MikeyJ

You know that a ruckman who can leap over houses is next to useless unless he can kick the football, don't you? Daniel Rich is where it's at.

Moloney showed no care for his teammates, no respect for the coach and no semblance of brains with his performance yesterday. While I was encouraged by many aspects of what I saw yesterday (Frawley, Sylvia, Brock, Robbo, Aussie), Moloney's performance illustrated exactly why he has no place in the red and blue. I won't shed a tear if he never plays for our club again. FCS, we need everyone pulling in the one direction at the moment and he has consistently shown this season that he pays no respect to the coaching staff, his teammates and the die-hard fans who turned out to watch our beloved club. If this leadership course that the club undertook over the summer is worth its salt, his teammates would have let him know in no uncertain terms what they thought of his efforts. That I'm not confident they did speaks volumes of the depths to which our leaders have abdicated their responsibility.

There is no "true story" because there is/was no press conference. wheres_jacka has some explaining to do, methinks.

Once a case is referred directly to the tribunal, there is no provision for an automatic 25 per cent reduction in the sentence for a "clean record" or guilty plea. It's purely up to the discretion of the tribunal members. In this case, the tribunal chairman "strongly suggested" that the tribunal members take into account Hall's contrition and his admittance of guilt. So, in effect, Hall did receive a discount for a guilty plea, but not because it was mandated by tribunal law.

I don't know where SEN got their initial report from, but the only press conference the club has called this week was on Tuesday afternoon with Dean Bailey. There has been no other press conference announced this week, and there certainly wasn't one at 10am this morning. Looks like a rumour that got WAY out of hand.

I've said it before elsewhere on these boards and I'll say it again - Daniel Rich is solid gold. Any club who passes on him will look silly in a couple of years. We must draft him if we get the chance. With regard to Naitanui, I'm all for taking a risk to get a huge return, but not in this case, when Daniel Rich provides a rolled-gold alternative to Naitanui's admirable physical attributes but uncertain skills.

The doubts about Franklin had nothing to do with his skill and everything to do with his temperament. While Buddy's not the most reliable kettle of fish, he's a brilliant player. The queries about Naitanui are about how good a footballer he is - how much substance there is behind the flashy exterior. Given the complete inability of any of our players to hit the side of a barn door by hand or foot, I would have thought skills would have been No. 1 on the checklist for any potential draftee. Rich or Hurley, please, unless Naitanui shows something more than a big leap and a penchant for big hits during the under-18 carnival and the WAFL season.

While we're no certainties to get Naitanui, keep in mind his skills aren't crash hot. He can leap, run, jump and tackle, but he's not a footballer in the true sense. If we finish as low as I think we might, I want Daniel Rich. Pure, solid gold midfield genius. You're not touted as a real chance at the Sandover Medal before you get drafted unless you're special, and Rich is just that. I'd also rather have Michael Hurley, a genuine KP gun from the Northern Knights, before Naitanui. Just my thoughts recorded for posterity.

Actually, fatty, I can pinpoint the games and rounds in which Colin Sylvia performed each of these acts at least once. Towering pack mark: Round 5, 2006, v North Melbourne. Sylvia took a huge pack mark near the behind post at the Punt Road end in the first quarter. Bone-crunching bump: NAB Cup Round 1, 2008, v Geelong. Sylvia flattened some poor bloke in Melbourne's forward line in the third term that resulted in a goal. Don't argue: Round 11, 2007, v Collingwood. Big don't argue handed out in the third term on the Southern Stand wing. Booming goal from 60m: Round 8, 2006, v Hawthorn. The Dees were beaten, but Colin stepped up in the second half. One of his goals to the Punt Road end was a long-range effort from outside 50. I know the point you're making - that he's not a star yet and isn't even close - but as an avowed Sylvia fan, I thought it prudent that the facts were made clear.

I can assure you that if a journalist "embellished" as much as you seem to believe they do, they'd soon be out of a job. You'd struggle to find someone more cynical than a typical member of the press pack. They tend to require a little more convincing than your average joe (or Mo) and even after they're convinced of a story's merits and veracity, they need to find sources willing to go on-record to back up their reports. If you prefer to think of all media professionals as a pack of wolves hungry for any opportunity to publish untruths and lies, it says more about you than it does about those who engage in the journalistic profession.

Why is it bollocks? You haven't backed up your assertion because you can't. I'm going to assume that you've got no idea what you're talking about when it comes to the process of putting together a newspaper report, because you wouldn't have replied in that fashion if you did. When you [censored] about "the evil media" that's out to get your beloved football club, take a second to ponder what it would be like if the only source of football information the general public had was the AFL and club press releases. You'd get about one per cent of the information you do now, and even less of it would resemble the truth.

It's a little thing called space constraints. Contrary to the expectations of football fans, editorial space is not unlimited in newspapers. Particularly not in a national newspaper on a Wednesday outside the football season. You've unwittingly supplied the reason why the story was short when you used the word "padded". There's precious little room for padding in a paper like The Aus. In case you hadn't noticed, I'm mighty tired of uninformed people bagging journalists and reporters for no good reason, other than the supporter's own inherent ignorance and bias. When journalists deserve a kicking, I'm all for letting them know about it, but so much of the criticism levelled at the profession is unwarranted. If people had any idea of the importance that most journalists place on their integrity, and the hoops that a story has to jump through in order to be published, they'd be wary of ever accusing journalists of "making things up".

Mo, if McNamee had no interest in the role, he would have told the headhunters to go forth and multiply. And no one's said he's a candidate for the job. He has simply expressed interest in the role, by agreeing to meet with the recruitment company to discuss the position. Yes, it's a minor news story among several minor news stories, but it's the most newsworthy of those published in The Australian today and it is not poor journalism, as you sarcastically implied in your first post.

Because he's one of the pre-eminent sporting administrators in the nation and if the MFC landed him, it would be a huge coup. News about Judd has been floating around for weeks, if not months, and Carlton has consistently maintained that he'll be ready close to round 1. One of those items is "news" in the truest sense of the word and it's not Judd. That's newsworthy, because McNamee has expressed interest in the position after being tapped up by the headhunters. This is not something that was previously known. And it's probably exclusive to The Australian, hence they want to give it prominence. The editorial staff at The Aus clearly disagree. As do I. Is it considered minor that the MFC is a chance of poaching one of the country's pre-eminent sporting adminstrators, who's run the Australian Open tennis and golf over the past 15 years and who has one of the finest network of corporate and sponsorship contacts in the country? I don't think so, and I don't think most Melbourne fans think so either. Agreed. But McNamee's not close to being our CEO and The Australian's article hasn't said that. Therefore, it's not a major stand-alone article and neither could it be, without contacts going on-record. I disagree. If former rugby union and soccer executive John O'Neill was among the list of candidates for a vacant CEO job at Collingwood, do you think that would be a throwaway line in The Australian? No, it wouldn't. Hence, there's no reason why a similar situation at Melbourne shouldn't head The Aus's Wednesday AFL column, which wraps up all the AFL news on the quietest sports news day of the week.

Since Nasher brought up his pet hate, this is one of mine. What on earth was wrong with Greg Denham's journalism in this case? He's got the information about McNamee from a source and had it confirmed, but it seems neither McNamee, the headhunters nor the club would talk on record. Thus, it makes it pretty hard to write the 15 paragraphs you seem to be demanding without making it up. The news about McNamee is clearly the most newsworthy item that Denham had, so it was up the top of the story and the headline refers to it. He's also got the information about Chris Judd, and some comment from Carlton. Rather than waste space in a tight sports section on a Wednesday, they've combined the two stories. Not uncommon in a paper like the Australian that tries to give equal exposure to all sports that capture the national sporting public's interest. Again, can you please explain to all the good people at Demonland what was wrong with Denham's "journalism", as you put it? Or, as I suspect, are you just whinging because there's not enough words about Melbourne for your liking, and casting needless and unfounded aspersions on someone's professionalism as a way of coping? [/rant]

Too true, mo. My previous post was intended as an observation, rather than a judgment, as such! I was quite impressed by the raw materials Garland showed - his challenge now is to convert his obvious talent into regular performances, if he's given the opportunity. I recall one match for Sandy where he started on a forward flank. In the opening minutes, he read the ball beautifully off the back of the pack, took one bounce and drilled it post-high on the run from outside 50. He did all of this with remarkable smoothness and poise for an 18 or 19 year old. I don't know whether he'll be better suited up forward or down back. At this stage, it appears he can do both. Tarrant isn't a bad analogy, but Garland appears to be a better kick, as most are saying.

Garland didn't show a great deal last year at Sandringham, but when he did manage to get himself in the game, he exhibited more than a little skill and poise. He's a lovely kick, a good mover and a good size. Let's hope he continues to develop his footy smarts and ability to be involved for more than a couple of minutes a quarter.

Be careful how you remember Paul Prymke. He was a very promising key defender, as shown by his performances in 1994, before a bad back injury curtailed his career. There's not too much else on your list that would elicit happy memories from many Melbourne fans, though!

It's Addam Maric - see if we can remember that!

The 1000 fans refers to the crowd at the Crichton Medal count, not the crowd at the WCE-Ess game. The second sentence in the story that DD has posted is the caption for a photo, not the second par of the story. Confusing, but it's probably just a function of copying and pasting that text from the news website. The error is at the end of the story when the writer talks about Darcy Daniher and Kepler Bradley and Mark Bolton. They've obviously written it in two different ways and forgotten to delete the last three or four pars.

I'd trade pick 4, Cameron Bruce and Russell Robertson in a heartbeat. Whatever it takes.

Reports on SEN have it that Chris Judd is holding a press conference at 6pm AEST to announce his intention to return to Victoria. Bigfooty's just gone mad with the news, as released by Dylan Howard (I know, I know!) on that radio station. We must do our very best to land him. PS Apologies for the new thread, but I figured this deserved to be set apart from the speculation in the existing thread.

Keep in mind that the article said "over 3,000 MCC members have taken out the Club’s new MFC/MCC membership option for just $40". That's 3000 MCC members who have taken up the NEW option. There are still thousands of MCC members who have retained the full MFC/MCC membership for $150. Judee or mickrocks might be able to clarify further. I believe Judee said that ~90 per cent of MCC/MFC full members were retaining their more expensive MFC joint membership, rather than switching to the cheaper option. If all this is on the mark, that means that we've increased our numbers of MFC/MCC members by about 2000 people before the start of the season. Not a bad effort from all concerned.

I share your trepidation. If we get half an hour of reasonable football from Byron on Monday, he will have done his job in the circumstances.

Who to believe Rhino? When The Age and the Herald Sun carry conflicting stories, I'll go with the direct quotes from a club source every time. Thus, Caro, Fagan and The Age win on this one. Mark Stevens seems to be hypothesising at the end of his story, regarding Byron needing to spend more time at Sandringham.