jnrmac

Nicely summed up Sylvinator. If you had have asked yourself what we needed at the end of the season it would have been 2 big bodied fwds. Job done. Sellar and Clark are good to go now. Bery important. And if Sellar doesn't work we have plenty of talls in the pipeline that are developing. If you read the summary of draft review from the club it is clear to see that they crawl over every snippet of info about players. They do their homework. More than everyone posting here. My mail is we were very close to taking Jackson Paine a tall skinny fwd but decided that big bodies in the end were essential. Taggert you see is also 86+kgs. Won't get knocked off the ball too easily.

A grade players play at a grade clubs. We have been terrible at nurturing a grade players. At Hawthorn or Geelong they have the culture that can turn a Sewell or a Varcoe or an Enright into an elite player. We don't do that - yet.

Seems like they are doing a lot of 'round the boundary" and no drills up the corridor. Sound familiar??

Absolute carp. You can have your theories but this is one hare-brained one. Bate wanting to go had nothing repeat nothing to do with Prendergast. BP didn't recruit Bate either. The players we got rid of were fringe players at best. What are you smoking? BTW the list manager is Tim Harrington.

Great stuff guys. Much appreciated for the thoroughness of the reports.

Wow. Heres one page I opened from 87 that was interesting. Average Home games attendance for the year. The Dees were second to Carlton. Gee we stuffed up didn't we? Were sitting in a great position - winning games, good attendances. WTF were the administration thinking or doing?? Here is a table of the 14 clubs and their average crowds for home games, including transferred games, this year: Brisbane Bears: 10,081 Carlton: 29,049 Collingwood: 22,860 Essendon: 16,663 Fitzroy: 12,314 Footscray: 15,520 Geelong: 19,528 Hawthorn: 18,045 Melbourne: 27,014 North Melbourne:20,630 Richmond: 17,463 Sydney Swans: 22,005 St. Kilda: 15,659 West Coast Eagles: 24,349

Yeah that's a quality list. In their best number 7 picks ever they have a list of other notables that includes John Meesen.

And wouldn't that stick it up $cully.....

Nice segue

What is he then?

two points. DB's approach was probably right when he first came but it shows perhaps how difficult it is to change that approach once the players get used to the coach. The softly softly approach didn't work with Morton or Davey and arguably a bunch of other players. So Neeld could be the right man for the right time.. Neeld is doing everything that we would expect him to do. be blunt with the payers about where they are and where they need to be. After all he has seen (with Dave Misson) first hand what it takes to be successful in terms of fitness, commitment and game plan. DB did as well but his knowledge and game plan appeared to be based on stuff we couldn't deliver on. DB didn't have the assistants with the knowledge either. He had a bunch of first timers aside from Royal. West and Mahoney were learning their trade. So far I am very impressed with the team the Dees have build around Neeld. It should show pretty soon. The only other point is whether Neeld is right in being public about the heat on players and personally I think he is. The other way clearly hasn't worked. These players are players with talent. That is it. If they want success they have to sacrifice a lot for it. Our players frankly have not done that. You can look at the Scully/China trip as a microcosm of that but the facts are (as I believe) our guys treated the trip as a junket and not as a professional player should. Sylvia's most recent misdemeanor is more evidence of cancer within the group. Cousins going to the Tigers was interesting to me because it showed the young tigers what it took to train and compete. Say a lot about Cousins but he was a ferocious trainer. Its also why you can never have a Fevola at the Dees. Cotchin, Deledio and Martin now have instilled in them what it takes to be an elite player. And quite possibly all three will be. That is the difference betweenm having talent and being a good player and being an elite player - the commitment, training, intensity and drive. I hope to hell that Neeld can bring it. From what I have heard so far the signs are good. There will be players fall by the wayside (Sylvia and Morton are two obvious candidates) but it will be up to them.

Ahhh, someone who gets it. Our culture pretty obviously (for all you posters who think he is being harsh) has been SOFT, POOR, too accepting of failure and happy with mediocrity for WAY TOO LONG. Thank God for Neeld. When you have a COach and Fitness guru that have come from teams that have played in multiple GF's and know how hard other players work comment on our poor training form why would you question it? As for 'humiliating' players what crud. He is stating the obvious. If they want to be elite players this is what they have to do. Simple. If they don't do it they wont play. We have a PPoor record at turning good talent into elite players. How many elite players have we had in the past 10 years?? I mean Judd, Cousins, Buckley, Goodes, Hird elite. I'd argue none. Maybe Neitz but that's about it. Its not because they dont have talent. Its about culture and acceptance of OK is good enough. I am rapt Neeld is putting the challenge on Morton and Davey. Two of the biggest disappointments I have seen. At least Davey has achieved in the past but his last year was woeful. They are players that have to become elite if we are to be successful.

Great report. Much appreciated! Thanks

Can't believe their 'levels' are so different. They have been off work for 4 or 5 weeks and would you imagine be training all of this time. Also imagine you'd want to come back fit to impress the new coach. Maybe being first day this was a sampler but boy I'd be dissapointed if they weren't all firing after two weeks or so. BTW Where was Davey???

They usually all put lots of muscle on because this is when they do weights! It's when the aerobic stuff starts that a lot like Morton can't keep it on. That's why most need 3 or 4 pre-seasons to build up gradually..

Most AFL contracts run til Oct 31. Nothing unusual here.

I'm sorry but you do not know that he failed to be fit for work; or, that he was p!ssed. He was dropped from the Aust team before he could go to 'work'. As to whether he was too drunk we can guess but we don't know for sure. Nor did you answer what would you would expect if you had an accident on a Monday morning at 6am? So you can talk about context and I get the frustration and team rules etc but my point was about normal work standards. Many of us have been out til the wee hours before having to go to work. We still do our jobs. Now if he rocked up to a game half cut that would be different....

Newton's kicking was atrocious. The number of 'sitters' he missed in his 30-odd games (over 7 years) was diabolical. If he could kick he could have cemented his place.

I am not a CS fan and are as frustrated more than most with this player but really your email needs responding to. Would you go through the sanctions you have suggested at your workplace for being a passenger in a car? We all like to think the players are as passionate as we supporters are but the truth is they are not. Does that mean we should get rid of them? I actually think probably if they are a serial offender but when I think about it in my own workplace I would be up in arms if I was treated that way for being a passebnger in a car and technically doing nothing wrong. And arguments about "they are highly paid and should be grateful for their opportunity" etc are really nothing more than supporter pasion and ignorance about how some players (thankfully not all) view their employment. CS maybe is just is plain dumb.

It's simple really. Col's best finish in the Bluey has I think been 5th. He has played 8 seasons and was pick 3 in the draft. Has all the talent and mongrel but is an airhead and is our most disappointing player. His second and third efforts are non-existent. Neeld needs to put a rocket where the sun don't shine in Sylvia. 1 year or he's out. It's a team game and he doesn't play a team game. The Pies don't have the best talent but they play a great team game. That's where we need to be and Sylvia does not fit on those plans. Just like TJ. Wasted Talent. Two top 10 finishes in the Bluey in 10 years (a 1st and 3rd). We have to fix the culture. And now. We cannot get talented young players to turn into elite players unless we fix the culture... Culture culture culture.. Aaaarrgghhh.

Hot News Flash. $$cully's Mum is now the new CEO

We play the GWS twice, both in the second half of the season....

Cale shies away from physical contact. Many of his efforts are quite lame. He deserves to cop a pasting from his team mates and probably here as well.

Look at Dale Thomas to see what is required to improve your fitness. Has moved on to be elite after the past 28 games or so. Works hard. That's what we need to do. Particularly blokes like Bennell and Jetta

Ross Lyon went through something like 10 assistants in 3 years. Dos that tell you something?? As for the Bubble and the fallout It's fair to say their siege mentality turned out to be very poor for them with secrets, innuendo, gossip and whispers driving a lot of the behaviour at the club. Yet he did manage to get them playing winning footy for a while. Give me John Northey any day over Ross Lyon.