bananas

If only every midfielder worked as hard as Scully and Trengove. There were a number of times today when every other player of ours was completely static, and Sculgove were the only guys working to try and make space and create an option. They need to teach the rest of the boys how to play modern football.

Random thoughts on the game today: 1) 'Quarters won' (Bailey's favourite stat) is absolutely useless for judging our improvement. We won the last quarter today and it meant ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. The Hawks had switched off completely, the crowd had gone to sleep, and we got some junk time goals. Woo frickin' hoo. A more incisive stat would be 'Quarters won while the game was still up for grabs'. 2) We are lazy. For all Bailey's talk of 'competitiveness', he hasn't managed to instil any kind of work ethic into our players. When a guy looks up and sees nobody to kick to, it's because 17 other guys haven't been busting their gut trying to create an option. Case in point: Melbourne kicks blindly into their forward 50, and the Hawks mop it up. Looking up, there's a guy charging down to the vacant half-back flank, and he floats an easy kick into that space, which the player gobbles up. Situation reversed: Melbourne mops up a poor Hawks kick forward, look up and see ... nobody. I will exempt Scully and Trengove from this criticism. The number of times today that I looked down onto the field (the top deck is great for noticing this kind of thing) and saw 15 static Dees and two hard-working first-gamers trying to create space and become options for the ball carrier was depressing. Those two need to teach the so-called senior players just what modern footy is all about. Running hard for each other would also help with the 'over-handballing' problem. They've obviously been instructed to play on as much as possible --- but dishing a handball to a bloke a metre away, who is flat-footed, and who is being guarded by Campbell 'God I Hate Him So Much' Brown, is a recipe for disaster. Only dish off that handball to a guy running past at speed! For this to work, we need guys to actually BE running past at speed. Run for each other, Melbourne players, and we'll look a lot better (not good, that'll be a while, but better. Have a look at the first 3 quarters of Essendon v Geelong and study the Bombers style of play). 3) Brad Green is awesome. I hope his effort today is highlighted during the week, and some of the other so-called leaders have a good hard look at themselves. End rant. Probably more to follow when I think of it. Cheers, B.

I'm all for being optimistic, but I think the class of Hodge, Mitchell and Roughhead will get the Dorks over the line. We don't have anyone (Davey included) who is at their level. (I'll be there though, hoping I'm wronger than I've ever been in my life...)

When he kicked 5 against Carlton last year me and my mates were all giggling like idiots because he's been the butt of a lot of jokes over the years ... we're gonna have to pick a new bloke to ridicule amongst ourselves! Maybe Fitzpatrick ...

FB : Bennell Warnock MacDonald HB : Davey Frawley Rivers C : Grimes Jones Trengove HF : Petterd Miller Bate FF : Maric Martin Green Foll : Jamar Moloney McDonald Int : Scully Bruce Strauss Cheney In the backline: Warnock, Frawley, Rivers, MacDonald all pick themselves. The club seems to be preferring Bennell to Cheney at the moment, and I've cheated by using one of the Half Back Flanks for a midfielder (Davey, but could just as easily be Grimes/Bruce/whoever). In the midfield: Jamar is our most important name on the team-sheet this year. He's finally putting it together as a bash-and-crash ruckman, and giving us a chance at the stoppages, something none of the other options (PJ, Martin, Meesen, Spencer) have managed to do. Junior is the old hand, Moloney and Jones have the seasoned bodies, and then it's youth youth youth with Grimes, Trengove and Scully. That group will show flashes of brilliance, but won't put together four quarters of great footy for a long while yet. In the forward line: God, it's a mess. Miller is the luckiest man in football to still be necessary at CHF (if Jurrah and Sylvia were fit, I'd have him at Casey), though if Bate could just learn to play 5 centimetres taller, he could probably steal the job. Martin at Full Forward is obviously a massive problem, but the club is persisting. I just wish they'd stick to their guns and keep him down there long enough for him to either: 1) learn how to do it, or 2) make it obvious that he'll never learn how to do it. Petterd and Bate are no-brainers on the flanks, and Maric has the edge on Jetta purely because of fitness (that will be an interesting selection battle to keep an eye on through the year, I reckon). Finally, a question for those who've been at some of the pre-season games: has the club shown ANY indication that they'll play Brad Green forward this season? Seems like everybody on this forum believes it's the most obvious thing to do to help plug the gaping chasm in our forward 50, but is there any evidence that Bailey thinks so too? Bruce on the bench as the ultimate spare parts man, with Strauss and Cheney both fortunate to get in due to injuries to others. So, yeah, that's how I see it.

I didn't get to many games last year but when I did get along, one thing that really impressed me about Jetta was his work-rate off the ball. Whenever we got bogged down on the wing as we came out of our back half (which happened a lot!) and the opposition got back in numbers, it seemed like it was always Jetta who'd make a second and third lead and eventually find space on the half-forward flank. Maybe I just saw the right games, but since then I've been a fan ...

Tapscott = Moloney mark II, but bigger! Imagine this kid after a few pre-seasons, we'll be fighting off rugby clubs trying to do a reverse-Karmichael-Hunt on us.

I don't have any of the new draftees in mine ... FB : Rivers Warnock McDonald © HB : Garland Frawley Bennell C : Morton Grimes Sylvia HF : Bate Watts Petterd FF : Jurrah Green Woneamirri Foll : Jamar Moloney Davey Int : Bruce MacDonald Jones Martin Any draftees playing round 1 is a bonus. How many of us would have included Bennell and Jetta in a similar exercise this time last year? Obviously the forward line is the concern but I reckon we'll be (for the next year or two at least) ignoring the traditional kpp type of roles down there, and having a more complex, rotational kind of thing going on. None of the six I have starting on the ground are 'talls' in the traditional mould -- Watts will be, but he ain't yet. Does that mean that those six players are gonna be incapable of kicking goals? I don't think so. And the resting ruckman (Jamar or Martin) can head down there if we need it.

Scully = Bones - yeah, not great, best I could come up with Trengove = Noah - this is brilliant ... commentators all over the place are gonna be annoying us for years to come. Gysberts = Jizz - we'll all have fun when Master Bate hands off to Jizz ... ;-) Tapscott = Pause - as in: "Luke ... (pause) ... Tapscott", hopefully a few Pies fans had heart-attacks and died. Gawn = Stretch - if that's his family nickname, I won't fight it Fitzpatrick = Fitzy - Dunno enough about him to come up with anything good

This sums it up for me ... Last year, we had terrible skills and terrible attack at the ball. Dean Bailey's buzzword for the whole year was 'competitiveness.' "We need to be competitive for longer," "One quarter of competitive football isn't enough," etc etc. Compare our attack at the ball (and at the opposition) now, to what it was a year ago. Bailey is not only upfront about what he wants to improve, he actually does improve it! This year, we have terrible skills, but our 'competitiveness' is fantastic. This year, Bailey's buzzword is 'skills'. "Our skills let us down today," "The endeavour was there, we just need to work on our skills," etc etc. If our skills improve as much in the NEXT year as our competitiveness has improved in the LAST year, we're going to be a very good football team, for a very long time. Bailey, so far, has done absolutely nothing wrong that I can see. GO DEES!

"I'm not pointing anything out, boys, I'm just flipping Terry Wallace the bird over in the other huddle ..."