Hulett Packard III

What article is that?

Tim Lane always puts it so well:- Laser of ridicule closes on James Hird's feet of clay

If you mean the Turkish wrestling position you're on the wrong thread.

Don't know much about Turkish wrestlers but thanks to that classic movie Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, I am aware of potential issues with Kazakh wrestlers' jockstraps -

Strange that you include Port as one of the teams you think we can't beat given we have them a decent fright both times we met last year. If we improve 5% and they stay the same, we could beat them when we play them in Alice Springs.

That's the opinion of some people but it's totally irrelevant to the EFC doping case which has to do with whether the players committed an anti doping offence by ingesting a banned substance. It's not about whether a peptide or any other drug should or should not be banned.

Was mates with Robinson, they got into trouble and weren't exactly forthcoming to the club about their involvement. Club said "ta ta" to both.

Actually, Saty was waiting for you all morning at the Junction Oval.

So why was it that some players at Melbourne resisted the call for them to train harder and be able to run both ways? Why did they not buy in when they clearly needed to step up to reach the fitness levels of the stronger clubs? Have the players at the club finally bought in now?

Let's face it. They're AFL footballers, not Chinese swimmers or Bulgarian weightlifters. They deserve to be treated with a little more respect and leniency. Don't they?

Would it be out of order to try to reunite both Beams boys at the club and bring dad to Melbourne?

Interesting

The eyes of the football world are well and truly on this thread - not just because Hogan is under discussion but because of the fact that the commentary here is all over the Essendon doping scandal. The word is out that every day last week before the Federal Court sittings began, the various counsel in the case including Middleton J would log in to Demonland to see if they could get a better appreciation of the issues under discussion from this very thread. According to his tipstaff, the good judge was spending more time in his briefs eating banana after banana and, during an adjournment in proceedings, placed a call to the management of the Gat about the availability of lodgings there. You are shaping the future of the AFL if not the world.

It means there aren't many people in the bar and he's been drinking on his own with not much to do.

And what about the AFL's flakiest team North Melbourne? If they lose to the Doggies tomorrow then they might have to beat us in the last game with Jesse Hogan playing at FF!

Curiouser and curiouser. So they know what they stuck into their players' bodies and they "think" it's all hunky dory? So why are they in court? Why are they challenging the investigation? Why are the players not answering the show-cause notices with the simple statement that as far as they and their club is concerned they were given stuff that was all legal and here's the list provided by Paul Little and Bomber Thompson just to prove it? Why the farce of the last year and a half? Why is James Hird in Paris? Why was Robson sacked? Why are they saying in their defence to the Weapon's action that he didn't provide a safe environment? WTF? The BS meter at Essendon is off the wall!!!

Wondering who goes in if Frawley doesn't come up?

How?

So we should put an asterisk next to Essendon's premiership in 2000 and to our runners up award that year as well. Who finished third?

Who would Rivers replace of Frawley, Garland or McDonald (assuming Rivers was fully committed to the club)? WJ makes the point about players getting involved in club politics and, irrespective of the rights and wrongs, once they get involved in that sort of thing, the exit door is the next point of destination. Moloney was our best player in 2011 and he was committed to his club and his coach (until the flare up before the Geelong game). After that, he wasn't worth a crumpet. It's a waste of time arguing in terms of ifs or maybes and his karma comment when Neeld was sacked said it all. Let's concentrate on what we've got because they are our future.

I hear what you're saying but I was looking at things more from a medium term perspective. Those players might, if they were committed to the club, have made a little bit of a difference but retaining them would have been a short term measure at best.

Bravo. About time the football world appreciated his value and worth as a player approaching if not already at elite level instead of just a good player at a weak club.

Sometimes you have to move a little backward to move forwards in the long run. Geelong's wiser heads determined that they needed to refresh their list and let go some seasoned players to give other younger players the opportunity to play senior football and give them the opportunities to play they might not otherwise have. I don't regard the moving on of Moloney and Rivers as "misjudgements" because their time at the club was up. Moloney was a player disgruntled with all that had happened at the club and Rivers was becoming injury prone and was past his best. Much the same as the decision by Dean Bailey to move Junior Mac on although I suppose we never realised how great the leadership void was that he left. Ironically, the Moloney's and the Rivers' were among those supposed to step up and provide leadership who failed to do so.

^ Agree. You can't let the players off the hook because they might have been stupid or misled. If it's proven they had prohibited substances injected into their bodies then they should pay the price.

Correct. This was made possible by Fremantle's superior fitness and the ability of so many of their players to run both ways which swept Collingwood of their feet after the first quarter. There were players in the Collingwood team who didn't really look as if they'd had a proper preparation eg. Goldsack.