old55

What do people honestly think the line is this week? Centerbet has it at 10 goals - IMO that's generous to us, in my head it's more like 80 points. But what sort of state is that when we're up against a mid-table club and I think that if we lose by 10 goals it's better than expected?

Selwood is a class above Jones as a player but the difference is not reflected in the win-loss difference. If Selwood had come to MFC he would have experienced a similar loss rate and if Jones had gone to Geelong he would have experienced a similar win rate.

I feel for Nathan 36 wins + 3 draws + 101 losses = 140 games http://stats.rleague.com/afl/stats/players/N/Nathan_Jones.html Joel Selwood 116 wins + 0 draws + 24 losses = 140 games http://stats.rleague.com/afl/stats/players/J/Joel_Selwood.html

AFL coaching is a very tough job, you have deliver against capable opposition on a fixed day - you can't delay the date and you can't really deliver less product. I'm reminded that throughout 2007-8 when I regularly visited a Collingwood board that posters universally hated their coach and referred to him and his game plan as "Mick Madhouse" - eventually the wheel turned. I was definitely willing to cut Neeld plenty of slack. But the problem for me is a disastrous start to the season coupled with "we didn't see that coming". While you can't really deliver less there are ways that you can mitigate the damage. In weeks 1 and 2 Neeld showed absolutely no grasp of what was happening or how to mitigate the damage. Since then we played against ordinary opposition - WC are really struggling and smashed us by 100points, Gold Coast showed where GWS are at and beat them by more than we did away from home and Brisbane played like a basket case until they played us. We need a solid lead time to secure a new coach - September is not the time to start looking. Also important list management decisions are taken in the next few months.

smoked cheese!

I see a toad behind what looks like a giant eraser - reminder to self - stay off the blue cheese after 10pm

If Fitzy is EVER going to get an opportunity it's now.

Maybe because Ian Flack had a long history of experience working with Liam and Mifsud wanted to draw on that experience. Why should Mifsud be restricted to talking only to MFC employees in relation to Jurrah's welfare? Is Ian Flack all you've got in "a few mischief makers who hold grudges"? Throw in Barry Prendergast and Dean Bailey and there's your 3 disgruntled former employees - you didn't break any confidences - they've all been named in the mainstream media anyway. Case closed.

I agree that disgruntled ex-employees talked to the tanking investigators. I even referred to those who have been named in the media ... http://demonland.com/forums/index.php?/topic/33594-new-ceo/?p=737608 But Jack claims on the basis inside information which he can't divulge, that this is either not the people involved or not all the people involved ... http://demonland.com/forums/index.php?/topic/33594-new-ceo/?p=737614 That's fine if it's confidential, but put or shut up ... Now is this thread he's mischieviously raised the Mifsud/Davey/Neeld matter. Far from shutting the conversation down I requested he provide us all with the benefit of his knowledge. But again he has refused to explain. Really it's reminiscent of Dr.Who's Scully to Richmond rumours. Long on mystery, short on substance.

I am only responsible for my own posting and unlike you I have only ever posted under Fifty-5 (nee old55) - TimD and Rhino Richards are not me and I am not responsible for what they post.

You're very adept at researching and quoting posts when they suit your purpose ... I accept that you don't think there is a "conspiracy" but that there is "a few mischief makers who hold grudges against certain individuals to spread some malicious gossip or misinformation to the right people or, in the case of media interviews, simply point them in the right direction as far as asking questions to the interviewee is concerned" - that doesn't materially change the problem I have with your posting. I never posted "hiding behind "confidentaility"" that is a lie all of your own making. I said it was fine to have confidential information - just don't continually post about it until you are able to back up your innuendo - that is my entire point

Disingenuous: lacking in frankness, candour, or sincerity; Your posting on this alleged conspiracy is lacking in both frankness and candour - two out of three is quite enough to satisfy the OR. I'm coming from the growing school of either "put up or shut up" on the conspiracy theories - it's fine if you've got confidential information - then don't post about it.

Jack disingenuously continues to post innuendo about alleged conspiracies against the club after saying he can't divulge the detail because the information is confidential. It's becoming clear what "Whispering" actually means.

I went to the Tanking thread that Jack himself started on 19 January - is that on tanking, mid-January and by the author enough for you? http://demonland.com/forums/index.php?/topic/32570-tanking/ and found no reference to Mifsud, Davey or Wilson when I scanned the first 6 pages. I then did a search on the entire 130 page topic with the keyword "Mifsud" and got no results. How about Jack alleviates the mystery and illuminatis us on the "interesting story" - or maybe you can do it on his behalf hardtack?

How about you just paraphrase the "interesting story" for me.

No I don't have time, my request was a vain hope for substance in place of more mystifying innuendo.

Got a link?

Yeah, but does it also mean that you only kick 5% of their score?

That's not correct - for a start off in both the first two games we continuously played with an extra man in the backline, sometimes two, whereas in the games 3 and 4 we went man-on-man all over the ground and only rarely pushed an extra man back when the opposition got a run-on - and it didn't really help when we did - we played our best footy man-on-man.

No I can't work it out - I've variously read that Barry Prendergast, Ian Flack, Dean Bailey and even Josh Mahoney have been reported to have discussed the Vault meeting with the AFL - is it one of them? How about you fill me in?

I'm not being "cute" You listed a whole series of attacks on the club and then concluded with: That directly suggests that Schwab was incompetent in not "by passing such elements" "Sheesh" indeed

So it's all Schwab's fault for being incompetent?

Who was that?

Last year we were terrible but I was willing to give the FD the benefit of the doubt that it was "the recession we had to have", but I was looking forward to incremental improvement this year and so was Mark Neeld with his suggestion at the Commencement Dinner that we could anticipate improvement. Come Round 1 and we were worse than last year - worse than terrible - Neeld didn't see it coming and has no idea why. He persisted with his plan in R2 and we went even worse - worse than worse than terrible. Since then v West Coast and GWS he has abandoned his game plan and gone man-on-man and asked the player to play with more freedom - yes we weren't as shocking against them for at least part of both games but both of them are struggling in their own way. He said his primary aim was to nurture the players and then promptly mishandled Jack Watts - a monotonously continuing theme of his coaching. We're paying for this bloke's education with big losses.

"happy" is not the description I associate with MFC at present