Whispering_Jack

It would seem that David King is impressed with Melbourne’s pre-season intensity ~ The AFL club that is “panels in front” of others with pre-season intensity

Given the issues that affected Max’s fitness in the latter half of 2022, any problem with his hamstrings needs to be managed properly. I’m sure our coaching, medical and fitness people will be right on top of this and they’ll do what’s necessary in his interests.

It would be nice if the club could confirm next week’s training times and venues. With schools returning in the following week, the next week could be the final opportunity to get the kids to a preseason session and if they are taking place at Casey which involves special arrangements for most of us because of the distances involved, plenty of advance notice would be helpful.

Casey Fields this morning STINGA'S PRESEASON TRAINING REPORT

A Herald-Sun article by Chris Cavanagh “DID YOUR NUMBERS COME UP?” (pages 76 & 77 yesterday) examined which club has the strongest draft hand going into the 2023 National Draft. Of course, it’s a long way off till November and the draft picks are dependent upon how each individual team fares in the coming season but the verdict has Melbourne ahead of the pack. Here are the picks each club holds – and why. ADELAIDE Rd 1: Own Rd 2: 1 x linked to North Melbourne, 1 x linked to Gold Coast Rd 3: None Rd 4: None BRISBANE Rd 1: None Rd 2: 1 x linked to Geelong Rd 3: Own, 1 x linked to Geelong Rd 4: 1 x linked to Fremantle CARLTON Rd 1: Own Rd 2: None Rd 3: None Rd 4: Own, 1 x linked to Essendon COLLINGWOOD Rd 1: Own Rd 2: 1 x linked to Carlton Rd 3: None Rd 4: Own ESSENDON R 1: Own Rd 2: Own Rd 3: Own Rd 4: Linked to Sydney FREMANTLE Rd 1: None Rd 2: 1 x linked to North Melbourne Rd 3: 1 x linked to North Melbourne, 1 x linked to Carlton Rd 4: 1 x linked to North Melbourne GEELONG Rd 1: Own Rd 2: None Rd 3: None Rd 4: None GOLD COAST Rd 1: Own Rd 2: 1 x linked to GWS, 1 x linked to Adelaide Rd 3: 1 x linked to Adelaide, 1 x linked to Collingwood Rd 4: Own, 1 x linked to Adelaide, 1 x linked to St Kilda GREATER WESTERN SYDNEY Rd 1: Own, 1 x linked to Richmond Rd 2: None Rd 3: Own Rd 4: Own, 1 x linked to Brisbane HAWTHORN Rd 1: Own Rd 2: 1 x linked to Western Bulldogs Rd 3: 1 x linked to Western Bulldogs Rd 4: None MELBOURNE Rd 1: Own, 1 x linked to Fremantle Rd 2: Own, 1 x linked to Fremantle Rd 3: None Rd 4: None “The Demons hold the best draft hand of any club with four picks in the first two rounds. Not only do they still have their own selections for those rounds, but they also have Fremantle’s as part of the trade that sent young ruckman Luke Jackson to the Dockers. Melbourne’s third-rounder went to the Western Bulldogs in exchange for Lachie Hunter, while their fourth-rounder also found its way to Whitten Oval in a swap for utility Josh Schache.” NORTH MELBOURNE Rd 1: Own, 1 x linked to Port Adelaide Rd 2: None Rd 3: Own, 1 x linked to Melbourne Rd 4: 1 x linked to Hawthorn PORT ADELAIDE NNRd 1: None NNRd 2: 1 x linked 
to Collingwood NNRd 3: 1 x linked 
to Fremantle NNRd 4: Own RICHMOND Rd 1: None Rd 2: Own Rd 3: Own Rd 4: Own ST KILDA Rd 1: Own Rd 2: Own Rd 3: Own Rd 4: None SYDNEY SWANS Rd 1: Own Rd 2: Own, 1 x linked to Hawthorn Rd 3: Own, 1 x linked to Hawthorn Rd 4: None WEST COAST EAGLES Rd 1: Own Rd 2: Own, 1 x linked to Port Adelaide Rd 3: Own, 1 x linked to Port Adelaide Rd 4: Own WESTERN BULLDOGS Rd 1: Own, 1 x linked to Brisbane Rd 2: 1 x linked to Brisbane Rd 3: None Rd 4: Own, 1 x linked to Melbourne, 1 x linked to Geelong

What about the enjoyment on the faces of the fans at attending a winning Melbourne match in Geelong at a time when the chances of us bringing home the 4 points was negligible and the prospect of that long drive home in the cold at the end of most games wasn’t exactly tantalizing.

Watch this to the end.

Just watching the Gridiron and it appears Pickett might have changed codes and gone to Pittsburgh 😀

Today’s Herald Sun has a report on the train-on players in anticipation of possible selection to fill vacancies through the AFL’s supplemental selection period, which ends on 15 February. Melbourne has one list vacancy and this is the comment on our two candidates:- “MELBOURNE TRENT BURGOYNE (Port Adelaide SANFL) Mid-Fwd, 21, 177cm, 70kg The son of Power great Peter and brother of 2021 draftee Jase, Burgoyne was delisted at the end of the 2021 season without playing a game for the club. Burgoyne’s two years at AFL level were cruelled by hamstring injuries, playing just four SANFL matches during this period. He remained with Port Adelaide’s SANFL side last year and impressed with his agility and reading of the play in defence, highlighted by 24 disposals and seven tackles against Norwood. KYE TURNER (Old Haileybury/ Frankston VFL) Defender, 20, 193cm, 78kg Turner gets his chance to trial at the Demons after playing just two VFL games for Frankston late in the year. The defender showed promising signs for the Dolphins, averaging 12 disposals and three intercepts while going at 79 per cent kicking efficiency. He also starred in VAFA B-Grade competition for premiership winners Old Haileybury, with Turner named at full back in the team of the year. The Demons already picked up unknown VAFA prospect Oliver Sestan in November’s rookie draft. Could it be a similar story?” I’m not sure where they got the idea that Oliver Sestan was from the VAFA - he actually played in the Goulburn Valley Under 18s and at school with Xavier College but not with their Old Collegians in the Ammos.

Demons Facebook announcing arrivals for 2023 Preseason Training. Good to see that Josh Schache is keen and hungry …

And (belatedly) the Herald Sun has confirmed in an on line thread entitled “AFL off-season: What your club’s players are up to over Christmas break” “THE BRAYSHAWS “As they usually do, Angus and Andrew Brayshaw did their 100 100m runs on Christmas Day. “The Melbourne and Fremantle stars gruelling session at Christmas have now been replicated by other players keen to get an edge on the rest of the competition”.

I don’t think he was ever “pinched” from us. Gold Coast was entitled to nominate him under the rules set down by the AFL and they validly did so. End of story.

This is the one from West Adelaide, isn’t it? In which case no rules have been broken.

Special tribute to the late Ritchie Benaud on the second day of the Boxing Day test as Australia reaches 2/222.

… and the answer is “Boak”.

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.