drdrake

Our forward line and movement into forward 50m is really bad.

No question he gets off, there was nothing in that.

Player managers dropping garbage to media to try to get another contract.

WCE have to look to off load players as they have Salary cap issues. Not a good place, well and truly past their best with some big contracts and no kids coming through. Getting Tim Kelly was meant to keep them in contention. It will be a very slow rebuild.

Afl counts all the club freebies. It is the biggest chest beating number to afl has.

It can't run in parallel with the mens game as it will get no coverage and at those pay rates the AFL can not afford a full season. Public interest in AFLW is falling and will continue to do so as the quality of the product is still extremely poor. It won't improve for a long period as it isn't an elite program with 18 sides. It should be 8 sides which is a better reflection on the percentage of girls that play the game compared to boys, still high but you need 8 sides for a decent comp. If you had 8 sides 14 game season with finals, more money for the players and it will be a good standard of football. The AFL however knows that the male product at grassroots is in massive decline, other sports are smashing AFL for male participation add in online gaming, covid, the only way AFL can grow is through increase female participation.

I don't think so, AFL will subsidise his wage outside of the soft cap for promotion of the game.

The big one is Harris, does she chase coin at the expansion clubs or stick fat with Melbourne. To me she really looked happy this season enjoying playing and her team mates.

Depends what happens at Gold Coast, Al Clarkson will be coaching next year and it will be either gws or gold Coast. Afl need high profile coaches at these clubs to try and get some interest on the side. These clubs and AFLW will be costing the afl a lot.

It's been an interesting watch over the past month in particular. Teams are more focused on stopping us scoring then trying to score. That just leaves our backline set up behind the ball. The fear of the opposition is great, it is we don't want to get blown away early so defend hard, then they realise they need to score and we bang on 5 goals quickly to kill the game.

Walk past any primary school playground at lunch, basketball courts will be full, soccer balls will be out, you will be lucky to see a football. AFL clubs once visited schools to run clinics, that turned into a marketing call to increase club membership rather than get players into the game. Getting the kids to play is hard to find a half decent coach is even harder. My son goes to a high school that prides itself on sport and AFL Catholic school, 180 boys in his grade, 11 tried out for AFL, 50 for Basketball, 35 for Soccer, I think he said that only about 8-10 kids in his entire grade play AFL

Gil has done some amazing things for the AFL, keeping the game running over the past 2 years big tick, the growth of female participation another tick. Now the whack, the expansion of AFLW and AFL GWS/GCS will be the biggest financial challenge they new CEO has. The AFLW will need to be heavily subsidized by the AFL along with the two AFL expansion clubs. The utter neglect for junior boys particularly in Victoria will be a massive issue for the new CEO, the game outside the increase participation of females is in a rapid decline at grass roots level, this was pre-covid and post covid we are seeing further drop off. AFL is to hard, you need so many volunteers to get a junior side on the park, Coaches, Team Managers, Umpires(massive shortage), Trainers, Time keepers, Umpire Escorts, each week a side needs 6-8 volunteers for your team to play. Basketball you need a coach and scorer. They will say the game has never been in a better place, might look that way in the top tier comp but underneath that there is massive issues.

Essendon and Port had game plans to keep the ball and shift us as much as the can. Worked for Essendon in patches due to the width of the MCG, never going to work at Adelaide Oval. We just sat back and waited for them to eventually go forward. I don't think Weideman or TMac did anything wrong the way Port defended and we moved the footy didn't help the tall forwards. One will make way for B Brown but I don't think Benny would have been to upset missing last night.

Playing for school mid week then local club on the weekend, best of both worlds. You got to play with School mates then have another circle of friends from outside school

A few State schools are jumping on the sports academy bandwagon but these still can't compete with the PSA schools

The coaching you get at PSA schools compared to your local football club is calk and cheese. Most top end private schools have ex AFL players/coaches coaching their program, local footy you get the dad who puts his hand up, you might be lucky and get a good one but a lot don't. I'm from the West, we don't have that prestigious private school, you either go into the City or head to Geelong, that explains why players drafted from the Western Jets is extremely poor in comparison to the NAB clubs in the East. There was a series of articles a little time back that went through the states, basically saying if you aren't in the private school system in Metro Vic you have a very slim chance of being drafted

That's the key keep winning gives you options to rest players, ensure little niggles don't become big ones, give the players time to recover from injury with no pressure. Beat Port this week, 0 and 4 is a long way back for them.

I bet we are wearing the royal blue jumper

You could safely say Melksham will be gone, Hibberd is more likely to retire then play on. Then there are a number of fringe players that might look elsewhere or be cut off the list.

All about smoke and mirrors. Make something look like it has a bigger audience than it actually has to attracted sponsorship, TV $$$$$. I'm based in the West, my kids school if assigned to North Melbourne but the Bulldogs also get in there. A couple of years ago both clubs visited the school offering free tickets to the students, to access these free tickets you had to go online to register. We did this away game for the Dees V both clubs, as soon as I registered for the tickets receive Welcome to Bulldogs and Roos membership for all 4 of us. Free tickets that turned into a one game free membership. The MCG you basically have about 50,000 capacity outside MCC and AFL members, Marvel is less, seems like a lot of clubs with the arm chair members

Formally known as tanking. Still can't believe we are the only club to ever be sanctioned for tanking. WCE would need to off load players to fit him in. Their salary cap has been busting at the seems and they would need to off load a player like Gaff or Yeo to fit him in. Freo might have the space in their cap, but even with the poor performance yesterday you still expect them to be 7-12th on the ladder.

April is going to be a very interesting month of Football. A few side with Top 4 aspirations and a couple more to make the 8 could find their season over if they can't find some wins. Bulldogs, Port, Essendon, GWS would not have expected to be winless after 2 rounds.

Posted last week that the post match outburst was putting up smoke to hide the issues at the Bulldogs. Really 1 forward, weak backline and strong mids with no ruck. They need Bruce back to have any chance

Dogs backline is just terrible

No Salem goes out, they maintain the structure with 3 talls, a hybrid mid tall in Smith with Hunt, Bowey and Brayshaw. It is a structure we like playing with hibberd played the Smith Role on GF with Petty, May and Lever, plus Salem, Rivers, Bowey. Bringing in Weiderman helps keep the forward structure with like.