Demons1858

That's how I read it Demons11. I think both clubs agreed to try and take the spotlight off their clubs by making mother hood statements

Players all know that to get players in you pay overs. Lots of reports about the $$$ but no one knows other than a select few. Not many 21 year old's in the All Australian squad last time I checked.

It will be much more than that if he is forces to go into the draft. He'll put a massive price on his head for years 1 and 2 and then get paid under's for years 3 and 4 when he reaches the MFC

Is that Leverd ... Good to see the most sort after player in the draft nominate us. Hasn't happened for a while

Agree. A 20% CBA increase in the cap means $800k is the same as $650k in the past. And $650k in a few years will be the equivalent of $500K. You also have to pay market rates to get someone decent. Not too much to pay given all defenders can pressure but few can make goid decisions and he will likely be with mfc player the rest of his career

Agree. Our defence is not elite but probably not that bad either given the low-ish scores against. Defensive systems have worked more times than not this year. We no longer have the gapping holes in our list we once had but we do have form slumps and talent levels. So we should rightly be talking about what we need to do to become elite in more positions across the ground in view of future finals. With our key backs still developing (and somewhat unknown commodities) an established defensive or forward tall would be helpful to lift our teams 'elite-ness'.

The other player that will strengthen our defence is actually a forward. If we recruit Mitch McGovern (out of contract) then TMac goes back. Problem solved with some cash to spare. Strategically, we should be making market rated offers to both McGovern and Lever so that one of them falls out of their salary cap.

That Collingwood game couldn't have been scripted better. Was sitting with a Collingwood mate of mine and he was giving it to me until half time. I think Jeff even got dragged from the field which was rare for him in those days. His goals after half time and the Melbourne win gave me plenty of ammunition. Like the stories I read about the past players reuniting at local levels to play with each other. Shows the bond and respect that happens when players work hard and make sacrifice for each other to achieve a level of success. In those days we played finals regularly. Happens at AFL and local levels

Hey binman, you are probably reading a little too much into all this. This year Frost and his brother are well ahead of him for key backs. His form slump lasted 10 games plus preseason and we persisted with him early expecting him to return to form and then later due to injuries to backs and now rucks. While he plays like last week and last year he would get a game in my starting line up not because we want to develop him but on merit. He will also get a game when we have injuries to bigs if a little out of form as there is no one in the 2s left

Last years form is irrelevant. He deserved his place then. Like alot of players that are on the fringe they get games when they are in form and are dropped when not. Better players can sustain form slumps. My prior post is consistent with Macca's views I would say

Spencer's last game round 5 Oscar's return game round 6

Oscar was lucky to came in when we were short of rucks and we needed to throw in his bro for coverage. Since then I would say he has been not poor but just average. Against the Pies he showed signs of his early form last year where he was backing himself a bit more. He is still 21 and as a tall has plenty of upside still but it could go ether way. Having better coaching/development resources could just be the difference. Wouldn't have liked his chances of becoming an AFL standard player in year gone by. In any case most teams have 2nd or 3rd best defensive tall that don't set the world on fire

He mentions his upbringing in the NT in the article. No one has greater involvement there than the MFC with 2 games and our Next Gen Academy in Alice Springs Done deal !

Apparently May is "planning to start contract talks with the Suns in the next three to four weeks" and wants to focus on his performance. As captain the Suns will offer him an attractive longer term deal. If the deal doesn't get done then and negotiations stall he is likely to be out the door. I guess we will watch this space in a few weeks time ... http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/teams/gold-coast/gold-coast-cocaptain-steven-may-stalls-on-new-contract/news-story/378f5e68a64db5fff3519daf71271061

For mine, this season has highlighted some areas we need shore up. The issue is that each year there are only a certain number of players coming out of contract and that are gettable. While the MFC will try to fill all of the deficiencies you can't be too picky about the priorities unless of course you are Hawthorn or Geelong and you have a leading reputation of performance and culture over a long period of time. So we need some of the following to become an elite and serious finals team not in any order of priority. We need a decent back up ruck or decent forward / ruck that can ruck all day if we have injuries the cupboard is bare on our list (Spencer isn't dependable and King is a question mark). We can't have another year derailed like this one. We should poach a teams 2nd ruck like Preuss or rookie a more mature player at VFL level. If Spencer is injury prone there is no point having him on the list We need talent and speed at the fall of the ball in the forward half Have liked Kent in the past but we should shore this area up by focusing on rookies next year e.g. Garlett, McDonald-Tipungwuti, Davey were all rookies Any high quality established key back/key forward/midfielder would add to the list at the right age (not interested in mid range quality types for this category) Midfield: Lewis, Vince and even Jones aren't getting any younger. Brayshaw looks to have issues Forward: Weid might not make it and is atleast another 2 seasons away before he can be assured of starting in the 22 Backs: Frost and OMac are showing some promise but are not guaranteed to make it The reality however is that there isn't a large pool of high quality established players wanting to come to MFC or any club for that matter, so we need to consider any that might be interested. If we can get May interested then we go hard as he fits one of our needs. That would leave OMac or Frost to develop and compete for the remaining key defensive spots or be traded if they aren't up to it

Who cares if he was injured 4 months ago. Clearly he needs to rehab better or get match fit and sharpness at Casey. Agree he will get better by seasons end but why pick him until then? Give him 100 percent game time at Casey until he is back to his peak

DEMON David, you can go to http://www.melbournefc.com.au/ for official MFC coaches comments, The forum is for poster / supporters opinions

He does need a spell at Casey to work on his fitness, ball use, movement and speed at the contest. Often flat footed when he gets it, is predictable with his attempts to evade and is more easily tackle than in the past.. Might still play however as our other mids look like they are going to pull up sore.

No, talking about Petracca, he seems to have a great passion for the club, supporters and the game. I think Greene has had a few hiccups off the field

Awesome talent. The best part is that he is suited to a role that is really hard to fill being a forward / mid. Toby Greene doesn't dominate possessions but has become super important to GWS. Love his attitude and way he embrace the whole aspect of being an AFL footballer

The knock on trealor from Collingwood supporters is his disposal. Gws pushed him out to create salary cap space and spread the age of their talent pool by using him and other picks as currency for the future

Don't need to. My comments were in reference to SOS and the drafting since he has been at the club i.e. 2015/16 drafts

Must admit I haven't gone through it in detail but I can't recall any major stuff ups that cost them anything significant under SOS. Happy for you to enlighten by you Skuit? Note that I'm not looked for example of players traded in that basically cost them nothing to recruit and helped pair back the list to bottom out

Think your underselling his efforts. Its true that they got plenty of assistance but they played it smartly just the same. Traded in experienced players that were done at top clubs at little or not cost to guide the youngsters and focussed top selections on future talent which the afl hadn't totally expected. You just need to look at the Gold coast to see how not to do it (although I acknowledge they got lesser concessions). All those talented draft selections which they now don't need are now used as currency to bring in even more selections and mature bodies at the point end of their list management

Carlton list was the terrible when SOS arrived and its profile suggested it was only going to get worse in the coming years. SOS has cleared out heaps of players quickly that might have got a game but aren't going to improve enough to play in a potential finals side. By clearing them out he helps them bottom out to get trade picks and to a lesser extent saves some salary cap money. They have rarely traded top end draft picks away only the bottom end ones if I recall correctly - although there was one mega deal were they traded in heaps of GWS players. So he traded in heaps of young cheap GWS talent and brought in the occasional players in place of late trades that go nowhere anyway. Whether the GWS imports work or not - that is a bonus. What's more important is what they do with the top end talent they recruit while they bottom out. They would want to get it right like Todd and Jason have. The GWS list he moulded looks alright so I think he knows what he is doing but starting from a long way back - time will tell