DeesFlag2020

I’m just predicting 3 flags in the next five years - that is all l care about in my football supporting life!

He is also a handy replacement should on of our key forwards go down or lose form. We only really uound top form in the back third of the season once our forward line struck form. It is essential for us.

He’s like all the Cats supporters l know: they don’t rate us, and really believe they have another six flags in them this decade. I hope they stay in denial because that means they will stay mid list or worse for the rest of the decade.

I would take it further than that. Max, and the JACKO outskilled them. A case of “ if Max doesn’t get you, Jacko will!” Exactly as it played out!

II think it is nonsense to say we suddenly drop out of the 8 if we lose particular players. One of the things that l love about our list building is we now have such depth, and our recruitment has been not only geared to our long term future, but to give us an insurance against injuries. We now have most positions covered. I love in particular the recruitment of Dunstan: unwanted by the Hawks because of his poor kicking skills, but in most other aspects elite particularly his hardness at the ball. We have several players who were recruited from other clubs because of lack of skills, but had great strengths as well (eg Langdon). Just as Choco’s academy taught him to kick, so it will for Dunstan. It is very reassuring that we have such smart people running our club. Brilliant list management by our guys, and just gives further credence to the confidence we have built for the future.

Yes, we should all acknowledge Sparrow’s elite kicking in this. This guy is going to be a star into our long term future!

I must say l left my sitting room not long after the 3rd quarter started. Couldn’t stand the tension. But l couldn’t resist a sneak at the 16 min mark. Wow what a thrill. Indeed many thrills. Such glory which l still even today have not recovered from. The Dees have a magic model which will sustain us for much of this next decade. My dad ( who died in 2000 after fanatical support for the Dees all his life, which he passed on to his sons), and maintained all his adult life managed to convert his crew in the Middle East in his Wellington bomber to be Dees supporters in 1943, just before they were shot down and two of them became POWs in Germany (sadly the other 5 died). He said as a POW, his Demon scarf was his most prized possession! He would be over the moon with this win just as we used to be as kids with him in the Grey Smith stand. I only wish he was here to enjoy it with us. I am sure l am not alone.

I think many have overlooked a key aspect of this scheduling. We can play at this time because it is the first match of the season, therefore no match the previous week. It is a great opportunity for us to have a standalone match and has the added bonus of being the first of the season with the heavy publicity that brings. I think it is a fantastic idea and an appropriate reward for the previous season’s outstanding team which we undoubtedly were.

It is interesting to speculate where his best position will be going forward. He is built like a rugged onballer, but we have plenty of outstanding versions of them. I suspect he will end up on the wing, or centre, certainly has the class for both. Not sure yet about his endurance, but no doubt we will find out in the next year or so. Certainly an amazing prospect….

Roos succeeded Nield at a time of crisis overseen by the AFL with the management under Jackson. What Roos did was to create a stable professional environment so that the club could be rebuilt and was a more attractive and professional set up to attract quality players. In that process Jackson and Roos oversaw the appointed of Goody as a designated successor in a two year timeframe but with a much stronger list. This also allowed Goody time to set his own environment and to attract his own coaching/management team. The recent premiership would not have been possible without that process under Roos/Jackson, although the vision and professional set up we now have is clearly Goody’s, with a strong recent contribution from Gary Pert.l. Am not disputing Gioody is primarily responsible for winning the flag, but initial insightful and visionary management certainly helped.

His elite running ability eventually gets them every time. No-one has his endurance or commitment. Was a key part of our premiership….

I agree. We were a mess as a club then, and it was not until Roos came in that we started the reforms that have lead to our current success. Part of this is we are now getting the best out of our playing Group, which obviously includes developing young talent effectively, to the extent that it seems we are elite in that pathway in the AFL. I have no doubt the Billy Stretch would have benefited greatly from that environment, along with a number of other recruits which we managed to burn. Our current recruitment and development pathways are setting us up for sustained success. Exciting times.

The fact that he is captain of the WA under age side shows he has great leadership potential, and obviously potentially great skill as a player. The question l have is he more Jack Viney than Billie Stretch. We will soon see l guess….

Sounds a bit like a young David Neitz: about the same size, can play back (remember Carey rated Neitz the best back he had played on) and forward. Hope he can kick and mark as well as big DN, as well as a gun shot for goal. From all the write ups about him, he sounds as though he has all those attributes and like Neitz he sounds like a beast. The only doubt expressed being his endurance no doubt bought on by the glandular fever he had last year. This will be corrected when he gets into the Dees system and goes through our pre season programs. Sounds like yet another outstanding move by this Administration.

Reminds me of a young Dusty. Big statement l know, but justified…

I am assuming they will continue to apply the same disciplines and common sense they did post grand final. That is the point l was making - l think, We should all take heart from their behaviour after the GRAND FINAL, and l am assuming that discipline will continue, but we all need to be vigilant.

I think we are well looked after in that regard. One of the things l have really been impressed by is the way the club and the players have behaved post game. Sure they rightly celebrated hard, but it was by no means over the top, and the club fairly quickly has started to focus on the next assault. The forensic analysis of what makes a winning AFL organisation (which they so impressively demonstrated in 2121) has been refocused on 2022 and beyond, which makes me very confident this is going to continue well into this decade. I do not recall any winning AFL team in recent times displaying such restraint and good sense. It is great credit to the club at all levels from the playing group to executive management and makes me, for one, very confident this is no “flash in the pan”. Besting Carlton’s and Essendon’s 16 premierships by the end of the decade would be a nice (and realistic) goal as neither of them are going to win one in the next 5-8 years!

I think there have been a few instructive instances this year of your improvement in this regard. The best example l can think of offhand is the vital goal Gus Brayshaw kicked in the grannie in the third quarter on a 45 degree angle 45 metres out. He deliberately took his time and nailed it with a perfect kick. Meantime BT was going bananas in the commentary box saying he is not paying enough attention to the game and should hurry up! Apparently Gus has been having special practice goal kicking at every training session at Choco’s skills academy because he has been unhappy with his goal kicking performance. A better example of advantage of specialist skills coaching l could not imagine as that kick more than any other got us up and running at a critical time in the game and we never looked back!

Is it only me, but l am begging to worry about our increasing tendency to draft small players. However good Bowrie is, and he seems very good, l think you can only have 2 or 3 that size on you list, and we already have three. Zac Taylor would be another…

He wouldn’t have made the GF lineup, particularly owing to his age, and l suspect his attitude. We are well rid of him.

I think the Tigers will also improve when they get their injured players back, but l don’t expect Dusty to be the force he was. The cats to be mid-list and miss the finals.

Yes goes with his ridiculous claim that no one left the ground in the last 30 minutes……how could he possibly know?.Said oh so dogmatically too. He is a fool!

I object to mediocrity wherever it is, especially when it is forced on us by the Murdochs. The AFL grand final is now a major global TV sporting event and the international showcase of our great game. We should object to having that fronted by such a mediocrity as BT, especially when there are plenty of other more highly competent younger alternatives.

That was more than 50 years ago. Surely we can be a little more modern…..

Having now watched the finals replays on numerous occasions, l think it is time we use our new found power in the AFL community to demand some changes in the leading commentary teams. The first to go must be BT. Not only is he so often factually wrong, but his understanding of basic tactics is so rudimentary as to be embarrassing. He is also quite open about his prejudice against the Dees. For instance: 1. l remember during the commentary for the game against Richmond on ANZAC eve last when we were leading by over fifty points, James Brayshow suggested that Melbourne should be now favourite for the flag. BT’s reaction, “l will never believe that until Max Gawn holds up the cup in September, no matter how successful they are during the season” 2. He has no understanding of basic team tactics eg. during the GF Langdon gathered the ball on the half back flank and raced up the the wing with Kossie racing with an opponent from the centre to get in position on the wing. Further up the field McDonald was racing towards the boundary line on the half forward flank with his opponent to give him an additional option. Langdon chose McDonald which prompted an outcry from BT saying he should have chosen Kossie (“l like Kossie” were l think his words). Several minutes later, Daisy Pearce, who was sharing the commentary with him and who has ten times his football sophistication, pointed out that he kicked it to half forward to lessen the risk of a turnover which could result in a goal to the bulldogs. Pretty basic football common sense but totally lost in his populist nonsense. 3 Angus Bradshaw: when the Dees were surging in the 3rd quarter of the Grannie, Brayshaw took an extremely courageous diving mark on the half forward flank about 45 metres out on a severe angle. If he goaled he would put us in front for the first time since early in the second quarter. He deliberately walked back slowly with his back to the play concentrating on what needed to be done to covert. BT went ballistic saying he needed to concentrate on the game. He clearly had no idea of Brayshaw’s history in poor accuracy in kicking for goal. In fact for much of the season he was having special tuition at training every week to improve his goal kicking at Choco’s skills academy and clearly was using that to ensure he nailed it. He did, which was a key part of our resurgence. The deliberate slow walk back was part of the process to ensure successful convergence. If BT had just basic football knowledge he would have known that. 4 Neal-Bullen marked 40 metres out in the last quarter when we were six or seven goals up. BT said he has to kick this so that the side will be able to enjoy the rest of the game, but if he doesn’t they won’t. This of course was totally nonsensical,. This can be bracketed with his ridiculous comment with five minutes to go saying “not a single person had left the ground”. How could he possibly know that?—- and it was said very dogmatically. I’m sure there are other examples that others could add to this list. We can do a lot better than BT. Time has passed both him and Eddie Maguire by. With much more sophisticated, and/or younger commentators (eg James Brayshaw, Daisy Pearce, Gerard Wheatley, Nick Riewoldt) providing much more nuanced commentary on a game which has become much more complex and subtle over the last 20 years, there is no long longer room for these dinosaurs. I propose we keep a record of all our examples of these incompetencies on Demonland, publicise them, and build a case for BT’s removal. We can do a lot better.