hore can go to a ruckman (and concede 10cm) or Darling we have to play 3 big talls in round 1.

As do I.

Where the list is at:- Oskar Baker — not selected Toby Bedford — selected v Hawthorn Harley Bennell — injured Austin Bradtke — not selected Angus Brayshaw — selected v Hawthorn Mitch Brown — selected v Hawthorn Kade Chandler — injured Kyle Dunkley — injured Bayley Fritsch — selected v Hawthorn Max Gawn — selected v Hawthorn Mitch Hannan — injured James Harmes — selected v Hawthorn Michael Hibberd — selected v Hawthorn Marty Hore — selected v Hawthorn Jayden Hunt — emergency v Hawthorn Luke Jackson — selected v Hawthorn Neville Jetta — selected v Hawthorn Nathan Jones — selected v Hawthorn James Jordan — emergency v Hawthorn Kade Kolodjiashnij — injured Ed Langdon — selected v Hawthorn Jake Lever — selected v Hawthorn Jay Lockhart — selected v Hawthorn Oscar McDonald — selected v Hawthorn Tom McDonald — selected v Hawthorn Steven May — selected v Hawthorn Jake Melksham — selected v Hawthorn Alex Neal-Bullen — selected v Hawthorn Aaron Nietschke — injured Clayton Oliver — selected v Hawthorn Christian Petracca — selected v Hawthorn Harrison Petty — injured Kysaiah Pickett — unavailable Braydon Preuss — injured Trent Rivers — not selected Christian Salem — ill Joel Smith — injured Charlie Spargo — selected v Hawthorn Tom Sparrow — emergency v Hawthorn Adam Tomlinson — selected v Hawthorn Aaron vandenBerg — selected v Hawthorn Jack Viney — selected v Hawthorn Corey Wagner — not selected Josh Wagner — emergency v Hawthorn Sam Weideman — selected v Hawthorn

I would have Sparrow in the side.

The club have a couple of places in mind and when the final decision is made it will be near the "G" and will include help from both the Government and the AFL. I wouldn't expect it for a few years yet though, there is a lot of work to do in settling on a spot and the construction of the facility. The club are looking at something that will set them up for 50 years, not just a stop gap that will be outgrown in 10 years.

Like tmac said in the commentary box his role is to be the last line of defence. Move across and back as required to force the opposition to consider the kick inside 50. Said rhe work he does is hard to see. As you say he will also take the opposition big in a man on man, almost traditional full back role allowing may and lever to intercept and be attacking defenders. A very specific role that means he will not get many disposals or kudos for that matter. Lots of one percenters and not much razzle dazzle. Key is he plays the role coach asks him to the letter. I sudpect unlike frost.

Omac will take Patton, allowing Lever and May to play their roles ,not sure which bit the experts don't get on here. The coaching staff have faith in Omac, a young defender still learning his craft

Just got off a plane from Sydney which was turning into a flight to Tassie. Entire squad and staff milling about as I got into terminal. Offered a ‘carn Dees’ to the group on way past, received a smile and thumbs up from Jake Lever. dees by 4 goals

Based what has been comuncicated Re the modified training regime of AVB, I get the impression that Burgess and the club have a flexible horses for courses approach. With their somewhat unique abilities, I don't think either of AVB or Harley necessarily need to be in top 5% league fitness to make an important contribution. More important to get them out on the park somewhat reliably than push them too hard and have them break down and so long as the majority of the team has good fitness, I think we can carry a few highly talented freaks of below average fitness.

Did you really have to quote the whole freakin' post?

How did you go on the back nine?

The lack of detail in the announcement suggests it's far more sinister than a simple oops. This has been going on for 8 years? In that time they've signed Dangerfield, Ablett Jnr, who else? How does Carlton feel about the $40k 'penalty'?

Last year we were at relatively full strength (injuries aside).

You must be new here. ?

Can't say exactly when, that's still up in the air, but it will be around the MCG precinct and I'm sure that the fans will be happy with it when it happens. It won't be at Docklands or Port Melbourne that's for sure, it will be near the MCG.

I think this is total horseshit, disrespectful and ill intended. The guy has carried the leadership and expectations of this club for the past 6 years as we built to a prelim before last years stumble, which was in no way his fault. It’s annoying me how quickly and ignorantly supporters turn on the few brave players that have stepped up to bearing the burden of leading our club. How about we acknowledge the service Nathan has given the club, note his injury free preparation and years of quality football and wish him well..? As a man of history Hemingway, maybe you should read Roosevelt’s “Man in the Arena” speech of 1910... "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

Jeelong always get off lightly HATE THEM Smug Bastards

Any thoughts why Rivers hasn't been given a go. Going to ruin my supercoach backline

Touching that is probably more dangerous than coming into contact with the coronavirus!

Report says sick

Was told yesterday that when Mitch Brown was with Essendon, his shoulders and hips were shot, that's probably why he was delisted. He was training once a fortnight with them, since he's been with us he hasn't missed a training session. Amazing what a different outlook can do to a player.

Brisbane and Richmond also do not have any injuries. This is exceptional given they played in the Prelim and Grand Final respectively. Other Finalists with minimal injuries are Giants (4) and Eagles (2). Here is a summary of all clubs (excl those listed as 'Test' on AFL website. Carlton (3), Sydney (2) and Port(3) are also in good shape from an injury perspective. While we are rightly proud of our improved injury list and pre-season I'm wary of how much of an advantage it is for us as many other teams have improved and lists are healthy.

Mark and Trevor are working for the Demons this year, dealing with elite mindset. They’ve created a company called SALT, which stands for Speaking and Leading Truth. i for one was unaware of this until I saw the photos. Indicates that plenty of stuff occurs in the background that we fans don’t get to see, not that we should expect anywhere near 100% transparency anyway.

Honestly I just can't wait for AVB to run through and flatten a pack of Collingwood filth for HB to pounce on the loose ball and slot one from 50 out on the boundary in front of the members on queen's birthday.

Gary Lyon & Tim Watson on SEN hinted that HB was tracking better than was being reported. I suspect it was pure speculation on their part but interesting nonetheless.

You are so right. I have probably hit a golf ball 100 000 times and only once did the shot sound like a pro hit; and that shot was a putt.

The fact Geelong have been paying over the salary cap for 8 years tells me they only self reported once the AFL HQ finally got wind of it. They should of been fined 500k! It might seem a bit steep, but it's complete rubbish the Geelong finance department didn't pick up on over expenditure.

Not really. He did next to nothing laat week.

Good point, Goodwin might be saving a rookie downgrade for us. Maybe he plays supercoach?

I don't understand the lack of detail in the article from the AFL - they need to be open and transparent.

You don't need to justify it to anyone, Andy. You could argue that there are plenty of legends of our club who could get a run in the banner - what you've done this time around looks terrific, regardless of who made it and who didn't. Great job all round.

Ahh, those two were walking together, maybe they celebrated with a pre-flight lunch together. I’m actually now rushing to another business meeting, so didn’t have time to do a Saty. Who I saw: May, Lever, Hore, Gus, Harmes, Max, Lockhart (I think), ANB, Milkshake, weed..that’s all I can recall, there were obviously more. also saw Darren burgess drop his laptop rushing through security

Honestly I can't wait to see this scenario but see HB pounce on the loose ball kick it a milli second before the siren goes and see it sail through the goals after the siren for us to beat the filth by 1 point in this year's GF. I could truly die a happy man. Can't think of anything I'd be happier to take to the grave.

Not so concerned about the result but rather what we see that is a portend for the season. Is there a discernible game plan? Are any of our new recruits and/or any of our young players from 2019 going to step up? Will our potential stars (Petracca etc) show that they have arrived? Will our older experienced (slower) players show anything or will it be more of the same? Do we have enough run and carry, pressure on the ball carriers etc? Are our disposal skills (kicking) good enough to compete at the highest level? As per 2019, are there still discernible gaps in the line-up ? In short, do we show that we have improved significantly over 2019 ? Because our first half dozen games are going to test us. We do not have time to ease into the season. We have to come out from game one and be able to maintain a high level of consistency for the full season.

Could well be true. I get the feeling that the club are intentionally playing down and keeping pretty quite on Harley generally to manage expectations and keep some of the media attention and pressure away from him as far as reasonably possible.

So many times we've quietly "celebrated" champ opposition injuries only to have some chump Kent Kingsley us.

Went to a lunch today and a couple of players were there, Max and Tommy. When asked who they thought would be big improvers this year, Tommy said Bedford and Spargo and Max said Corey Wagner and in fact both the Wagners. Corey was told to put on 5 Kilos and when he got back and had, they said they wanted him in a different role and he had to shed the weight. They enquired how the change in captaincy was perceived by the supporters and were told it was mainly positive, in fact mostly positive.

Very bizarre thread... The season needs to start ASAP

Probably the easiest way to understand it Fanatique is imagining how Adelaide supporters felt when Alex Neal-Bullen had 23 possessions, 6 marks, 6 tackles, 3 goals and 3 Brownlow votes against them in 2018.

Yep I think while Harley may be getting excited (which is fantastic) I suspect they are still going to have him ticking off a set of small goals along the way working to a plan. He may be fit but will he be Burgess fit?

Personally so would I. I am sick of moralising. Win games and win a flag, I don't care about the hows and whys and whos.

Thanks Andy, good photos. Good to see the boys enjoying themselves.

The roar is not journalism

B: JETTA, MAY, SALEM HB: HARMES, LEVER, HIBBERD C : LANGDON, PETRACCA, TOMLINSON HF: FRITSCH, T.MCDONALD, VANDENBERG F: PICKETT, BROWN, MELKSHAM FOLL: GAWN, OLIVER, VINEY IC: BRAYSHAW, JONES, LOCKHART, WEIDEMAN, SPARROW, SPARGO, NEAL-BULLEN, BEDFORD

Tensions are starting to ease here in Hong Kong. We had all schools closed since Chinese New Year and wont re-open until at least the 20th of April. Most places that can have people working from home have been doing so. This has largely worked in limiting the spread here to about 3-4 diagnosed a day. For a city of 7.5 million people crammed together, it's impressive that we have had under 100 cases. But, this is in main part because Hong Kong has been through all of this before and ghosts of SARS have never been far from people's minds. As far as how extreme people are being (lining up for masks, raiding supermarkets, staying indoors for days on end), these seem to be run along cultural lines. It's very rare to see a local out without a mask on, whilst the only time I've worn one is when I walk in the door for work, until I get to my office. Many people even just wear the mask as it is the 'socially acceptable' thing to do. Hotels, bars, restaurants, malls, and attractions are all either empty or closed. There's a lot of bargains and great spots at exclusive places to be found at the moment. We're probably six weeks ahead of Australia, in that we've already had out ridiculous stampede on toilet paper and now the supermarkets are all overflowing with the stuff. We're now seeing a lot more people returning to work. The public Service started back on Monday and more and more firms and businesses are asking people to come in. This will be a big test as the only real proven control for COVID 19 is isolation. Socially, more and more people are getting out and about as the panic has now subsided (Protestors even came out to play on the weekend and set some stuff on fire). The atmosphere is probably one of caution, rather than the stress and high tension of six weeks ago.

amazing how fast the love disappears for players near the end of their careers! Jonesy was never a star of the game but he well may have been at least pushing that tag if he was playing w a finals team, where he wasn’t always expected to be the main battering ram . He sacrificed a lot to lead and stay w us...in the darkest of dark times. I still feel big gratitude to him.