Bring-Back-Powell

Fair call. Don't have any problems giving him a couple of more games...but you have to draw the line somewhere. Is it just me, or does CJ always play in losing sides. I think the St.Kilda, Collingwood, Essendon and Brisbane games of last year where the only wins he's played in.

Surely you tipped against us when we played Adelaide in 2005 (AAMI) with half the team out and coming off a 6 game losing streak!

Anyone want to guess the final 22 before its released tonight. In - Holland, Bizzell, Yze, P Johnson Out - Robbo (inj), Neitz (inj), Rivers (inj), C Johnson EMERG - C Johnson, Petterd, Ferguson INS: Holland's confirmed in the 22 to heighten our defence. Bizzell should come in to add some versaltility forward or back Yze should come in to add some scoring power (if he's still capable at this level) I had trouble tossing up between P Johnson (a foward option) or Ferguson to add an option in defence. Went with PJ as every man and his dog around here wants him in the side. OUTS: Robbo, Neitz and Rivers are confirmed out. Toss up between CJ and Brown. Went with CJ as he hasn't shown he's capable at AFL level as yet (apart from NAB Cup/regional games) and only averaging 10 possessions. At least with Brown, you can be guranteed 20-25 possessions but hope to god he uses the pill properly. Would love to see Pettard debut this Sunday. Saw the kid V Geelong at Skilled (Mar 17th) and showed he'll be a class act in the future (albeit only had 30% game time). Me thinks he's not ready though.

JB, Gary and Nathan Brown alluded to the fact that Neale has an absolutely fantastic rapport with the players. Could that be the major problem with ND. I doubt some of the more successful coaches like Malthouse, Sheedy, Pagan and Matthews are best buddies with the players.

Good. Thats very Geelong. Celebrate one week. "Sack the coach" next week. If Geelong go in over-confident, I reckon we can get them, as long as all our boys play the game of their lives.

8. To be honest I love these sort of "back-to-the-wall games", when nobody gives us a shot in hell of winning. It makes these kind of wins so much sweeter.

5:00 am. The nightclub has just closed and everyone's been asked to leave.

To those who think we'll win more than we lose this year, have a look at the fixture. We play Geelong and Freo (top 6 teams) with Neitz, Robbo and McLean out, Head up to Sydney (tough ask), Play the Dogs at the Dome where we never win And play the Eagles at Subiaco where nobody wins. So a realist would say we're looking at 3-5 after round 8 - at the extreme best. And then we play most of our interstate games in the second half of the year. I honestly can't see us winning more than 9 game this year. I like to be realistic so I don't set myself up for disappointment.

Who cares. Half of Hawthorn's goals resulted in free kicks. Sure most of the frees were there, but it would be interesting to see how many goals Hawks kicked without free kicks.

We were also roundly castigated as well after our 'woeful' performance against St.kilda, but we didn't have a 100% crack - Hawthorn clearly did. Thats why we're so angry at the club at the moment. I along with many other Demonlanders will start being positive when some of our higher profile players play games as if their football lives depend on it, and when we actually show up for 4 quarters. If we have a good solid 4 quarter performance and come up short by a couple of goals against Geelong, then I'll start to be more positive....considering our injury list. Thats all we can ask for at this stage.

INS Holland, Yze, Bizzell, Sylvia OUTS - Robbo (Inj) Neitz (Inj) Wheatley (inj/omit) C Johnson, Brown and Godfrey should remain in the team- at least they bleed for the jumper. However if they were to drop one it would be Brown (I'm surprised he got 26 touches) Pickett won't play- he's too fat. Although I don't mind the idea of Byron playing in the goal square for most of the game. Won't happen though. Sylvia's an obvious in. Be nice to have at least one of our top 5 picks playing. Yze must come back. With all our injuries up forward, we need some goal kicking experience. Showed a couple of promosing signs against St.Kilda and would have played on Monday had it not been for Adem himself volunteering to be dropped. I'm sure most Demonlanders will forgive Yze if he makes a solid contribution (ie-4 goals) when the chips are down. Bizzel must come back into the team to face his old boys. Can offer versatility up forward or down back and I thought his pre-season from warranted a round 1 gig. Chris Johnson should be dropped. After being blown away by his scintillating pre-season performances against Hawthorn and Richmond (@ Princes Park) the kid has shown nothing in two weeks. Only averaging 10 possessions. Time to find some form at Sandy and then have another crack at AFL in a month or so. Ben Holland should come in to counter Geelong's potent and tall forward line of Mooney, Ottens, N Ablett and Hawkins. Matthew Bate to remain in the side. Still averaging 19 touches a game and he's done just as much positive as negative (including a 55 metre goal V Hawthorn) and some chizzling inside 50 entries. Must address a couple of issues, but I'd rather he do this in the seniors as he has an X factor about him. Colin Garland - An absolute left-field smokey to be selected, but I doubt it.

Beauty. So we can pencil in the West Coast game in round 8 for a win

He's got a lot of friends in that department Good summary.

Mark Harvey please. I don't think he'd stand for this current garbage. Although Freo might be handing the baton over to Harvey if Connolly flops this year.

Me too Jaded! That thought going on at the back of my head keeps on telling me that we will recover, and be just fine (like last year after round 3) but I'm not so sure this year.

I've been reading the site after the loss against Hawthorn and came across the notion from some scribes that we could be 0-8 after round 8. At first I thought 'thats crazy', the Dees will be good enough to win at least half of those games. However after coming to the realisation that we've got the injury list the size of Mount Hotham (pardon the pun), a midfield lacking some serious grunt and missing our best player, a defence that has conceded 11 stupid free kick goals in the last 2 weeks and a forward line that can't crumb a goal to save themselves, we're in trouble. I saw the warning signs in the NAB Cup/Regional Series when they refused to take the thing seriously and expected it all to click in round 1. For anyone that saw the saw the Geelong game at Skilled (Mar 17th) will know what I'm talking about. So lets look at the next 6 weeks. ( I had us pencilled in for 4 wins after round 4 because they were all at the G...not anymore) Round 3 V Geelong (MCG) - The Cats' foward line was absolutely on fire last weekend and should be too much to handle for our defence. Perhaps the unpredictability of Geelong may save us. 25/75 Round 4 V Freo (MCG) - Dockers may be 0-3 (WCE this week) heading into this one. Will be absoluetley pumped for this one and it will be hard to fathom a top 4 fancy will continue to lose games. Play the MCG better than the Dome. 25/75 Round 5 V Sydney (SCG) - How many years in a row can we keep pulling off upsets up there. Have won the last 3 games in Sydney, but it would be hard to see them doing it again. Perhaps a change of scenary might do the Dees the world of good. 40/60. Rouind 6 V Port Adelaide (MCG) - I firmly believe this will be the Dees first win for the season. Port have never knocked us off at the MCG. Hopefully Neitz, Robbo and Pickett will be fit for this one. 75/25. Round 7 V Western Bulldogs (Dome) - Considering how well the Doggies play at the Dome, and how awful we are there, I can't see us getting close in this one. 20/80 Round 8 V West Coast (Subiaco) - No comment required. I think 1-7 or 2-6 is most realistic. I believe we will start winning constantly from round 11, however many factors have conspired against us so far. Thoughts...

What do we need? A new coach! At least the team always wins the week after they sack the coach

I voluntereed to vote this week so I may as well provide my 2 cents worth: 6) Miller - One of the best games of his career. 3 important goals 5) Bruce - Was a force when we were up and about. At the moment he is our most quality player...and thats not a great sign considering he shanks every second kick. 4) McDonald - Whoever gets 30 touches and 6 tackles in a game deserves votes. 3) Godfrey - Tried his heart out all game, showed committment and kicked 2 goals. Got better as the game wore on and deserves a game next week. 2) Brown - 26 touches and 9 marks. Deserves a consolation vote or 2. At least shows heart. 1) Moloney - In and out of the game but did play a part in our comeback.

Your mates with Reid aren't you DD? Whats he like as a bloke and footballer?

Pretty weak segment and interviews. Lyon hinted that J Frawley was in line for a round 1 debut had he not got injured. When it came to the last player (Jack Riewoldt), the only thing Lyon asked him was "So do you have a manager" and Riewoldt replied "Yeah Nah, I've got one. Ricky Nixon from Flying Start". Really interesting stuff that

He was far from our worse on Friday Night and therefore must be retained. I'd be sharpening the axe at blokes like Chris Johnson (yes he had a great NAB series but has yet to show anything in H & A) who ran around like a headless chook and Matty Bate who continued his lacklustre pre-season form last week. CJ looks like the sort of player that is an absolute star in the VFL, but isn't quite up to it in the rigours of a helter-skelter home and away game. I've been saying this for 6 months. I hope he proves me wrong. We need a win on Monday, and therefore we must play players who are good enough to get us over the line. I think Yze's moment in the sun may arrive this Monday. If I'm wrong then Sandy for the following weekend.

The last time we played Hawthorn, when both teams tried to rough each other up, the Hawks kicked the first 8 goals of the game (in 2005)....and Hawthorn were on the bottom at that stage! Apart from last year (when we beat them by 76 points) they've been a bogey team for us, and I'm seriously concerned on Monday. Don't get sucked into how badly they played against Brisbane, they'll be just as fired up to atone as Melbourne.

May I volunteer to do the votes for Haw V Melb. What are the current odds on Holland winning this Demonland player of the year Never thought I'd see him high on the leaderboard. Perhaps Mr Bruce, Mr Johnstone and Mr Green should take notice of the current standings!!

Good stat YM. Thanks for the reminder. But it still doesn't make the tripe that was served up last week any easier to swallow.

The last time we tried that tactic against Hawthorn we lost to them by 7 goals when they were bottom of the ladder at the time. (2005). We always come off second best when ever we try to rough the opposition up. We're just not a tough nasty team.