Whispering_Jack

Ok … fill in the blank ________ and Trengove are two names that have appeared on the playing list of Port Adelaide.

Close but no cigar.

Today’s quiz. Who wears the number 32 for Port Adelaide?

Melbourne player Troy Broadbridge passed away on this day in 2004 while on his honeymoon at the Phi Phi Islands in Thailand. He was one of an estimated 227,898 people in 14 countries who perished as a result of the Boxing Day Earthquake and subsequent tsunami in the Indian Ocean - one of the deadliest natural disasters in recorded history. Always remembered.

Good luck to him in his rehabilitation but those Perth Demons are something else. Their colours are red and black, not red and blue.

Until about 12 months ago Chris Doerre was the draft guru of the bigfooty.com website operating there as “Knightmare”. By then, he had gone commercial and was writing for the ESPN conglomerate producing his insights into matters AFL extending beyond the drafts and attracting controversy for his views of a nature that certainly didn’t hurt his click count. Anyhow, he somehow fell foul of the powers that be at Bigfooty and now he’s still doing his thing at ESPN as well as freelancing. The name of his latest effort on YouTube is “My top 2023 AFL Draft prospects and 2 AFL Draft learnings”. I was interested to find out whether he was pushing one particular player. You live and learn.

Agreed. Sometimes you can have problems and they turn out to be good problems. If everyone’s fit, then potentially you might have a number of key defenders lining up at Casey for a game - Tomlinson, Joel Smith, Adams and both Turners. Little wonder that Corey Ellison took the punt on a move to Williamstown.

Tomahawk is known for his ability to take on the forward pocket ruck duels for the Cats and for initiating or kicking goals as a result. His strike rate is excellent and I'm not talking about the same form of striking that you're thinking about. JvR did help out in the ruck this year at Casey but the fact that he's doing it at preseason training against the likes of G & G suggests that he might be called upon to do that this year - hopefully at the higher level. I wouldn't be expecting TMac to do any ruckwork because of the history he has with his foot.

I think you’re onto something but you could have the wrong player. See my post above about the Herald Sun article written by Glenn McFarlane. The “untried player” who is practicing the craft of ruckwork against two of the AFL’s elite ruckmen is the one I think the club could have in mind for a Tomahawk role.

I’m having an early breakfast and catching up with the news and there, staring directly at me is an on line story in this morning’s Sunday Sun written by Glenn McFarlane ~ Have the Demons already solved their key forward issues? The story also appears at the bottom of page 86 in today’s print issue under the title “Van Rooyen’s time has come at the Demons”. It’s about Melbourne’s hopes that an untried talent and an injury-prone veteran can help it overcome its key-forward issues from the latter part of this year. “Track watchers have noted the solid pre-season form of Jacob van Rooyen, who is yet to play a senior game but came so close last season, and premiership forward Tom McDonald, who only managed nine games in 2022 due to injury. The Demons struggled to get bang for their buck when going forward last season, with their forward mix an endless source of debate.“ This made me wonder whether the people at the Hun are reading our reports I mean the article got the drift about our hopes that the availability of JvR and TMac for senior duty in 2023 will make a difference to Melbourne’s forward set up, but that’s nowhere near the full story unfolding in front of the eyes of our “track watchers”. Firstly, some housekeeping about fact and fiction. The article refers to JvR as a “20-year-old 191cm forward” but he’s neither. His date of birth is listed on the MFC website as 16 April 2003 which means he’s still a 19 year old and the site refers to his height in one place as 193cm and elsewhere as “[S]tanding at 194cm”. I can add to the debate by saying that from my previous observations and again on Friday at training, he’s probably a bit taller than that. At one stage, he was contesting in ruck duels against Brodie Grundy (202cm) and appeared to be giving away only a couple of inches to the Demons’ new big man. At another stage he was pitted against Harry Petty (197cm) who barely shaded him height wise. Perhaps, when the club updates its website in the new year, it might organize the players to be measured for height. In the meantime, we might be happy that the media and other clubs are labouring under a misapprehension about JvR’s vital statistics. 😀 Secondly, McFarlane has only covered part of an intriguing story that’s unfolding with regard to repairing the issues that derailed Melbourne’s premiership defence this year. At this time of year there is always the matter of pre-season preparation of the team for the year ahead and the development of tactics and strategies but this year, the big story is what the club’s ruck set up will look like with Gawn and Grundy, both leading practitioners of their craft. And based on Friday’s training session, that “untried talent” might also have a role to play in that story as well.

Right at the moment, it would have to be ADVANTAGE KYE TURNER on the basis that he’s fit and Trent Burgoyne isn’t, although there’s still plenty of time in the supplemental selection period for that to change. Turner held his own yesterday and looked impressive at times with his marking. The thing is that there’s no shortage of tall back men at the club and it’s likely that if he gets the nod, it will be a while before he sees any AFL action.

It was around about this time four years ago that I turned up to Grosch’s Paddock on a sunny December morning to witness a sparkling Melbourne training session. With a few exceptions, the boys were training hard, looking fit and healthy and all was sweetness and light. I drafted a glowing report about the Demons’ prospects for 2019, sat back and looked forward to a year of football bliss. To my surprise, the Dees had a shocker of a season finishing in 17th place. They even ended the year below Carlton who turned at 1-10 halfway through the season and they sacked their coach! We snuck home by a single point against the eventual wooden spooners on the Gold Coast and the whole dismal year ended in doom and gloom with bushfires ravaging the continent. The scourge of Covid-19 was waiting for us around the corner. Come January, my New Year’s resolution was never to write a glowing preseason training report again. Hence, in summary, my impressions about this morning’s session at the Paddock was that it sucked! Some of the negative things I noted in my head as I watched the session were:- • The number of players who were in rehab or injured during the session. The rehab group included premiership players Angus Brayshaw and Michael Hibberd while Jake Lever hurt his knee during the session. Bulldogs recruit Lachie Hunter also took a knock early but resumed training. Others in rehab were Andy Moniz-Wakefield, Joel Smith, Deakyn Smith, newcomers Jed Adams, Will Verrell and train on potential recruit Trent Burgoyne. Disappointing. • Hardly any of the young players appear ready – most of them were kept back from the simulated match play and trained separately under Choco Williams. They might have been good at NAB Cup or APS football, but they are not ready to play AFL senior football in 2023, not even the kid we plucked out of obscurity from Xavier College. Recruits are not what they used to be, and we might as well start getting used to making the long drive down the Monash Freeway and beyond to Casey Fields if we want to see those blokes next year. So disappointing that we will not get to see our first rookie draft pick burning up the G against the Bulldogs in Round 1. • Who oversees the players’ wardrobes these days? I noticed a couple of ruck duels between two blokes who were both wearing the number 6 on their backs. How do they expect us to tell them apart so that those of us who take the trouble to turn up to a training session can report on their performances with some accuracy? Not good enough! • There was too much fun and frivolity. Players were having a fun time but it’s December - exactly the time when players should be knuckling down for the rigours of the long season ahead. • My god, Christian Salem's aged! His hair has turned grey overnight! • I have a number of other complaints and that’s why this report isn’t a glowing one as you might have expected. Take off the rose coloured glasses and start worrying. Think MFCSS and with a bit of luck I might make a different New Year’s resolution at the end of 2023. Merry Christmas all!!!

The article ~ How late draft interest forced unlikely prospect to alter schoolies plans

Training 14 December 2022 A lot of close ups but it looks like Gosch's to me and the giveaway is the caption that tells us that Max Gawn is taking a mark at Goschs Paddock.

He's a defender right? If we sign him up we go into Backman Turner Overdrive. (I'll let myself out now)

Ellison was a solid player at Casey and must have been looked at by some AFL clubs. The fact that he’s gone to Williamstown suggests that there might have been job opportunities involved as well - it’s a long trip from Cranbourne to that neck of the woods. He will be missed but if you look at the MFC’s recruiting of tall players over the past month or so, it’s probably a logical move for Ellison.

… and yes, Steven May trained today!

Kyah Farris-White (the AFL’s most photographed Category B Rookie!)

Kade Chandler

Blake Howes

Charles Spargo

These are on Instagram (some duplication with Twitter) Christian Salem

Not worried about how hard or soft the fixture might be at this point in time. As long as everyone at the club has the resolve to atone for our disappointing 2022 finals series I’ll be happy. The AFL has given us the opportunity to come face to face with that reality almost immediately by pitting us against the Lions and Swans in Rounds 2 & 3 and let’s not forget that the Bulldogs got us in Round 19. So we start the season facing three teams that beat us last time up.

Take that Chanderpaul. Twice in one day. You don’t want to be batting under lights with a pink ball in play and our very own Scotty Boland and Mitchell Starc on the rampage.