Its Time for Another

Interesting binman. What a minefield that decision is going to be next season. Petty clearly is holding his arm. It's one thing to push someone but surely it's another to actually grab hold of their arm and hold onto it to twist their body away from the contest. I thought the only change to the rules was that you can put hands on the back now as long as it isn't a push. Good luck to the poor umpires deciding when hands in the back are or aren't a push. If I was a forward I'd just lung forward just a bit when I feel the hands on my back. How could an umpire tell if it is a push or a dive. I can hear the supporters howls from here. Including mine. And it's probably not the umpires fault. Talking about rule changes. I can't believe they didn't do away with the ruckman having to nominate and just give a free if two players from the same team go up in the ruck contest. That rule very nearly cost us a finals spot thanks to Dangerfield's antics. The other is the protected area. I guess that can be fixed by interpretation rather than changing the rule itself. But this season this rule was completely inconsistent and potentially disastrous in several games.

When I started going to thre footy you could watch the U19’s, Reserves then the Seniors. From memory Robbie Flower went through all 3 in the one season by May. and never left the Seniors.

I've got SpecSavers. I better swap.

When I was there last week I was standing next to someone and we identified the drone and couldn't believe how steady it was. Just didn't move. We looked again some time later and it was still rock solid in exactly the same position. I was fascinated then realised why it was so steady. It actually wasn't a drone it was a street lamp. I'd be taking my training reports with a grain of salt if I get back there again. I now fear I might have given a training report on the Melbourne Storm by accident.

As a Junior coach I always followed the AFL bred philosophy. Train like you play. In this case this would clearly be a free against Petty. Don't see the point of this other than a good philosophical exercise for Nietschke in practicing body contact.

Thanks again Six6Six. As usual an outstanding set of photos.

Now that you mention that I have seen him doing that. Would love to find out from him if that's actually what he's doing. Another question for Saty to ask.

I have some mates i ride with in Melbourne from time to time and also out of town. Maybe we could link up for a cruise to Mordialloc and a coffee with them at some stage. We went up to Bright in April and rode Hotham and Buffalo. Great experience. Maxy Gawn rode the 3 Peaks challenge last year which is Tawonga Gap, Hotham and the back of Falls Creek. It has a time limit. Amazing effort for anyone but especially someone who's 208cm. No doubt set up his pre season when could walk again.

Interesting info. I only ran a few 400's. Isn't it known as the toughest race because its the perfect distance for lactic acid overload. I remember completely seizing up after a couple. I wasn't much of a runner. Where do you ride? Is it Adelaide?

Nice. You have to be a certain age to get that. I did 1500's at school and 800's a bit after school. Broke an ankle playing footy in my late 20's that was the end of the very mediocre running and playing career. Been a cyclist every since. Alas only worked out how to stop throwing up a few years ago on the other side of middle age. There's a lot of people who would have preferred I'd worked that out many decades ago.

Thanks Dazzle. That’s high praise coming from you. Alas I’m lucky to get to training once every few years.

I would love to do that at some stage. This Saturday is crazy. Have 3 functions we’re meant to be going to. One of them in Melbourne which it looks like the better half is going to fly down to after we’ve spent all day at another one.

Were you a runner Ernest?

Good news. Just read someone on the Melbourne Football Club, The Mighty Demons Facebook page saying he attended training from the beginning and Lever was there running laps. But someone else posted an article saying he's not expecting to be back until mid season. Not sure if that's true or not but I thought ACL's were generally 12mths so that would be right. Might also be going super conservative after Docherty at Carlton ruptured his again yesterday after just coming back from 12mths recovery.

Yeh I agree. I thought cameras on phones was going to be a gimmick. But they turned out not to be. I wouldn't have had a camera with me as I wasn't planning to be there. I tried to play with them a bit but the quality deteriorated too much. But I was surprised how good they are considering they're just from a phone.

These photos are off my iPhone so apologies for quality. These are a sequence of the players doing the 150m sprints in pairs. You can see from the faces how hard they are working. This is KK and J Smith who were always the lead pair. You can see the next pair just starting. That's Miso first in on the right. He had a stop watch and was counting them off. A lot of them had their own heart rate monitors and timers on their wrists. ANB and T Mac. You can see how they've matched pairs in their running ability Good to see Fritschy already in his second season matched with the Skipper Sparg's not throwing up yet but in a feet not touching the ground mood with JKH Good to see Melk back in the main group at least for running and with his best mate. This is why we got both of them These guys were always the last pair. Maynard is just getting back into full training after 6 months or so out. Not sure why Frosty is there.They weren't lagging too far behind although Maynard was tiring by the end. These two were separated from the rest. I reckon it's another sign of how professional the training is nowadays. Ruckmen clearly can't run like elite running midfielders so why make them try to compete against people they can't and don't need to because they have a different role. But put them against someone else they are closely matched two and they'll be able to push each other much further. Same goes for all the other pairs. It's smart organisation and attention to detail. What I also really like about this photo is the look on Gawny's face. This is not the joker Gawny face, this is the professional sportsman driving himself to continue to be the best player in the competition in his role. That is the very serious Gawny face fighting the pain barrier. You can also see what a monster Preussy is. This photo doesn't do him justice. He looks about 20% wider than Gawny. He's a huge package. I'm sure having Gawn to compete against constantly will be raising the bar for both of them. I'd love to know what it's like compared to what he was doing at North. Saty good question for you to find out. Best mates paired together. Attention to detail again. Happy players. Successful team. You can see the pain Hibbo's putting himself through. This is the preparation stuff we don't usually know about during the season. Funnily enough Melksh looks like he's suffering less even though he's just coming out of rehab. Shows you how they stay in rehab a long time because when they are released they are back up to the standard of the main group and can slot straight in to the main training. Wagner brothers paired together. I guess they did a lot of this at Casey but they must be loving it with the big boys. Petty is keeping up with them pretty comfortably. He looks like he's a very good package of skill and athleticism. This is the group jogging back between 150m sprints running past the trainers in red who were picking balls up for them to pass to each other and back as they jogged back to start the next 150m.

Rose Bay. We actually met on a tour of the AAMI facilities some years ago. From memory your son played junior footy at Newtown and mine played for Easts Bulldogs and I coached there up to U17's. Hopefully your son's fully recovered from his ACL.

Photographic proof.

Two injury issues which I really hope aren't significant. I turned up half an hour in from when they were due to start but Lever wasn't there. He was due to resume today after his "minor" procedure last week. Hope he's ok. Jack Viney was already finished by the time I arrived. Really hope there's not an issue here. The Club said he had "ankle" surgery. That seemed strange. Hope it wasn't more surgery on the foot. He's not able to do anything like the running yet of other rehabers. Does anyone have any info about either of these two.

I spent a night researching what makes you throw up in extreme exertion. It's a critical overload of acidic carbon dioxide in your stomach which you don't expel under exertion because you breath too fast and shallow to expel it all. The acid builds up in your stomach until it reaches a critical point and you have to throw up to get rid of it. I started breathing very deeply on major hill climbs. In order to do it I had to gulp air like a goldfish. Didn't look pretty but I've never thrown up again. I eventually adjusted to breath deeply without looking and feeling like a goldfish.

Dropped in to the Demons Shop for a birthday present for our "3" legged friend. That photo is not a thank you smile. I have a feeling its a WTF have you done to me now. Anyway I love it. So does my son. My wife and daughter who are the dogs alpha and beta weren't impressed. Especially when they found out how much it cost.

Had a good chat to Charlie Spargo at the end. He said he didn't expect to play so many games and to walk straight in and play finals after the teams been out of them for so long. I told him I read about him throwing up in the last session. He said some do some don't and he seems to be one that does. I gave him my secret tip on how to stop throwing up in intense exertion as I used to do it all the time bike riding at the top of hills. He liked it and said he's going to try it. So when he starts blitzing next year, you'll all secretly know why.

Thanks for the compliments everyone. It was great to make a training session and see what the recruits etc look like up close and personal. Not too close and personal though. Age is nasty. I really need those optical sunglasses. Couldn't see what the rehab group were doing on the other side of the ground and like when you know you are old when the Police start looking very young, the new draftees look like babies. They're now younger than my son. Oi! But all jokes aside the draftees other than Tom Sparrow do look very light and look like they are going to need quite a lot of building up. Toby Bedford was a standout in that bunch and Sparrow looks pretty good. I didn't really see it but apparently Jordan's kick is a real weapon. Bradtke is a stick. Agree. The kicking out drill just shows you they are working on new strategies all the time. I still hold great hopes that Frosty will come good by fixing the brain fades. He's a special package of height, strength, agility and speed. Garlett looks much happier. Looked like he was enjoying himself which is the main sign I reckon we want to see from him. He just oozes class. If you marked a virtual cross in front of a player and said drop a ball right there with just the right amount of force, he'd hit the spot every time. Can't help but think that silky delivery is best used entering 50m. He's such a born footballer, knows how to read a game so well and such natural talent. He looks like he's never going to build into a big bodied player but you can see a lot more muscle definition already. There's been many great players over the years who are no bigger than him. Baker has bulked up a lot. Still just running laps while he gets the conditioning after doing those hammies at the end of the season. Petty is another that oozes class. Silky skills. Good pace for his build. Was holding his own in the 150m running drills. Apparently regarded very highly internally. Not quite sure how things will end up for him with May, Lever, O Mac, Frost, J Smith, Keilty, etc etc. Smith will play a different role. Maybe he'll end up being better than O Mac and Frost. Otherwise not sure. same for Keilty. Jeez May is a good package. On top of everything we now about him as an elite full back his skills are elite and he has really good agility and pace for his size. He's one of the most significant pickups we've had. I guess because he's a backman and not a midfielder or key forward his move to us didn't get the same amount of coverage as others but he's a significant pickup.

Couldn't agree more. Fingers crossed the footy gods smile on him and he gets an injury free crack at it. He is a very impressive looking package with height, strength, speed, solid skills, a bit of his father's aerobatic flare but my feeling is whether he gets it all firing at the right time will make or break him in 2019.

Training just finished. Dashing to the airport now. Can answer questions later. Will try to post some picks but will be of players running and kicking. Nothing special there.