whatwhat say what

Goddard is killing us.

Agreed frankie, hoping we hit the scoreboard hard early and put serious doubts in their minds. The only positive I'm taking out of the weather is it'll make it slower and harder, and that means our lack of run post-Darwin won't be so important. If we lose today tho...

I'm absolutely packing it on the way in. I really don't have faith in us; the weather should draw the two sides closer and that really worries me. It's going to come down to a battle of who puts their head over the ball and wants it more.

Interesting that apparently garland - a free agent - hasn't spoken to the club or had the club speak to him about his moves in 2015. For mine, we have too many third tall type defenders - garland, Howe, Lumumba and Grimes all essentially can play the same role of being able to play tall and small. Potentially White and you could argue Dunn also fall into that category. Something needs to give, and with Howe and Garland both out of contract it makes sense that one is likely to go.

i wonder if they might run jones and heppell head to head, vince and viney to goddard and zaka respectively.

root is hitting it superbly.

and bellend too. three down in a bit over an hour of play!

starc is chucking pies.

australia's bowlers looking decidedly unimpressive. pitch is up and down in a big way too, but looks slow.

that really wasn't that far away from voges just then.

great start for australia.

yr not wrong. reckon we can entice pendles over?

he didn't suffer from concussion, he had what sounds like an injury to the neck. if he's right, play him. if he's not, don't. we shall see, i guess. i've come around to the idea of fitz being in. if he's in, and presuming brayshaw is passed fit: B: Jetta - Fitzpatrick - Dunn HB: Garland - T. McDonald - Cross C: Tyson - N Jones - Brayshaw HF: Watts - Dawes - vandenBerg F: Howe - Hogan - Garlett Foll: Gawn - Vince - Viney I/c: Toumpas - Lumumba - ANB Sub: JKH Emerg: Stretch - Jamar - M Jones if brayshaw misses, stretch comes in. the idea of n jones, vince, viney, tyson, vandenberg, brayshaw and occasional stints from lumumba, garlett, cross, and toumpas being a midfield rotation is very encouraging.

zaharakis doesn't have any such threat over his head, as he's not one of the 34. from memory, neither is zach merrett, but there's no way the bombers will give him up. zaka would be a fine addition to our side, but bombers, as is their wont, would demand hogan, brayshaw and some magic beans for him, and then go off in a huff when we declared that price was a bit steep. our second rounder (18-25ish) would be what you'd want to pay.

we need players who can see ball, get ball, use ball. if if he can get over his knee injury without any major concerns - and it's a big IF at this stage, as apparently it was a pretty nasty one - then we'd be mad not to chase prestia. in terms of targetting players from the northern clubs, prestia and treloar would be top tier, dixon, bennell and josh kelly next, and then the likes of plowman (richmond want him), tomlinson, leuenberger (again, tigers into him in a big way apparently), lonergan, et al.

hm, interesting with 'vandemon' and grimes also up and about... i'd expect lumumba, vandenberg would practically be auto-ins. jkh must come under consideration given we'll need run, and lots of it.

dunkley hasn't confirmed whether he wants to go to the swans yet. he has plenty of time to nominate himself as a father-son, i believe? he may prefer to go into the draft.

no, it really isn't. when hogan comes out of contract, the new cba will have been arranged - the aflpa is trying to get it tied to revenue in the game, around the 25% mark. hogan could easily pull in $1m a season in his third contract, and wouldn't even be that extravagant. i wonder what the tipping point is going to be for the afl to really become a different sort of business.

garland has already been speculated to be worth $500k+ on the open market. tall third defenders are hard to find.

he's a fair bit taller than 190cm now, isn't he? i guess it'll all depend on who finishes stone motherless. blues could use a weitering, lions would love a schache, gc17 would probably take either, and we would go schache, i guess (the real answer is callum mills, of course).

Oh yes, slip of the thumb... Apparently it's Dixon and Bennell: http://m.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/gold-coast-plan-to-lose-harley-bennell-and-charlie-dixon-20150706-gi6g1z.html Our first rounder, second rounder and Howe.

Caro is saying Bennell is on the move - would love him, I reckon with Roos, Goodwin, McCarthy and Jetta to take him under his wing like he has with Garlett GET HIM TO THE DEMONS!!

that's fantastic news. god i hope he can get back and play the way we want, and need, him to do.

confirmed by moloney prior to the start of the season. unbelievable, to be honest.

whether or not he's in play might be irrelevant, as we're at 100% of the cap, don't have anyone notable on big money going (possible exception being jamar), and have a couple of reasonably significant players - garland, howe - out of contract. also, i can't see treloar leaving gws, and if he does, i can't seem him heading for the dees.