jabberwocky

Nah dime a dozen midfielders like him grow on trees.

Agree with everything in that statement.

One came runner up in a B and F in his first real year of footy, his development stagnated this year but he will continue to develop. IMO Jones will become a clearance machine once he corrects a few mental flaws. The other is a strong forward with a big left foot and a big engine who is also developing and had a few poor games at the end of the season. Young players will be inconsistent, many mature to become very good footballers, some dont. You dont trade players too early in thier development, it will come back to bite you. We are trading FOR young talent not THE young talent. Trade the older blokes.

Yeah lets trade them for some young players who have show something???????????????

No thanks, I think it would be better to give the spot on the list to a young player than to cabbage. We don't need cabbage, we need some god red meat. The one thing that our playing list has on its side as silly as it sounds is time. We are not going to make the finals next year. Development of the young blokes we have and the ones we get. If we do it right then we will have a number of young players hitting their prime in the 22-26 yo bracket at the same time. This could give us Geelong style depth. Picking up blokes like Seaby will hamper this.

Having a tough uncompromising stance both on the field and off is exactly the culture I want at MFC.

This is excellent news as far as I'm concerned. This and to a lesser extent the Green negotiations flag a culture change and a hardness and resolve that will take the club into a successful future. Does anyone have any knowledge of the circumstances in which footballers contracts can be terminated? Are they subject to the same emlployment rules as others.

Poor attempt at a smokescreen. You are the person who also goes by the name YM. I much prefer Goose though, he is a little insulting but he doesn't tend to threaten or attempt to ridicule people so much.

I was about 99% sure before. That response confirms it 100%. Especially if he was banned again last night.

Gee you sound like another bloke who posts on here. Use of language is almost identical. He seems to go missing when u post and vice versa. And you also threw a lot of mud and Cameron Bruce not too long ago. And look at that your name is a sledge that rhymes with Bruce. You reared your head last time he was banned from memory.

All his posts and threads are dumb and I don't reply. Threatening people with homicide if they disagree with his opinions, thats more than dumb. Thats using intimidation to try keep control of the thread. Not on.

Tim Boyle, Tim Boyle, Tim Boyle. Like to see you try. You seriously should never be allowed back on. That is a disgraceful not to mention illegal comment. MODS????

do you really think we got leadership out of that draft?

Patience and a strong resolve is needed by our recruiters. If we start paying players above thier worth now it will come back to bite us when we have a crack at a flag. Warnock would be nice but not at any cost. The down side and precedent it sets is a big risk. Spencer is a while off, Meesen doesn't look like it but could make. Rookie list another ruckman maybe, some very good ruckmen have been developed this way. We wont need a ruckman to play finals next year. Spencer or someone else may thrust thier name forward by 2010.

not ridiculous. It highlights that we have a midfield not capable of competing in finals. This was my point, highlighting our deficiencies. The hawks are a couple of years down the devlopment track than we are. I hope and actually expect a player like Jones to be able to get a game with any club in a couple of years. Add Martin, Garland, PJ Morton and maybe Maric to that list as well. Obviously if these players start to develop and perform, so will the team. The individual players must be judged on thier merits and thier ability to contibute to the team. The other benefit about building a team in adversity is that you weed out frontrunners who are unable to win thier own footy and players who drop thier head when things don't go thier way.

"who after 1 or 2 years of training and playing amongst elite players," Exactly. This is something you didnt put in your original post. I hope and sincerely believe that we will have more players playing closer to the required level by the end of next year. I think a lot of the players you mention would not have got a guernsey in the geelong or hawthorn finals team. I probably could have added Whelan and Rivers (sigh) to my orginal group. Jones, Wheatley and Mcdonald would not get a game with either midfield on current form. Bruce dont think so. Sylvia maybe.

No that's a ridiculous post. It is a good excercise to examine who on our list would be picked in a premiership team. The more players we can add to that list the closer we will be. If by foot soldiers you mean good reliable consistent performers who can withstand pressure then I would say that most of our players haven't developed the consistency to make it as "foot soldiers" yet. Good finals teams have few weaknesses and are able to execute a plan. That is not two thirds of Melbourne....... yet. Mo can you name the 12 or 13 players that are capable of playing in a premiership this year?

We failed to rebuild seduced by the possibility of an impending flag. Many clubs get sucked in to this. Lets hope we learn from the past and the Geelong and Hawthorn bueprint.

It is an interesting excercise to assess the holes in our list. For mine it would be Green, Davey and Mclean. I think that Garland and PJ could also break in. Miller might get a gig at Geelong. I struggle to see anyone else who could currently break into thier 22. Others of course will have thier ideas. Hopefully by the end of next year we will have added a few more names to this list.

Call the afl and tell them that we played 19 on the field in the Carlton game last year. We will have the four points taken from us and record this as a loss.

very good athlete and a big unit. exciting player. didn't realise he was so quick.

excellent post. Luck has a lot to do with recruiting. Some people even have dual identities and suggest 2 diffferent no 1 picks. Reprehensible!

Mate easy with the "enough said". Its a forum, people reply, its how forums work. I see your point but history says that over 50% of no. 8s are a miss and you want us to trade a good senior player and a genuine up and comer. Not worth the risk. Trade the senior players and players that we have an oversupply of. That McPharlin/Croad trade happened because at the time the hawks were flush with KPPs. Bate is the type of player that we may well need in our next finals tilt.

i would take bate at his point over 5 of them, let alone green. good post

Hodge was taken in the 2001 super draft. Great deal if that was the case. But Hodge is only a piece of the pie and obviously it is 7 years later and they are having thier first crack at a premiership. They have developed thier list mostly from the ground up and traded away a number of thier mid age players for picks, excepting the deal that you mentioned. We don't need to trade for the no 1 pick, we have it. Hopefully we develop a few stars from our early picks. And hopefully our young guys that are showing a bit become consistent players.