praha

3 wins next year, 2013 finals, flag in 2014.

Yeah, to be honest, I probably will go there again if the Dees are playing, so I made a little lie, but god damn I hate that stadium. Just the worst. It's funny how there are seats near the scoreboard up along the side, but those seats are never sold because they don't actually have a view of the ground. Who the hell designed that stadium? Morons.

Firstly, I am never going to a game there again. The fact that I couldn't see the boundary line below me without standing up AND standing on my toes is a disgrace. Secondly, the room in front of you is probably half that of the MCG. At the G, you can walk past people without them having to fully get off their seats. At the Dome, people have to literally get up, stand and turn for you to walk past. Even old cinemas from the early 90s aren't that bad. Thirdly, all of the restaurants at the Docklands suck considering what you pay. I went to Mecca Bar and paid $22 for a chicken kebab - one shish kebab on a small bed of rice. Wow. (I know this has nothing to do with the stadium but thought I'd throw it in lol) I just hate Jihad Stadium.

Yet he gets dropped after one bad game and players like Whelan, Robertson and Bruce, who do absolutely nothing for the development and leadership of our team, get regained in the team.

I think Watts has a great football brain. You can tell by looking at him. His positioning is normally pretty good. However, you can tell he is still adapting to playing against the big boys and is still learning what his body can handle. Couple this with the fact that the kid is very dedicated with his studies and he has Yr 12 exams and you're going to get a hesitant player with a lot on his mind during game day. No matter how often he says it doesn't effect him, he will always have a clouded and hectic mind when playing. Leigh should know better than to make a statement like that. I think it's really unfair.

Jurrah has had more experience playing and training against/with men. Watts has pretty much had 5 games.

I just don't understand the point in dropping Maric and keeping the likes of Whelan and Robertson in the team. Either you play for the future or you play to win. And we can win without those two in the side. It's not 3 years ago. I hate seeing young players getting dropped when they're playing better than some of the senior players. Really gets on my nerves. Jamar gone hurts us in the ruck. Martin will have to step up. I gag everytime I see Miller's name. I hate him as a footballer. And I think we all saw McDonald getting dropped, ahh, I mean, injured, soon.

35,678

How much money does this kid earn...Surely he can't be on more than 150-200k atm?

Harvey would be the most likely to get the "sack" next. Malthouse will just move on. Williams from Port as well.

I hate Docklands. Worst stadium for football. Tried to get tickets on Saturday and was told the whole first level was already sold. Seriously, wtf? Gonna have to make do with the top level in the pocket. GRRRRRRRR

Wow...talk about giving numbers of past heroes to current day duds...

Quite a list. No doubt had Daniher stayed on, all of Johnstone, Ward, Godfrey, Ferguson, Neville, Yze, White, Carroll, Bode and Weetra would all still be on the list and playing.

I didn't expect him to play during VCE. 2010 will be Watt's break-out year. He'll kick his first goal against the Bombers and have a few good games before being rested ahead of exams at the end of the year.

At the end of the first quarter I was really thinking, "We get such an awesome crowd and the best support we've had in ages, and we play like this. Typical!" It was the same feeling I had when we played Freo about 4 years ago at the MCG. Decent crowd, with hardly any Freo fans and all red and blue. We played terribly, and the only time we made any noise was when they came onto the ground at the start. http://forums.demonland.com/index.php?showtopic=15288 Check that thread out. Sheanan mentions that we AREN'T the youngest in the competition, and this poses as a problem. Yet he says we struggle in a lot of areas. Which is a catch-22. If you want to be young, you need to be bad before you can be good. I am a strong believer in playing young and winning later, and I don't see the point in playing players such as Robbo, Whelan, Wheatley, McDonald and even Bruce. They won't be part of the winning Melbourne team in a few years, so replace them with Newton, Jurrah, Valenti and others, so they can improve.

Finishing bottom means nothing. We can finish 14th, but if we have less than 5 wins, we still get the picks.

To answer your question: No, we're not tanking. We're just not good enough.

Jamar has been great in his two games. He gets hit-outs and presents. I thought he played better than Fraiser yesterday. Only two games, but on those games he is 2 of 2, both of which were great by an average ruckman standard and I think he is deserving of a HD.

He's a Pies supporter, granted, but told me Collingwood had a younger team today than Melbourne on the field. Even if it's not true, I thought to myself: Players like Robbo, Whelan, McDonald, even Bruce. Are they totally, 100% necessary to be in the team? I'd suggest that McDonald is there for leadership reasons and I don't expect them to dump the captain, although I anticipate an "injury" soon for him to miss a couple of weeks. Robbo is at the end of his career. He isn't part of our plans for the future and as great as he has been for our club, his selfish play isn't good for a learning and developing team. Whelan is a solider. No doubt. But I think he might just be done. A fantastic player over the past 9 years and I guess he could be spared a position, but if a young gun is knocking down the door, I'd rather see Whelan go to Casey than someone like Martin, who is said to be part of our future. Now Bruce. Our highest paid player and best and fairest winner. I'm not a fan of Bruce. I watch him more than other players because I like picking on him (guilty as charged). He backs out of contests, which is my biggest gripe. And unlike McDonald or Davey or Whelan, he just isn't reliable and genuine enough in his game play. Maybe it's just me though? So I guess the question I put forth to all of you is whether you think it is totally, 100% necessary to have these older players in our team. If they're not leading and not helping us win games (like Richo at Richmond, for example), then I can't see any reason for them being in the team.

Beamer was respectable today. On a type of day when the handball should be outlawed, his style of play actually helped us get on the scoreboard. He didn't put in 4 quarters though. Green was OK and made a target early on.

Everyone except Watts.

I think we can all agree Watts is better than all of those players and anything less than 12 goals today would have been a massive under achievement. I call bust.

From another thread: *sigh* We don't have any silky smooth players besides Davey and Sylvia. We have a non-existent forward line. We have 2 players under 50 games holding up our back line. Our "leaders" back out of contests and spray at goal. Our one true leader in McDonald just isn't AFL standard anymore. What do you expect? Rebuilding. That is the word. This is the first year of that rebuilding. Last year didn't count because the list was still infected with Daniher's duds. Slowly cleaning them out and slowly pulling them in. Hence a 3-4 year plan. It's one game, against a team that is flying, on the big stage, of which hardly any of our players have played on.

You clearly never watched Grgic play lol

On the big screen before the game, Schwartz was talking about the great names that had worn number 4, in reference to Watts' guernsey presentation. He mentioned Norm Smith, Ron Barrassi and then....Brent Grgic. He must have been joking, right?