Lord Travis

Brayshaw showed true toughness a few times. Really pleased with him. Hogan ragdolling Rance is great to see. Dustin Martin is the f*cking softest c*nt I've ever seen. He jumps on guys and grabs their throats, it's disgusting how the umps never pay frees against him for it. The second he gets tackled, throws his arms out like he's been shot by a sniper. He is absolutely gutless on top of being a filthy piece of sh*t of a human being.

Vanders going well. Tyson needs to go back to basics and just handball it off as first option instead of trying to take on multiple tacklers. If we tidy up our disposal we are well in this even though they're smacking us around the ground!

I agree with most of what you're saying. The only difference is the players you mentioned who had clangers made up for their mistakes. Tyson sprayed a few kicks, but was involved in multiple chains that lead to goal, and kicked a good team lifting goal himself. Watts uncharacteristically shanked a few, but worked his ass off to set up other goals and kicked some himself. Jetta laid a few solid tackles down back, McDonald was pretty much BOG etc. Toumpas did not do anything effective for the team yesterday and that is why he deserves to be dropped. But I do take your point. I can see upside in him too. He generally finds a decent amount of ball, more than the likes of Salem, Kent, Kennedy-Harris and a few other highly touted youngsters on here. I remember he played a really good game against Geelong in the wet. IMO he was BOG for us that day, picked up 20+ disposals and laid 7-8 tackles. He also backed into packs to take intercepting marks and just generally read it well. Games like that show he has the talent and work ethic, he just needs it to click consistently at AFL level. The Toumpas bashing on this site needs to stop.

Draft for talent. We need depth everywhere. Would be nice to add more well rounded midfielders to the list and take a ruckman.

It's a pain in the ass that's for sure. Here's hoping we go down there and beat them for once. Would love to see Dunny line up on Mitch and just niggle him all day until he is forced to listen to Grand Old Flag the sook!

We should make minimal changes to what was a winning team. The players should be rewarding and taught if you play your role and win then you keep your spot. Vince could come in for Toumpas. Dawes can play in the VFL this week, unless Garland is injured in which case he can replace Garland. No other changes, so two at most.

It's going to be good time when as a Demons supporter we can genuinely look forward to winning maybe 50% of matches we play. It's been so long now and it seems so far away. Pretty pathetic really.

Sorry if I jinxed us guys. As soon as I got to that sh*thole of a stadium there were just bad vibes in the air. I was surrounded by drunken Essendon supporters singing and whinging and it just seemed like we would lose. The boys were missing basic shots in the warm ups, Hogan missing from about 20 out, Dawes missing the lot from 40, and Matt Jones dropped a basic mark and then slipped over. That pretty much set the tone. After the first 15 minutes there was no intensity from our boys. Even Nathan Jones didn't look like he wanted to be there. Positives - Vandenberg looks the goods. He's hard at it, has decent skills and reads the play well. Pity he missed that goal, but good performance all round. From a distance he looks like a young David Schwarz. It's the floppy hair, big build and throwing the body around. He's already ahead of a few on the senior list IMO. - Garlett and Lumumba look the goods as well. Though both missed a few gettable kicks, they are both involved and gave run. Jeffy is an exciting player to watch! Few great grabs and runs. Love him! Shudder to think where we'd be with Terlich off half back instead of Lumumba. - Watts looked comfortable for the most part. Dawes finally clunked a few marks and provided a presence. Good to see them both take a few grabs a kick a few goals. Hopefully they get confidence from that. - ​Dunn was better today after a few off matches. Apart from one shanked kick out he was back to being general of the backline and helping control play. Negatives - Hogan fumbled and got out-wrestled by someone 10kgs lighter than him. He's a kid so it doesn't matter at this stage, but it wouldn't be good for his confidence. I don't want him to get Melbourne-a-fied and lose that aura he has, the swagger and attitude. - My boy Dom Tyson again has untidy disposal tonight. He's been poor all NAB series, hopefully he's just rusty and tidies it up for the season proper. - Frost in the ruck, and mostly up forward. He really struggled in the ruck and gets frustrated easily. He's given away a few frees and a 50 this NAB series from shoving guys around needlessly. From what I've seen at GWS and this NAB series he is a natural defender. He's got good closing speed and is better at shutting down a contest than clunking a mark. He's got a lot of pace which would could use to move the ball out of defence. Up forward he can't use his pace, he doesn't clunk many marks, and his shots for goal are poor. End the experiment and let him settle down back. If he is playing ruck and key forward in the season proper then we are in trouble. - Jack Viney had a shocker. Poor decision making, poor disposal, poor game sense. He needs to forget that game ever happened and move on. I love his attitude and hard work, but he needs to tidy up his game to keep his place and become a leader going forward. - Bail did a whole lot of nothing. All he is good for is providing run and covering lots of ground. If he doesn't give us run and his opponent gives them run instead, what good is he?! - Matt Jones. Just Matt Jones in general. He is a negative. Having him on the ground is playing with a man down, that's how detrimental he is. I didn't think he was that bad in the past, sometimes he gives a bit of run, but after paying more attention to him it's easy to see why he has been getting such a hard wrap on here. In the second half my Essendon supporting mate made a game of following him, and sure enough he made mistake after mistake and was involved in a number of Essendon scoring chains. I don't care if he has a mature body, until he is gone from our team we will remain anchored to the bottom of the ladder. Get rid of him. We lost to a sub-standard VFL team. They weren't even a VFL team that plays together, it was a bunch of guys selected from different teams shoved together so a match could be held. We lost to them. That is downright embarrassing, even if it is NAB cup. Guys like Nathan Jones should be absolutely gutted tonight for what just happened. I still can't believe it myself. What a sh*t weekend.

At the ground now and have a feeling we'll lose. I think it's years of conditioning losing the unloseable :/

Will become a key to our defence for the next 10 years. He's an athletic freak and loves a contest. He'll play both shut down roles and rebounding roles. Another great recent piece of trading!

Good to hear he's extended his contract, but I'd like to just see him out there first!

Toumpas was alright against Freo. He didn't win as much ball as he should've, but it wasn't from lack of trying. He was constantly banging into the packs and laying tackles. As silly as it sounds, I think his contested work is actually decent and he's very underrated in this regard. Anyone who says he doesn't go when it's his turn is either blind or a liar. His uncontested work is where he needs to improve, which is odd as it was supposed to be his strength. Before he was drafted he was a running skilful goal kicking machine, and was the best performed midfielder at the level. At AFL level he seems to run to the wrong places to link up and just doesn't get enough of the ball due to this. If he can learn our systems better and know where to run he'll become dangerous as we know his skills are usually very good. For what it's worth, he was better than Salem yet again the other day, yet gets crucified on here as usual.

Steven is a great guy and a family friend. As a kid he used to get me into the rooms at the MCG after games to meet the team. He also got my a footy signed by the entire 1994 team. He really loves the Dees and to this day attends every match and keeps in contact with those inside the club. His appointment can only be a good thing for us. Good luck to him with the new position! Go Dees!

Like other interstate players on our list, he will leave when his contract is up if we don't start playing good football and winning. It would be devastating to lose him and Hogan in a few years time if we are still cellar dwellers, but it's a real possibility. WE NEED TO START WINNING GAMES.

It won't happen, but finals is a pass mark. I'm expecting 8-10 wins and finishing anywhere from 9th-14th. If we are bottom 4 again I'll be disappointed. Finals in 2016 is a non negotiable. Next year it will be 10 years since we made finals. It should never take a team that long in between making finals, let alone being a realistic chance to win a flag in finals. if we don't make finals next year then I'll have nothing left to give.

Gary Ablett Jnr and Jimmy Bartel. GAJ because he's one of the best footballers of all time, yet he comes across as a likeable humble guy. Bartel because he just gets the job done over and over. He isn't flashy, but he's a smart footballer, he's a good contested mark and great overhead, plays his best footy when it's pissing down with rain and he can just dig in and scrap. He's a big game player too. Love him!

Happy to hear Stretch showed a bit. Even though he's still slight, he's gonna crack some games this year. I think he's gonna be a really good player for us long term. He just has something special about him. He'll wind up being an Isaac Smith/Brad Hill type, and we know they are super important to the Hawks for their run and skill. Can't wait to watch him tear it up!

Didn't it had been that long since we beat them and that depresses me. I always think of North as the ones we can't beat and it sh*ts me to tears. We should've beat St Kilda Round 1 last year but fluffed it at the end. If we don't beat St Kilda this year then we may as well have not bothered showing up. They're where we were 3-4 years ago, and if we lose it just shows how slow we are progressing.

Good news for the club. JKH had a solid debut season. With more fitness he has the skills and smarts to move through the midfield for stints as Roos stated numerous times. I think JKH is gonna be a good player for us. Here's hoping he has another good development year and add more strings to his bow. One of my favorite youngsters at present.

These stats include finals. If you take away finals games so it's just for the season, Jones was 5th or 6th ranked player in the comp. He had a super year and again is underrated by people still!

You can win a premiership without a good forward line. You cannot win a premiership without a good midfield. The midfield group shapes a team. We've had a poor midfield for years, and we've been poor as a result. CHF was the most important position for decades. With the way the modern game is currently played with zones moving around and space being filled, the CHF is less important than it used to be. Goal kicking midfielders are the most important IMO. Look at the best midfielders in the game, Ablett, Kennedy, Selwood, Rockliff, Jobe, Pendlebury, Stevie J etc. They all go in, win their own ball for their team, and then hit the scoreboard also, often multiple times. They are the most important players in their team.

We are no chance of winning the premiership. They may as well have put our odds at $1,000,000. This is going to be a year of growth, and if we perform really well and other teams struggle/suffer key injuries we can push for the 8. Scraping into finals would be a miracle and I'd be damn happy with that. Realistically I'd say we'll finish around 13th-14th. Definite improvement, but still a ways off.

It's good to see we've drafted someone who has a desire to be the best he can be. At the very least we know we've got a kid who will give his all and not cruise through his football career like say another pick 3 in Sylvia. Glad to have Angus at the club!

Footage from his first game below. He came on as sub and had 9 touches and 6 tackles in under 2 quarters. He's only played a handful of games, but he's shown signs of being a good player already. He's really competitive, like Nathan, applies good defensive pressure, has good run and good skills by both hand and foot. He'll play as a half back flanker putting pressure on and rebounding. Also has scope to become a midfielder, as he showed late before being drafted. He's a talent, similar to Nathan at the same age, but less in the centre square and more run from behind. Same competitiveness, better skills and awareness than Nathan at the same age, and is quicker. I'd be happy to give up any pick out top 10 for him as I think he'll be a player and is flexible to play both defense and midfield. Would be a good get.

Pick him in the rookie draft. We need more ruckmen on our list, as Jamar is closing in on retirement and all other options keep breaking down. This guy could fill a hole in our list and also attach a good media story to the club. He'd also drive training and preparation standards if he has that sort of will power!