52k2

Who said you cant teach an old dog new tricks. The photos are now on flickr under 52k2. How do you post them to this site?

Sorry I cant add anything about Scully, Trengove or Gysberts they must have been on the other side of the oval. One thing on Tapscott, in a drill involving 30mtr kicking between two players, Morton was paired with Taps, I couldnt tell Taps dominate foot and on several kicks Morton took the ball hard and accurate from Taps and said ' missile like '. I guess he was impressed by the accuracy and power of the flat passes. And no I havent figured out how to download photos.

Went to training on Wednesday, took a few photos but dont know how to download them here. Of the players I noticed: Tapscott....... Buggered if I can tell whats his dominant side kicked great with both feet, muscled body: game ready. Maric............ Was in everything, offered himself in the forward line, quick and nippy. Millar..............The standout, ran well, offered himself on multiple leads and generally kicked well. Gawn.............Tall, mainly did forward/backman drills, kicks accurately over 40mtrs[ if a bit high] leads well and fast. Jurrah............ Didnt train with group, did lap work and 30mtr kicking to trainer, looks nearly ready for main group. Davey........... The ball carrier, quick and hard to catch through the center. Bartram......... Trained alot by himself with trainer, just kick to kick. Blease........... Went swimming with Bruce, Jamah and a few more. Frawley.......... Solid session will make it hard for not a few forwards. Green............ Good session, looks very fit and according to him eager to start. Martin............ Did ruck session with Spencer, spent not a little time in the toilet ? MacDonald..... Joel, Good size body, wants badly to get at the bears in round 5, mainly Adcock. Moloney.......... The motivator on the ground, its his voice you here most. Morton............ Still a stick insect, but he just keeps getting on his own and getting the ball. Rivers............. Did everything looks good and ready for 2010. Sylvia............. Great body tone, takes everybody on, I think he finally believes in himself. Warnock......... Very solid and didnt do anything wrong. Watts..............Has put on muscle, looks much better, looks taller? Wona.............. Went flat out all session, hope fore a good year. Sorry if I forgot anybody, just ask away if you have any questions. Its hard to get near all the players with the construction going on. Here's a piece of useless gossip, as we were leaving in the car along the Cranboure/Berrick road there were three enginneers inspecting the rail crossing/ railbed/ dont know what it means if anything??????

Can anyone tell me when the training sessions are for next week? and where. Happy New Year and let the games begin.

As an old bugger I can remember talking to John Northey at the family day in 1986. We were at the MCG huddling under a tree as it was pouring rain at the time. He was fending off questions from all the people equally caught under that big tree.[bless it] One of the questions asked was where would we finish next year, 1987? Guess what, he didnt say third, he talked about finishing further up the ladder. We had alot of young players and we were off, a great ride that didnt go all the way, nearly, an injury to Gary and a bit of luck, who knows? What I am trying to say is, it is possible, has been done before. We know about Scully and Trentgove what they could do or be, but I believe that the clubs dynamics, the way we play the game, not good or bad, but the style will hinge on Gown and Tapscott. They add an X factor to the club, rest Gown in the forward line and watch the defenders cringe. I am not saying they will set the heavens alight in their first game but it makes the DEES a much more potent outfit. Can you imagine the small forwards licking their lips around Gown in the forward line. ONE TEAM ONE TOWN ONE WIN EVERY WEEK

So yet more emerges about fifa demands, Boy have I been silly for alot of years. I thought the Romanov's were killed by the commos in 1917 when they just fled to Geneva and changed their name to Fifa. I wasnt against the world cup being held here but they [fifa] are surely testing my resolve. I still cant believe the sheer arrogance of fifa, dont they and their slavish underlings have any idea the harm they will do to the local sports. If they wanted to compete on a level playing field fair enough, not come in and napalm the locals, and then accuse the locals of being anti soccer. You soon become anti anything when they hold a gun to your head. To survive the terrible merger years, go down hill on and off the field and finally have light at the end of the tunnel, only to cop a napalming from foreign latte sucking nuf heads, ITS WAR. They can now stuff off with their round ball, privileged members and hold their ego fest and anything else they want to hold in iceland or somewhere where the locals will bend over for them.

You are right adelaide Demon we invited fifa here with a bid for the world cup. Its like inviting someone to your home for a dinner party, they accept and then lay out their conditions no make that demands for attendance. The menu has to be changed, also theres a pub down the road that they think would be a better venue also 6 oclock would be better than 7. I noticed you stayed well away from who pays the piper, a bit of a tufy that one. WELL WHO PAYS? It will be millions, many many millions, take our losses and multiply that by 18[no of afl teams] and you start to get an idea of the potential pay out by someone. Who pays, ffa they dont have that sort of money. Well they will make a good starting point to sue for loss of earnings. Thats only the afl how many teams in how many codes will be affected. Its no good saying its many years till the possible event happens they will sort something out in the mean time. Not good enough, I dont like signing blank cheques that only might have the details filled in before their drawn. My club is that important to me to want to see the details up front not when some sports politician in Geneva decides us footy pleds deserve an answer, whatever it is. In other words in plain english the latte set in Geneva dont care about footy just the world game so really we should be getting down on our knees thanking them for even looking in our direction. FINALLY WHO PAYS please explain.

FIFA only has the power if we stand by and let them dictate their terms to us. I am soooo grateful Mr Buckley would allow the MFC to play our games in Canberra that year, if in fact we get the cup. Can you imagine the Queens birthday game against collingwood, boy would we rake in the money from the huge attendance. That is my chief problem with this whole idea, will we be compensated for the loss of money? By whom? How much? Or are the footy supporters going to subside soccer through loss of money. If soccer is so terrific, great, fantastic the world game why does the A league average less than 6000 people a game? Or do the enlightened ones [read soccer supporters] only worry going to international events as the local scene is so crap. Before we go madly tripping down the world cup road, surely those are questions that need, No must be answered. As supporters who go week in week out we need these answers before we sign anything. If you think I am anti soccer I dont really care, to me the MFC comes first,second or third and soccer comes a very distant 427th. No matter how you manage that season we will lose money based purely on attendance only. One last thing why are we the footy supporters the ignorant ones? After all we arnt the ones coming in to somebodies patch telling them, No demanding that they change everything, venues,dates,attendances and maybe even things we dont know of yet! If you believe this world cup wont have any impact, let alone the potential to have a major impact on our finances you are according to the great one "DREAMING'. We deserve to be told all up front, unless soccer just dosnt care and they continue to treat us as flies on the wall to just squash.

Once again I will ask the same question I asked the previous page........ WHAT ARE FIFA SO AFRAID OF LOCAL COMPETITION FOR? To say they arnt, why do they DEMAND that, not ask nicely or even plead or beg NO!!!!!!!!! they DEMAND. And as a reason for giving soccer everything they demand is because more people do soccer than footy, that is plain dumb, follow that logic through. The most popular surname in the world is NG, is that your surname, if not why not. More people have that name than any other. You can do any thing with figures cant you, now back to my footy club. I dont want the mighty DEES to struggle and fight to get out of debt and then have some no name nuf head from god knows where make decisions to put us straight back in the red. If they want to have the soccer world cup here good luck to them, but DONT destroy my club in the process. This is for the soccer wantabees, am I over reacting? I dont know, no one in soccer is coming clean on what they DEMAND. They operate in a news black hole, they want your commitment first then they tell you what you just committed to. And finally again why are they so afraid of competition?

I barrack for the dees and only the Dees, I dont barrack for leeds, porto, juvuntus or any other soccer team. Any action that gives rise to a potential weakening of my club I am against. Now you may call me anything you choose, TUF! Now we have the name calling out of the way lets look at this proposal. If what is reported is incorrect and only 8 weeks are lost at the G and ALL OTHER VENUES, so be it, after all you need time to reconfigure all the venues. 4 weeks of games and 4 weeks to reconfigure [ dont you love that word]. So either you have the slowest and dumbest people requiring 4 weeks to paint some lines on the ground and place 2 gaols OR you need time to place seating out on the ground[thats my bet]. If has happened for concerts on grass grounds, the seating damages the surface of the grass, and at those times the seating and stage are only down for a few days. Just imagine what the surface will be like if it is covered for 6 weeks, 4 for games and 2 of the 4 reconfigure weeks. It will be unusable for weeks after the latte set have jetted home. But wait theres more. There are 3 options as I can see, 1 No AFL that season..... It would kill most clubs, after all contracts still have to be paid and you just cant tell all the people employed by footy Australia wide to take an unpaid year off. Then there is the media rights, paid for but not delivered, ground contracts and all this for a few weeks of soccer. 2. Shorter season........... Contracts would still have to be paid out in full, media and SPONSOR deals still to be honoured. Games played at smaller venues, less crowd, less money. 3. Same length season.... Games would be played all over the place anywhere with gaol posts and grass. Less crowds means less money, less exposure media wise, less corporate sponsership. And this only applies to the AFL, what about the VFL, NRL, Union, SANFL, WAFL and all the rest, pray tell who is going to pay compensation to all these bodies? I probably just scrapped the surface with compensation issues. This is my final point, if soccer is so great and universal Why is fifa so scared of local competition ?

DB deserves more time, most people over the last 2 years have been screaming for him to produce loss after loss. He has done that with not a little class and cunning. Now people are screaming[ once again] but now he has to produce wins or he is out, give the man a break! I believe at times DB has shown us some of the future, the game against essendon in the third qtr he put Jurrah and Watts across the half forward line by themselves and we didnt look half bad going forward in an otherwise bad game. i think between them they kicked 4 and we looked like a team. But having seen that for nearly a qtr he quickly changed it all round and we never saw that again. I believe he saw what he wanted and didnt want anyother team to notice. Also the game against carlton, Jamah kicked 5, thats proberly half of his total goals. ND believed resting ruckman should sit the pine, DB [i think] likes them on the ground. Over the past couple of years resting ruckmen in their forward line [ particulary last qtrs ] have cost us games. A different coach, a different style of game and certainly a different class of cattle. Lets hold on tight and see how far we go. ONE TOWN ONE TEAM ONE WIN EVERY WEEK

When all the hype and chest beating is left out of the posts it all comes down to this...... 2010 Over the last week or so I have been watching the DVD's of this year, watching certain players, not the game. I was surprised by how well Jamar did latter in the year, he not only held his own but won his position, and played the team game. Its surprising how many times he tapped cleanly to his mids. As I said before 2010 is the year for decisions for, PJ [who I like] , Spencer and Meeson. It wouldnt harm if we got a ruckman this year to give us an option after the 2010 cull. Not all of those three will make it.

I cant answer why but I believe it isnt only success, or a cup as the only answer. This is a quote from the 'Annual Report' for 1960, page 15 under the heading 'Finance' " Sales of membership tickets for the year were 3584 Senior tickets and 856 Juniors. It is impossible to understand why we should have such a small number of tickets sold when one considers the success that the team has enjoyed over the past years" In other words stuffed if I know, but what I believe is that we have the largest core of ' always supporters'. We are there no matter what.

This will be my final post on this site[ thank god a lot of you are saying] so I will have my opinion on the above question. Please put up with this answer as it will ramble a bit as thats the way my memory is. The essence of a footy club is different for each person,to me its remembering a lanky kid being given the megaphone to arrange the kids foot races at a family day in the mid 80s outside the G, nobody could understand a word he was saying, his name Jim Stynes. Seeing Tony Campbell play on Dunstall two weeks in a row at full back and beating him both times, we won both games and kicked hawthorn out of the finals. Allan Jakovich at vic park being dragged in the fist half and the collingwood hags giving him a real hard time coming off, back on in the third qtr. kick a clean half dozen, we win and boy did he go to the boundary and put it up the hags, but best of all walking out of the ground my wife and I singing out loudly 'the collywobbles are back again. The first game of robbie, we didnt know what we were in for, 1st final against nth in 87 robbie killing them in the gaol square, rd 22 87 at footscray the cheer that went up when people with trannys said dunstall had just put hawks up late in the final qtr. I didnt know how to buy a finals ticket, never had to. The great times the not so great times, merger, Troy Broaddbridge memorial game ,truely a moving game and the boys didnt let him down. a tear in the eye. Farmers 9.1 against collingwood, Paul Johnsons run down against bris last year. A young kid called Davey no one would look at, those idiots in the afl area wearing those t shirts with RIVERS written on them. Great times, great club, the pink lady evening, magic really magic, well done and great to see the club become the conscious of the league. We should go back there. The club is many things to many people, How I would love a flag, but to me the flag isnt the club, its part of the club, so I will disappear into the past and enjoy my little bit of paradise [ my seat at the G]. EVERY WEEK EVERY WIN EVERY YEAR GO DEES.

Sorry 'Roost it' I only saw your answer after I replied to another poster[ I am a slow typist]. No I have never seen a MFC day flag as I only came to Melb. in Dec 70, and the girl I went out with was a DEES supporter , so I chose to barrack for the DEES. I shudder to think what would have happened if she had barracked for someone else [ Collingwood...... spew, shudder, toilet] So I have not seen one, but theres still time.