Bonkers

If I were the club I would be getting a cashed up member/s with plenty of coin spare to make a 'donation' to Casey Council. They would then be able to make Tom the MFC 'ambassador' to Casey. Problem solved. Tom is from the area so its a good fit IMO.

I think if Strauss steps up it could free up Tapscott to play midfield/forward flank. He will be more damaging for us there kicking goals & hitting targets forward of the centre. He will also be very hard to match up on as not many are equal to his size & have as good overhead ability. I can see him playing similar to the stewie dew or Chappy role in our mid rotations. Bartram will probably displace Strauss short term. Long term I hope it's a different scenario as good kicks are gold in today's football. Kicking through or over the zone is a skill Bartram will struggle to develop & is a limited footballer IMO. I like how he applies himself but can see his place in the side under threat if players such as Strauss develop.

He shut down Zaharakis. I think he needs games at AFL level to gain fitness & be able to run out games more effectively.

Jurrah missed two goals that would have won the game, Bennell one & Gawn one. Strauss shanked from memory 2 kicks Friday night, the rest were to advantage or lace out. We shouldn't have been in the position to be losing the game but the forwards didn't put the nail in.

Strauss did shut down Zaharakis on Friday night & caused some damage the other way. Tough call to make on a player who needs a run of games to gain confidence & time to adjust to the step up in speed of AFL. I would not drop a young player until their performance level drops. If we weren't about development this year & all about results instead it may be a different call IMO.

Thought Strauss was good tonight. Have often wondered why he is marked hard by a few on here. Considering he's been injured quite a lot & has played less than five games I think he has shown glimpses of what he can become.

Interesting McNamara is listed on the ball. Haven't seen any casey games while he's been playing in that role. Anyone have any reports about his progress?

He made his name as a flashy goal sneak who chased down defenders. He can be a damaging player as a mid but all clubs have figured him out. He has never handled a tag well & it makes me wonder why they continuously play him there when he hasn't bee able to overcome a tag in 2 years or more. He will never be an inside ball winner. Playing him as a mid IMO was always a stop gap because we had no one else that could kick the ball with precision. I agree that he probably needs to be dropped, however I think the FD need to assess the way the game is moving & find a more adequate position. He can't free himself of a tag by gut running & isn't able to win his own ball. That makes him easy to shut down. The fact that he is small & easily intimidated also makes me think he should be used in the midfield sparingly & returned to the forward line where he can use his pace & agility more to his advantage. Yeh he had an atrocious game we are all agreeing that, but what is the solution to get him out of this funk?

I agree with most of your points. Aaron is clearly struggling to play defense or midfield & is obviously frustrated by the tags he is getting each week. He had one or two touches to quarter time & should have been moved to play as a deep forward or asked to do his own tagging role to get him into the game. Whilst I wasnt happy with his performance today, I'm wondering if he is frustrated with the role he is being asked to play.

Good news is G.Lyon is pumping up Watts tires. Best game in the red n blue 13 disposals at 85% efficiency. Evans 14 disposals on debut.

Copping a bake from G.Lyon & D.Frawley. Never had any time for Juice. Doesn't work hard enough & has never been good enough. Scraping the bottom of the barrel at the moment. Surely we'd be better off playing Cook or even Howe.

Davey one touch at quarter time. Bailey needs to make a move to free him of the tag.

From what I heard on MMM radio he hit his head. Not a knee injury. Think he is still on the ground??

You have supplied your reasons why you believe the loss happened the way it did against WCE. Your first reason being WCE are bigger bodied is valid in terms of contested possession. Your next point was that due to us being a young team we don't travel well. Well to you that may be a valid reason, but to me that is just an excuse & poor mental application. After talk of taking it up to the WCE in the lead up to the game it ended up being exactly that, talk & total embarrassment. You listed your most glaring factors. -We were bound to be flat after the bye: I don't know how we were bound to be flat. We had a week and a half to prepare mentally & physically. If they weren't ready to turn up & play the only excuse can be poor preparation, poor mental application or poor team structure. -We previously played the easy beats of the comp: Sorry but no matter who you played the previous week as a professional unit you are expected to turn up and perform the following week. You stated it yourself that there was a mental effect detrimental to the teams performance the following week. I don't know about you but I would have thought being professionals they would be able to get themselves in the right frame of mind physically & mentally to perform each & every week. If they aren't capable of doing this then questions have to be asked of the players & coaches who are in charge of motivating them. Going by your logic because we played a really really tough team in the Hawks the week before playing Brisbane, we should have been switched on to play well in the first quarter against Brisbane. Well that didn't happen either. You then went on to state that we will be judged by how we perform this Sunday against the Crows. I'll be judging the teams performance based on collectively what I see throughout the year. So far I haven't seen too much encouragement. You asked me to explain why we shouldn't have failed in the list that I supplied to you. Fair call & I will. My first point was regarding moving the ball through a defensive zone & this goes hand in hand with the third point I made about being able to implement a zone. You stated that it is an effective way of implementing pressure. That most teams are employing the forward press/zone & most teams struggle against them. You have just proved my point. If is is an effective way of creating pressure why isn't the playing group able to put it in place when almost every other club in the league is capable of it & Essendon has mastered it in the space of 4-5 months. The fact that we are a young, inexperienced, inconsistent & a physically under-developed team has nothing to do with the fact that the coaching staff have failed to teach the players how to implement this tactic. Unless you are stating that our playing group is mentally impaired all players on the list should be capable of setting up this zone, knowing where to stand & understanding what their role is. That is part of being a disciplined unit. If you are able to practice implementing a zone as a team then you are also able to practice moving the ball through a zone. It is pretty obvious we are deficient at doing this, which leads me to believe the players aren't being taught it. This has nothing to do with being young & inexperienced. My second point was regarding kick ins. You talked about how Paul Roos has stated that the right way to go about kick ins is effectively what we are doing but we only have Jamar. It's up to the coaching staff to provide another option. For example that option may be that Jamar, Martin & Watts all run to the same side of the ground & contest for the same ball if we are outnumbered. This will at least create a contest in a group/pack rather than being outnumbered each time. Having numbers at Jamar's feet to lock it in would also be a help if we are going to employ this method. So onto my fourth point regarding pushing players up the ground & leaving no forward options to kick to. You stated that we are not a good team. Do you mean we aren't a good team in the sense that we are poorly skilled? How does this have anything to do with knowing where to stand, run or make position? That is all to do with what they are being taught. Their instinct is to flood the back line rather than work hard & create options forward of the ball. The last point that I made was regarding contested possession. You are accurate in stating that age, size, experience can effect this part of our game. What you haven't mentioned is that the way the team is set up to play also influences this. For example if the team is setup to employ a forward press (which we aren't) the team is automatically going to increase its tackle count & inside 50 count. The increase in tackles is going to increase your contested possessions. Tell me what part of being young & inexperienced is stopping the team from creating pressure in the forward half of the ground? That is purely coaching & the way they have been taught to setup. I'm not expecting a magic wand & I don't expect this team to be a contender. What I do expect is the team to be structured enough to get the best out of themselves. That comes from the coaching & individual player preparation. It's clear from the performances this year that the best possible performance from this playing group is not being met.

Your list of factors leading to the loss looks like excuses for an under prepared team. How do you answer the following short comings in the way the team is playing at the moment? -Failure to clear or move the ball through a defensive zone. -Failure to perform effective kick ins & set up effective kick in structures. -Faulure to setup a forward press to lock the ball in our own forward half & allowing the opposition easy transition into their attacking 50. -Pushing all players to the defensive side of the ground leaving the ball carrier with no one to kick to further up the ground. -Ranked 15-17 in all contested football statistics The issues I have listed are all coaching related. It was obvious there were issues with our structures during our NAB Cup performances not just against the Hawks & WCE. To me the only answer I can think of is that our FD are 6-12 months behind in modern football tactics & structure. If the players have been taught these tactics & structures they certainly don't know how to counter them or implement them, which is another coaching issue as the coaches haven't been able to educate the players.

This is all a bit odd to me. If Stynes has been in the role since the start of March, why hasn't this information been made available to the members? Why hasn't the club made a statement via the MFC website or other forms of media? Also I distinctly remember hearing Jim Stynes state on Triple M radio pre game before our first home game of the year that he had no direct involvement with the football department. This change of role may be nothing for us to really worry about & the club may feel it is not noteworthy to communicate. But the fact that Stynes role has changed so dramatically without any information or explanation until now to me is a bit bemusing.

A bit of mongrel & desire to rip the opposition apart with physical aggression when not in possession. Work Rate & Hard Running, Tackling, pressure, chasing, all the so called 1 percenters which should be just an every game non negotiable norm at the club, but this team seems to struggle to perform.

Never said there were similarities with Egypt. All I stated is that facebook can be a pretty effective voice & I used Egypt as an example. The petition group has already had there first win in their first 24hours of existence. Demons fans call for Bailey sacking on Facebook

Who is to say that whoever started the group won't go further? Last year people stopped turning up to Essendon games, the result was Knights got the can. If enough people vote with their feet the club has to listen. The reality is that members have voting rights & if enough people get p*ssed then the members of the board are also on the block not just Bailey. The whole problem with the club is that we as supporters put up with these performances. The supporters & members are ultimately why the club exists, if we aren't happy we have the power to make a change. The club is accountable to us. I'm not saying that what I have stated will happen, but my whole point was that everything has to start somewhere. If you have an issue with what is going on at the club & you feel strongly about it you have every right to start a facebook group, or whatever it is you feel will get your point across strongly.

Funny that you say that. Egypt was freed of a 30 year dictator by people getting organized & starting a rebellion using facebook & social media. Whether you think it's clueless or not, it has proven itself to be quite powerful in giving everyday people a voice.

What happened last night is no different to what we witnessed against Hawthorn. Interesting what Jimmi & the board do now as they have already stated it's unacceptable after the Hawks game., Bailey hasn't given them many options. This side is going backwards in it's development, has no confidence, looks unfit, unskilled etc etc. Quite simply they are a disgrace. Hope the club does what's required to bring a proven premiership coach in.

I heard an interesting stat last night wathcing the Lions vs Saints from Leigh Matthews. If you win the tackle count & contested possession count you will win 85% of games. I think that stat in itself tells you a lot about football & the way it should be played. The MFC will have to lift its defensive intensity & intensity in general to win more games. Whether this aspect is linked to the amount of experience & age I guess it is. I would assume the boys will have to get fitter & stronger basically to raise their intensity levels consistently, so you can use the excuse that the playing group is inexperienced to a certain extent. However mentally as a player you don't need 5 pre-seasons to be able to or want to tackle & win the contested ball. If we want to climb the ladder I think Bailey is going to have to instill a hunger to hunt in packs to tackle & to play harder than the opposition. For me that is what has been missing from the games I have seen this year. If the hunger has been there it has only been sporadic IMO. This sort of attitude can not be questioned from the successful teams & their coaches(Collingwood - Malthouse, Geelong - Thompson, Hawthorn - Clarkson, Sydney - Roos). All the speculation & discussion we hear about the game plan is really inconsequential as each club that has won the flag in the last 10 years from memory has had their own game plan, which is then superseded by the next up & coming side. If we want to improve we need to first raise our intensity levels for longer periods throughout games which will come from building stronger, fitter players & also building mentally tougher players that will represent the club with pride. There is no doubt that the players have the talent, everyone has seen it when we challenged top sides last year. What has been missing tho is consistent desire & intensity from week to week. The challenge is to become mentally tougher & stronger as a club(in particular the playing group & FD). I think that is where the club is at.

Sorry Newton being nominated didn't inspire me, pretty much why I'd forgotten about it.

Ah that's right, interesting selection.

Newton is on the rookie list.