drdrake

I remember thinking the same thing for the past 2 years, both Port and Brisbane missing key players we should win, by half time our seasons was over. Even going back to 2007 heading to the MCG Friday Night against St Kilda Round 1, the beginning of the downward spiral. Hopefully against the same team we can start to climb out of the hole we have been in for the past 7 years.

Easy to say you want to play, but the only slim chance he would have is by moving back to Melbourne and playing VFL this season or at the very least moving to play SANFL. There is no way any one will pick him up unless he does this.

You are assuming he is not fit, maybe the club would rather give him one more week don't travel him to the middle of Australia and get him cherry ripe leading into round 1. I think this would be the same with Dawes, two games is enough to get you ready.

Why? he can play next week against Hawthorn and the following week for Casey, if he finds touch and form through those games he would be in contention for round 1.

From Friday we have 3 weeks left, Chris Dawes even if he doesn't play Friday he may still get a run against Hawthorn then a match with Casey the week after, two games is enough for him to be ready for round 1. Looking forward to Friday night

This is spot on, you lose generations of supporters. Through the 70's and early 80's the club would have lost a lot of supporters, more the kids of supporters choosing winning teams. We start to gain back some kids through late 80's, 90's and early 2000's but any kid under the age of 10 wouldn't remember our team winning on a consistent basis. It would be interesting to see how many MFC families have lost kids to Hawthorn. Not a hard choice for kids over the past 7 years, success or failure?

When you look at our list it is important that our better players, the ones most likely for round 1 play as much together as possible. Hopefully we have three fit tall forwards back and with a couple of midfielders. I would like to see our line up Strauss Frawley Dunn Grimes McDonald Terlich Trengove N Jones Watts Vince Fitzpatrick Howe JkH Dawes Hogan Spencer Tyson Michie Cross, Viney, Toumpas, Kent, Gawn, Pederson

Was there any talk yesterday about the new sponsor that PJ mentioned at the AGM. From memory it was a substantial sponsor that should be finalized this month.

What having the talls does is gives us a plan A and plan B and a combination of Plan A/B. Plan A we saw on Friday, keep the footy control the footy and tempo. Plan B, more attacking footy, kicking long to our talls and getting numbers to the fall of the ball and the combined plan controlling the footy out of the back half then pulling the trigger to send the ball deep inside 50m. Options different game plans, we saw one on Friday is the basic keep the footy model that we turn to when we are trying to get control of the game and once in control we will see a very attacking plan.

Hard to pick a team, but I think we line up Strauss Frawley Dunn Grimes McDonald Terlich Watts N Jones Cross Toumpas Pederson Howe Fitzpatrick Hogan Kent Spencer Tyson Vince Michie, Byrnes, Blease, Trengove, M Jones, Mckenzie Sub Jamar, Jetta

No, I think the role he is playing, small forward/HFF he is behind Kent, JKH, Byrnes, Blease and from today Toumpas and Salem that played that HFF role. I think Bail and Tapscott will spend most of this year in Casey jumpers.

I hope the white jumpers from today are our clash strip, looked good

I went down in December, and to me from them to now he looks at least 5kgs heavier.

I went and had a look, yes the boys did chip the ball around but we hit targets. A few missed but a majority hit the target and we controlled the football. Proved one thing a good midfield and defense wins matches. The white team seemed to have the stronger mids and defenders whilst the blue team had the stronger forward line. Viv Michie will play round 1 and I have Nev Jetta as our best small defender from today. Salem first time I have seen him after Christmas, he looks to have put on 5-10Kgs and looks like an AFL player and not the boy we drafted. Today in windy conditions his foot skills were the stand out. Matt Jones looked good, Dom Tyson wearing No 9 was good in close, Vince, in fact everyone who we brought into our club through the trade/Draft period did well. We can actually control the footy that was the most pleasing thing. Our players knew the style each side is playing but we still managed to hit targets. Can someone tell Tom McDonald to take first option and stop over thinking. He gets the footy and I don't believe it is his skill letting him down it is second guessing himself.

If what was posted last week is correct and our Intraclub hit out is the week after, I think that highlights the approach we will take. Give fit players a taste, no risk approach and we really start looking at building our round one side from the week after. If all goes to plan the week after should see a majority of our list fully fit and we build our best 22 from there with hopefully the 25 players that are in consideration for round 1 all playing against Hawthorn.

We could go back over past training reports, I remember clearly the ball spending a great deal of time hitting the deck. The skills and ball movement at training this year is a miles ahead from what we have seen over preseason over the past 7 years. Yes it is pre-season but if you cant execute your skills at training you have no chance executing them on match day. I go to training now and enjoy the ball movement and our execution.

I'm a bit different, I was lucky to attend a lot of pre-season training when Neeld and Bailey coached, the players skills where woeful. The skills of the current group is miles ahead, which leads into better quality of training and drills.

I agree with this, keep possession until the right option opens up and then hit it hard. The other thing I'm looking forward to and this is something that we are seeing at training the players working for each other, creating space, blocking, positioning, shepherding all the stuff that don't go on stat sheets.

This sounds like Paul Roos, he structures preparation that gets his teams right for the season not pre-season. The Richmond game is early then a two week break till Geelong. It might be a case of Richmond get a good hit out for most players then get back to an intraclub to fine tune then hopefully we go close to full strength against Geelong and Hawthorn.

Love to know whether Fitzy/Hogan/Jamar/Dawes finished the whole session including the full match simulation stuff. Looks like our list is pretty close to full fitness with the exception of Garland and Riley. Clark is meant to resume full training next week and Viney is OK. Does anyone know if we are having an Intraclub match next week?

I wouldn't think so he is a mid size defender, to short to play a key role.

What we have is better coaching staff, better club administration, Better fitter playing list and from the training last year to this year it is chalk and cheese, the skill levels have improved last year drills were riddled with miss kicks and errors even yesterday with a good wind blowing we can hit targets, the size of our players body's have improved not to many skinny kids. We also have a group of young players hitting 22+ and approaching 100 games plus a few senior heads 26+ with well over 100 games. The balance of the team looks to be a lot better We will be a muched improved no question.

Just like we had to do a few years back, hopefully like us this bites the doggies in the arse

Then do the rucks Spencer and King Every year this happens the areas we seem to have the most depth become depleted a few years ago it was small forwards and none could get onto the park now it is our ruck and key forwards that we looked at a thought we are covered then bang injury occurs. If Clark did his hammy on the 20/12 its now 1 month, unless he re-tore it he should be back. Wasn't he running with the rehab group last Wednesday?

40K is achievable but a lot of things need to go our way. One way to push this number is offer the 3 game package Melb V Sydney/Collingwood/Geelong, we are one of the only clubs that don't offer a 3 game package.