Jumping Jack Clennett

I'm not surprised he's having neck surgery. The only thing that surprises me is that he ISN'T having spinal surgery. After most stoppages , he gets up last, after about three oppos. take their arms off his neck, and their knees out of his back. It's either a ball up, or holding the ball against him.. He just shakes his head in disbelief, then gets on with it. Somehow Sellwood throws himself at the ball like Nathan, and gets frees. "Chunk" deserves a Brownlow for courage and persistence beyond that of most players in AFL history.

And Keith Carroll's grandsons are the Reid brothers at Coll. and Sydney.

Wait a minute , Bobby!I'm pretty sure Stuart was a right footer! Long, raking drop kicks...and stab passes...yes! But not out of the backline..... wasn't he a rover/forward? He also was able to take a hanger... I think he took the first hanger I ever saw. I'm trying to think of a Demon left footer with long, raking kicks from the backline . Matthew Febey? Surely there are others! Help!!

I was listening to the radio prior to watching Sunday's game on TV. The Perth commentators made fun of our banner, which extolled the virtues of our skipper in his 200th. They laughed in sheer derision at what it said....something like "Nathan Jones" 200.... Our Hero...Our raging bull". Twice they read it out and laughed in mocking fashion. I could hear them all giggling in the background. No mention of what a gutsy effort it's been to reach such a milestone the way he plays. I didn't hear the radio when Nathan was penalised for holding the ball while unconscious, but I'll bet they thought that was pretty funny too.

Did any other Demonlanders notice the musculature on their young first gamer, Langdon? It was in sharp contrast to our pencil thin Oscar McDonald. Also compared to ANB and Stretch with young, thin bodies. Funny, that. I'll never forget when Troy Simmonds went to Freo. At Melbourne, he was so skinny you could see all the lumps in his bones sticking out. He wasn't a teenager, and I thought he just can't make it with a body like that.. After a pre season at Freo he became a muscle -bound powerful ruck man West Coast have similar skills in body building. I guess it's the warm climate.

After he fumbled ,he bent over to try to retrieve the ball from the ground. The Freo player had no interest in the ball. He deliberately crashed Jones' head. It should NOT have been construed as "taking out the legs". It was a merciless example of misjudgment by the umpires who were grossly influenced by the Freo crowd in the first quarter.

[quote name="jnrmac" pos "It was 12 to our 2 in the first 2 qtrs." _________________________________________________ And those two frees we got.......... One was absolutely blatant. The other was a distinct disadvantage to us, where the advantage should have been paid. I think we actually had three frees in the first half. It was obvious that there would be a deliberate evening up of the free count after half time(when the damage was already done).

I can't help but feel that when we come good, it's going to be a rapid, and lasting, conversion. My reasoning is as follows. We've had exceptional adverse events with premature deaths closely involved with the club......Broadbridge, Wight, Stynes, Bailey, Flower. Now Daiher's really crook. The Jurrah saga. Yes, it was a risk for us to put so much effort into him....Collingwood wisely let him go.I think the club suffered with all the problems he had, and our laudable attempts to assist him. The tanking issue. There are those that say we'd have been negligent NOT to have done what we did, especially after the Kreuzer Cup. It seemed that you could get away with it , since Carlton( obviously), and Coll.,Ess., and Hawthorn all did it without repercussions. But ,not us...oh no, we were reprehensible shameful wicked cheats who now are getting what we deserve for establishing a losing culture. Recruiting.yes...we haven't done it well. But I can't help thinking there's an element of luck in recruiting.We've made some monumental errors. But we don't seem to have picked up any ready made stars(like Cripps,Elliot,, Bontomtelli,etc). Almost all our first round picks get serious injuries in their first year.Many of our first round opportunities have been in drafts compromised by the expansion clubs. Lack of star players. Other weaker clubs have had many more stars than us( eg StKilda....Harvey, Riewoldt,Lockett etc, North with Carey, Harvey,etc. and not only are they stars , but they are able to play on for 250-400 games. Netiz was a star, and he's our ONLY player ever to play 300. Before that you have to go back to Flower with 271. (I guess Jimmy was a star,too.) I know we've been criticised for poor development of our talent, but you'd expect more from our potential stars( imagine what a difference there'd have been with 300 injury free games from Schwarz, Lyon, Tingay, jakovich and Charles.! Self-perpetuating AFL system where stronger clubs get better time slots for matches. The less success you have, the harder it is to attract sponsors. Most of the above reasons for our lack of success are reversible. Whether it's by better luck, or better management, I think things will turn for the better quickly when they start to turn. I'm tired of watching us lose, and not holding much hope of victory when I watch each week. But when we DO win, I get a hell of a lot of satisfaction. I'm confident that one day, soon, the wheel will turn. I'll certainly be sticking fat, hoping we'll come good in my lifetime( I've been saying that for 50 years!). One thing I'll never do is boo Melbourne players, or shake my fist at them, yelling obscenities, as they leave the field after a bad loss. No one gains anything from that. I'd like to see Melbourne play a more attacking brand of footy. I think that would create more of a perception of positivity, as well as help us win a few more games!

I don't like Heppel. I'm jealous. I wish he played for us.Every possession he gets sets the Bombers up for a forward thrust. Very like Pendlebury. Somehow he senses who is out by himself , and has time to direct a pass to him, setting up a dangerous attack. The only player we have with comparable skills is Watts, but he doesn't get the ball as often. Heppel marks well for his size, never fumbles, is deadly accurate in front of goals, and runs all day. I hate his narcissistic dreadlocks, but admire his skills like mad. Does anyone know what is Pendlebury's stat for metres gained? Interesting to compare to Heppel's.

Ricky took two contested marks the goal square, I think, that day. Bennett kicked 4 in the last quarter with the wind. I also remember Joe Rugolo kicking a couple from the boundary. Was that the same game? I was at the Bennett win with Baghdad Bob. He was having a contre-temps with a Big bloke in an Ess jumper in front of us. Bob said.." why don't you shut up, mate, you're wearing your IQ on your back!" He said...." I haven't got anything on my back!" We laughed like hell. He got murderous. We moved away.(forgetting our mate had gone to the bar to buy us a few cans!"

I think we would gain a small advantage over all other clubs if we abandoned this lazy tactic. ( I call it " lazy" because it's the easiest time to do rotations,due to the extended stoppage time) A player who has just kicked a goal is on a confidence " high"..... I think he's in good head space to take a big grab or snap another goal. Nowadays, he dashes 100m to the bench( which puffs him out), sits down, and the "high" abates. All those coaches should be able to arrange rotations without removing fresh forwards from the field. We shouldn't do it just because all the others do it. I remember a Port game( not v. Melb) years ago, when Tredrea was marking absolutely everything in the first quarter. He had 4 goals up in the first 15 min. They then rested him for ten minutes. He didn't get any more goals. I remember thinking, " if they lose this by about a goal, it's BECAUSE they took him off when he was unstoppable." ( as it turned out , they won easily, but they weren't to know that early on)

We made the top four eleven, not ten, years in succession from 1954 to 1964. Another factor in the end to our dominance was Richmond coming to the MCG. Before that, sides only experienced the MCG once a year, if they didn't make the finals. We played the finals on the ground where we trained, and played every second week. Now with so many teams sharing the MCG , it is not just less of an advantage, we're at a disadvantage. Rarely do we play home games with a partisan crowd (except against the strong interstate teams) This is a huge contrast to Geelong, and the Adelaide and Perth clubs. It used to be advantageous to be based at the MCG, but Melbourne now has no territorial base, like Essendon, Richmond,Footscray,Geelong,Carlton and the stronger interstaters do.

I thought McKernan and Hurley put in good bids last Saturday. Also, there's something about Collingwood jumpers doing a very good job of spoiling an average guy's looks....think Maxwell,Didak, Cloke,Blair. There is a lot of others...please help.

Though Tommy occasionally stuffs up, he quite often does very accurate, quite long, pinpoint passes out of defence. I wouldn't write him off as a swing forward based on yesterday's kicking for goal.

what about the first Grand Final in 1948!!! Ess kicked 7.27 to our 10.9 for a draw!Then we killed them by 39 in the replay. They got us back yesterday!

It very nearly worked!

Excellent question, Sue. I reckon it was "umpire error". It was quickly overlooked, because StKilda were quick to take the kick-in. Are you like me, watching replays of a game lost by less than a goal? I keep seeing minute facets of the game like a slight fumble, or a contrary bounce, and I think if hadn't happened, we'd have won! Futile, I know!

Witts might be taller.Sorry,Josh....just saw your post.

It doesn't really matter whether the opposition know our routine. The important thing is that our players know approximately how long is left, for the reasons outlined in the opening post. "Traffic lights" were just a suggestion. Perhaps a bright light on the bench when there 's less than a minute to go. Does anyone else ever get the same sense of frustration I do , when there' s 10 sec to go in the quarter ,we have the ball in the centre, and we kick it sideways or backwards?

My suggestion which started this topic was serious. Most of the replies have either dismissed it, or made glib witticisms, or missed the point altogether, diverting the thread to a debate on the virtues of a count down clock on the scoreboard. I don't think my proposal was ridiculous. It suggests a simple method whereby our players have more idea than the opposition how much time is left at the end of quarters. It had occurred to me long before last Sunday's loss.

The debacle last Sunday proved that the archaic method of telling players how much time is left needs to be updated. It's important players know how much time is left at the day of every quarter, not just the last. For example, I find it frustrating when there's only 10 sec to go in a quarter, and our player has the ball in the clear around the centre. He looks up, sees no good option upfield, so goes back or sideways rather than bombing. The siren sounds, and an opportunity is lost. Normally players don't bomb it, since there's a danger it'll "slingshot" back. But with no time to go,there's no downside to roosting it to full forward(even if Hogan has three players on him.) Another time it's vital to know how much time is left is when a player has a mark or a free with only a few seconds left. If he wants to play on (say to reduce the angle of a shot for goal), he has to do it quickly. One way of keeping the players informed would be a "traffic light" system from the bench with, say, a bright greenLED light for 2 min left, orange for 30 sec, and a red for 10 sec..........or some variation of this. What do others think?

A couple of times yesterday, I reckon our players confused the guernseys. Our players had to accustom themselves to picking out our players in St Kda-like jumpers. Once, when Jetta ran clear , couldn't see any short options,and booted it 50m to a Saint out by himself( who had plenty of time to hit a teammate on the chest, resulting in a goal from his pass). I can't remember the exact details of the other occasion, but it was similar. So I think it's possible that it might not have happened if we'd worn less StKilda- like jumpers, and we might have won!

Just a minute!!! Leave Barassi out of this . He was dynamic and inspiring, and went in hard for the ball. He never did thuggish acts(Roger Dean definitely staged in 1963) He did often argue with the Umpire, which wasn't good, but it wasn't thuggish, either. I agree that Judd was a great player....one of the greatest. I am just reminding people that he had a vicious streak. Matthews' behind the play assaults on Giles, Smith and McMullin are well remembered by Demon fans, and if you ask supporters of other Clubs, they'll tell you of Matthews atrocities with their players. Have Demonlanders noticed the scar under Gary Lyon's chin? Am I correct in suggesting that it is a result of the time Ablett senior elbowed him up the jaw behind the play, when Gary was beating him pointless? I don't know which is worse, felling guys behind the play, or potentially blinding them by screwing your thumbs into their eyeballs. What do you think, Daisycutter?

If you are Juddy's mate, you're in a good position to ask him about his vicious attacks on opponents. I admit that I'm possibly over-influenced by an interest in eye injury( my line of work). But I'd like you to ask Chris, who undoubtedly is an intelligent and well educated bloke,whether he has any regrets about screwing his thumbs into another player's eyeballs. Not many other players do this. Has he any concept of "duty of care"? Does he remember Nick Walsh.? What was the real story about the "pressure points"? I wonder if I'm alone in my opinion that he and Matthews are the two most reprehensible thugs I've seen on a footy field.