Adam The God

Daniher kills us every single time. He generates 5+ shots on goal against our defence. Absolutely owns us. The only reason we've beaten them the last two times is his poor kicking. The last time he kicked straight, they beat us.

You've got to remember we're transitioning out of the pokies business. You don't then strip away other financial winners, without having a strong revenue stream to replace it. I'd like to know what the multiple angles are that don't make it work. IMO we need to be a little bit less precious about this as supporters. If we've got a decent football side they will win that game and it's an advantage playing a team up there who have never played up there. We make much more money on this game than we would if 30,000 turned up to the G. There's still a strong case to keep playing the NT games. At least for the short to mid term future. 2022-2025 we can start thinking about alternative revenue streams. Hopefully by that stage we've built a powerhouse and we no longer need these NT games, but don't hold your breath.

Your two sentences sound like a combination of opinion and dislike, which completely contradict each other. The hype around them is over the top, but if they finish higher than us you won't be happy. You can't have it both ways. The hype around Essendon is no more over the top than the hype surrounding us last off season and as we proved, the hype was real. I hope the Essendon hype is false, but they look pretty balanced now. I concur though that if they finish high on the ladder, I'll be [censored] off. I cannot believe their cheating was allowed to enable them to get top draft picks and bottom out without strong enough draft sanctions. When Melbourne and Carlton had salary cap breeches, they were impacted (I'd argue) long term. Not so, Essendon. The amount of elite midfield talent they've assembled in the last 3 years is comparable, if not higher, than our own.

I had Essendon in my 8 this year. I've really rated them for the past two years. That is, I've really rated their list. They've actually got a really good list balance. Yes, okay, maybe they lack inside depth, but they will challenge next year if they can keep Daniher and Fantasia on the park. Adding Shiel to that midfield makes them extremely dangerous. I noted a few Demonlanders don't rate him, but I think he's a star and will add not only inside hardness to their midfield, but more breakaway pace. My concern with Essendon (from a Melbourne point of view) is their leg speed and potential speed of ball movement. If they get it right next year, they'll murder us on the outside. I think Worsfold is past it, but there's a chance with his list that he could pinch a flag in the next 2 years.

Well, they're different players. I don't rate Maynard either, but he's on the list, so it doesn't cost us much to keep him.

Hi Saty. How are you going? I've never used the term list clogger in my posting days, so don't be too sensitive. I had Kent and Bugg on the fringe and have been on record as saying Bugg would go. He did. I'm not going to play the man here, so I'll merely say we were confident enough to offload Tyson because we could get a much cheaper replacement and at the same time, land Preuss in the deal. Tyson was most likely a salary cap dump. Thanks for the source on the Lyons trade.

Disagree. Cripps is a better player than Kelly for mine, who was taken outside the top 10.

What a rubbish list. Haha, oh Gazza. Loved you as a player, but you've got little clue as a commentator.

He's retired... https://www.sbs.com.au/news/hawk-langford-retires-after-afl-delisting

If people are posting news like Lyons' three year deal, would you mind linking to a source, so it lends your post more credence? Thanks. And FWIW, Lyons is the perfect depth player for us. He's not A grade, but he doesn't have obvious weaknesses either (unlike Townsend).

Another Bugg for mine. He's a NQR. Even when it comes to depth, I think we've gone past this level of player.

It did exist in RDB...

I must also say that whilst I am happy with the additions during the trade period, I am concerned by our lack of depth. But I guess this could he said of one of our major competitors next year in Richmond too. Surely, they couldn't go another year with such an incredible run with injuries? I just hope we can continue to improve our system to enable us to cover holes where injury occurs, as well as staying injury-free for the majority of the season.

I hope attitudes are changing to the end of VCE exams. The ridiculous pressure that is placed on students does impact on families and the mental health of students and those around them. My VCE had absolutely no correlation with my career. I went to an APS school and a lot of people I know simply got jobs (mostly in real estate) as a result of who they knew or did a two week course at TAFE that got them into their industry (mostly the ridiculously unregulated and high paying real estate industry). The pressure and stress is in some ways a good precursor to life in the real world, but 13 years ago when I did it, it was fail VCE and you'll be living on the streets. As long as you're passionate about what you do, you'll work hard and you'll do well in life. That's the key learning for mine.

I wonder if this changed post season with Collingwood's finish?

That's not Judd's fault though. That's Carlton's, who have been worse at recruiting than us over the past two decades. If West Coast hadn't recruited Sheed, Shuey, Mastern, Gaff etc to build depth in their midfield, as well as recruit KPP players in Darling, McGovern, Barrass etc they could easily be in Carlton's position. If you remember, Carlton had an undersized Fevola as their KPF and not much else at either end. They were never going to win a flag with that list. But we'll agree to disagree, mate.

I think it was a win-win trade. Carlton's problem was they didn't go hard enough at trying to build their midfield to compliment Judd's recruitment, therefore during his time at Carlton, his class compensated for their lack of depth.

Which raises the question: does Hardwick only have the one gear?

Wednesday 12pm, as has been said multiple times across the last few pages.

He's a very good player, but player retention is the key to our future success, so he'd need to come across for under a million. I see us saying we'll pay you $850k and make you a better player in a team going places, but him ultimately taking the $1-1.2mill offered by another club. We then back in our current list to keep improving and snatch a flag or two between 2020-2025.

Fair enough. That's what I was asking. Clearly you were keen and therefore it's not a hindsight call. I certainly remember the likes of Barrett coming out and saying we'd stuffed another draft. Of course, you're right. We should have Kelly, but I love Cripps and would have loved him just as much. We made the safe call and haven't necessarily totally [censored] things up, especially if Salem ends up playing in a couple of flags off half back for us, ala Hodge.

Saying we should have taken Kelly at 2 is also in hindsight. I don't really see the difference. Were you advocating for us to take Kelly at the time? I don't recall.

It seemed to me at the time that we couldn't split the top 10, so we played it safe and took two players, instead of one. It turns out Kelly became a star, but plenty of top 2 picks have been relative busts. Still the right call at the time.

The Toumpas recruitment was a much larger blunder and even the very best recruiters get it wrong. Wells is roundly accepted as one of the best, but his 2013 year on paper was a shocker.

Daisy?