Its Time Again

Just watched Burgo's Crows knock off the Dogs in Ballarat. Have to say work rate really stood out. I used to say there was a good Melbourne and a bad Melbourne. The good one ran and created options in defence and attack the bad one didn't and didn't do either. If you're not fit enough you just can't do the necessary running required in today's game. It's quite instructive to see how Burgo has weaved his magic already at Crows and how quickly they have become competitive. I'll never forget speaking to Flash at the 2011 B & F and he was saying Bailey was trying to get them to play a game plan they couldn't play. They were too young to have the running power to run up and down the ground the way he wanted them to. No doubt he was right about the game plan he just didn't adjust it to the players capability. This just reinforces what I said elsewhere about a big part of our success now being having a critical mass of players with enough years to be fit enough to have the stamina to compete with the best.

Interesting. I have no idea what stage it's at or how it's going but there doesn't seem to have been much progress since I took the photo below nearly 3 weeks ago on 2 April. I've just remembered I found out recently I know someone who works in there as a groundsman. Don't know if he actually works on Gosch's or just AAMI and others. I've put a request through to a mutual contact for some info on progress and will post if I get a reply.

On 3 August 2021 VIC Govt announced the upgrade which was to start at that time and finish in March 2022 in time for the start of the season.

It was originally planned to be ready to train on in May.

I reckon in the past 18 months this team has taught me more about what it takes to be a great football team than anything I learnt from any other team anywhere since 1964. We seem to be in the eye of a perfect storm that has taken since the end of 2007 to realise. There are so many parts to the equation that without any one part you don't end up being where we are now. I didn't know half those parts until recently. Roosy said before he took the job that the key elements to a successful team were :- - list management/recruiting, - development/conditioning, - coaching. It's fair to say we've learnt the lesson the hard way that list management/recruiting is meaningless without the right development built around it. Cale Morton & Jack Grimes in '07, Watts '08, Scully Trengove '09 were generally regarded in the industry as the players that should have gone at those picks. Who knows what the first 3 might have achieved under the development and culture we now have. There were some nasty misses in the recruiting other than them which cost us many years of development but hindsight doesn't help. In '07 Dangerfield went 10 but 5 other teams didn't take him either. Cyril Rioli went 12 but 10 other teams didn't pick him either. In '08 I'd still have taken Watts over Nic Nat especially given we ended up with Maxy shortly after and Watts ended up being Fritsch. Blease at 17 was a bit nasty when Luke Shuey went the next pick and Jamie Bennell at 35 when we had told Rory Sloane 44, we were taking him at that pick. In '09 Dusty went the pick after Trengove but I doubt he would be the player he is today if he'd gone to us and probably would have left years ago like he nearly did at the Tigers to go to GWS on big bucks and be with his father. Gysberts at 11 was a bit nasty with Daniel Talia 13 & Lewis Jetta 14 (although Melksham 10 has made up for that) Tapscott 18 when Nat Fyfe went 20. When Bails was appointed at the end of 2007 the first thing he said is that it generally takes five years of a group of players playing together to become a contender. I believe this still holds true. Unfortunately that led to his first major mistake which was the philosophy of getting rid of any player that wasn't going to be there in 5 years. It's taken until probably the past 18 months to recover from the vacuum of leadership and experience that created. It's also 5 years of being taught and executing the same evolving gameplan, so you obviously need the same coach. (If it hadn't have been for Pert's review at the end of 2020 and the Board resisting Bartlett's efforts to remove the coach who knows where we would be now but it wouldn't be Premiers that's for sure.) I believe it takes 5 years for players to reach their full physical development so they have the stamina to be able to match or outrun their opponents and the strength to compete against the best. I think we've learnt over the past 18 months that the player driven culture has a lot to do with training standards. Obviously all of this has now come together. Some outstanding recruiting and list management supported with the right development and enough players who have been around long enough to be at the top end of work rate and game style. Goody from day one defined his gameplan philosophy as hard at the contest, attack from defence and holding the ball in the forward line. That's what we've ultimately seen. But it was interesting hearing one of the players saying last year that Chappie had been "banging on" about the defensive structure for years and they had finally got it. One of the things I've picked up the most over the past few years is how important setting up off the ball is. We were still pretty clueless about this in 2020 but there was a major transformation in this over the preseason leading in to 2021 and we are now one of the best at it in the comp which has got a lot to do with how well we are going. There's so much more to it but work rate is also a product of knowing where to be and where to get to a lot of which is off the ball. Go Dees

It’s the hat right ?

I watched Kossie pretty closely last week. He had little to know impact. Seemed lethargic. It's been a pretty slow start to this season and end of last season. I appreciate that he does a lot of pressure work off the ball but he's a fair way off his best. Wonder if they will consider dropping him if this continues. Give Bedford a go.

Great work guys. Asked nearly all the questions I wanted answered.

Agree. Not good news about your Avatar but at least it's 8 weeks and not the season. He's a big loss. Plenty of players who I was wondering would get a game are getting a chance already. There's some excellent depth on the list at the moment.

51,513 Thanks for updating the tally George. It's not even on the club website. We reached that amount around early July last year and mid June in the previous record year. So we are way ahead at this point. We got an extra 13,000 from this date to the end last year so at this point we are heading for at least the early 60,000's. Where it ends up probably depends a bit on how many people were motivated to join earlier than last year and whether it will start to slow or hopefully the opposite.

Thought Irving packed up and went home.

Crows got a pretty kind fixture. Played 5 of the top 6 at home. We played one at home.

Assume the Wookie was playing in the ruck. Dalek? Back pocket?

Sheesh people around you must get frustrated with you. Your own post is right there in black and white and you're trying to deny it. Trying to be pedantic about individual words is ridiculous. You go back and read your own post. You take what an Agent said and turn it into something it wasn't. I've been on here for a long time and you're now only the second person I've put on Ignore.

Mate you've written a post that conveys that an Agent on the doco said something that creates a worry the Club were prepared to trade Jackson. Whereas the Agent on the doco's express words were that Melbourne were not prepared to trade Jackson. A lot of people on here won't have access to that show and you are inventing a damaging falsehood you have taken the time to communicate to them. I call that dangerous. For some reason I had rated you as reliable. Won't be doing that anymore.

On a different note, for those who thought our deal for Jessie Hogan was a dud. Freo let Cerra go for pick 6 and a future third rounder. He had no on or off field baggage and is on his way to being an absolute gun. We got pick 6 and 23 for Hogan who was gone in what two years without hardly playing a game. That's not a comment on Hogan who I wish the best, just a comment on the trades. On another side note. Scully turned into the pick we used to get Hogan who turned into May Kolodjashnij and Sparrow. Thank you Tom. Where is he now?

Come on Lord Nev. Are you suggesting your comments aren't saying you were a tiny bit worried we were offering up Jackson for trade? Irrelevant if you didn't say he was going. The actual words from D'Orazio should have left no room for you to be a tiny bit worried about Melbourne offering up Jackson at all. Frankly it's dangerous to suggest that.

Lord Nev, paraphrasing can lead down rabbit holes that aren't there. D'Orazio said after our presentation. "I got off the Zoom call and Adam and I were chatting and he thought I really want to go to Melbourne." Later they go back to the Cerra situation and D'Orazio says "The main reason he won't pick Melbourne is they won't be able to facilitate a deal." Connors says "Won't trade Luke Jackson." and he says "No. And to their credit their presentation is the best I've ever seen.....They focused on Cez and said why they think they're good and why they think they'll make you great and went through Petracca and Oliver and how they were just good and suddenly they are top 3 players of the Comp." There's nothing obscure there and that's word for word.

I checked back with the Club and they confirmed that it's now 49,667. The guy said his numbers must have been delayed. If that's the case it's been out for weeks which as you say George is quite possible.

How weird is that. I just checked and it definitely said 47,667 then refreshed and it now says 49,667. Only checked after I read coach's post. It's a bit strange that it jumped that much in one day. Has virtually never done that much of a jump by this stage of the year. Wouldn't surprise me if it's meant to be 47k.

I watched it last night for the first time. His agent Robbie D'Orazio (Probably not correct) made it pretty clear he understood he was going to us to be a backup if we get injuries. As you say we recognised we'd had a very good run in 2021 and both the backup mids VDB and Jones are gone. Obviously figure it's too good to be true to have another season with such good luck on the injury front. Also had Tim Lamb, our List Manager on the phone saying we don't have any money but there would be incentives if he plays. So in that context a brilliant cheap pick up for that purpose and who knows what else he might be able to do. There was also a phone conversation with Goody asking him how his endurance is and he said it had improved a lot but he hadn't been given an opportunity to play as an outside mid. Said he was best suited as an inside mid and his best endurance was repeat burst power sprints. So a bit of a hint by him that he wouldn't mind being tried on a wing. Maybe if his fitness is good enough he could play Gus's defensive wing role and free up Gus to go into the guts if we have injuries.

47,667 not 49,667

Emailed club on Monday for updated membership total. As of now it is 46,827. They are pushing for 50,000 for the opening round. To put this in context last year we reached this number around 7 May and 2019 coming off the 2018 success we reached it around 21 April. Go Dees

You're on to something here. I spoke to Jordy McKenzie at the 2011 B & F and asked him what big difference did he notice playing against the top teams like Geelong. I kid you not, he said their butts. They are just so big through the hips and [censored] you just bounce off them when you try to tackle them and they mow through you. Hopefully people don't take this as an opportunity to take pot shots at an ex player.

As long as it’s not the dreaded 426 he’ll be fine. Hunt didn’t just get back to his previous best last season he far exceeded it