DeeSpencer

No it didn’t

From his highlights and watching him at training he loves leaping for his marks. Plenty of smalls like Eddie Betts and Cyril have done it over the years and don’t forget the great former demon Gary Moorcroft!

If the population was really booming in a way that led to footy club memberships booming why have the Dogs not capitalised on their flag with the growth of the Western Suburbs? They target those areas constantly for growth. The big clubs in particular have seen their membership numbers boom and I'm sure that's because they've created far more cheaper membership categories and sold them to casual fans and people who don't renew every year. Smaller clubs like ours have been supported by loyal members who buy a full membership year in year out. The MCC memberships should've helped our bottom line and should continue to grow, there might be close to 10k+ available if they got everyone there signed up. But for most others they are already committed. I know a lot of casual fans of big clubs who don't go the footy, clearly there's some form of bias by association involved but nearly everyone I know who's a Melbourne supporter is a member and turns up.

Happy to target premierships and growth, I'm just not sure where the numbers will come from. There was a huge base of latent Tiger supporters, the children of the people who were there in the 60's, 70's and 1980. As well as a boost from Tasmania the Hawks dominated the outer east to grow with success for decades. The MFC was powerful but was it ever big? I'd love to be wrong and get 60k and be well on the way to 70+ but in the mean time let's get over 50k this year which will be a huge step then go for a flag!

Both us and the Dogs had 35k members is 2015. The Dogs won the flag in 16 and had 47k in 2017 that dropped back to 43k last year. That tells me they didn't really have a big latent fan base available to scale up. The Tigers won a flag and went from 70k to 100k. I'd hope we turn 44k in to 50k, but unless they are doing wonderful work or finding some other way to fudge the numbers I think 60k might require and premiership and 70k is a pipe dream.

He doesn’t have the same tackle pressure and contest to contest work rate as Spargo and ANB as a forward though. He had 10 pressure acts, Spargo had 22 and ANB 27. Some of that is because he played more wing but either way he’s rarely had that high pressure game. He’s an undersized wing/mid/high half forward who runs to the right places both ways and has some nice hands and movement around the contest. That’s how he got 40 in the VFL often. That’s how he played well last year. I liked his game against the Pies. Didn’t like the way his ball winning or ball use folded against the Tigers under pressure and he didn’t do anything special defensively. Can he or Stretch state a case that they are better than Jones for round 1? Maybe, but I’d be picking the skipper because at least you know he’ll win the ball and attack contests.

Baker only came in to full training about the same time as Melk. Not sure he was ready. Would’ve liked to see him play. No point playing the twin towers after last week. Preuss isn’t a dominant back up, there’s no reason to see him forward more. Keilty might be worth another look or used to spell the talls, otherwise Weideman will do the job backing up Gawn. Not sure how McDonald being poor last week changes that. The forward spread and pressure was bad last week, that’s a more pressing issue.

Because football was more enjoyable when the quarters went for 24 minutes than 30+. Everyone is busy, if the games go for closer to 2 hours than 3 it makes it easier to get to and from a game without taking the whole afternoon or evening. I like the anticipating moments before a bounce, as a player lines up for goal etc but they should be kept as pauses and not delays.

Measures need to be taken to shorten the amount of time a match goes for without cutting down the 20 minutes per quarter of actual game time. 80 minutes of game time is perfect, allowing it to take 160+ minutes is not. Cutting down the breaks between goals, the time it takes to ball it up/throw it in as well as encouraging less stoppages to begin with, the quarter time breaks, the number of times the clock stops for minor indiscretions and so on.

Goody flags playing 22 or 23. I’d take out JKH, Melksham and Frost from the list I named. Keep Keilty as the 23rd man. The big challenge is how do you evaluate the guys who play well in the 2’s v the guys who might not do well in the main game. Hannan and Brayshaw have come in to the round 1 based on vfl form in years previous.

There’s also often thousands in the bar and lots of empty seats in the public they are just in 1’s or 2’s so harder to see. If they had their time again they’d change the top half of the top level to public seats but open up more of the ground level to mcc members. You’d then get more bums in seats from the same crowd. Booking individual seats ruins the walk up culture that is a huge part of the club and makes Footy a mixing social experience not just an outing.

Viney and Jones to play VFL as per stevoooooo. Probably both of minutes restrictions, let’s them have a look at the depth guys under AFL conditions as well. They might play VFL next week as well. My guess of the 26: Backs (8): May, Hibberd, Jetta, Lewis, Hore, Oscar, Hunt, Frost Mids (9): Gawn, Oliver, Gus, Harmes, Brayshaw, Salem, Vanders, Fritsch, JKH Utility: Keilty (plays 2nd half to rest Gawn and T Mc more) Forwards (8): T Mc, Weid, Melksham, Petracca, Spargo, ANB, J Smith, C Wagner

The final preseason games should be on fox footy or ch7. any previous games should be streamed or televised at a clubs discretion. They need to stop filming this stuff and having everyone watch it.

They are in the vafa, I don’t really understand it, the MCC has a great football division with men’s and women’s teams.

Good. Now someone needs to make sure he doesn’t fold to the pressure of banning walk up seats for big games. The greater unwashed complain the mcg isn’t full for big games due to a bunch of seats at the top of the members being left empty. I say, bad luck.

Can get an LED soccer substitute board for about $100. Or the old fashion manual ones for about $15. Maybe next time the AFL can pay us 90,000 and we'll get what's needed, split most of the spare cash and put the rest on for a demonland bar function.

It was strange and I was tempted to stand my ground. There was a camera guy and a journalist all of 50m away the other way so fair to say they weren't implementing some kind of secret weapon play. At the end of the day the coaches and players are there to work and improve and I'm not so I moved but I must say I prefer the way Brendan McCartney engages in the occasional banter over the fence. I did make Robert Harvey run around me up the tan hill though, I'm not prepared to move for the enemy.

Someone reported he left training early during a session last week. No update on what's happened but given his injury history its not a good sign.

I'd happily put a big bid in for Jamie Elliott. Worse case scenario it makes the Pies pay more to keep him. Stephen Hill if the price is right? Come play wing/back flank and finish your career with some wins. Brandon Ellis for the right price? Has only had one great year in 2017 since his early days but he can run and kick. Un-retiring Cyril is still a great idea. Realistically we've signed Salem, we need to get Weid done at a fair price and then it's probably more shopping around the edges looking for guys who can fill needs.

I wandered by at around 10:40 and stayed for maybe an hour until they were wrapping up. Looked mostly a craft session as Saty would say, lots of smaller group drills focusing on particular skills. Gathering the ball, quick hands up, hit up a kick, get a handball, kick inside 50 was one drill and there were plenty similar. Lever was doing some jogging. Apart from Hannan, Garlett, Neitschke, Tim Smith (not expecting good news there) everyone else was on deck. KK was in a t shirt but was involved in some of the drills. I had a good look at one of the craft drills and to be honest I wasn't all that impressed with the overall skill level. Jones missed a few easy handballs in a row, other players dished it off on the deck or too high, the kicks were sloppy. Petty and Chandler were 2 who impressed me with reliable skills. Interestingly it seemed a guy like Austin Bradtke was fresh and hitting his targets where some of those who played on the weekend looked fatigued. They split in to forwards/backs/mids and I wandered over to observe some clearance stuff and was bluntly told by Ben Matthews to move at least 30m away which seemed particularly odd given I was wearing headphones and couldn't hear whatever wise secrets he was imparting. Anyway, maybe our clearance structures will evolve to something more than Gawn hits it to Oliver/Gus/Viney/Harmes/Petracca who make something good happen. The general plan seemed to be to get the ball to someone running forward ideally in to the corridor. Most of the guys who played on Sunday (I think maybe all apart from Harmes) started to filter out to the sidelines or do some goal kicking whilst the others did some match simulation at the end. Melksham and May both impressed me. Viney involved, got cleaned up by Preuss at one stage and enjoyed a wrestle.

Overall I think they paint a picture of a team that plays an effective style of contested footy but needs to add in more uncontested play without diminishing our strong suit. Eg: When we win the ball let's get it to the outside freely so we aren't tackled with it. When the quick play from half back isn't on let's play some kick/mark footy, switch and reset. Goodwin and co made a number of in season and in game adjustments to our defensive work last year and the hope is May helps there. Becoming a more efficient team with the ball probably centres around Fritsch and KK in to the side, without upgrading personnel we were always going to have a hard time fixing the issue of flooding numbers around the ball instead of finding open space and bombing it forward.

I think Frost and Oscar were (and are) both bad and limited footballers. Oscar is more talented and a nice kick who doesn't turn the ball over, but he still has no physical presence and doesn't kill the contest. Both the Balta and Higgins goals on the goal line came after Oscar failed to kill contested situations. He's indecisive, slow and hesitant to commit his body. Frost will have a few clangers but if he's put in the right positions - ie. playing from behind on a lead up forward (ie. Jeremy Cameron, Tex Walker and others last year) he'll make them earn it. It mostly comes down to how they want to use May and how the other defenders will work around him. I get the feeling it will be May at CHB and Oscar at full back to start with and we'll try to dictate with pressure up the ground to stop quick ball exposing Oscar and provide May a chance to intercept and control the half back line. Sounds good in theory but if May blows up chasing around a decoy and Oscar gets exploited deep then I can see the argument for May to stay deep and Frost to come in at CHB.

Keilty is the new Pedersen is my hope, a capable ruck/forward to come in if needed. I’d play him next week over Preuss as the back up ruck. Maybe just for the 2nd half again. Wouldn’t expect him to play round 1 but I think he did enough to deserve another look. Petty I’ve always been a fan of his clean skills and very good intercept marking. He can get caught out of position and isn’t all that quick or attacking so where does he fit in our backline mix? May, Hibberd, Jetta, Lewis come back in, I’d leave Salem at half back. That means 2 more spots for Hore/Hunt and Oscar/Frost, or 3 spots if they leave Salem in the midfield mix. Can Petty play ahead of Hore as an interceptor? Or ahead of Oscar/Frost as the 2nd tall. If we were a development team I’d play Petty because long term he’s got more talent than Oscar and Frost. As a team that needs to win as many games as possible I’m not sure we have that luxury.

Define very unlikely? Freo play North in the last round, assuming they both win next week the winner and loser of their match in the last round will finish on 24 and 20 points respectively. With the loser on 20 points and probably a percentage similar to what they are on now given they'd have won 1 game and lost 1 game. Adelaide will move to 20 points with a win next week and we will move to 16 points if we beat the Dogs. Then if we beat the Crows in the final round it will come down to percentage to determine 2nd place. Hypothetically if both teams win 50-30 next week then the Crows will be points for/points against 319/181 and we'll be 282/175 A 41-30 win in the final round we have us 323/205 (157.56%) and the Crows 349/222 (157.21%). Win by a decent margin next week and we'll be looking at only having to beat the Crows by a small margin.

I assume come round one it will be ANB and Spargo both in the side. Spargo is a similar player with better class and potential. If we stick with 2 pressure forwards then Corey Wagner is a very similar player who might have a little stronger hands and nicer field kick, but he's hardly a clean user and probably only gives 80% of the defensive pressure. Garlett seems unlikely. Hannan is a long way off. Joel Smith was underwhelming in terms of pressure as well as skill. Bedford and Chandler remain unseen, it's unlikely they are ready. Would the midfield mix ever get so deep that we're rotating Vanders, Jones, Fritsch through half forward as well as Petracca/Viney/Oliver/Gus/Harmes and they all provide enough forward pressure to do with one less dedicated pressure forward? ANB isn't under immediate threat but he has to show some skills under pressure and not just when we're 10 goals up against bad sides. He's not so great of a defensive force that he can spud it up every time we play a team that puts pressure back on him. He has to make some quicker and better decisions and he has to be stronger at the contest and take some bodies.