mo64

Fantastic effort by all those who attended. It moved me to donate $50 this morning. These statements made by Stynes and Lyon are important if the club is to move forward: "The main thing is, people like Joseph who maybe felt discouraged to be around the club for whatever reason, are encouraged to come back in," Stynes said. Lyon said the days of internal division at Melbourne were over. There are people on this forum who are quick to take potshots at the likes of Gutnick, Johnson, Guest, Ridley and Szondy for things that have happened in the past. If people continue to ridicule those who have given up their time and money to the club for nothing, we will go nowhere. Now is the time to move on, and embrace anyone who can help the club.

Are you suggesting that he's a chance of winning the NAB Rising Star? IMO, Morton will probably get a nomination before the season ends, but won't poll a vote in the award. Palmer, Cotchin and Rioli will get votes from all the judges, which leaves 2 players for the remaining votes. Ibbotson will get a vote from a majority of judges, and I'd say that both Garland and Aussie will get a vote from someone.

Read what you initially wrote you ignoramus. The FACTS were that Heffernan was traded for salary cap reasons, and you just made up that [censored] about Sheedy threatening to play him in the reserves. Heffernan, Caracella and Blumfield all did the right thing by their club by agreeing to move, whereas Ferguson wouldn't. Your comparison is ridiculous, which isn't surprising given that you know jackshit about the game.

As usual, Rhino's wrong. We got Heffernen and the Dons pick 15 for our pick 12. In other words we virtually got Heffernan for nothing, because the Dons had salary cap problems.

Heffernan, Blumfield and Caracella were all required players at Essendon, but had to be shipped off for salary cap reasons. Totally different scenario to Ferguson, who the club wanted to trade, but he refused to go because he was under contract.

TAB Sportsbet have been pretty conservative with the line margin in recent Melbourne games, and rightfully so.

Trading for a draft pick somewhere between 25-35 doesn't guarantee that you'll get something of value.

Rhino the psychologist has spoken!

Jamar provided us a with a real contest at the stopages, and despite his bloopers, was very influential. I'm still not sold on PJ as a forward or a ruckman. He played there out of necessity this week and did quite well, but is not a long term option. BTW, Luke Darcy has been doing some ruck coaching down at the club. Speaking of ruckman, it made me cringe when I saw that Brad Moran kicked 4 goals for the Crows. The Crows used the draft pick that we gave them for Meesen to pick up Moran from the Roos.

All excellent points Chook. There are many on this forum who think that it's selfish when a player takes it upon himself to make things happen. Personally, I love this trait in a footballer, and have refrained from bagging Colin Sylvia.

I'm not. For starters, he's had an injury ravaged year, so physically he hasn't been at his best. He was recruited as a bottom age player, so he has plenty of physical and mental development left in him. But more importantly, from a list management perspective, who would be our key forwards next? Miller and a questionable Robertson. If you want to be a competitive side, you have to at least have some structure about your list.

I'm not talking about the coach and players' expectations. I'm referring to the greater football world, ie; media, supporters, board members. Bailey has yet to experience any of this pressure. Matty Knights was copping it from the media and supporters earlier in the year, even though he's a 1st year coach. To date, Bailey has had it easy.

I wish they had of delayed the 1988 grand final so it didn't clash with the 100m mens' final.

I've been a critic of DB, and remain so. It's the easiest job in the world to be a coach of a side that has no expectations of winning. Let's see how he's going in years 2 and 3, when there's pressure on the team to win, and the wolves are out. Three years out of the finals is something that this club can't financially afford.

According to some respected officials at under 18 level, the talent pool at the top end is deep. Unless a trade for Jono Brown or Kerr is negotiated, no 1st round picks will be traded.

In this year's draft, Davey won't be worth a 1st round pick.

Most of the WA kids are playing senior football in the WAFL. I'd rather read an assessment of them based on how they're currently performing at this level, rather than 1 under 18 game.

The same headline applied to Geelong circa 2006. The article is hardly mind blowing, because each year, every club has to decide on their draft strategy. Drafting a big name player is always fraught with danger, because unless you win a flag, the move is judged as a failure. In McNamee's defence, he probably saw the off-field benefit of signing a Jonathon Brown as a short term fix to our financial woes. BTW, Collingwood's list is actually quite healthy, with a group of talented young kpps and 3 damaging mids in Thomas, Pendlebury and Davis, all of whom haven't reached their peak.

He's just following the game plan!

Spot on DD. It's just like when someone says "how many of our players would get a game at another team". As you say, there's no prototype to a premiership player.

Another fluff article if you ask me. Every team has a blueprint to win a flag, but history shows that there's no set formula. I'd be more encouraged if CC believes that of the 18 players in position, 4 of them will become elite players in the next 5 years. That's what wins a flag, not 13 very good footballers.

The impression I get is that a player's total possessions in the modern game flatter to deceive, and is somewhat irrelevant. Teams rack up close to 400 possessions these days, which averages out to 18 per player. So 25 possessions is about average for a running player.

How the hell did you come to that conclusion?

It's funny how people have bagged our influential ex-players for not getting involved in the club, and when they do, they're bagged for being an "old boys" network. It's great that we're getting passionate Melbourne people back to the club.

Reported on SEN this morning that we will pull out of the new stadium deal. The main reason being that we want to keep our administrative offices at the MCG. We will train at Gosch's paddock and lose our $250,000 deposit.