Adam The God

But it doesn't matter who you have defending, if the midfield pressure isn't on, any defensive unit will get scored on. So I think it's a respectable gamble. Collingwood have more run than us with Crisp, Maynard and Quaynor to our Bowey, McVee and Salem. We'd be more comparable if Rivers stayed at half back, probably at the expense of Salem or ultimately Lever.

Yep, that's fair, although TMac was a premiership forward, but I get you.

I am excited to see how they go. Collingwood used an undersized defensive back 7 in 2022-2023, but it allowed them to be good at ground level and ping quickly off half back. Salo is the next one in the gun I reckon. If he had a bit more speed, he'd be perfect back there. That said, his leadership and experience will probably be needed if Lever is on thin ice generally and May is edging towards the cliff. With this last block of games, I hope they give the back 6-7 some continuity together. Likewise, we need to find a forward mix soon enough, instead chopping and changing. I think mostly because JVR has had such a poor year as a forward, it's thrown out our forward mix. Blake has really good endurance, but he's also a nice, neat kick. Good luck again, Blake.

Lever is out. Who is the other?

I'm excited to see how our defensive set up functions with May, Turner and Howes, they might be a little big for us, but I like that we made the call on Lever. I'm not convinced we can play both of May and Lever in the same team. They slow our ball movement down too much and are slow to defend plays now. At the other end of the ground though is where it's going to be most interesting. Melksham, Jefferson and Petty with Fritta and Kozzy. Petty will, I assume, take second ruck duties. Having Melksham down there will hopefully give Jefferson some support against the taller interceptor like Andrew, but more likely Collins. So that should allow Jefferson to fly for the ball. Kozzy needs to go bezerk and Melky and Fritta need to contribute strongly on the scoreboard if we're any chance here. We need a redemption story with our mids. They were dreadful in the corresponding game earlier in the year, so they need to lock down on Rowell in particular IMO, so I'd be fine with a hard tag there from Viney, and I'd be happy for Oliver to go head to head with Anderson, and for Trac and Kozzy to go against Miller and co. As is the story most weeks, bring our kicking boots and we're a chance, particularly early in the game, otherwise you can forget it.

Particularly when the majority of debt is owned by the RBA at 0.1%...

Six each.

I think you could make the argument that this actually goes back to the 2007-2011 list management decisions that left a gap in Max and TMac age demo, which meant instead of having those guys, we had to spend picks on acquiring the Mays, Melkshams, Hibberds. So we're still playing catch up with the next generation and it's probably something that will only right itself if we keep making good decisions as we build that next core.

Well, I have time for Adams as well. And I left put Howes, who I think will be a handy player, but I was more wanting to illustrate that every player I mentioned had shown something at AFL level.

Except taking a dig at our young talent based on this year's performance is like taking a dig at our young talent in 2019 or 2020. Strawman.

It's quite well known that the more games you get into youngsters, the more they'll be able to impose themselves on games. When McVee, Langford, Lindsay start to impact games and stay in contests for longer, run harder, concentrate for longer, as we've seen with Kozzy, they have the potential to change the way we play. We have been on a list shift since the end of 2023. We're resetting on the run and it's making for some ugly results and a very poor ladder position. We need some aggressive trading and list management this year (again), and we'll start to see more improvement. But to imply we've got little emerging talent is nonsense.

McVee, Windsor, Lindsay, Langford, Turner and Bowey is a pretty good start. Add JVR, Kolt and maybe even Picket's mate and we've got some good developing youth. Along with Chandler, Kozzy and Rivers on the next age bracket up. Please advise whether you support Melbourne. Thanks very much.

I don't buy this train of thought. We don't have trouble getting it in there. We have trouble converting. Ironically, McKay probably doesn't help with that.

We never actually had 70,000 physical members. Definitely a significant membership drop off though.

He should have gone with option #1 for CEO, who would already be at his desk and working. Our FD problems stem from a nothing, charade of a review last year. Brad was the football director, he should have been the conduit between FD and board, along with (likely) the CEO. And yet we had our two beat midfielders, arguably of all time, trying to request trades out of the club last year. They both love Goody, but things in the FD were allowed to fester. Whose fault is that? The board should take no ownership over the demise of things both on and off field?

Letting your mate Greeny off pretty easily as usual. Our board has been asleep at the wheel since at least 2020. An interim president and an interim CEO. As @rjay says, how was this allowed to happen? Not good enough.

What a [censored] post.

Hyperbole as usual. Caleb is not a poor kick. Neither is he an elite kick. He's a decent kick who is a pretty bloody good kick for goal on the run. He had an incredibly consistent first season and then has spent time learning a new role at the same time as battling injury. Give him time.

Do a bit of googling with Caroline Wilson. He was strongly favoured by AFL HQ too. Just as Peter Jackson was back in the day. Instead we got a guy with no footy background at all.

From Caro's reporting he was the lead candidate and had the job.

Keith Thomas.

We should have gone with our first option.

But what a stuff up. Fancy hiring a new CEO during the season, having taken 6 months to hire a new one, and the new guy can't start for another 6 months.

The only reason Barlow would have a seat at the table is if he was willing to put his hand in his pocket big time...

Think it would have been nice if the president emailed members to update them of the change in plan, rather than us read speculation in the media. Green has been pretty email happy all year, but silent on this.