Little Goffy

Yep, I can confirm that. If we only win four games for the year then we'll be getting top pick plus pick 17 AND 18. (This assumes that Richmond win three more and pass us, otherwise it'd be pick 2 + pick 19 and 20)

Oh come on, when was it serious to actually say that one error costs a game. Brown screwed up because he had a brain freeze under pressure with 30 seconds to go. It's a problem, I'd suggest it's his last season and he wont get many more games, but don't overdo it, huh?

Didn't help that bloody Bruce 'The Goose' Macaveny still called it as 'White' when PJ was rucking. How does he still get allowed in. He deliveres commercial hype and stupid outlandish comments ' oh, the best game in 100 years' and idiotic garbage like that, which just undermines the genuine recognition which the other commentators give players during a game. Bah.

I'll say exactly what I replied to Jarka on 'Game Thread'. Aren't you a sour one? Cool it for an hour and a half, could ya. Then he wont be your problem any more and you won't be his.

Aren't you a sour one? Cool it for an hour and a half, could ya. Then he won't be your problem any more and you won't be his.

Right, I see. A little excess exuberance. I suppose with the amount of anger directed at the coach around here it's easy to think he wasn't liked. Mumy and Daddy still love eachother, and we both love you, we just need to be apart. I wonder if any players will be running away from home?

Dunno about a coach to get Judd. Get the best coach we can is the best way to advertise. As for the potential cleanout, if I had to prepare the full list of the possibles it would go something like - Retirements/Delisting Brown Ward Pickett Holland Bizzell Yze Ferguson Neville Trade options Johnstone Miller Jamar And in fairness to other's opinions Godfrey C. Johnson So, that is a lucky 13 of potential departures. The sheer bulk of possible delistings is part of why I don't think Godfrey or CJ should be on the chopping block. Ferguson might be tradeable by some fluke. Then again, the poor guy deserves a change of luck. Lets see, Johnstone and a second round pick for Ball to come back to Sandringham! Jamar and Miller to boost the early picks, either adding new ones or upgrading existing ones. Delist Ward, Brown, Pickett, Neville, Ferguson (who would be traded if possible, ala Peter Walsh). Leaving six or seven slots open. Target a couple of these rumoured superhero ruckmen/forwards in the early draft (2 picks), go for speed and a speculative KP backman with some of the remaining (3 picks). Be sure to leave at least our first pick in the pre-season draft to collect any departing players from other clubs (eg. Judd or Riewolt) Interestingly, Ball is a friend/teammate of Riewolt now, and played for the Sandringham Dragons alongside Judd, back in the day. The final result is, out of our best 22. - Johnstone (the rest simply aren't best 22) + Ball + whoever we can snaffle in the pre-season draft + at least one top rated ruckman/forward + a host of kids The shift from Johnstone to Ball would be a major step up in leadership and hardness, without any major loss on skills. After Judd and Sandilands he would have to be one of the best options. I personally wouldn't be prepared to trade away the kind of draft positions that would be demanded for Riewolt or Judd, though I wouldn't flinch at grabbing them in the preseason draft. With so many senior players retiring or soon to retire, and players like Robertson and Bruce soon to be eligible for veteran status, we should actually have a little bit of room in the salary cap to accomodate a star recruit or two.

What a stupid poll. The tone of the question is clearly driving for a 'no' response. Quick sentence analysis - Did any of you actually like Daniher? - establishes that the author didn't like Daniher. Did any of you actually like Daniher? - establishes that the author looks down on those who did. You're poll is actually a pretty lame attempt at bullying people into the desired answer. Says something that there is you and maybe four other people who would say that they didn't like Daniher. I just hope that whoever our next coach is doesn't have your ego and lack of respect for others.

Can you imagine that kind of attitude becoming normal around here? 1) Thompson, Jolly, Viney (as coach at Hawthorn if that counts), if Viney doesn't count then Simmonds. 2) Ferguson, Jamar, Neville (like others, I see it as good for them) 3) Brock Mclean, Jared Rivers, Brad Green. You're welcome, good luck with the project.

Heh heh. I'm sure once he sets his focus on it there will be hundreds of little Godfreys. Although he may be more use preventing champion players from other teams having their own. Eew. This train of thought can go to very bad places very fast.

Wow, I'd forgotten all about it. I'm gald someone reminded me because it is a big milestone and Godfrey is a player who has worked damn hard to get there. Only one full season (2003) in his entire career, but despite being routinely dropped and even spending long stretches out of AFL level, he still is totally committed to the club and the task at hand. Take Godfrey's attitude and plant it into every young player on our list. Maybe throw in a little Gary Lyon arrogance... Congratulations Simon Godfrey. I can't wait to see what the banner says!

Yep, I'm not interested in Connolly as head coach. It would make dropping Daniher look profoundly stupid if all we do is sign up a coach who would give us nothing that we didn't already have. Fremantle have underperformed drastically. They are only now rising to the level of hot-cold streaks and up-down seasons. The demons achieved that years ago, and do it better. For christs sake, the man RECRUITED Tarrant! (Although, the whole deal may have just been to get rid of Medhurst) Not to mention that Fremantle have the highest rate of both on-field and off-field discipline issues. And they aren't actually that 'tough' a team, so no excuses for the endless tribunal visits - it's not hard play it's careless, stupid play. I could see Daniher crossing to coach Fremantle (and doing very well), but I can't really see Connolly being taken up anywhere else. Maybe Demonland should run a poll and sent the result to the club. Select one option - Chris Connolly. vs A stack of ripped bicycle tyres and a ferret name Gretel.

My first thought was that the suggsetion would be to recruit Woey as an assistant coach. I guess that just shows how little credence I give to the idea of him playing at AFL level again. What might be interesting is Woey being a player/assistant coach for Sandy, like Rigoni did for a year after he was delisted by the Demons. But of course, there are probably going to be about four of the demon's older players all looking for a spot in Sandy next year! Sandrigham line up for 2008 - B: Brown Holland Lamb HB: Woewodin Bizzell Ward etc.. etc..

Yep, I hear it too, though not by any reliable source! Hopefully he can provide a few party tricks for Daniher's farewell, and remind us all that the club still has a good future despite a terrible run these last six months. Then again, maybe the entire bloody 'senior' line up could do that for a change, instead of loading it on a kid. Finally, I get to actually see the kid playing!

Robbie Flower. Jimmy Stynes. Ron Barassi. Steve Waugh? Roger Federer? So long as Connolly is kept at a distance and evetually some kind of consensus is reached I'm pretty comfortable with the process. Oh and a final thought - let no-one who is in any way connected to the Carlton board get involved.

I don't remember any well handled coach resignation in my life! But seriously, while there have been a few stuff-ups with loose comments and some poorly managed frustration following the Richmond game (I expect more self-control and professionalism from a club president) I think the 'overall thrust' of how it's been managed has been ok. Only ok. Could have been better if the players hadn't made quite so many "we're going to make the finals and I Neale Daniher" statements to the media, too. Let's just hope that the longer phase of adjustment is handled well, because Mark Riley is no Neil Craig and I'd be very troubled to see a St. Kilda style situation where players are seriously considering walking out on the club. Which reminds me, at least Daniher didn't get sacked right after a dissapointing EF loss such as in 2004/05. He's only ever been under the pump when there has been a serious performance problem, namely 2003 and this year. It'll be weird when Daniher starts coaching at another club, because he's been the Demons coach for as long as I've followed AFL.

He's not really raising an alarm, it's just a kind of overview of the key issues for a new coach to look at. It's odd, but while we do have a statistically fairly old list, we don't really have a huge problem with impending retirements. Bizzell, Ward, Brown, Holland, Yze and Pickett aren't exactly key players for us at the moment. McDonald is, but onballers are a commodity we have in reasonably good supply. Neitz and White are obviously a big deal, with Robbo maybe only a couple of years to go after them. But we'd be hoping for Dunn/Newton to cover at least one position up forward, and I personally would love to see Green spend more time closer to goals. Rucking without White is an issue. PJ is improving, Jamar appears to have plataeud, Neaves is still potential, though good potential. Dean Cox might be a better targeted recruit than Chris Judd. But things can look very different in a hurry with six or seven draft picks coming into a side when mostly depth players have gone out. (guessing based on possible retirements, delistings, trades) And there now appears to be three different highly rated ruckmen coming towards the draft, so hopefully we'll add one to the list and build them up to fill that hole.

Yeah, it's a little sad that after such a long partnership they wont be 'together' for the big milestone. I'm sure he'll be along to the game though. I imagine Neitz would insist.

What a completely unhelpful comment. I guess Gary Lyon is a shirker too, I mean, he quit long before he was actually dead. And the best thing for a about-to-be sacked coach to do is fight tooth and nail against the board, turn the players against the club in a desperate attempt to make yourself indispensible. Take a moment to think about how hard it is to admit that you're beaten, that it's over after ten years. Daniher did the best thing for the club when he had been placed in an untenable position by a board which, while doing the necessary, managed to blunder multiple times in how they went about it. What is your problem? What slum did you grow up in that taught you to put the boot in when someone is down, just for the hell of it?

Viney for me. I'd like to see a demon leader leading the demons. But most importantly, I want to see a stable assistant coaching group with good talent and support, who the new coach can be comfortable delegating to. It's a team thing, ya know. Maybe we can introduce co-coaches or a coaching rotation every year

White is a capable player who still provides the occassional flash of brilliance. McDonald is an All-Australian from LAST YEAR for christs sake. They've both been raking in the possessions and their specialty stats - hit-outs and tackles respectively. Carroll is a quality defender, although like someone suggested here the other day, he might not actually be best suited to the FB role. Brown, Ward and Holland are admittedly depth players and probably shouldn't routinely be getting spots in the 22. But teams cop injuries in finals just like any other time. I'll point out that Armstrong and Heffernan are both premiership players. Yze looks like fate is coming after him with a nasty, nasty agenda. I'd hope he'll be back next year and provide us with at least one more season of good football. Let's face it, Yze's very best is about as good as it gets from anyone and we'd all be ecstatic if he managed a return to form. The break might even be what he needs. On second thought, "mate, what you really need is a major hernia" isn't something I can ever see myself saying in a positive way.

Right, I'm upgrading this topic - not just overall results, but articles and key moments from the last few years. Here's a couple of interesting historical perspectives I've come across in a quick search of the net. Until someone complains, I'll keep gradually building this 'archive'. Hopefully it'll make for some interesting reading. Demonology article poor start to 2002 Melbourne v Geelong 2003 Comparing Melbourne & Geelong problems, 2003

Ok, I'm a big fan of CAC. Let's face it, while there have been a few poor years circa '01-'02 Craig Cameron's performance has included at least one 'premiership' recruiting season (Green, Bruce, Wheatley, Whelan and Godfrey) as well as consistent performances in the last couple of years. My only criticism would be that I'm still not a fan of recycling players, although Vardy did win us a final back in '02! Dunn Bate Newton is a draft I think we'll see a few hundred games out of. Jones Bartram Buckley and Neville looks pretty handy too. And of course 2003 went well enough, we'll wait and see how CJ goes but I still think he can step up. According to www.thedrafter.net Melbourne is second only to Hawthorn in the 'retorspective ratings' of draft history since 1998. And it's worth noting that the site doesn't include Rookie drafts. And, for that matter, is 'popularly' rated, so it's a mircale anyone comes in ahead of Collingwood. It's an interesting site, by the way.

All right, $10 just because I've never seen the guy play, and because it'd be worth that much to watch everyone here go stark raving mad. Another $5 for each quarter of the game that he actually spends time on the ground instead of the bench - lets put pressure on him being given a decent go, not on the kid to kick goals, right? And if they give him a run at the Manuka Oval game against Sydney, I'll personally hand it over with an extra $20 at the after match function! Oh crap. Did I just commit to up to $50? I'm a freakin' student for christs sake! Manuka oval against the swans might be a good place for him actually - not much you can do there except bang it long and hope, so his speccies would be worth the trouble.

Good post. I'd rearrange it slightly so that Whelan was in for Pickett, with Buckley missing out for now (or competing with CJ for the spot currently taken by Ward) I wouldn't drop Godfrey though (huh? did I say that?) because frankly, even though his disposal was terrible last week, it was noticable that he was one of the few people really working at it. Getting him back to tagging dammit, he shouldn't be doing Green/Bruce/Pickett's job! I don't know enough about Garland to comment, but Bizzell seemed to be doing ok. Garland is a bigger body though, yes? More of a true KPP/Gorilla minder. It might be a good idea to bring him in if Holland is going out. So, I think I'm with you on this. Above all else, I will be absolutely furious if there are players out there who are playing through (aggravating) injury when the only thing at stake anymore is the coaches job.