Whispering_Jack

What are they smoking at our universities? The right intent "From what I saw Essendon's program was not illegal and was in fact well documented and controlled."

Friday's session will involve an intraclub practice match according to Roosy at tonight's AGM. Whether we find out much is another matter since a number of our talls and KPFs are likely to not take part.

Not phone number, only his cell number.(segue into a collection of brightly coloured photos of bananas and alpacas behind bars provided by the Frog)

No but I've always believed that at some point in time as the investigation nears the end game, the lawyers would have to be called in. Look at the players in this scenario - Little, Hird (x2), the AFL, the EFC, Doc Reid, Dank, the Weapon and an unknown number of players - my guess, at least a dozen. Many are no strangers to litigation and, in Little's case the law is often an important tool in his tactical battles. The future of a football club is at stake along with the administrators, coaches, professional footballers, all possibly fighting for survival. Against them, a strongly circumstantial case with no positive tests and the direct evidence of what the players ingested, purposely hidden away and nobody seems to want to know where. Also against them, the unusual situation where charges will be laid under a code that takes precedence over the sovereign law. Criminal authorities, Worksafe and player managers lurking in the background ready to wave Writs and Orders if necessary. Smart move by ASADA to bring in a judge who is well versed in administrative law. They should only have been so smart when the idea came into someone's head about conducting a joint investigation with the AFL to the interim report stage. Anyway, it's not a good sign for the Bombers and their beleaguered players. As for our players, it's not a good sign either but whatever happens, we need to determine exactly what happened and face up to consequences if we have done wrong (and I haven't seen enough to convince me either way yet). Hopefully, it's not turned into another tacky political fight which is the usual way of things around here.

Just be careful what you say on here people. I discovered at the AGM tonight that it's not just deranged and aging men who read these pages but real ladies and not just the types who frequent the Gat. Politeness is now the order of the day around here.

Never been big on singing the song at functions like that. Reserve it for winning games and, in the case of AGMs, after winning premierships.

... and yes, Roos did say that next Friday, it will be a practice match.

I thought PJ was good, forthright and clear as he went through the financial reports. It's clear from what he said that we do have an advantage over some of the other "smaller" clubs in that we still have a healthy balance sheet in the black by $3.3m underpinned by land and buildings at historic values and some decently valued gaming licences. We are capable of servicing our debt and debt of itself should not prevent us from at least breaking even. The overriding factor is that the team needs to perform on the field for us to become healthy in these areas. Paul Roos was, as always, impressive. He was laid back and conducted his brief session in much the same way as if he was sitting on the couch. He interviewed three of our midfield "imports" in Daniel Cross, Bernie Vince and Dom Tyson. There's no doubt that if he can't instill confidence into the playing group, then nobody else can. If at all possible (and I know the cost might be prohibitive for some) you must try to get to the 2014 Pre Season Launch if today's cameo is anything to go by. Demons on right path but bumpy road awaits, says Paul Roos Two highlights of the night for me:- 1. Dom Tyson, when responding to a question from Paul Roos about moving from Sydney where AFL isn't such a big deal to Melbourne where everybody's football mad, said, "but you came from the good part of Sydney"! He won me over for what he said because it showed that he not only has a good sense of humour but he recognises the value of having a good coach and being able to ply his trade in football's heartland. All three of Roos' interviewees showed great character and will under doubtlessly add to the depth of leadership and good values at the club. 2. As I left the G (and what a wonderful stadium it is), I walked past the statues of two of the great footballers of my lifetime - Ron Barassi and Leigh Matthews. As I wandered past the former Hawthorn great, a bird crapped on his head but left RDB untouched: a great omen for the future.

I'm at the AGM and we've heard from Glen Bartlett and now Peter Jackson who is explaining the overall operating loss of $1.7m. It's not exactly happy hour here!

Alas ... only the beginning of the end ... but a just result (for some), infractions will issue in the end and the lawyers will have a birthday.

Not a bad idea since we haven't been united for 50 years.

Comprehensive in the end and it was George Bailey who was the only Aussie from the Ashes victory who represented the country tonight. Yet we dominated them completely and utterly for more than three months.

Actually, I'm hoping that there's no rain tonight because it might give us an opportunity to see Joel Dernbach batting. After seeing him bowl and in the field, I reckon there must be some reason why he's playing international cricket.

No rain that I know but I was wondering what happened to these games if they were rain affected.

They couldn't spell his name correctly in the headline but Waylon Manson, the indigenous player with the C&W name could be back in the limelight thanks to a coming Foxtel reality television show - Foxtel reality show The Recruit revives AFL dream for Waylen Mansen

Does anyone know if the Duckworth-Lewis system operates in T20?

Good topic ATJ. David Parkin used to say it was important even for a premiership to have the capacity to bring in five ready made players in a new season and, given where we've been, it's also important for us to make changes. I agree that Tyson, Vince, Cross and Hogan are virtual certainties, fitness permitting. Michie, Kennedy-Harris and Salem would probably be the next in line. The master has listed seven new faces from last year but you can make that eight because, although not everyone's popular choice, Cam Pedersen might come into the picture as a possible replacement for Garland if he's not ready to go.

Considering he's played a handful of games, been affected by injury woes, won't start full training for a month and hardly any of us have seen him play, aren't we getting a bit ahead of ourselves?

Put me in for some sort of duty on the day Rollo. Can we clear up with the rules committee as to whether James Hird is eligible to coach BomberBlitz on the day?

Centrebet don't appear to have caught on yet George but their odds are interesting:- $4.75 Fremantle Sydney $5.25 Hawthorn $9.00 Geelong $12.00 North Melbourne $15.00 Richmond Collingwood $17.00 Essendon West Coast $26.00 Port Adelaide Adelaide Carlton $67.00 Gold Coast $81.00 Brisbane $101.00 Western Bulldogs $251.00 St. Kilda Melbourne $501.00 Greater Western Sydney They have Essendon line ball to make the eight at $17.00. They're an infraction ... I mean a fraction too short for mine.

That's right - the next open training session and the only one for next week will be held on Friday 7th February, 2014 at Goschs Paddock at 9.30am. That's a sure sign that Paul Roos and his crew mean business with the start of the season closing in fast. In many ways, we Demon fans have been spoiled with three open training sessions a week at two different venues but that is definitely not the norm at many other clubs. Over at the Gold Coast Suns they're still advertising their 18 January open beach training session on the Palm Beach foreshore. When I turned up last week to watch them train I discovered that I was the only person interested enough to watch their closed training session on the oval next to Metricon Stadium from behind a wire fence. (Yes I know - it was a closed session and the weather was too good even for watching G. Ablett Junior sweat his socks off). So given that we're unlikely to be the recipients of Roger's excellent training reports and/or Tasman's equally marvelous descriptions, I thought it might be a worthwhile exercise to guess what style of play Paul Roos is instilling into his charges behind closed doors (or wire fences). On that subject, I came across this interesting article in the Age last week - Clarkson prepared to tinker with his premiership winning Hawks. Of course, he needs to change given the loss of a star like Franklin but Clarko shows that he's switched on. Nothing stays the same and besides, every coach will have spent some time trying to work out ways to beat the 2013 premiers so he knows he can't stand still anyway. At the other end of the ladder, I think Roos has the advantage of a team that should have a different mindset, will have substantially different personnel in the midfield and hopefully a bigger, stronger and healthier forward line. I would expect Roos to concentrate on our strengths in developing a style of play while attempting to shore up our weaknesses. I suspect that in doing so, he will show some flexibility so that if Plan A doesn't work, that won't be the only option available for the team so that we can keep our confidence intact rather than fall away completely as we have in recent years.

In the NRL, it's come down to this - Ashley Madison offer Cronulla Sharks $11 million sponsorship deal . With infraction notices on the way, I don't think this would be a good idea but in any event, unlike Essendon which will survive, I suspect the Sharks would struggle to see out this contract.

The broader issue is about coaching and leadership and while you've put your case about Bailey being the better coach, I would argue that it's a moot point about the evil of two lessers and one that really doesn't matter anyway. Each had the same number of wins in their first 33 games but Bailey was kept on for two seasons longer than Neeld so I guess he wins ... but only just. Both inherited [censored] sandwiches and both had careers that ended in disgrace and a shambles. By me, that means Bailey doesn't even get a consultation prize for the feat of being a better coach than Neeld. I think we should be more concerned with righting the wrongs of both eras and hoping that the new coach and his leadership group are up to the challenge.

Is there any danger that the amateur historians here could stick to the topic please?

I have actually set my Foxtel IQ to record the NAB Challenge v Richmond courtesy of my iPhone App. The wonders of modern science.