Nasher

No, nothing has to give at all. Cheney to remain at Casey until he becomes a better option than someone already in the side. It's unfortunate that Cheney has been playing consistently good football for Casey and can't get a gig, but the fact of the matter is that he plays in a position where our side is full. Rewarding good form is nice and all, but the opportunity to promote has to be there. At the moment it isn't and I'm dead against manufacturing opportunities and potentially risk weakening the side. The fact that Cheney has still not got a game suggests the FD agree. For Cheney, that's just tough luck.

Far too valuable in defence. I don't understand why people want to screw with our defensive setup. It's our biggest strength. Yesterday it was the sole reason why our heart was still beating at quarter time, and Garland was a huge part of that. If we hypothetically had taken Garland out and replaced him with Cheney? Hmmm.

Agree also. I've alluded to this play in the three words thread. He was cooked by his senior teammate there.

I think the fact that he started to really get on the end of it when the heat was on proves the opposite of what you're saying. It was very disappointing that he missed those shots, but players who are having a lot of set shots on goal always have off days so I'm not ready to put it down to mental weakness yet. I think it was just an off day. If you want to see someone who goes to water when the heat is on, look no further than the bloke wearing the black and white guernsey number 1 today. If there's a bigger downhill skier in the AFL I'm yet to see him.

Are we talking about the holding the ball in the middle of the ground? In the replay he looked to be completely hung out to dry by a more senior teammate on the scene. Even a half-baked shepherd would've saved him, but he got nothing. I might watch the replay again later in case my memory's playing tricks, but that's as I remember it. "Liability" is a ridiculously harsh assessment on Watts' game anyway.

I'm having a lot of difficulty believing what I'm reading here. Morton was excellent today.

Nice numbering system 3> Jamar - herculean effort. I've never been resentful of Jolly leaving, but I can't help but smile seeing Jamar pants him twice in one year. 2.5> Moloney - I had great difficulty splitting these two. Massive effort. 2> Garland - Welcome back. Did absolutely everything right today. What a gem. 1.5> Morton - How many times did he get free by half a paddock? Amazing stuff. Not a big accumulator of the ball, but extremely damaging when he gets it. 1> Davey 0.5> Scully Lots of others considered. I found the top 4 easy to pick, and could've thrown a blanket over another 10 for the next two.

Hehe. It never ceases to amaze me how players seem to become more in mind when they go out of sight. The rose coloured glasses definitely come out.

Yep. One of Meesen's friends posted last year when he first got injured saying that John thought his career was over because of this injury. I thought it may have just been hysteria at the time, but it appears to be on the money now.

Hat trick?

Wasn't this announced (and discussed on here) weeks ago?

Haha. Not sure if it was what was actually said on SEN or just Redleg_24's interpretation, but Shane O'Bree definitely isn't one of their bigger names. He's been a fringe 22 player and has spent time in the VFL this year.

A dreadful run of bad luck is what has kept Bail out of the side. That seems to be the theme for his career so far, actually.

Given that, I'd settle for In: Dunn, Frawley, McKenzie Out: McDonald, Watts, Garland Swap Jones for Garland if Jones is injured. I'm pretty flexible on this though. Gysberts is undroppable, I don't think Morton will be dropped, and I don't want PJ in the side. I'd be happy for the remaining two spots to be made up of any two of Garland, Jones, Watts and Bennell.

So would you take it one step further and say if they won the QB in a "good" year, the players would go "bugger it, we won QB! No need to bother contesting the finals now"? The answer is of course not, because they'll have forgotten about the Queen's Birthday match by the next week, but a Grand Final will be the pinnacle of their careers. I'm not disputing that it's a big game, but comparisons with a Grand Final are complete nonsense. It doesn't come close. I freely admit that; no difficulty at all. Still doesn't make it like a Grand Final though.

It's mostly because every Collingwood supporter I know seems to just magically turn in to a complete moron when the topic of footy comes up, including people I otherwise hold in very high regard. Gives me the ....

Actually, while I'm up on the soap box, the other term I hate is "our Grand Final". Christ almighty. The insinuation that playing against Collingwood on QB Monday comes even remotely close to playing in a Grand Final is, quite frankly, insulting. Sorry Collingwood, we do not high you in such high esteem that we think beating you is akin to winning the flag. The older generation love beating you because of the rivalry in the old days, and the younger crowd love beating you just because your club is arrogant from the top down, and you've got so many flog supporters who are just braindead zombies, walking around parroting every pile of waffle that comes out of Mick's mouth as if it is gospel. But a Grand Final it ain't.

I've never understood the argument that Collingwood "let" us have this game. People realise it's the AFL that create the fixture, not Collingwood, right?

You'd hope so, but the FD thought that a 5 kegs overweight and clearly unfit Wonaeamirri was more deserving of a game than Maric. What does that tell us? Anyway, I agree with Rogue in that I've hardly seen Maric get mentioned with the exception of his optimistic fans. It's hardly been a Maric bashing fest. That role is reserved for Cameron Bruce. He might've been handy in the VFL, but to get in to the side he needs to do more. Take a lesson from Lynden Dunn in how to get your name up in lights.

I agree with that, I'd (reluctantly) choose Moloney at the moment as well if we lost Junior.

Being a great forward is not a pre-requisite for being a good coach, nor does being a great forward automatically make you a great coach. Basically, you've got no idea whether or not Josh Mahoney is a better coach than Ox or Garry. In fact, I'd hazard a guess that he probably is a much better coach than either of those two, given that he's a coach and they aren't. Josh was one of the first blokes Dean head-hunted when he took the job. I have a very hard time swallowing this forumulated opinion that he can't coach.

In my eyes there are no candidates waiting in the queue that tick every box. The most likely candidates - Davey, Moloney, Green and Bruce (yes, blah blah blah, but I bet he's still in the picture for the FD) all have their pros and cons, when ideally you'd like the captain to pretty much choose himself. I'm hoping Junior keeps playing until one of the young division is ready to step up, but that seems pretty unlikely.

Yes - I looked it up and I'm pretty sure he got the 6 names from FootyWire - it's just got the team moniker there so it says "Lions" for both Brisbane and Fitzroy players (software is unable to distinguish between Brisbane Bears and Brisbane Lions I guess). But yep - Scott and Clarke never played for Fitzroy, they were at Brisbane at the time.

Or it's a testament to how biased posters are against him in general.

Well done. A very exciting prospect.