Little Goffy

Well, that was a better quarter. McNamara stood out. A proper little fighter there for sure. But the shots... the shots...

Awful.

Ouch. When Daisy gives away two panic turnovers in a row you know there's trouble.

They've got swagger, they've got synergy, they got a bit of sumthin' sumthin'.

I'm feeling a bit of pre-game hunt-kill-destroy rage but won't jinx it by making any predictions. I'll focus on the fact that both Goldrick and Hore make the game more fun to watch as well as being top quality inclusions.

It gets worse. Soon your constant bleating will have to be because you are the "JessMary of everything" - Vic and Tim are both masculine names. Anyway, back to the topic; It's interesting to me that different organisations can have such dramatically different apparent hierarchies. I've worked in government departments that had swollen out to having more than half of all staff be managers on 100k+ because absolutely everything that happened there was 'project thing thing' or 'stakeholder relations this and that'. Plus, with the outsourcing wave after the late 90s all the research and expert advice had to be done through a procurement manager who would negotiate the contracts with the manager from the consultancy (who had been an internal research manager until a month before) and then the actual research and investigation would be done by some uni students and interns. In the case of football clubs and their commercial relationships, I guess the need for having executive level status is because you are dealing with often very large companies with big corporate egos and in a position of strength to pick and choose. They're going to want to believe that they are dealing at the top even if the whole deal is as simple as 'for this much sponsorship, you get this placement of logos, this much direct marketing to members, and this many club media products proudly presented by you.' Funny to think that if not for the egos and tax-deductible lunches, the whole thing could be done like an online shopping cart. The political economist side of me is writhing with the reminder that automation of the workforce advances based on relative power of the people who lose their jobs, rather than the actual efficiency gained.

Could do with a bit of the other recent(ish) appearance of unobtainium, from The Core. Is almost completely indestructible and converts external pressure into focused energy.

Biff, just... really... get your hand off it.

Suddenly I feel like Goodwin's position is safe. Just to clarify the suggestion: As our ruck, we're going to play a 195cm key position defender and occasional forward who has only had four games in his career with more than 20 hitouts, has only played more than 10 games in a season once, and (while giving full credit to his recovery effort) has serious injury history in parts of the body that are particularly vulnerable when playing in ruck. So that a multiple-All-Australian ruckman with super fitness and field positioning awareness for around-the-ground marking that is frequently crucial to the play can be moved to full forward to make the most possible use of his iffy set shots.

When it's not your day, it's not your day, but youch, it was not our day.

Dogs have come out in the second on a mission to rough us up but it isn't doing them a lot of good. On the other hand, we're putting legitimate chase and pressure on. Lily Mithen will have a lovely collection of well earned bruises, too.

Anyone else feel like we never actually gain from the wind? Strange quirk; possibly a tactical coaching oversight? Wonder if Zanker's "ambitious" long shot on goal was a product of a general instruction to try to use the wind?

Bit of a croaky throat?

I've seen that a few times just this week. We shpuld keep an index of these 'star' players. One that stuck put for me was a Collingwood 'star' who I still couldn't recall after checking the name on footywire. I can't tell you exactly who it was because I've already forgotten them again. Staaaaaaaar.

My brother is a very serious Carlton supporter. 'nuff said. ?

2020 the year of the bomb. 2021 the year of the sniper. On the bright side, Melksham's is possibly our easiest role to cover with existing options, and if one or more of those replacements do well then he'll be forced to earn his way back into the team. Melksham in good form is elite in his position, but he clearly got a little bit complacent last year. You'd never wish an injury on anyone but if it sharpens his awareness of his own footballing mortality it could be a turning point for him.

A wog? But surely if you are using the term yourself, that means you don't mind it. I'm glad that's settled.

Gawn's hard work around the ground to get to dozens of contests every game that gets us out of a tight spot or opens up an opportunity is far too valuable to sacrifice for his merely 'good' forward work. Plus, he is actually a terrific ruckman. He creates more scoring shots from a ruck role than he would if his job was nothing else but forward! Having said that, I'm sure he'll be rotated forward a bit more than he might have been, just to keep things a little unpredictable up there.

It could be a nice, small rule change that opens up play just a little without causing any disruption at all. It has just the specific problem of over-riding coach's demands which will have been drilled into players from about 8 years old so it would be appropriate to have plenty of consultation, a good lead-in time for clubs to train the new habit, and a fairly generous interpretation in initial implementation. Zero from three. Good to see the Imperial office maintaining their batting average.

Can anyone explain why Angus Brayshaw is now permanently 23cm above the surface of the Earth? Is this a product of new high altitude training or has he spent too much time on the low-G treadmill? It's gonna mess with his GPS data for sure.

My brother once joked that all he had to do was get a lot fitter and a lot more skilled, play a few good games in a row and get a brief promotion up a grade, then be called up another level to cover an injury, and he might just get match-up briefly on a retired AFL player who is just having a bit of fun to keep fit now. Which basically means you've played AFL level. Even completely as a joke, it is a connection. It's the idea that the AFL-level is the elite pinnacle of something, but that 'something' is the same basic notion as what everyone is doing. It's more than just a sterile, distant product with a huge gap between spectator and 'performer' that starts being unbreachable in your early teens.

"But now, each club has a boys coach who doubles as the girls coach. It’s a full-time dual role that makes it impossible for both programs to operate concurrently at full capacity. " Well, that's just idiotic. It basically means that on a club-by-club basis the decision of which group gets more attention will be entirely down to the personal attitude of the dual coach. Meanwhile, focusing on the boys comes with massive incentive because a successful boy gets literally 20 times the future pay, visibility and connections. A club/coach which did try to commit equal effort regardless of gender would be placed at a huge disadvantage for future reputation, recruiting, mentorship networks, and industry connections. I think this is a rare moment where both supporters of the women's game and those who see it is a side-show novelty can agree that this is bad policy. The living embodiment of corporate window-dressing that actually has the opposite effect to it's claims because of the overall corporate structure. Meanwhile, the part about private schools... that's been a drift for a long time and to actively make the problem worse is a disaster. Imagine a future where even the dream of playing elite football relies on having rich parents. Imagine kids having to face that fact when they are still kids. Since it's creation as such, the AFL Corporation has continually become more like an ancient Ziggurat Temple administration. More and more revenue is centralised because the High Priests tell us only they have the authority to use it. More and more the actual football community which generated that revenue is expected to then be grateful when it is granted some of it's own money back.

Invited at the last minute to come train with the club after we just lost two players of his type for some of the early season when he is also versatile and able to provide support for another role we lack depth in... clearly we have wildly overplayed our hand here. Worth a closer look, and that is all what the club is doing at this point. Personally, I'm surprisingly unconcerned about our forward line. I'd rather give Kaine Baldwin a try on our list just in case the athletic package comes together again after the repeat injuries. What happened to his drafting? He was a 'big thing' before the injuries. Does anyone know if he is simply cooked?

If you don't understand what this thread is about, you are on the right thread.

While footballers aren't the tip of the spear as far as vaccine rollout goes, you'd expect that for the economic/social significance compared to just a couple of thousand jabs required they would be in the fairly early rounds. Of course, we're still waiting to see exactly what community-level protection the various vaccines offer. One strange case came up in Germany recently where multiple people at an aged care facility tested positive despite having been vaccinated. On the one hand, it was a little worrying, on the other hand, pre-vaccine the same circumstances would have meant the entire care centre infected and dozens of people dead. It did appear that even in this incident the vaccines a) provided really effective suppression of transmission, and b) eliminated symptoms to the point where Covid was only detected due to routine screening! It is reasonable to expect that by very early in the season the AFL clubs will be generally vaccinated and highly safe. The only way I can see Covid seriously derailing the season again is if the Demons are top of the ladder by August and a new mutant COVID-MFCSS strain breaks out.