Whispering_Jack

Fixed - thanks

The 2016 trade and draft period saw some familiar surnames the club's history, stretching all the way back to our first season in the VFL. Dion Johnstone from Scotch College and Oakleigh Chargers via Warrnambool shares his surname with George Johnstone who played eight games for Melbourne in 1897-98. Then there was also ten year player Travis Johnstone who played 160 games (111 goals) from 1998 before moving to the Brisbane Lions in 2008. Trapper was an AFL Rising Star nominee in 1998 and won the club's best and fairest, the Keith 'Bluey' Truscott Medal in 2005. I don't believe that any of the Johnstones are related. Mitch Hannan comes to the club after spending a season with the Footscray Bulldogs in the VFL but way back in 1927 a little known player named Peter Hannan from Yarraville played 2 games with Melbourne. He ended his career with 6 games at Footscray in 1933. Former North Melbourne champion Johnny Lewis gave Melbourne three good years in the twilight of his career in the 30s and the club will be hoping for the same from Jordan Lewis after he crossed from Hawthorn in the trade period. There is no record of a Hibberd, McKenna (a bit of a surprise actually), Filipovic or a Keilty at the club before Lachlan and Declan were drafted in the recent rookie draft but the Smith name is legend at the club and Tim Smith now joins Joel, son of Shaun, in illustrious company. Norm Smith played in four premierships in a playing career that spanned 1935 to 1948 and coached the club to six flags between 1952 and 1967. His brother Len also played with the club and played and coached at Fitzroy and later for a short period at Richmond during which his innovative approach laid the foundation for the Tigers' golden era of the late 60s through to 1980. Norm's son Peter also played with the club for a short period in the 60s. Current MCC President and former captain Steven Smith was one of the Demons' best players in the 70s and 80s and captained the club. At least a dozen Smiths have represented the club. Included are Ray Smith, a defender from Essendon in the mid 70s, Shaun Smith (father of Joel) who took the mark of the century in a game in the 90s at Carrara and tall forward Nick Smith who was listed on the injured list as being out for "four to six" weeks so often that he earned the monicker "426". On balance, having a Smith at the club must be good because a Smith has been associated with the club for ten of its 12 premierships - 11 if you count dual Brownlow Medallist Ivor Warne-Smith who played in the 1926 team. Having two Smiths at the club will therefore be even better!

I'm thinking of reviving our Book of Numbers series and for starters, I reckon it's time for a look at Number Eight. My favourite player to wear the guernsey was the late Bob "Tassie" Johnson who passed away last year. Late AFL great Robert "Tassie" Johnson lives on in enduring love affair on the Sunshine Coast Tassie was a great exponent of the drop kick and holds the club record for most games wearing the number 8 (202). He played mainly at full back where he was a true champion of the game but on the odd occasion would also go into the ruck and performed well there. The list of players who wore the number from 1912 to the present day: 1912 Fred Harris (also #29 in 1912, #7 in 1914, #28 in 1919) 1913 Jack A "Dodger" Evans 1914 A "Bert" Trahair 1915 Jack A ‘Dodger’ Evans (see 1913 above) 1919-1925 Charlie Lilley (also #6 in 1913 and 1915, #11 in 1914) 1926 Herbert White 1931-1932 W ‘Bull’ Adams 1933 - 1941 Rowley Fischer 1942-1943 Don Hewson 1945 Ralph Latham 1946-1947 Roy Stabb (also #22 in 1945) 1948-1951 Doug Heywood (also #25 in 1943, #26 in 1944) 1952 Ian Toyne 1952 Maurie Lehmann 1953 Don Cameron 1954 Geoff Collins (also #3 1948 to 1952) 1955 Kevin Clarke 1956 - 1957 Jim Sandral 1959-1969 Bob "Tassie" Johnson 1970-1975 Peter Keenan (also #10 1981-1982) 1976-1978 Peter Johnston 1979 Glenn Elliott 1980-1982 Brent Crosswell 1983 Les Bamblett 1984 Peter Thorne (also #40 1978 to 1979) 1985-1995 Graeme Yeats (also #45 in 1984) 1996 Craig Turley 1999 Jeff Farmer (also #33 1995 to 2001 and changed back to 33 during the 1999 season) 2000 James Cook 2001-2006 Alistair Nicholson (also #44 1997 to 2000) 2007-2014 James Frawley 2015- 2016 Heritier Lumumba

I think we've learned through hard experience that one player will never be the saving of a club. What's needed is good administration, good people who are well looked after in all areas, innovation, hard work and a team all pulling together in one direction. Then if the right player from another club comes along and is available, I'm fine with that as long as you don't regard him as the focal point of the club, but rather as one member of a team.

Boxing Day means a lot of things to different people. Some relax after the festivities of Christmas, many head out on holidays, others head off to the big stores hunting for bargains while others still go off to the G and the Test. This day to me will always be associated with the 2004 tsunami which took the lives of a quarter of a million people as the big waves hit shorelines around the Indian Ocean in one of the planet's greatest natural disasters. Among the victims were many Australians included Demon defender Troy Broadbridge who was on his honeymoon at the time. We won't forget him - today, we celebrate his life and memory ...

I heard that one of the boys from Gippsland, Kieran Byers is around 203cm so they won't be short.

Zones have been forced on us through the northern states academies 'rjay'. I suggested Dandenong Stingrays because they are located close to Casey Fields and would make a good fit in the transition from high end junior into senior football.

Yes, I only saw a bit of both of them when I was at the (supposed) final training session of the year last Friday and both appeared to be handling themselves well in a highly professional environment. All indications are that they will fit in well at an AFL club - especially Clavarino who should be close to a top 10 pick if he continues to develop in 2017. It would be nice if the Dandenong Stingrays was declares an MFC Academy zone in the real sense where we could have the right to match bids if other clubs wanted these players.

"Effectively they have had their first round pick taken away." I would be tempted to do the exercise myself but for the fact that my brain's in holiday mode. However, I'm not so sure that the penalty is the equivalent of taking their first round pick away. It might make it harder for them if they tried the ploy of trading into an early draft selection as they did this year in order to get Taranto at pick 2 but I think they will still get their first choice academy player (and there could be three GWS academy boys in the top 10 if the AFL conveniently ignores the fact that two of them are being developed at Victorian TAC Cup clubs). Worst case scenario is that they would go into points debt which might defer the pain for another season. The interesting thing will be to see whether the AFL decides to come to grips with the reality that the NSW clubs bordering on the Murray area which are traditional football areas should be outside the GWS Academy zone. Of course, this would be tantamount to an admission by the AFL that it hasn't actually been telling the truth about the purpose of the northern states academies.

It looks like we've exhausted all reasonable matters for discussion about a training session that in the end involved one player from our list. The training threads will continue when the team returns, presumable in the second week of January. To all who contributed to the training threads enjoy the festive season and have a happy and healthy new year.

The make-or-break experiment An interesting article going back a few years by Peter Hanlon on St Kilda's failed gamble on 210cm tall basketball convert Blake McGrath who is now at Casey. He's no stranger to the colours he'll be wearing in 2017 because he started his footy career at Pennant Hills who wear the Demons' strip. And, at his height, he'll be able to look eye to eye with Max Gawn (although their paths are unlikely to cross on the football field).

I think the AFL ruling is consistent with past rulings and an understandable position to have in order to prevent clubs from engineering retirements to their advantage. It seems to me that some people feel aggrieved that Lumumba's departure was left far too late and that this somehow disadvantaged the club. They seem to be of the belief that had he gone in October then we would have had an additional vacancy on our list at draft time to enable the club to draft another player. However, given our draft position with no pick till the late 40s the extra selection would have been a lowly pick and not of great value. Even without the capacity to upgrade a rookie in the off season, we can play rookies in the pre season competition and if necessary, upgrade a player from virtually the start of the season. The whole thing is a storm in a teamcup - we've lost a player whose contribution was negligible in 2016 and it was unlikely that he was going to get many games next year. He was able to dominate a game once whilst at the club - and that was a pre season NAB Challenge game in his first season. No sweat.

I was wondering why I couldn't get any fresh lettuce at the supermarket. Gil obviously bought them out to ensure he could hit the AFL's favoured son with a bunch of wet ones.

What ... are you his accountant or something?

Following on from the reports of training on Monday, I'm wondering what the story is with today's training session. Did it happen? Did the players realise that they were supposed to be on holiday and therefore opted out or did they take the day off in solidarity with Heritier Lumumba on the announcement of his retirement? If it turns out that there was indeed no training today then please feel free to derail this thread. We can make an exception in the Spirit of Christmas.

I can't believe I sat through that entire movie (even if it was 50 years ago).

It's now official ... Lumumba retires from the AFL Thanks Heritier, it was certainly an experience having you in the passing parade of players who have gone through the doors of the Melbourne Football Club. I suppose we are going to have to get used to the fact that you won't be coming down to training any more. Keep well.

And now that an end has come to the Heritier saga, it's time for this review of the player's year in 2016 to end. We'll open a farewell thread for reminiscences.

Scandinavian athletes have been doing fartlek training for the better part of 100 years and it works for increasing both speed and endurance.

Dees strengthen Casey ties with new name for VFL affiliate

I asked about this last year and was told it had to do with fitting in with the local football teams. By playing at night, the Scorpions would not be taking people away from the local community clubs and vice versa although I note that the crowds at the night games didn't appear to be much greater if at all as a result. With the advent of the Casey Demons and the wearing of the club's traditional colours, I think it might become easier to make out who the players are. This would be helped if MFC players were able to wear their normal jumper numbers irrespective of whether they're in the AFL or the VFL. I hope someone makes the suggestion to Peter Jackson. After all, he's not only our CEO but they've named the "Peter Jackson VFL" after him ?

The Age article doesn't seem to present a firewall problem - The Block 'in serious negotiations' over sale of Gatwick Hotel. According to Victoria Police - ""The Gatwick has been a part of St Kilda's rich history and very much a part of policing within St Kilda."

That may well be so but my reasoning is that he needed to be set straight at the very beginning of his career which I'm sure would happen with his equivalent today given the personnel (think Brendan McCartney) we have at the club now.

And congrats to the Demon Army - you guys do great work for the club week in week out throughout the year.

Some observations delayed after watching a fascinating last hour or so of the cricket last night - I had promised the grandkids a special end-of-school year treat and what better than a late December visit to Gosch's Paddock for the Demons' last training session of 2016? The club laid it on for the large crowd - a sensational BBQ with the smell of snags and grilled onions wafting all the way to the bridge over the Yarra on our arrival, to the flies, to a Satyriconhome-like built Santa, to the flies, to Checker the big mascot and to the flies. Most of the players were there too, with the exception of our now regular absentee Heritier, ANB (patella tendon according to the real Saty) and I didn't see Dean Kent. I worked out that the rehab group (and there were quite a few but none looked seriously injured from my layman's viewpoint) were the ones not wearing numbers on their backs. I saw Cam Pedersen riding a bike on the sidelines and Jake Melksham running the boundary looking like an Olympic middle distance runner and some of the newbies like Flipper and Mitch Hannan getting acclimatised in the foreground. Josh Wagner and JKH were also doing some running and light work at the side. My 14 year old granddaughter who was once a fan of Jeremy Howe came expecting to see Jack Watts' platinum locks but was disappointed at the hair colour which didn't appear as extreme white as advertised in previous photo galleries released by the club. Her two younger brothers didn't last long. After picking out their favourites in Max Gawn and Jesse Hogan (not hard to do as they really stand out) it was off to the hot dog stand, followed by a kick to kick session which soon ended in the obligatory fisticuffs. I broke up the fight by pointing to the players on the nearby ground and telling the boys that they should follow the lead of their team who train like professionals and don't get involved in any argy bargy. It dawned on me then that this is the fundamental difference between the club now and what it has been in the past, for more or less fifty years. A club that intermittently seemed always divided about something with the rifts constantly leaving us unable to reach the professional standards we are last witnessing both on and off the field. The argy bargy is thankfully a thing of the past - the club's nameless, faceless men are now sad and irrelevant fossils. Peter Jackson, Paul Roos, Brendan McCartney and now Simon Goodwin (far more hands on at training than Roosy) have seen to that and a new spirit permeates the club now. You can sense it when watching training even though you can't see everything and you don't know what every individual drill is about. It feels good - I call it "the vibe" but it's much more than the vibe from The Castle. I guess the exception to the rule might be "the Heritier situation" but I think the club has that well covered. One of the work experience AFL Academy players wore #8 on his back in what appeared to be a message that like Heritier's namesake, Lumumba is gone. In all likelihood, he will soon be replaced by the son of Shaun Smith. Jesse Hogan looks and trains like a man ready to grab centre stage on the AFL scene. I heard that big Maxy is about to get a gig in Foxtel's superhero of the month series and I know that I'm prone to making big statements but look out next year because I reckon Jesse will be on that programme in a big way after his next season. He is moving beautifully, runs hard, looks solid and even cracked it for a smile at one stage. The story about extending his contract for a couple of years must be true because he looks like a man unburdened by the contract speculation, one who is now on a mission. Clayton Oliver also impressed me - he just has that something special about him, especially in close pouncing cat-like on the ball and dishing out handballs to players in space. He's one of a number of members of the young brigade ready to move on to a higher plane. Billy Stretch is no longer a skinny kid, Jayden Hunt looks solid and there's something about Sam Frost that suggests he will be one of those who will step up another notch. As the session went on, I couldn't help but think of poor Colin Sylvia recovering in hospital from a broken neck and other injuries sustained after falling from a balcony. If only the place was like this a dozen years ago when he arrived fresh from Merbein, he might truly have become one of the champions of our game. The team moves on to a break of a couple of weeks before it gets really serious. To my eye it looks as if there is great room for improvement and a move up the ladder, especially with the infusion of some seriously experienced talent in Jordan Lewis, Michael Hibberd and Jake Melksham. The question is whether, when the battles begin, our improvement can outmatch that of the others.