The Chazz

As opposed to Flash? They showed footage of him last night on AFL Teams when Burgoyne kicked a goal in "that" quarter. There was a 50/50 ball for him to win, and instead of putting his body on the line, he put his foot out and tried to clear it, the rest is history.

Melbourne will not get in to a bidding war with GWS over this, as they simply couldn't match any offer the they made. I'm also quite sure that the way our contracts have been written in recent times would allow for a variety of payment terms to ensure we can offer a player, like Scully, a handsome deal, without compromising on other players. FWIW - I think Scully will stay, especially as he watches the GC struggle this year, knowing that he would be a lot closer to playing finals footy for us, as opposed to GWS. It would take an unrealistic offer from GWS to convince him to go (ie. In the Ablett/GC category), but I think Sheedy is smarter than that and wont throw top dollars at a 3rd year player. If they (GWS) have learnt anything from the GC game so far, it would be to spread the money out and get a dozen reasonable players rather than forking out for 1 drawcard and a handful of average-at-best players.

Not concerned about the Club at all. I can see what direction they are headed, and what boxes we need to tick to get their. And can also see that we are on track in achieving our goals. It's the supporters that can't see this that I'm concerned about, but I guess every club has "them".

Didn't watch any footy last year chump champ? If I recall, Sydney made it further than 10 other teams, and nearly made it to the last 4. With all your ranting and raving of recent weeks, I will not take any notice of any of your posts from now on, and encourage others to act in a similar manner. It's obvious you have no idea, and I have serious concerns about your wellbeing, as I'm sure you think you do know what you're talking about.

Exactly my point Disco. Anyone get out to Casey for training today? Interested to hear what the intesnity was like around the ground.

Thoughts on Bennell playing that quarter-back role? On exposed form, Tapscott does look a likely type to play that half back flank role, but I am reeeeeeeeeally wanting to see him play most of his career in the forward half. On unexposed form, maybe, just maybe Sam Blease can be the other player (along with Bennell) to play across half back. At worst, Tapscott and Bennell playing back, at best, Blease and Bennell back and Tappy up forward. Strauss was drafted for this type of role, I just have my doubts, but like always, happy to be proved wrong! And knowing how some people think on here, no, I haven't seen Blease play, so it's hard to make that type of statement, I'm just being hopeful.

Being a bit harsh on Blease. It would be like saying that picking Tapscott was a mistake because he had shown us nothing at the end of last year. He only got back in to football last year through the reserves reserves, and now he is starting as ruck-rover in the proper reserves. If he keeps improving, he may just get a run in the firsts by mid year. Give Sammy a chance to prove himself before any more idiotic posts are made about him.

At least it'll feel like he's back at home. Just has a differnt postcode to his parents.

Hey GSOAG, just watched WW, how accurate was my post???!!!

I find it ironic that the we are struggling in the forward pressure department, yet it is of public opinion that we were the ones who introduced the importance of forward pressure when a young Aaron Davey used to have more F50 tackles than anyone in the league. It's a shame Aaron has become so vital as our quarterback-type, as it takes the man away from the position that he made his own. I think Aussie is more than capable to fill his shoes, he has done it at times, but really needs to add some consistency to his game. I honestly think we are a better team when he's in form, he also has the ability of finding that extra gear that Jurrah owns and doesn't always use (not saying Jurrah is struggling, I'm saying that when Aussie is playing, Jurrah goes to a different level that no normal AFL player has).

Is that right? I watched the Carlton v GC game live, and then the replay again on Sunday morning. The one thing they kept highlighting was the fact that the GC would often not have a mid on the defensive side of the circle, and get smashed in the clearances as a result. So I decided to watch our centre bounce setup quite closely that afternoon, and I thought nearly every time we had the "ideal" set up, it's just we still got smashed in the clearances!

Basically, what you're saying in each of the "fix's" is; * We have to WAIT until we have perfected our backline clearance. * We have to WAIT for Watts to become that big body forward we need. * We have to WAIT for McKenzie and Scully to both a. come back from injury, and b. be strong enough to play as our midfield kings. Pretty obvious what we have to do I think.

It's not a worry at all disco, it's the truth and has been that way for the past 3 years +. As E25 said, are you just starting to realise this? I'm sure as hell that Bailey, Stynes, and co aren't.

Maric played some crackers in the preseason - just shows how much you should read in to those games. Plus, I'm quite sure Martin would have gone near the ball more than the 3 times you saw him - couldn't really see him starting in Round 1 if not. Stef has been our biggest improver, and easily in the top 3 or 4 most consistent so far this seaason (albeit 2 weeks old). I can't see how someone who kicks one bag of goals in the reserves, and is a repeat offender of being terrible when playing in the seniors, should be selected ahead of Stef. The other impressive thing about Stef this year is the fact that he has had to play multiple positions each game. Against a couple of weaker teams this fortnight, the need to swap him around may not be as great, so I'd love to see him play out of the goal square for the next 2 games. I'm not sure what defender he would get against the Lions this week, maybe Merritt? Will most likely get Bock the week after. 2 great challenges for him to learn from, and honestly, he has the capability of beating both. The advantage of that is Jurrah will get the number 2 defenders, and let's face it, the Brisbane and GC second defenders aren't much = 2 big bags for LJ coming up?

The thing you need to remember, and the thing a lot are starting to realise, is that our senior midfielders aren't that good! So what if we start with Jamar, Moloney, Sylvia and Jones in the guts at a centre bounce. It's only Jamar that is a true A-grader, and Sylvia shows that he can make it. I'm not saying that we need to get rid of the other 2, I'm just saying cut them some slack. If they were stars and performed crap, then I'd have no hesitation getting stuck in to them. Reality is, they're not. What we will find though is that in a couple of years when Scully, Trengove and McKenzie are that bit older and are our true A-graders, the likes of Jones and Moloney will be quite handy players for us. Unfortunately, we need them to be more than handy now, but sadly, they don't have the ability to be. That has nothing to do with coaches, etc, if it did, why isn't Newton kicking 100 goals a year? An extra bit on Moloney - he had a lot of potential when he first came to Melbourne. Let's not forget, he wore number 32 for Geelong - Gary Hocking's old number, Club's don't give young players special numbers unless they have an opinion of them. When Moloney first came to Melbourne, I have no doubt that the umpires hindered his progress for the next 3 years. He also had injury problems, but the umpires would have sucked every bit of confidence out of him. How do I know this? Because the umpires at their training used to show footage of Moloney's style and used him as their guinea pig to "clean" the game up. That's a fact.

AJ - I have been harping on about getting Martin playing FF, then 2nd ruck for that exact reason. People are quick to point out he hasn't done any good there in the past, but what is the definition of "doing good"? If we can get 20 goals from him, but our crumbing forward can get 20 goals from direct contest he was a part of, then I think it's a success.

With 7 minutes to go, that attitude wasn't working and they started to pile goals on. with 5 minutes to go, I'd hardly call it a losers mentality. We're not talking about doing this in the first 2 minutes of the game when a side has quicked a couple of quick ones on us. we're talking about in the last part of the quarter and trying to protect a lead. It was our inability to be able to slow a game down against Sydney that probably was the differnce between winning and drawing. In that game, if we slowed the play down, played smart, possession footy, we win, simple.

Silly thread. Far too much reality and common sense for some on this site! That forward pressure is an interesting one. Sydney could only do it in a tight manner for about 5 minutes in the last quarter the other week. It does highlight the gap between the handful of better teams when they can do it for longer periods (like Hawthorn last week).

The best part is, our window wont be open until 2013 at the earliest, and even then will be barely ajar. That to me gives Bailey 2 more years to get to the end of 2013 to prove he is our man. If, by the end of 2013, we are still floundering around the 8th position, we'll be able to make a more informed decision*. At worst, a new coach (maybe a Roos or Malthouse) comes in at the start of 2014 with a playing list of the likes of Trengove, Scully, Grimes, etc having around 60 games to their name. You would think that a few quality candidates would put their hand up to coach that group. So the list will still be plenty young enough to mould. * That's based on achieving the KPI's set this year, that NONE OF US know about.

That's a very good point, and I thought that's why we drafted Tapscott? Showed as a junior tha the can kick goals from a flank, while swinging through the midfield.

I would have done the same thing as Flash. The signal I would have been sending to my opponents was "right you pricks, you're coming at us, you're outrunning and outplaying us, try doing that when you don't have the ball in your hand. We're going to play the next 5 minutes on our terms, so we can get in to the sheds with a 3 or 4 goal lead that you have to peg back". Is it still that hard for people to understand that he did the right thing????

Has Clarkson come out and stated that his thought we had nothing to give because we "put the white flag up" just prior to half time? He knew they were a far superior team all day and they just had to keep doing what they had been for the past 2 quarters and hopefully it would change. It did. I would love to know Clarkson's opinion about that 5 minutes. I'd be pretty sure he'd have been annoyed with the fact that we had stopped their run to some degree, not sitting back pi$$ing him laughing at us giving up.

How many times do you see the top teams slowing the play down when their opposition gets a run on? Nearly every bloody time. It is far from showing the opposition that "that's all we've got". The difference is, the better teams execute it to perfection, we don't...yet. I think it's a tactic that we will use when required (just like every other team in the AFL does), but I wouldn't call it a habit. If we can halt a sides run by slowing play down, then get it back to a level playing field, as long as we have belief in ourselves to get it back from there, it works. The issue is not that we stopped running with 5 monutes to go, the issue is that with 7 minutes to go, the momentum changed and they were starting to reduce our lead. For that 2 minutes, we didn't stop running hard hard, and kept trying what had been working, but what Hawthorn was doing was better, and Flash knew this and decided something had to be done about it. It's obvious that you wont see reality in this point.

So, going in at half time 19 points done, gives a side more confidence than going in level after being 27 points down with 5 minutes to go? Interesting. The only flaw in my arguement in what would the score have been had we not "put up the white flag", or in smart footy's terms, slowed the play down? Personally, they way the Hawks were coming, and seeing what they did in the 3rd quarter, I am of the opinion that they would've kicked 3 more goals.

WYL - How can you honestly say we put the white flag up? There is absolutely no justification behind your opinion. If saying to my teammates, "let's go in to half time with a 20-odd point lead, rather than allowing our opposition to dominate like they currently are, and go in to half time level" is a sign we put the white flag up, that is a serious concern for those that think that way.