RalphiusMaximus

If we're 1-5 I won't be at all bothered. These are some pretty good teams we're facing. If we fail to overcome a pitiful Richmond I'll be upset, but a win over any of the others is a bonus. It's the second half of the season where we'll be showing something. By then some of our young guys will be finding their feet and we have a better run of opponents.

Don't read too much into NM winning a couple of games in the preseason. They're still weak. We have a legitimate 50-50 shot at that one. Well, maybe 60-40. I agree that we'll go down in the other four. It's simply too early in the season for our young guys to be showing enough to challenge them.

I'd swap LJ and Wona around personally. I think the more room you give Jurrah the better, while Wona's fitness isn't really good enough to be pushing up the ground.

He's not questioning Miller's effort but your acceptance of his effort as a basis for being in an AFL team.

Your entire contention lacks validity. You've taken two entirely different sample sizes to start with. Are you working on the assumption that the lists you've provided represent the first team for each side? To make the comparison even remotely valid you need to show the entire list complete with total games played at all clubs for each player. For instance here is a list for Melbourne as of the beginning of this year: 1 Matthew Warnock 38 2 Nathan Jones 70 3 Clint Bartram 59 4 Jack Watts 3 5 Jordan Gysberts - 6 Matthew Bate 68 7 Brad Miller 127 8 James Frawley 40 9 Jack Trengove - 10 Cale Morton 40 11 Paul Johnson 62 12 Colin Sylvia 87 14 Lynden Dunn 52 15 Ricky Petterd 29 16 Jack Grimes 12 18 Brad Green 198 19 Addam Maric 11 20 Colin Garland 20 21 Daniel Bell 66 22 Brent Moloney 90 23 James McDonald 235 24 Liam Jurrah 9 25 Kyle Cheney 12 27 Jared Rivers 90 28 Joel Macdonald 80 30 Tom McNamara 3 31 Tom Scully - 32 Cameron Bruce 203 33 Austin Wonaeamirri 18 34 Stefan Martin 27 35 Luke Tapscott - 36 Aaron Davey 119 37 Max Gawn - 39 Neville Jetta 15 40 Mark Jamar 73 44 Rohan Bail 1 43 Jamie Bennell 16 46 Sam Blease - 47 James Strauss - 48 Jack Fitzpatrick - Rookies: 13 Jordie McKenzie 3 26 John Meesen 6 29 Michael Newton 21 38 Danny Hughes - 42 Jake Spencer 6 50 Rhys Healey - A quick look hasn't turned up the complete St Kilda list for 2004 with games played, so that can be somebody else's project.

Where has anyone ever said that? The problem isn't his effort but his ability. A poor player giving 110% is still not going to have the output of a good player giving 80%.

Here's a few photos from the game vs Bombers. It's a new (second hand) camera that I'm still working out the controls on, so they aren't great. Sadly a lot of them missed the action due to a delay in taking the picture. Still, better than nothing and a few of them came out OK. These are the pick of the bunch. If anyone has more, please add them. I've noticed there don't seem to be any out there yet.

On looks I'd go Cale Morton. Tall, skinny and with a mop hairdo. :D

They could always do something innovative and have multiple captains. The team already works largely in units or Backline, Midfield and Forward. Why not name a captain for each? Perhaps one for the ruck as well? This would just be a modified leadership group with a little more focus. Perhaps even captain and vice captain for each part of the ground who then act in the same role as the leadership group now?

Well, it could have been worse. He'll miss our first month or two. Most of those are pretty nasty games for us, so it's not like he'd be carrying us over the line in them. He can take some time to focus on his weights.

Don't forget the new Viney when he arives.

He cops stick because he does the 1%ers but fails to perform at his primary task of kicking goals. Consider the last quarter pass from Straus. I was sitting with a Bulldog supporter who'd come along to watch. He couldn't understand why I was upset that Straus had passed to Miller rather than taking a low percentage shot himself. How could it not be better to have a set shot from 25 m directly in front than a running shot around the body from near the 50? Observe as Miller misses the unmissable yet again.

How are you counting that? He was 1 on 1. It was unfortunate that another bomber read the kick early and ran flat out to get a hand on it at the last moment. Had he been a foot slower it was a mark to us. I agree that the result was terrible, but it came very close to being a great pass.

Quote from Bomber Blitz. That about sums it up. Who was that guy anyway? There is no 23 listed on the AFL umpire profiles. Perhaps the Umps were letting their new guys have a run as well?

I loved Robbo and I agree that he had more goals in him. Had he stayed on our list, he would likely have topped our goalkicking again this year. That being said, I'm comfortable with his forced retirement. It was a tough decision, but he was not going to be in our next premiership and it's better to take one more dip at the draft pool in the hopes of finding a new player than it is to hang on to an old one for one more year. What we need far more than one player who can kick goals is someone to teach our forwards how to kick goals. We seem to have no structure and no teamwork in our forward 50, and when we do get a set shot we miss more often than we hit. It's all very well saying that Watts is a great kick, but it won't help us this year, and probably not next either. We need the KPF's we have right now to kick goals, not points.

Why all the love for Joel Mac? He was seriously ordinary yesterday. He left his man at the wrong times and got caught out repeatedly because of it. Slack, unaccountable football. Also his disposal wasn't great. He did a decent job when he was at the contest, but too often was seen looking back at the man he should have been marking as they pushed the ball inside 50.

That would be the play where he took the ball in traffic, won the clearance, avoided multiple tacklers, refused to pass to a teammate under pressure and eventually found a man in a decent position to pass to? Had the ball gotten there half a second sooner it was the best play of the day. Sadly it was read by an opponent who left his man and ran to intercept.

This is the guy who injured himself flying backwards into the path of an oncoming forward and back to attempt a mark/spoil right? Also the guy who ran down an opponent from behind on the wing, outbodied him and then took off with the ball in the other direction. I really think you need to comment on the game, not your preconceived notions of what the players will do.

Very interesting to see how some people viewed this game. I was sitting on the wing, right next to the gate the coaches were using. I was absolutely thrilled with the way we played today. Early on I took to keeping track of scoring shots rather than the score itself. Simply put, if our forwards could kick we would have been ahead for most of the first half and the margin would have been a couple of goals at most. Given that nobody in the club has any reasonable expectation of Miller, Newton, Martin or Maric scoring from set shots, this was not a surprise to any of us. The important point is that we matched them all over the ground, our tall defenders were all over their tall forwards (most of the time) and the midfield broke even although they were not as well drilled or clean. The worst thing was the lack of accountability in our small defenders. Two weeks running we've had bags kicked by he small forwards while our bigger guys held their own. This is where we'll really miss Wheelan and Weatley this year. Players of note (in no particular order): Jones - I don't know what the people bagging him are on about. He was dominant today. We all agree that his disposal isn't the best in the team, but he was heavily involved in everything, often touching the ball 2-3 times in a forward movement. Was our best midfielder in the first half. I'll add that I was at the game with a Bulldogs fan who is far more experienced than I (he actually played with Bruce at Melbourne High). He agrees with me in this and plans on adding Jones to his supercoach side. Warnock - Is our best Gorilla Keeper. He smashed Hille when he was forward. Ryder was too quick for him, but otherwise was very solid. Morton - I never want to see another poster complaining about his courage. He repeatedly put himself in harms way today, and eventually it found him. Had some very good moments, as well as a couple of ordinary ones. Sylvia - Loved his game. He hard, powerful and skillful. Loves body contact and can win contested ball. Petterd - Had a really good game. The highlight for me was a contested overhead mark in the pocket in a small pack. He was the smallest man there and took it cleanly. Looks like a hard matchup as he seems equally comfortable playing tall or small. Jurrah - Was not a happy lad being played out of the goalsquare in the first half. Fletcher was giving him a hard time, he was being held and pushed out of marking contests and in general looked like he wanted to be somewhere else. Change of forward structure in the second half put him up to half forward and he looked a different man. With the freedom to move up into the midfield he was suddenly involved and interested. He still had a quiet game, but it's clear that he needs to be played off the HFF. Newton - While he had another ordinary game, the forward line looked better for his presence. His one shining moment had nothing to do with the ball. He chased from the forward pocket, through multiple possessions, ran right through a shepherd and forced the ball out right in front of us on the wing. Given that this is an area he's often been criticised for, I was thrilled to see him make the effort and get the payoff. Frawley - Wasn't his best game. He was fine defensively, but a couple of his kicks were shocking. He should not be taking the kick-ins. Straus - I didn't notice him early on (was he subbed in at halftime?) but he showed us all what he can do by foot today. His kicking is everything we've been told and more. His pass to Miller in the final term was magic. Pity Miller couldn't make it count. Miller - If he could kick he would be worth keeping. Sadly, even his field kicking was pretty poor today. We looked much better when he was pushing up the ground, but anywhere in the forward 50 he's shocking. The miss after Straus gave him a perfect setup was horrible. Martin - Has a bad case of the fumbles. He gets to the right places and often has first hands on the ball, but he never ever takes it cleanly. Missed some very easy shots. Played on when he shouldn't have and missed what would have been a sitter. When he did settle down and take a set shot he put it through the middle. Not a great action but it flew straight. He is not a ruck. Had a couple of hitouts but was soundly beaten overall. I think if he is to become anything at AFL level the coaches need to pick a spot for him and let him learn how to play it. Pinch-hitting all over the place is going to ruin him. Scully - Magic hands. A couple of times he was caught with the ball, and he couldn't stand his ground against the bigger guys he was playing on, but that will come. Had a couple of really bad kicks here and there. Also some pretty good ones. Not a domintant game, but fair. Trengove - Much the same as Scully. He's a much better kick. Grimes - It's really all been said. He's a star. Bate - ... Bennell - He did some good things, but too often let himself down with poor kicks. Umpire 23 - I'm not sure I've seen a worse game. Made some truly bizarre calls, none more so than the holding call against Maric just before the final siren. Even the bombers fans jeered. I may have caught a glimpse of a red and black shirt under his umpiring gear. Obviously, there were others, but these were bits that stood out to me at the time. Bartram has no place on an AFL list. Didn't really notice Bell. McKenzie is solid and hard at the contest.

It didn't look that bad at the time, but sometimes they don't. He does have skinny little stick legs. At the time I thought he'd just been crunched in the marking contest (and there was absolutely no sign of him squibbing).

I still prefer Green, but I wouldn't be at all upset to have any of the three mentioned in the role.

Spencer had a nasty corked hip(?) last game. Probably still sore. No reason to push him into this game on one leg.

All of them. Including the ones who didn't play last week. I would also like to see the Bombers forward line fall on their collective face and give us a real glimmer of hope for our game later in the season.

Entirely possible. I won't commit to which one will play which spot, but I think they will be the pair to anchor our forward 50.

In the long term FF and CHF will be Watts and Fitzpatrick. Laugh if you will, but I have faith in my own entirely baseless conclusions despite a complete absence of facts and four games between them at senior level. Just you wait until 2014 and see who's laughing.