Demon Disciple

Jake Spencer just does not have it, plain and simple. He is not a footballer, and so many people were hoping and saying that he would fix our ruck problems, all we needed to do is give him time. The only problem is, if you have no natural talent to play AFL, no matter how much development goes into you, you simply will not get anywhere close to AFL standard. The problem we now face, is that we have rookie'd him for 3 years and i think as a result, we have to promote him onto the senior list. He will just take up space on our senior list, that's not being cruel, just realistic.

Geez i don't know, how about some intensity going into the 4th. Like you said, we were only 16 points down at 3/4 time and we didn't even give a yelp. Is it too much to expect a team to give their all for 100% of the game, cos that's what they're paid to do.

Why would he??? He's still got 1.5 years to go. It's the MFC brains trust who idiotically decided to give him a contract extension. Bailey needs to go, but who would we replace him with??? I would dearly love Paul Roos to coach us, but that's really far-fetched. Who else is there? Maybe we get Peter Sumich to captain-coach. 2 Birds with one stone, new coach and a new FF.

Why oh why did we extend Bailey's contract?????? It's not as if he was a wanted man, this will be his first and only time as a head coach of an AFL club. Everybody's lauding the board and the direction it's taking, however i reckon they have really stuffed this one up. Bailey simply isn't good enough to be a head coach.

So too would the Gold Coast, and given they have zoned access to the NT he will no doubt be picked up under their zoning allowance (does that mean GC wouldn't even need to use a pick in the ND on him????)

Lucas Cook is very skinny, ala jack watts. We would have to wait quite a while for those two to develop AFL standard bodies to hold down CHF and FF. Sure we got time, but i would like to see a more traditional Gorilla FF, seeing as we already have the versatile KPF in Watts (touch wood he comes good). Tall 195cm + forwards seem to be all the rage atm, long gone are the days of the traditional monster at FF. Sure versatility is huge right about now, but there is nothing wrong with a FF that can only play FF, if he does it well. Lockett, Dunstall, Ablett, LLoyd, our own courageous skipper 'Neita' (him being the exception, holding down CHB as well, he's just a champion). Bring back the Gorilla!!!!

You gotta feel sorry for Barlow. He made the greatest of transitions into the AFL, Freo surprising everyone and continuing their fantastic run (who'd have thought at the start of the year). He was in Brownlow medal form too, seeing there only seems to be Sandilands who would take votes off him for their games.

He got ko'd along with Graham Polak on the weekend when they clashed heads together. Both were out before they hit the ground. If there's any way to get injured, poor old Mitch Thorp will no doubt find it. He has had rotten luck with injuries.

No one can question Jack Grimes' endeavour, it is right up their with Moloney's (probably greater). 70% of the time Grimes' disposal is top shelf, producing fantastic bullet-like kicks that are a joy to watch. It's the other 30% where his disposal comes undone. At times it is deplorable and costly turnovers result, given he's usually in the backline trying to set up the play going forward. It is this 30% that makes him seem slow and he is also unaccountable at times, but then he wouldn't be a Melbourne player if he wasn't. Let's not forget that it's only his 25th game or so, improvement is inevitable at such an early stage. Hopefully with this, he will raise his quality of disposal up to 90%. His turnovers will always be highlighted, as he is the one creating the play. As for him becoming captain, he's still way too young. I've been a massive critic of Junior in previous seasons, but if he wants to continue on next season, he still deserves the captaincy. If not, give it to Moloney for a year or 2, then we will see how good Grimes goes.

what i wanna know is, what was tony shaw smoking and where can i get some????

What i still cannot fathom, is the fact that we gave Bailey a contract extension right at the start of the year. Is it so he wouldn't feel under pressure???? Well any coach that had Bailey's record should be feeling the bloody pressure. No, it has to be because we want to keep the wolves at bay, look at them all lining up to get his signature *crickets*. He is so slow as a coach, just like our starts. He has 2 game plans (if you can call them that), the first being this obsessive run through the middle of the ground (to which the answer is a simple zone), the other is to limit the damage of our poor starts so that we don't lose by a heap. I have no idea what our board sees in him, and the fact they continue to sing his praises is starting to worry me. We are becoming an old boys club off the field, whilst our players are rolling the dice to see if they want to turn up on game day. This has been going on for 3 1/2 years now. I don't want to hear that our players need games together to gel, Bailey, you keep regurgitating the same old crap, all talk and no action is what you are. I want a coach who gives a damn about his coaching record, not one who thinks it's gonna come together in a few years. The last coach who thought that was one Terry Wallace and i think he'd have you covered Bailey. As for the playing group, for years they have tried to rid itself as being labelled downhill skiers. Nothing has changed. They just don't realise that they are meant to turn up every week and give a good showing. That's why they're paid so bloody much (too much). Put em all on performance based contracts, that would save the club millions. Maybe then we might be able to give Baldy and his inept sidekick (Josh Mahoney) the flick whenever we bloody feel like it.

As pathetic as he might be, he needs to stay in the team for the rest of the year. Sure, on most performances he deserves to be dropped, but we really need another tall forward and the sooner he comes on (touch wood) the better. He isn't going to develop anywhere near as fast playing at Casey as he would playing in the AFL. What he needs is a massive boot up the arse.

apart from it being wayyyyyyyyyyyy too early to discuss trading, he would probably cost too much. I definitely wouldn't want to part with our first round draft pick (draft a KPF) and our 2nd pick wouldn't be not enough to get him. Then we also have to factor in the possibility of Carltank being so ticked off with the Gysberts for McLean trade (daylight robbery on our part), their asking price will be ridiculous.

Too right!!! Countless times today and many a time in all other games, umpires are making a call 30 metres away (and more often than not) on the wrong side of the pack. What is really starting to frustrate me, is the amount of time an umpire is willing to wait before he calls a ball up. It ain't coming out, but they still wave their arms like morons. The problem with all umpires these days, is that they want to be part of the game. They are not there to put on a show, just to adjudicate it. A good umpire is one that isn't recognised during the game.

Trading up would be very handy this year. Imagine if we had 2 first round picks and were able to pick up 2 of Luke Mitchell, Lucas Cook, Jamie Solly or Jack Darling. Even one of them would suffice.

I'd only go after him if Petterd were to leave at season's end and he came very cheap, even then i would be hesitant. There must be something wrong with him if 2 clubs throw him out.

Unless we re-drafted him, Stephen Powell came to us before 2002. I distinctly remember him playing in the 2000 Pre-lim and then kicking our first goal in the GF the following week. Unless i have read it wrong.

Yep, he would've done better than half of our players on the field today. At least he tries. If i didn't know any better, i would've thought we were tanking.

Not sure if Bailey needs to go, but his selection of Mahoney as his forward line coach was a serious lack of judgement. Mahoney has to go, he is fuseless. As for the players, all bar James McDonald should give their match payments back. Trengove and Scully need to be rested, Miller should come in for Johnson, Davey needs to be told to kick the bloody thing long and none of that short crap, Sylvia has to go back to Casey, Grimes should be told to never kick sideways or backwards and get greater awareness. Rivers is just about finished (he is sooooooo slow) and Jones needs to get a rocket put up his arse. What i am frustrated about, is this constant need to handball. Kick the bloody thing long. Rant over.

4; Josh Kennedy getting ko'd from a fair hip n shoulder by Sylvia

We've been ready for 46 years.

I think you are being very kind to Jack Grimes tonight. He absolutely butchered the ball, not one of his better games. You got to love his endeavour, but some of his turnovers tonight were absolutely inexcusable.

Nic Nat can have the Rising Star. Our last player to win it, some 6 years ago, is now being bandied around as trade bait. I'll wait for Scully to accept his premiership medal. The question i want answered is, are the Bulldogs overrated, or are we that good????? Either way, i hope we come out next week breathing fire and roast those f&^#@ng birds.

I know jayceebee quite well, and he continues to reassure me that Jack Watts will be a very good player for us, as i have my concerns. Whether or not what he said above was tongue in cheek or not, i don't know, as it is so hard to convey tone through writing. However, he is a staunch supporter and believer in Jack Watts. I think what jayceebee is referring to with the Natanui comment, is that we really did ourselves no favours in winning 5 games back in 2007. We could have picked up both Watts and Natanui if we'd 'list managed' a little better in 2007. But then all these other possibilities wouldn't have come about, such as Sam Blease and would have we won fewer than 5 games last year if we had of had him? I have noticed however, whenever Natanui is mentioned on MFC boards, everybody gets extremely defensive. Everyone on this board realises that there's an elephant in the room, but simply refuses to acknowledge it. I hope Jack Watts becomes a great player, better than NicNat would be great, but no one can deny that Natanui will become a very good AFL player. If you do, you're just living in dream land. It's as simple as that.

The heads at the AFL are starting to lose the plot. HAving a final 9/10 would be ridiculous. It's ridiculous enough to have half of the teams make the finals each year. The Bombers highlighted the flaws in such a system last year, when they qualified for the finals with only 10 wins. What a joke! 10 wins is definitely not deserving of a finals spot (they then got belted the next week, and rightly so). When there will be 18 teams in the comp, a finals series of 8 teams would give the AFL a lot more balance. Competition will be greater for finals spots, with those who make it being more deserving than say a Bombers team of 2009.