Elwood 3184

Egan’s employment with Xavier College includes a position with the Old Xaverians as “Head of Development”. There is disquiet within the amateurs football community about the growing disparity between the haves and the have nots. Clubs like Xavs will prosper because of this and similar arrangements and good luck to them but other clubs will fall by the wayside in the post Covid environment.

And this has now included a third club. Gold Coast has traded its pick 37 for Carlton’s future third on traded from Sydney.

Carlton and Sydney executing a pick swap. Swans get pick 48 and a future third rounder Carlton get pick 31

Agree with the compliments to @Gawndog98. Great work! A few issues for me. I think Adelaide will take Riley Thilthorpe with its first pick. He’s local and he’s versatile - can play ruck and key forward. Collingwood’s early draft position is currently picks 14 and 16. I don’t see therefore where you have come in with them using pick 17 and then exercising an NGA pick in McInnes. I’m expecting the Magpies to take the precaution of moving up with one pick and out with another to shore up its position with McInnes. I don’t have an issue with your two picks for Melbourne at 23 and 24 - they could go in many different directions depending on how earlier selections fall and we don’t have much control over them save a possible swap to improve position. I suspect if we could do such a thing, the change wouldn’t be earth shattering. Baldwin is a highly speculative pick given his two ACLs. We have Max around to guide him but it’s an enormous risk for us to take. I think someone like Geelong would probably be better suited in time and patience for him to develop. Finally, we only have three draft picks so we won’t be using pick 50.

I understand that the AFL didn’t accept Collingwood’s submission regarding the Beams payout which means they still have a $1m salary cap issue going forward for the next two seasons. The bottom line might have to be some further delistings before the next list announcement.

Knightmare must think that Melbourne’s hunting for midgets. He has us being outbid by Sydney for a 171cm NGA pick before Berry and later on by a 172cm Fremantle NGA player. Apart from Kozzie, we still have Spargo, Chandler and Bedford - all small fellers.

How many players are still not contracted and how many spots does the club have available for the draft?

Shocking list management and a PR disaster for the Pies.

There have been suggestions that now we’re keeping Tom McDonald, we might not require an additional back up ruckman at the club.

HUGE!!!

There’s a snippet in The Age about Melbourne having an interest in Shaun McKernan (although the Saints appear to be front runners for him ATM).

The Nev Jetta story keeps on resurfacing despite denials all over the place. Is there anything to this story or is Nixon pulling our legs?

Oscar will most likely end up a delisted free agent.

This is probably the most interesting time of the year outside the playing season. Strong and effective trading and list management can play a big part in how the team fares in the year ahead.

Young Tiernan Stynes (son of Jimmy) looks like being another tall potential father son and he’s around 14/15 years old. Apparently, he’s a top basketballer at under 16 level. Imagine Stynes and White as young talks playing with a mature Luke Jackson in a few years time!

Sadly, beyond redemption. No.

Scully? Don’t recall him playing for Melbourne. My only memory of him is as a fringe player at Hawthorn.

We’re a much different club playing in a much different competition than 10 years ago. There’s no status quo and nobody’s going to let a club go to Tassie under your conditionsZ

Sadly, Chris Michaliades passed away this week aged 29. He represented the VFL and also played for Port Melbourne.

After Port Adelaide beat Melbourne by 51 points (after a 4 day break), Glen Bartlett publicly excoriated the team and the media joined the chorus. All I’ve seen so far from the media was the commentators saying they did well after a tough year and a massive win last week. And Eddie sulked ...

If one of those commentators mentions that a player kicked to a dangerous spot again, I’ll explode.

There would be more than a few clubs who have been in touch with management of both players.

If healthy, I would clear space to have him at the club.

In that case, why not keep Preuss?

Actually, if Naitanui plays against the Doggies in Round 16 we would have been a finals side.