Whispering_Jack

Trengove blitzed in the second quarter. He's elusive, clever and oozes class. Brad Green is just ahead of him for BOG honours. James Frawley is the best of the defenders. Jack Grimes and Beamer doing well in the middle and Joel McDonald is doing well in defence. The Russian is dominating the ruck duels against Stef Martin. The general skills are reasonable for this stage of the season. Missing are Watts, Bate, PJ, Garland, Meesen, Bruce, Wonaeamirri, Tapscott, Gawn and Blease. For those interested in totally useless trivia the Reds lead the Whites 9.6.60 to 6.3.39 at half time.

I'm sure the score's pretty much irrelevant but the red team leads 6.2.38 to the white team 1.2.8. Jake Spencer opened proceedings with the first two goals. Brad Green is all class as usual. Trengove best of the new boys.

And that list gives us a good indication as to which of the MFC listed players won't be playing tomorrow: 4. Jack Watts 6. Matthew Bate 11. Paul Johnson 20. Colin Garland 26. John Meesen 33. Austin Wonaeamirri 35. Luke Tapscott 46. Sam Bleese All players who have been under an injury cloud and whose numbers are being used by the Casey top up players.

Thanks TT's Demons and welcome to Demonland. I wonder however, if the numbers on the club's site are going to correspond with the numbers of the players in the intraclub game. I read somewhere that some Casey lads were training and could be used as top up players so it would help if we knew their numbers.

Some clubs are more advanced in their marketing than others and a few have already had their first intra club games and radio promotions. Carlton's figures are remarkably low which might reflect low expectations or the fact that their fans are disillusioned by the events of the last 6 months.

After years of seeing Crawford act the fool on The Footy Show I still can't take him seriously. While the proposition that our skill levels are below par might be correct (especially as we have the AFL's youngest list), I don't believe that it's possible to make that assessment on the basis of a number of attendances at pre season sessions - especially if that number is, as I suspect, one or none. For heaven's sake, we haven't had an intraclub match yet, let alone a NAB Cup game and we all know how unreliable they are as indicators of skill levels and of how teams are likely to perform in the coming season. My guess is that Crawford is doing what he's best at when he tries to be humurous on TFS i.e improvising and, as usual, he's not being funny or clever. That said, we have a lot of work ahead of us to get off the bottom but Crawf's been good enough to hand us that little bit of incentive for the season ahead. Not that it's needed in football these days, but we do play his old side Hawthorn in the opening round and the Hawks will be vulnerable without Buddy and a few others. Round 1 would be a good time to prove Crawf wrong IMO.

Hi Dappa. 2fa has every right to post here as you do and there's no reason why he/she should keep his/her "trap shut". There's also no reason to resort to this sort of thing in discussion here: "Then you're a moron 2fa. Simple as that." Most of our posters who visit this thread are interested in what happened at training on 5/2/10 and not on personal diatribes. Please take note of what Fan said immediately after your last post.

You can't blame the Blues because they were only following Andy Demetriou's orders after the AFL investigated the notorious booze cruise and specifically warned Kernahan and the Carlton board that the team had to stay dry!

I was a bit surprised when I heard the date for the family day at Luna Park as being the day after the intraclub game at Casey Fields. That makes it 14 February which is the Big Sunday at the St. Kilda Festival. That means big crowds, car parking hassles and queuing forever for the rides. Then. on the way home, you have to hurdle over the drunks in the streets. I'm not sure that's the right atmosphere for family day.

He just came right out with the statement when asked by The Ox about his reaction. I have a feeling that he might have regretted saying it as soon as the words left his mouth but good luck to him. You hear so many players over the years getting interviewed and giving us BS, it was refreshing to see somebody tell the truth.

My highlight was Jimmy. He's lean and has a shaven head but he's still Jimmy and in his adversity he's still looking strong and, as always, courageous. What a great leader! A few other heroes from bygone days were there - Ron Barassi, Brian Dixon, Noel Mahon and, of course, Stewie Spencer. The introduction of some of the recruits was terrific. Tom Scully is so cool for an 18 year old that I'm inclined to call him "the Ice Man". He answered the questions of The Ox and CC seriously and earnestly. You can tell that he's really driven and determined to succeed. However, I would like to see him lighten up and smile a bit. Surely, life isn't all serious? Jack Trengove is a bit more laid back and yet very cool in his own way. Joel McDonald is, of course, a more mature age player who looks a bit like Ben Stiller and who isn't a big fan of The Fev. The explanation by Bails about the injury situation was comforting. I think jayceebee has covered it pretty well. It seems that the only players who are longish term injured are PJ and John Meesen. He was quite positive about the ability of players like Matty Bate, Mark Jamar and Aussie to be ready to play at some stage during the NAB Cup series. And after the song was sung they showed film of the recruits. Max is going to be an imposing player one of these days.

There was no mention made of their jumper numbers. In question time Bails was asked about the players in rehab. In respect to Blease, he said that he was going well at training. He is running off the line and is showing good pace. He is kicking the ball and has also put on a couple of kgs. He recently had a bone scan and got the "all clear". He just needs to regain confidence in his ankle.

A lot. Standing room only. The Ox and CC interviewing some of the recruits.

5 Jordan Gysberts 9 Jack Trengove 28 Joel McDonald 31 Tom Scully 35 Luke Tapscott 37 Max Gawn 48 Jack Fitzpatrick Also Matthew Warnock gets # 1, Jordie McKenzie # 13, Liam Jurrah # 24 and Rohan Bail # 44.

Barry Prendergast spoke about the club's recruiting. The emphasis has been on finding players who can contest the ball and win in the middle. Tom Scully is an elite runner with a great work ethic - a committed professional. Jack Trengove moved from the national championships up to senior football. He finds space and puts the ball to his team's advantage. Jordan Gysberts has elite hands, plays inside and is tall for a midfielder. We wanted talls - especially Max Gawn and Jack Fitzpatrick but we wanted someone of quality. Luke Tapscott is a big bodied midfielder, has a bit of "prick" in him and has a great kick. Max is 207cm and Jack, another tall who won the repeat speed test at the draft camp. Joel McDonald has tremendous experience in the backline and that rounds off our drafting process. The jumper presentation is to follow.

Dean Bailey spoke of two years of significant changes, it's been tough but our membership is still growing. We need to show more improvement to reward those who showed their faith. We're here to provide an environment in which we can win games and premierships. This involves time and putting games into the young players at the club. With continuity comes success. Our recruiting has been focussed toward success. The young players recently drafted are exciting - not just the early picks. Everyone's working hard including a number from the group who have been around a little. Jared Rivers and Brent Moloney have had outstanding summers - they have had their best pre-seasons yet. Players must earn their places in the team. We need to sustain an attitude that will win us games. Pre season has been good with the players working hard - we need to get better at kicking and decision-making. We need to score, to defend better and win in the middle. Suggested we'll have some smiles on our faces as the season progresses

Cam Schwab spoke about the plan ie the red and blueprint which gained it's initial integrity and momentum from Jim. Spoke of the club's legacy - it's ethos which is the basis for decision making. We look at our brand, our team, our resources and our community. If Cam comes onto Demonland he can expand on this but I'm not worthy of expressing his words. Cam said it was an indictment that we're stil training at Junction Oval but the good news is we move into our new facilities in the Melbourne Park precinct. We have a 21 year lease at Casey Fields reviewable by us every five years. We will be looking at possibilities with a planned development at the Docklands. Cameron stated that we're becoming the club we want to be and we're on track! He finished by presenting Stuart Spencer with the 1956 Bluey Truscott Cup. Stuart was winner in 1955 and 56 but never collected his cup because he went to Tassie at the end of the season.

The club's accountant spoke. He was very entertaining for an accountant and there were no questions. Bottom line is that the club made a small operating profit and, thanks to debt demolition, club debt has been reduced to $1.5m. The situation is improving but we are still reliant on the AFL and the MCC so we're not out of the woods yet. AGM over. Now down to the MIN.

The way the four recipients (and the skipper who presented them) proved everything Jimmy said in his introduction.

Jimmy opened proceedings. "We have good people at the club - players, board and administration. We have a great coach who knows where we're going, we know how long it takes and we'll get there!" Cameron Bruce and Brad Green have just been awarded life memberships. Two more about to be awarded, my guess is Paul Wheatley and Matthew Whelan.

I still see Mark Jamar as the key to our ruck problems at least in the short term. If he can stay healthy from now on and if he can continue to improve as he did on the rare occasions that we saw him in 2009 then he should be able to hold the fort till the younger brigade develops. What did surprise me was the fact that they're still looking at Jack Grimes as a defender. My thinking has been that he's more than ready for a midfield role.

The NAB Cup provides a perfect opportunity for experimenting and I'm all for the idea of giving Stef Martin a run as a ruckman. He fits the prototype of the mobile ruckman that worked successfully for both Brisbane (Clark) and Essendon (Ryder) where the stand ins probably did better than the regular ruckman each of them replaced. Martin should still have back up in the form of Mark Jamar and Jake Spencer who should be recovered enough in 3 weeks' time to be able to get through about 25% of game time each first up. There's a few others who could pinch hit if needed - like Brad Miller.

Just on the "beep test" that kicked off training. Apparently, it's a slight variation on what we know as the beep test and it's called "the yoyo test". This is from Nathan Jones' Twitter from yesterday - Not so long ago such a test would have been won by Cam Bruce with daylight second. Goes to show we're going to have some fit boys going through the midfield from now on.

jayceebee31. We had no problem at all with missing out. The club is entitled to structure its training as it wishes. There are important reasons for conducting beep tests - all clubs are continually assessing the progress of their players and this was obviously the appropriate time to carry the tests out. The good thing was that there were people there from the club keeping the small crowd of Demon supporters informed as to what was happening and when the players were expected to return so we weren't kept in the dark at all. Anyhow, I got to see very little of the training because we had to leave for an appointment elsewhere. I did manage to catch a sight of Luke Tapscott limbering up. When I saw vision of him playing for North Adelaide in a SANFL final my concern was his heavy set build, particularly the big calves which suggested possible weight problems down the track. I hope it's not my imagination but he looked a bit more chiselled and showing the benefits of the training regimen at elite level. This is in line with comments I am hearing to the effect that the club's preparation of its players is becoming more and more professional and we are finally catching up to the big name clubs. BTW it's part and parcel of that professionalism that requires the club to make the development of its players the # 1 priority and we should be thankful for that and not complain about little things like the players doing their part of their training elsewhere. In the end, hopefully it will translate into a more successful club and that's what IMO really counts.

That's right. When Barassi left I think the idea was to groom him (no pun intended) as a ruck rover but it didn't work out because he was injured. He also had to fill in at times in the ruck in a team that lacked strength in that division. He did surprisingly well for someone who was not that much over 6 feet tall.