Akum

... which demonstrates perfectly that Lyon is the man for the job.

Apparently he was played in that way a fair bit in junior footy, because of his ability to read the game even then.

Yep - Judd, Murphy et al run just to the side of a teammate with opponent in hot pursuit, teammate just has to lean sideways the moment they pass, opponent has to change direction just slightly to avoid them, loses that fraction of a second and voila ... quality clearance. So easy but so effective. In other word, the midfield works as a UNIT, a combination. Ours is just however-many individuals each trying to get the ball out by themselves. Bailey's coaching philosophy was to deliberately not coach for team plays, in the name of "development", and West (to my chagrin, one of my favourite non-Dees players) seemed to follow blindly. The most important on-field job of the next coach will be to get our midfield (with or without Scully, but hopefully with) to work as a unit, a team-within-a-team - would be well within the capability of most coaches.

Excellent points. Which makes it more than slightly annoying that good Casey players Alex Silvagni, Peter Faulks, and now possibly Tim Mohr are being taken from beneath our noses. If we're trying to nurture Casey we could be doing it much better!

Fascinating scenario. Can't help but get the impression that the seniors have either collectively thrown in the towel and given up on a future with Melbourne past this season, or are trying to show us what it's going to be like without any input from them, or are trying to get by on reputation rather than performance. In which case ...

What about Trengove?

Agree to some extent, but Gawn & Jones each had only 3 handballs, and Jones had 0 frees against, so it can't have happened that often. And a bit tough to hang it on Gawn, in a game where our so-called leaders let us down so badly. The best demonstration of this is that Max in his 5th game got more DT points than Green, Davey, Bate & Rivers.

I think too that the lack of a Football Dept manager has been a huge gaping hole in the middle of the club since Leoncelli left.

The past few weeks has shown everybody who stands up & who doesn't when the chips are down. As has been alluded to by many posters in various ways, those who have stood up when the chips are down are the true leaders of the club at the moment. The pseudoleaders have collectively & individually let the team down again. And I can't for the life of me understand why the recruiters are getting canned. Some of the players BP has brought to the club are the ones who are standing up.

Equal scoring shots & 6 goals down.

Not to mention giving up 3 goals in junk time.

Agree. All that needed to be done straight away has been done. There's plenty more to be done for sure, but from now on it's vital to take care & get it right. Get everything right.

... like Jack Fitzpatrick

Come on, its hardly a secret if even Jeff's twigged!

Let me just say I'm looking forward to next year seeing what a real coach can do with a list like ours.

Sorry, thought this was a serious thread.

The main fly in this ointment is that Hardwick would never downgrade from a head coach job (which he's already put his stamp on) to what's virtually an assistant position. But Laidley might. Or even Ayres. No question that the defensive coach is going to be our most important assistant position. And I agree that Kennett is clearly extremely worried about the possibility of the coach leaving just before he does. Especially as he'd be held responsible by the club and supporters for Clarko leaving. Which is more likely to happen if "Lyons" is the man to make the big pitch at Clarko. But this crude attempt at intimidating Gazza would have only made him more determined to have a crack. That's the thing about bullies. In the end they always end up making more trouble for their own side than they ever did for their opponents.

IMO Jurrah's been badly handled this year. RudeBoy has hinted a few times that he needs to be "let off the leash". It's like all the X-factor has been drained out of him. And if he's been carrying a lower leg injury for several weeks, he could have had a spell long before now.

But if he actually was being undermined by Bailey, that casts a somewhat different light on the "Bailey-as-martyr" tabloid schtick.

One thing I do like is that this is the first game for a long long time where both of our most dangerous players - Scully and Davey - are in the team. Both need to be tagged, but it's a risk to tag them both, especially if they play a large part of the game on the ball together. It's time for the likes of Green & Moloney to step up as leaders should and play the games of their lives too. They'll never have a better opportunity to bury their reputation as "flat-track bullies". Still think that if we can get within 10 goals we'll be doing well. But you just never know ...

The questions are: (1) Is Sylvia the senior player who most deserves to be dropped on form? (2) Is it more than a co-incidence that Scully comes in & Sylvia goes out? Anderson's just guessing, but I did wonder myself when I saw the team selection - it was a mild surprise that he was the only senior player to be held accountable for last week. Oh, and could Sylvia's improved performance in 2009 & 2010 be partly or wholly attributed to improved fitness & having got over OP?

This

A bit surprised nobody's mentioned Gary Ayres. He wouldn't be first on the list, but he's done a fantastic job with Port. They don't have any big names (well, apart maybe from Valenti???) but seem to be incredibly close and are simply never beaten. I like coaches who have demonstrated the ability to take their teams a long way with ordinary lists and limited resources.

Would this imply that it's only some of the older players who have the beef with Schwab and the "Red & Blueprint" and the preference for talented youth over experience? And it was those older players who wanted to show their value to the team by not performing on Sat? It was clearly the senior players (Riv being perhaps the exception) who were the worst-performed, as was pointed out in the press (i.e. Selwood getting more possessions than half a dozen senior players combined). And that DB was sympathetic to this stand by those older players? And the Board threw it back at them by recommitting to their stand on "talented youth over experience"? Or is this pushing it too far? On one hand seems far-fetched; on the other hand, it does explain the apparent Board backflip.

Agree. I can certainly understand the anger at this, but by the same token, we seem to have alienated a lot of past players. When that happens, neither the club nor the ex-player wins.