old55

Yeah that's absolutely necessary too and maybe Trengove will be Bartel, Viney - Selwood, McKenzie - Ling, Sylvia - Chapman, Gysberts - Corey, Grimes - Kelly, Blease - Varcoe. You'd be counting on all that happening if you reckon we don't need more midfield star power. The key aspect with most of these ideas is getting the player across the line - if that happens the 2 compo picks are enough, if not - then they're not. Work on this needs to start now if we;'re going to attract a marquee player, a young star or convince a star draftee to nominate for the 2012 MD.

My assumption is the 2 compo picks should go close to getting a deal done. The key starting point is convincing the player to come to MFC - without that there's no deal - once that's done it's negotiation.

I think with the addition of Mitch Clark we're reasonably set backline, forwardline and ruck. There's some uncertainty re crumbing forward and small back but there are options with Davey, Wonna and Lawrence and Bennell, Strauss and Nicholson. I'm hoping we draft to address this are this year. Midfield class remains the big problem, made worse with Scully's exit, and really that's where flags are won. We have Jack Viney coming with 2012 1st rounder and he will help. We've got the Scully picks intact and I think they've got to used to address the midfield star question. I think there's 4 options: 1. Mini-draft 2012 - we're going to be as well placed as anyone to trade into this draft (see Compo picks thread) if GWS continues to want picks. If there's O'Meara or Crouch types next year we should be heading the bidding. GWS will plunder more players next year so more compo picks - possibly in the 1st round will appear. The problem is we're waiting another year for the player to arrive. 2. Use the picks in the alleged "super-draft", they're likely to be around 11-15 if we finish mid-table. Very good players can be drafted in that range but the super-stars are at the pointy end. 3. Go hard after a marquee player - Scott Pendlebury or Brendan Goddard (is he really a mid?). If we're at 92% of the cap then we've got about $800K a year head-room - it would take at least that to attract someone like Pendlebury - minimum $4M over 5 years - Collingwood would struggle to match this under the cap although they have other ways - a one-club Collingwood star is a made man for life. We'd be at the cap and we're going to need to pay our own upcoming stars more too - it would be a tough juggling act - we'd definitely need to move on some mid-pay-range players to free a further $5-600K which should be possible. GWS will be all over Pendlebury too after he signed the one year deal last year and we wouldn't be able to use the draft to get him because GWS would be lurking and, like in the Clark deal, Collingwood would get compensation if he went to them in the draft. 4. Target a Victorian who is homesick. A Gold Coast recruit coming out of contract? Apart from Josh Caddy there's not much there: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Coast_Football_Club Dion Prestia has been re-signed and the other mids at the pointy end aren't Victorians. The other possible candidate is Andrew Gaff at West Coast, but like with Pendlebury at Collingwood, star players rarely leave big clubs.

No they gave both pick 4 and the Geelong compo pick for O'Meara and pick 31 http://www.afl.com.au/trade%20tracker/tabid/10490/default.aspx We would have needed to give 12 + both compo picks straight up to top this I reckon.

OK ....

[MFCSS]Hopefully they're on the same page[/MFCSS]

and the worst part is - I know you're being serious

Look really it's just a beat-up - who gives a [censored]. Some fwits at Hawthorn have stirred up Geoff Lord to take a shot at the presidency because the Hawks haven't been doing well enough on-field. FFS!!! "Powerbrokers" "highly placed influential supporters of Melbourne" There's idiots who support every club, some more "influential" than others, and some of them at our club probably did approach Kennett.

I think there might be a rule that National Draftees aren't allowed to do individual testing and trialling with clubs.

I used to rate King, he sounded authoritative and knowledgeable and speaks about interesting topics - until I actually started to listen closely to what he said. He's full of it.

YOUNG KPF

You're half right - they did trade but they traded their compensation pick for Brennan with pick 10 for pick 5.

Heard Gerard, David King and Caro on AW Sports Tonight last night questioning the Mitch Clark trade and how much we're paying him. FFS what a bunch of idiots. King was saying for that amount of money we need a 70+ goal a year contribution - no what we need is 120 goals from Clark, Watts and Jurrah. He's a structural recruitment - Chris Tarrant or Harry Taylor aren't playing on Jack Watts with Scarlett or Maxwell 3rd up - they're on Clark now. Reid or Lonergan are on Watts and Scarlett or Maxwell are leaving Jurrah to go 3rd man up. It's a totally different story. Caro said that other players would resent what we are paying Clark - Gerard and King said - no players want to play with good players who will help the team improve. Gerard was banging on about how Kelvin Templeton brought great leadership to MFC despite no contribution on-field and doubted whether Clark would bring that - gee sorry Gerard, a 23 year old Jonathan Brown wasn't available for trade this year so we had to settle for Mitch. How often does a accomplished 23 year old KPF come up for trade? Never - that's how often. In my recollection, Kennedy in the Judd trade and maybe Henderson in the Fev trade are the only examples I can think of and they were compensation for the main trade target. So you have to pay for this type of player. Would we have been better off keeping Brad Miller or recruiting Setanta, Gerard? Caro was saying pick 12 is a steep trade price - how dumb can you get? At least King disagreed with her on that. Apparently the night before King was pressing Clark about what he said to Vossy when he didn't actually end up choosing to go home to Freo. It's pretty easy to understand David - he was set to go to Freo and settled on leaving Brisbane - he found out that he was going to end up at GWS instead if he insisted on going to Freo so he chose the Melbourne offer. The Clark recruitment is a great coup for MFC.

A myth is that Cam Bruce was ever a good kick - he always kicked helicopters - it just took some people longer to realise than others.

Newton is a rookie and a different type of player anyway and Dunn would be a delist candidate if we wasn't contracted. Here's a list of medium forward/mids on our list, where does Macaffer slot in? Jurrah, Sylvia, Howe, Green, Petterd, Bate, Dunn

Juice has a role to play - if we have Jamar/Martin and Clark/Watts at MFC with Gawn/Fitzpatrick and Cook/Newton at Casey - Fev and Campbell will be gone and Spencer won't be available until mid year. We'll get some injuries in that group.

Wow!

Newton's 4th law: For every supporter angry at an unjust delist there's an equal an opposite mob angry at a puzzling player retention.

I waded out of the MCG waist deep in it on 1 October.

Yep - same thing happened with Rischitelli then Brennan at Brisbane last year with Gold Coast.

There's got to be more announced - we still have to delist at least one more senior list player.

Juice, JUICE, J-U-I-C-E, JOOOOOOCE!

KB: Why did you only negotiate with Essendon? Lenton: 5 minute history lesson hoping we forgot the original question KB: Yes but why did you only negotiate with Essendon? Lenton: It was a sensitive negotiation FFS - holds as much water as a sieve - reckon you've heard a few explanations like that from the dock Redleg - just before the judge says "Guilty"

Expect North to Rookie him

there wasn't much taken after him - Pears, Otten, Greenwood