RalphiusMaximus

This makes me sad. Trenners looked amazing in his fist year. Now he's been relegated to the overly long list of failed first round picks we've had in the last decade.

Signed for two more years in June.

Nope. Finally saw him play and to me he looks a hell of a lot like Cale Morton. He's more physical, but that skinny build will hamper him.

I wouldn't bet on him moving. He's the face of the club, in particular appearing on all of their junior merch. Has madsive fan support. Trading him would do huge damage to their brand.

He's had a shocking run this year, but he wouldn't be the first player to have issues early in their career. A good pre-season and with luck he'll have a better time next year.

This is simple. If you can't kick, you can't be a professional footballer. Melbourne and Casey are the worst kicks in their respective leagues. No matter how good you are in other areas, it all falls apart if you can't kick.

We need good ball users. Kelly would be awesome, but I doubt if we'll go there as he would cost an arm and a leg. I don't know where else we'd find serious quality though.

Looks like we had a pretty good idea of where we were going to finish. Somehow along the way we forgot and started to hope for more.

I'll post this here rather than derailing the Hibberd thread. He deserves the positive affirmation after an awesome season. The rest of the AA selection on the other hand... They've selected three tall defenders and three rebounding half backs. That looks like a very top-heavy defence to me and they have nobody to stop players like Betts, Garlett and Fantasia who can tear a game open. They've put two players on the wings who don't play wing. They say that apparently wing isn't a position any more and you can just put more mids in there. They've kept up with the tradition of naming extra mids in the forward line. Three tall forwards, two midfielders and Eddie Betts. Gill made a big deal of saying that they were going to name a balanced side that could actually play games. This side is about as far from balanced as you can get. They don't have enough clearance players on the park, so even if Ryder wins the ruck, they will struggle to get the clearance. They have two very good contested marks in the forward line, but only one genuine small forward to crumb off them. They will be very reliant on Kennedy and Daniher taking marks. The backline is top-heavy with Hurley, Rance and McGovern, while at the same time lacking a genuine small defender. They should be able to use Rance as third man and intercept mark, but if the ball hits the ground they will struggle. Basically this is a side that would be capable of big scores against bad opposition but could well fall apart against decent sides.

I got sent a little booklet explaining how to buy finals tickets. Talk about rubbing it in.

Watts to the wing. He's going to be squeezed out of the forward line as Weed comes on, especially if we do land Lever and TMac moves forward full-time. He's always been better value up the ground and we need good ball-users on the outside.

I go back to something that I think Mark Neeld said. There are too many players on our list who are happy just to be playing AFL. They aren't willing to do the extra work to play finals because their personal goal has already been met.

Damn I wish this hadn't been so close to the mark. Based on the midline I had here, the end of the season has to be considered a fail, if only just.

The issue, once again, is that we have no plan to score goals. There is absolutely no point in dominating possession and winning contested ball through the midfield if you can't kick goals. We win by small margins because we lack the ability to finish our good work with scores and this is entirely due to our lack of a cohesive plan for our forwards. They don't work for each other. They don't create space for each other. They rarely lead. The NEVER block for each other. All we ever see from them is clustering at the top of the square and waiting for the long bomb. All we ever see from our midfielders is blind bombs or chips into the pocket. I keep saying this. Chaplin has to go. We need someone who can get our forwards playing as a cohesive unit and produce a better plan than "bomb to the hot spot." Not only has it cost us a place in finals, but it's going to cost us Jesse and possibly the Weed as well. How long are they going to put up with standing under a high ball waiting to get smashed? Sooner or later they'll jump ship to a team that knows how to use their forwards.

Amen Brother.

He's showing glimpses, but as you say he needs to build a tank so he can have an impact for the entire game instead of just a few flashes.

Height. We need more height at both ends of the ground. Our KPPs are some of the shortest in the league, particularly the forwards. Even the commentators were commenting on our short backline being exposed. Don't think it was bad luck that they rotated two rucks through full forward. We've been shown to be incapable of handling tall full forwards repeatedly, so Buckley decided to exploit it and we didn't have an answer.

Huh?

5 frees to 0 in the first quarter to help the Pies build that match-winning lead. Some absolutely baffling non-calls that could have helped us get back into it. That being said, we were pathetic in the first and deserved to be well down. It's our forward 50 entries. You can talk about the poor first quarter or the fact that Collingwood tackled more and we hardly tackled at all, but ultimately we had every opportunity to win this even with the [censored]-poor first quarter, the umpiring and the lack of effort. Where we lost this game is exactly the same place we've lost most of our games. We get into a good attacking position, then butcher the forward 50 entry and stand there scratching our collective head as the opposition run the ball back down the ground. Chaplin has been a liability all season and I can't see any evidence that he's learning from his failures.

Random thought more than a rumour. What are the odds of shaking Jack Martin loose from GC17? He hasn't really performed thus far for them, but every now and then he has a game that suggests he could be amazing if he gets his act together.

Well, North are looking to land it for them. That would certainly help to get Kelly over the line.

Ignoring the cost in terms of trade and salary, Kelly has to win. He's got pace, skill and hardness. He's exactly the sort of player we are desperate to get our hands on. Lever, while a bloody good player, is an upgrade rather than filling a hole. We don't need him the way we need a really skillful mid.

There's been some radio chatter about Mason Cox looking to leave the Pies. They say he wants to be the #1 ruck and has no chance of unseating Grundy. No firm takers so fr but they are talking about which clubs could use him. Doggies could be a good fit. We've heard that Spencer would like a fresh start elsewhere, but again no idea where. Kent has been mentioned a few times as trade bait. While everyone knows we're sniffing around Lever, I'm not at all happy that we seem to be ignoring the auctions for a couple of quality midfielders. Maybe our list managers don't want to unbalance our list by overpaying one player?

Reminds me of Grant Thomas and SEN

Take a stroll up to Flinders street and grab a beer or three with your mates. Then as others have said hop over to Spencer Street and get the Skybus to the airport.