deanox

Have heard that about a couple of our of contact players; they may not leave if Neeld leaves but they want to see what IS happening before committing.

http://www.afl.com.au/news/2013-06-13/another-lib-for-demons Alan Stockdale has arisen as a possible candidate for President or the board. He is a Melbourne supporter, with serious experience. The article indicates he has been approached, but doesn't indicate whether he has been approached by the current board or if he has been approached by disgruntled supporters.

I wonder if this has been quoted in the "Bailey or Neeld" thread?

I think this is the reason why so many people are willing to give this footy department a chance, and also why so many "Neeld apologists" are frustrated with the "sacking Neeld is the solutionists". I'm not sure why anyone has decided that it is Neeld who is leading everyone off the cliff, except for the fact that he is the public face of the footy department. He may be doing a terrible job, but he also could be doing a good job working with rubbish. There is plenty of experience there supporting Neeld. (Also add Misson tulip the list; not a coach but has serious experience at high performance clubs). Neeld may be making final calls but I'd make a substantial bet that at least Neil Craig has a big say in major decisions and would be guiding Mark along the way. We are getting belted, on field performances are terrible but there are many factors that explain that without it being the "coach" or "the game plan" including lack of midfielders, lack of experience, lack of cohesion and lack of leaders. Surely if it was "the coach" or if the "game plan" was so terrible one of the others would be saying "hey Mark this plan is shot". "Neeld apologists" aren't supporting the coach, they are supporting the football department and believe there is enough experience from current successful clubs that they are probably doing what is reasonable practise throughout the industry.

Roberts hasn't commented has he? Moloney, we all know that Neeld and Moloney didn't get on and there are two sides to that story. Moloney is the only one who has publicly backed his side of the story while "Neelds" side seems to have been confirm by robbo at least. Schwartz hasn't been involved at the club for years and I'm not sure his comments are any more "insider" than your average supporter. Given Stretch is currently in contact with the club die to his son I think he is at least on par with Schwartz on terms of knowledge. And Cale Morton actually backed the new regime and the standard they are setting.

I'd suggest taking responsibility means admitting that they have failed to live up to what they wanted to achieve and that they have made various mistakes along the way and as a result he is going to step down as president. The board can't just quit, otherwise there would be no one to run the club in the interim. The review will assess what skill sets are needed on the board, what skill sets are missing, who doesn't need to be there and what type of people should be on it. Subsequently people will be targeted and asked to help out by joining the board. Others will approach the club and say they want to be involved. Together this group of people will decide who will stand for the board, and if more people want to run than there are positions there will be a vote.

Not a bad idea, might improve some of the debate on here too! Could be during an interstate match at the Bentley or Leighoak clubs.

Redleg, this is the most eloquent post I have read on here in a long time. I agree with almost everything in it, and I hope every poster reads it.

Probably a combo of all rjay.

Good point about good teams. This is the sort of thing that Neeld talks about when he says "experience" and "games together". The more games these kids play together the better this understanding between players will be. Whether Neeld or another coach is in charge until they players have played together long enough we won't see these areas improving.

Clark has to agree to being put on the LTI list. I'm not sure if we have asked or not but given he was never going to be back in less than 8 weeks it seems odd that this didn't happen.

Interesting though regarding who will be our nominated rookie? Magner was first choice promotion but is available for another few weeks any way. Couch probably deserves a chance but it seems the coaching staff have decided that Magner and couch aren't up to it. Clisby may have noisy potential of all of them. But isn't performing as well at vfl level. Who should be promoted for the second half of the year?

After he has had a chance to build a list and train a group to play his way? Ie 3 years? That seems to be the standard "rebuild" turn around these days, and if after 3 years of rebuilding there is some promise the coaches get an extension of a year or two.Not saying he should/will get this long but that is probably the amount of time required to make a full assessment, otherwise we are judging on part results I.e. Neeld has built a spine but hasn't yet built an engine room.

Thanks RM. Can we carry Gawn, Fitz, Hogan, Dawes and Clark in one side? I would think that's one too many unless someone plays back. No problem with Fitz being the back up, because you do need depth players, and it seems unlikely we'll ever get all in the team together! I hope he is retained for the next two matches, an extended run will help settle the nerves. If he had held 3 or 4 more marks this week he would have been a useful contributor.

The problem with DE% is that it isn't "how many disposals retained possession". I think the definitions are that if the kick goes less than 30 m it needs to retain possession, but if it's longer than that it has to go to an "equal" contest ie 1 on 1 or 2 on 2 or better. Nothing says it has to be retained our that the disposal has to be kicked to advantage, a 30 m kick to the wrong side of a 1 on 1 counts as "effective", which is rubbish. I'm not sure what they call handballs or kicks into space ie of ground our being tackled.

I though it was Bailey who started the idea of a footy university/school at the club? I haven't heard about this being attribute to Neeld... I believe that players in the leadership group, and mayhaps some others are enrolled in a diploma of leadership or something like that, which is a new initiative under Neeld/Craig, but what I recall was that "the players are doing this sort of stuff anyway, so they got accreditation to award a qualification as part of the training" or something like that. If be interested to see the articles or wherever you got your info from?

1) Collingwood scored 13.11.89 directly from turnovers. This really supports the argument that we were ok when trying to win the ball but couldn't keep it. We only kicked 2 goals from turnovers. I think skill errors are often forced by actual and perceived pressure by the opposition; the reason why a team can look a million bucks against a poor team then get smashed by a good team. Increase fitness, experience and confidence are the only things that can fix this. They only way too improve all three is time. 2) champion data don't release the stats because those stats are their IP. They record hundreds of categories. The clubs have to pay big money to buy them, if they were released fir fee the company would go broke. Personally I think this should be done by the AFL and released for all. 3) newspapers buy the minimum stats we see and base analysis around that. Analysis is aimed at typical deadbeat and doesn't ever do real analysis. Half the time I don't think the authors are even at the game, stories are up so quickly after the matches the articles must be part written before the game. It would be great if they could get some ex coaches to do in depth analysis at a level they would do in club, to really explain what sort of planning and analysis may be applied.

The biggest knock on him at the moment sends to be his marking, particular when under physical pressure. Given his height this should be an advantage of his, but he didn't seem to write have the strength required at AFL level. For those who watch him at Casey regularly, how does his marking there stack up? Can you see him bringing his Casey marking form to the AFL or will it take further strength and development before this happens? At Casey does he take marks on the lead or in contested situations? I hope he gets a few more weeks to settle in. If he doesn't make in roads soon he will miss his chance (I think huge may be contacted next year, but not certain, can someone confirm?). If not he will need to show a bit more at AFL in the second half of the year if he wants to hang around. Also, where is his better position? Key forward or ruck who rests forward? With Clark, Dawes and Hogan we have enough kpf's, but if he stays on the list as the back up tall forward and back up ruck he has more value.

Two reasons for this: 1) Is that there aren't many interested candidates: McLardy said this earlier this year. The way the supports treat the board, why would they want to put their hands up? 2) Anyone who has half a brain (i.e. successful high profile members) and is interested, is talking to the board behind the scenes trying to work out what they can do, rather than slagging them off publicly. If it comes to the point where those supporters feel that the current board is making the wrong decisions and won't consider alternatives, then those people will run for the board in an election.

Not at all, and the club learnt that in rounds 1 and 2 this season. "We didn't see that coming" is because the club thought that having a playing list with the right attitude and work ethic combined with the right training standards and fitness would be competitive. As well as the above, we now have our KPPs sorted (forwards, defenders and rucks). We now need the next ingredients: top line mids and runners. Adding those into the mix plus the final ingredient of experience and familiarity (with team mates) will see improvements. Will it deliver a flag? That depends on other factors but it will get us playing better footy and will allow us to judge the game plan and the coaching. One thing is for certain - not having elite training and fitness will leave you in a Steve Bradbury like situation, we may compete we may be thereabouts, but we only have a chance if everyone else falls over ie injuries, form etc.

Was burnt by the umpires early in the game, did not get paid a thing when the ball was going forward and then had a "holding the man" against him. Had a go at the umpires following this.

Personally I think the reason Watts comes under so much scrutiny is because everyone can see he has the talent to succeed but for some reason it hasn't converted to on field success. He can kick, he can mark, he is agile, he is reasonably quick. When you see him do good things he looks like he could be a very good player, but he just doesn't get near it enough, or hurt teams enough. Other players not under scrutiny may not be superstars but they are least turning out honest performances each week. The second half of last year Watts played some good honest footy, not superstar, but on of our best. And everyone was happy for him. This year he has regressed, I'm not sure why, but it is possibly because he is a receiver in a very poor side.

The problem RB isn't that we are trading away senior players, its that senior players are choosing to leave, or should retire, but think they are good enough to play on. We offered Bruce one more year, he wanted two and left, but quickly found out that one was all he had. Junior should have been allowed to stay, however that is a great hindsight call,and is only made with respect to the leadership he would have brought, not his onfield output, he was the wrong side of 30 and had struggled to overcome injuries in his last season. Green was at retirement age, had struggled for a couple of years, announced his retirement and suddenly started playing like a 25 year old again. Another year? Possibly, but he would have had to be willing to do the hard yards over the pre-season. Moloney has been discussed to death. Robbo was 'retired' insisted he had something to give, wasn't drafted by any other club. Neitz, apart from Junior, our last true senior player and leader, was allowed to play until the end. Rivers chose to leave to chase finals - all power to him. Davey and Jamar are both being allowed to play out their careers here at this stage. Which other senior player did we trade away before their time?

After the media week, if the boys don't come out today all guns blazing I don't know if they ever will. If I was coaching Collingwood I would be pushing the first 10 minutes as the most important most intense 10 minutes of footy ever played. I'll be telling my guys to go hard to bump and harrass to hurt in the tackle and to keep the ball out of our hands as much as possible. Run their guts out in the first 10 minutes to break our spirit. I hope this has been emphasised to our players - we need to go hard at the start, but other sides will be trying to do the same thing. For us, the first 10 minutes may be important, but it is the next 20 that will really define the game. If they get the jump on us, that isn't a problem, because we still have 3.5 quarters to fight back. Collectively we can't drop our heads if Collingwood somehow get 2 quick goals. And us getting 2 quick goals could be a catalyst that sparks us today. I think the problem is a combination of belief and experience - belief that we can do it and experience to ensure we do it every week. In our favour is that Collingwood have been up and down, and that they haven't put teams to the sword this year. They have a young team today, so I don't expect them to put us to the sword, but it doesn't mean they won't be well drilled and wont hurt us on the scoreboard. They have good senior players, who are stronger and better users of the ball than our senior players, especially in the midfield, and I don't know how we counter that. I think we are a better chance this week than most games this year, and even horrible teams win some games, but with Clark and Frawley out I'm not expecting a win. I am expecting effort.

Interesting that Grimes is on the LTI not Mitch, when Grimes seems to be the injury with less complications. To put a player on the LTI, that player needs to agree to go on the LTI. I wonder if this was a situation of Mitch being too competitive to be willing to sit out matches on the off chance he could be back? Grimes has to miss at least 8 weeks (56 days) from when he was put on the LTI list.