grazman

Hmmm - personally I doubt that the talent pool is deep enough to sustain 18 teams... (and this point is not about footy per se), but what concerned me more was the continued expansion of gated communities.... It's indicative of an 'Us" and 'Them' mentality and cannot bode well for the future.

I think Bruce, Spencer and Grimes will be the ones that miss if that's the case.

You only have to look at Robbie's performances when he played for Victoria to realise in a good side he was one of the best... he didn't do it just once - he was always in the best players every time he played for Victoria in very, very strong teams. Call me parochial, but as much as many North fans admire Schimma, Flower would give him a bath every day of the week and twice on Sundays. I know many non-dees who feel the same way. It's Mike's list so it's his call, but if you look up "The Encyclopedia of League Footballers" the first paragraph on Robert Flower says it all: "Acknowledged as the best player in the VFL, pound for pound, over one and a half decades of consumate artistry." Robbie Flower represents everything that is worth watching in football. Anyone that wouldn't have him in their top 20 should go and watch some tapes and come back with their tales between their legs. I'd also prefer someone like Jack Dyer's assessment of Barassi compared to Whitten. Dyer regarded Barassi as the real Mr Football - Whitten was better at selling himself, RDB just cared about winning - something that Ted rarely achieved even in his time with the big V.

There's a very strong suspicion at Hawkland that McGlynn has OP and definately won't be available round 1. For those not in the know Williams has a very bad degenerative knee and reports are that he's been very proppy in the pre-season.

Then I'm completely lost as to the point you're trying to make... I'd also love to have the likes of Cox, Rutten, Bock, to plug our holes plus a host of other players that were overlooked on more than one occasion by every club in the league. Our potential KPP backs are Rivers, Carroll, Frawley, Miller, Garland, Holland, Warnock, McNamara and Martin. The first five are probably our best bets to hold down a KPP this year in the back line.

I like Egan - he's hard at it and fits in nicely as part of a very tight defensive unit, but he has the benefit of having both Scarlett and Harley to work with, plus the big bodies of Hunt and Rooke (when fit) with Milburn playing as the sweeper. I still don't see the comparison though. If we'd passed on him with our first pick he would have been gone by our second - who from 2006 are you advocating is a better KPP prospect that we missed? Egan's had three years to develop, Gilbert two, and Jim just the one. The stats from their first season would indicate there's not a lot of difference in it. If your judges have queries about why he won't fill out to be a KPP I'd like to know why. He has height, mobility, speed and courage. His kicking action is ungainly but effective. IMO he reads the play a lot better than many of our other KPP options. Here's the stats for the three in their first season: Egan: 15 games avg 6.9 disp and 2.7 marks (2005) Gilbert 2 games avg 6.5 disp and 1.5 marks (2006) Frawley 9 games avg 7.4 disp and 2.4 marks. (2007)

Frawley was taken much too early yet you're plumbing for Gilbert and Egan. West Coast would've taken Frawley which means he wouldn't have been there for our second pick - so I'm not sure it was much too early. We got both Jim and Ricky with our first two picks, both will be very good players for the club. I'm sure Petterd will develop into a very smart rebounding HBF/BP.

A good read for you Schtack if you're not too busy jumping at shadows. http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/general/j...4227048471.html?

Beau Muston Hawthorn- Probable ACL

He'd like some, others would need more time to be answered and others - well... IMO if clubs aren't delisting/trading out at least five blokes at the years end (not counting rookies) then they're not fair dinkum.

I think you're on the right track B. Though to my way of thinking It's not so much the opposition coaches they're asking questions of, rather their players and seeing what they'll deliver. I've been very impressed with Bailey. In Canberra he made the point of saying when you train players you push them beyond their comfort levels, bring them back then push them again. My impression is that besides a competitive hit out, Bails see the practice matches as an extension of training. A lot on here can't see the forest for the trees, they're worrying about the scoreboard in games where the scoreboard doesn't matter. He's asking questions of the list and getting answers.

and then the Swans lost to the Tigers... so at least we're better than the Swans.

Thanks gents - keep em rolling in. I'll be interested to see how Dunny and his man mountain status pull up. By my calculations that still leaves Bartman, Riv, Wheaters, Bruce and Wheels to have a run. Hopefully the first four can get a run in the next couple of weeks (permission pending for the week before Rd 1).

Excellent work D. Thanks for the report, much appreciated. I've liked the little I've seen of Valenti and the reports about him. As the last rookie selected you could do a lot worse than taking a bloke who just knows how to find the pill. Would seem an absolute monty for promotion to the senior list now in the advent of any long term injury because he's cherry ripe to play seniors right away. On a completely separate note watching a bit of the St Kilda and Bombers game it looks like a long season for backmen given the way the preseason is being umpired. You simply can't afford to grab your opponent at all. Hands in the back - is a bit iffy, but I don't agree with the chopping the arms rule unless its clearly a sweeping motion of the arm.

We've replaced the coaching staff in almost its entirety, we've adopted a new game plan, we've given players suffering from overuse injuries a chance to be ready to play during the season (not just the preseason and rds 1-4) and all I'm seeing on these forums is a bunch of pea-hearts and chicken littles whinging about how our year is over before it's even started because we haven't won a practice match. It's not me that needs a reality check. I went to see three matches last year against Geelong, Collingwood and the Swans. Two demonstrated just how bad we were (in terms of game plan and injuries) and one demonstrated the upside of our list. People were quick to bag Ross Lyon's performances last year, this year will be a much better indication of where he is at as a coach. I'm not advocating we'll win a premiership and we may not make the eight, but we'll be a much better side in 12 months time for having Dean Bailey and Co at the helm. We still need to improve in a whole lot of areas such as our player rehab, tackling, handballing and decision making, but these are all areas that are being addressed. (BTW the one team's performance I'll be very interested in this year will be Essendon. Apparently Hardwick was overlooked because he didn't think they were good enough to make the eight and needed some overhauling of the list. - Knights has gone pretty hard with the NAB cup... let's see how they're travelling by about rd 14)

What situation is that - favourites for the spoon... Like Hannabal said I wouldn't like to be stuck in the trenches with a lot of the posters on here.

Forgot to add Rhett Biglands to that list as well. That's 6 ACL's already.

No worries... no offence taken, and I understand what you're saying, but I think the AFLs position is to take the game to as many communities as they can - given that the premiership season is limited by H&A restrictions. Personally I'm not sure how much this might mean in revenue, but if we're relying on playing in Melbourne the day before a family day to sign up enough members then we're definitely talking about surviving rather than thriving.

I don't want to tempt the footy Gods, but here are the list of casualties for the year so far before a single premiership match is played: Nick Malceski Swans - ACL (Season) Paul Haselby Dockers - ACL (Season) Brad Dick Pies - ACL (Season) Kristen Thornton Swans - Knee (Season) Farren Ray Bulldogs - Cracked Fibula (6-8 weeks) Brad Fisher Blues - Broken Thumb (8 Weeks) Fraser Gherig Saints - Calf (3 weeks) - I'd think this is extremely optimistic. I see the Saints are saying Max Hudgton is OK, but he looked to grab his Hammy to me...

They've played Challenge Cup games at Narranderra before. They've also played them in Griffith as well. I think first and foremost is the prerequisite that the ground is up to AFL standard. The problem with Griffith as I understand it is that they play cricket on the oval as well. Having spent a large portion of my working life living in the Riverina I'd argue that support for AFL in the area is very strong and their contributions to footy in general shouldn't be undervalued.

Collingwood Carlton Hawthorn Richmond Essendon In Canberra it's Belconnen - They have Port Adelaide Colours - a Collingwood emblem (and mentality) and sing the Hawthorn song - now that's a team you can hate!

It probably just looked that way to me, because whilst the Saints did have a few youngsters, bye and large I could identify who most of the players were - so yep my bad. Looking at the list I saw Hudgton Gehrig, Kosi, Fisher Fisher Dal Santo Milne Blake Gilbert Baker Gram Montagna Fiora Charlie Gardiner I'm no expert on the Saints, so I won't argue the toss about who should be in their best 22, but I count 26. If CJ and PJ miss for us do we count them as part of our best 22? it's also debatable about how many games they can squeeze out of Gardiner, King and Harvey collectively, so once again my apologies, I should have qualified my comment as a near full strength side for a preseason match (most sides rest 5-6 senior players a game in the preseason) It's just interesting to compare the approaches. I'm not sure that restricting senior players programs and limiting their game time (putting them in cotton wool - according to the press) is a mutually exclusive term to having them prepared for the season proper. Yes they probably need some match fitness and need to play some game time, but the new NAB format isn't the best format to manage this - I'd go even further and suggest that the Saints really had nothing to gain by playing very senior players with histories of soft tissue injuries for extended periods in a preseason game, and a lot to lose. It won't be easy for either Gehrig or Hudgton to regain the fitness base they had. (As for Kosi, I don't think he was badly injured, but has he ever played more than two or three senior games in a row without being injured? - I won't be picking him for my dream team) Maybe we weren't fair dinkum about going all the way in the NAB, but if we get games into our younger players in the preseason, if our key players get enough match fitness to be ready for round 1 and if we've got as close to a full list as possible to choose from (remembering that Whelan was broken before the Preseason) then I'll be very happy.

Agreed. Double the number of weeks for a youngster and add 2 more.

Saints went in with a near full strength team to battle it out with the Cats today... So far in a match that's worth zero premiership points they've lost: Gehrig - Calf Hudgton - Hamstring Kosi - Unknown. Kosi should be right, but it's unlikely the other two will be ready for a while.

That's more than half our best 22 right there. Whelan has a calf/achilles injury.