RalphiusMaximus

A bit different if you take an action shot.

Did Cain not get drafted? I'd Rookie him in a heartbeat.

Interesting to see Scott Simpson in the list. He played a season or two for Casey a few years ago didn't he? I'm pretty sure I saw him piledrive a guy into the turf in a tackle and get reported in a game down there. I really liked his size and aggression at the time, but we don't really need more talls right now.

We won three quarters in that game, it's just that they absolutely smashed us in one and put enough on to win the match.

If there's no compo then we match the offer and make them trade for him. Easy.

I'm not overly worried about this issue. It would undoubtedly hurt is we lost him, but we won't get shafted yet. If he wants to go we would almost certainly trade him, but he won't be able to get away via FA. We have as much room as anyone else in the league in terms of salary cap. We'd be able to match whatever they throw at him and force them to trade. Of course, if we are in line for an early pick and are pretty sure of band one compo it could be worth letting him go.

He played a couple of games on serious KPF marking targets when we had injuries in the backline. Not against any of the best forwards in the league I think, but he still did the job against bigger opponents.

There was a series in one of the papers rating people in different parts of the field. They had Dunn as the best 1-1 defender in the league based on their stats. As you say, he was beaten once in a 1-1 marking contest for the season. That is a hell of a record. I agree with what a few people have said, if he can improve his decision-making with the ball in hand and stop giving away stupid frees he'll be a very handy player for us next year.

Wasn't this something that we were wanting to weed out? It's been mentioned at various times the poor culture of just being happy o be on an AFL list.

This makes me sad. He never actually played like I hoped he would, but I loved the way he went about things and always hoped he'd put it together and become a star.

The glass is always full unless it's in a complete vacuum. It's more a matter of whether it is full of liquid.

That was the rationale behind doing things that way. It was mentioned in an article early on in Neeld's tenure that they wanted the players to practice executing their skills while tired so that they could do it in games. The whole "train as you mean to play" thing. I think it said it was something the Storm do in their training.

The highlights were interesting. His kicking is a bit up and under, but he does seem to know where to put the ball at least. Far more interesting were his second efforts. It shows him repeatedly disposing of the ball and then running on to create options again, in one case picking up the spillage from his own kick further downfield. I suspect it is that more than anything which would make him attractive to our coaching department. He'll need to put in some work on the weights to get the bulk he needs to play that way in the AFL though.

Didn't one of the Jarmans refuse to come and play for us after we drafted him? Stayed in SA with a promise to from Adelaide that they would pick him up was the story I heard.

As RPFC says. What our ability to match offers does is force clubs to pay well over his value if they want to get him or else risk trying to get him in the draft. I think you'd want to have a pretty early PSD pick to be confident of nabbing him if you went that route, because there aren't many clubs who wouldn't want him.

There's an article up on the MFC site with Dave Misson. He says the following: Encouraging signs I'd say. I really hope we see a full season from him.

The question will what GC are willing to spend on him. I would think we can match anything they offer, but do we wamt to if they throw too much at him?

Not bad. I'm not a fan of his kicking if that's an example. He judged a few of them well but they were still floaters and he doesn't look to have much distance on it either.

I'd take him at 40 quite happily. He's got what we need.

http://www.melbournefc.com.au/melbourne/news/2013-11-05/eclusive-coaching-structure-crucial-roos 7 minutes in roughly, he hits the nail on the head. Says that there's only so much the coaches can do to get the players fit and give them a competitive gameplan, but ultimately it's up to the players to put in the work to learn their role and execute it. This has been a big failing in the younger players. They always seem to be looking to someone else to make things happen.

Could well have to do with insurance. What happens if a player is training with a club but not employed by them and is badly injured? Presumably by listing them with the AFL they will be covered for injury incurred during this period. To my mind that would be the main concern.

I don't really care about the sponsors. If I had the money I'd offer to sponsor the club to have nothing but the emblem on our jumpers. I think it's cheap and tacky to have a company logo splashed across your uniform and it truly saddens me that it has become a necessity in modern football.

I think this is actually a really good opening game for both clubs. It should give us all a good idea of where the two teams stand. We were pretty even with them mid-year. They've lost some midfield strength and a bit of firepower which should work in our favour. In all it's a very winnable game, although it should be said that we'll be throwing in an almost entirely untried lineup as well. Great work by the AFL in scheduling this for round 1 and giving both clubs a sniff of a flying start and a top 8 spot after round one.

Rumour - Totally unsubstantiated: Scott Watters is in discussions with the Demons for the heir apparent role. Wish he'd been sacked earlier, this would have been a perfect Halloween post

They'll just be running to start things off. Lots of laps and sprints to see what sort of shape they are coming back in.