DeeSpencer

4 games left until 250 games. 5 games left for the year. Play his 250th and 251st and retire knowing he did a damn fine job almost single handedly carrying a midfield from 2005-2010 and leading us back from hell. He is still in the best 22 but the difference between him and Moloney/Sylvia/Trengove/McKenzie as inside mids is narrowing. Leadership without him is starting to improve. We've also seen that one minor hamstring has the ability to keep him out for what about 8 weeks?

I definitely don't want to lose Warnock, because if either of Rivers or Frawley went down he'd be in the team in an instance. Really I still think he is a touch unlucky to be out of it. Until we develop another big defender (which means until we draft one) Warnock is good depth. McNamara is cover for a third tall, but wouldn't be much use if he had to take on a real tall.

Looking at the 12/10 rule I think we would be be best served by having those who have played the most Casey games playing the finals (not those like Watts who we would all like to see out there). Guys like Bell, Cheney, Maric, McNamara, Spencer, Newton, Strauss, Miller, Hughes (would be cruel if he didn't get to play finals) have been core players for Casey this year. Barring any injury I think these 9 deserve the spots. The last 3 spots might just be there for whoever is playing Casey seniors at the right time: Jetta, Wona, Tapscott, Blease, Fitzpatrick, PJ, Healey. Its certainly not worth rushing Gysberts as his back injury seems to be significant. I'm sure Casey would love Warnock to keep playing for them for the rest of the year, but I think its unlikely. I really hope for our sake and Casey's sake that we field 12 fit and decent VFL players to give them the best chance of competing in the finals. Last year was pretty sad what happened but it seems this year we have a greater core of guys who hopefully feel some responsibility with Casey and the club allows them to have a crack at some tough finals football.

Why? I'm upset for him but he'll get more goes if he keeps working hard. Disgusted is a strong word.The only person you could recommend to be dropped ahead of Maric is Jones. And he did a good job defensively and kicked 2 goals so its not like he had a shocker. Brisbane have woken up to us and brought in a very strong running side.

Geelong won 2 with Mooney and N. Ablett or Hawkins. Watts has shown his class at ground level, the next step for him is to beef up his marking ability. If he can be a strong target at CHF like Mooney is for the cats then I think we can get by with a combination of Jurrah, Green and Petterd in behind. Obviously we would love to have another Watts developing so we could play one at CHF and the other at FF - like Buddy and Roughy, or Riewoldt and Kosi. I think the best idea now is to have a serious (within reason) play for someone like Walker or Cornelius. But if it fails then wait a while until we really are a serious threat (which hopefully happens, and hopefully happens soon) to go after a stop gap.

Bail isn't an athlete playing football, he has clean skills and doesn't mind the hard stuff (and I have a funny feeling he doesn't mind dishing a bit out as well). He may not be a standout but he is shaping as a very promising footballer. If he was 20 years old and a high draft pick people would be saying he's like Jack Grimes. Games are rarely one by individual performances so I'm not concerned about his ability to bust open games.McKenzie deserves a nomination and I think is now at the head of the que based on accumulated form. All he needs now is a great game or another good game without a standout from anyone else. On Jetta - sure he's exciting but there are plenty of lively quick small forwards going around, most of which actually kick goals. On his attempted goal you say cruel, I say justice for Goodes trying to hand him a goal.

Our percentage of 94 indicates where I think we should be. If you look at that I think it would be fair to say we deserve to be 8-9 not 6.5-10. You have to remember we beat Port by a point, so that counters one of the close losses. The 2 games against the Pies they presented to us by them being pretty poor in round 2 (and we were damn good) and their kicking for goal and moving the ball poorly on QB'day. Winning those 2 would have us 8-9 and really where I think we should be. We were always going to drop a few easy ones (not sure it had to be WC in Melbourne though!). It's also nice to have Collingwood and Hawthorn as the only top 8 sides we play twice (although add in Adelaide to that and it makes 3 of 7 which is fair to the bottom side). People probably didn't predict Port and Brisbane dropping so low either.

Surely you don't propose Bate or Bartram are anywhere near delistings this year?I'm not sure Bartram has much development left but I'm not sure he needs to either. Yes he has to tidy up his kicking but in terms of stopping an opponent there's not much more he can do. Bate and Dunn are interesting cases. Bate has obviously played more consistent and quality football. The number of times he has been in our best in games is quiet substantial. His problem is his best and worst are too spread. Just like he has good attributes (long kick, racks up touches, kicks goals) and some shockers (lack of chase and pressure, dodgy in close etc). But Dunn seems to be cleaner. He is certainly a better chaser, and he has the ability to go into the middle. If Bate gets his chasing effort up and can even add the ability to go onto a wing then he will certainly bounce back quickly to be the class act we know him as.

His defensive skills are amazing. He's the small version of Frawley defensively. A couple of things really impressed me today. McGlynn got the ball and ran straight at a stationary Bartram and tried to crunch through him and where most on our list would be brushed away Clint just took the tackle and got him. Also when Kirk got the ball from a handball over the top for what looked a certain goal and then bang out of nowhere Barts runs him down. Sensational With his kicking - when he gets the ball he can spot up a short target 30m away and hit him pretty well. The other players just need to be aware of it. He also isn't a bad long kick to space. Obviously its the kick under pressure that needs to be precise that is his weekness. Where does everyone think he will finish in our B&F. After playing every game besides round 1 so far I think he'd be around the bottom of the top 10.

Where and when was he well and truly beaten? Sure in the last quarter playing full back with little to no pressure on their midfielders Morton got carved up by Goodes.But in the first 3 quarters especially when Goodes was in the middle it was an even battle. Both had similar possessions and Cale got forward for a goal and a goal assist as opposed to a couple of Goodes goals.

The way he picks the ball up and gets handballs out of stoppages isn't just head over the ball hard stuff, its actually amazing skill. He has total disregard for his body and is always shepherding, tackling and all the other the team things. Today he was up against guys like Bolton and Kirk who have been doing what he's been doing for over a decade and he's smashed them. The 2008 draft was the one our future had to be build on. Watts, Jetta and Bennell are tracking well. We've barely seen our second and third choices (mainly due to injury) but our late pick ups in Bail, Jurrah and McKenzie are killing it. Everyone knows about Jurrah but Bail and McKenzie are gems.

16 touches. One lace out 50m pass to Green (that Green dropped). 1 behind. Looked like he was adjusting to the increase in pace and work rate of the AFL as he was pretty stuffed by the end of the game (when his turnover off half back was pretty disappointing. But he did lead hard and chase reasonably well. I'd like to keep him in and get him some more experience at the top level but with Trengove, Moloney and McDonald back soon I don't think we will be able to stick with Maric as well as Bennell and Wona.

Jetta came back from injury and immediately played better games than Maric was in the VFL. He then got selected on merit to play in Darwin and played a blinder. His next few weeks at AFL were progressively not as good and he now finds himself in the VFL. Maric has been building all season off an almighty sloppy start to the year. He should now find himself above Jetta and Wona in line for a game. Unfortunately he is behind Bennell/Green/Bate/Watts/Sylvia/Jurrah for a spot in the forward line. If he continues his good form he should be able to force himself a spot in the team (maybe as early as this week). But as of last week he certainly hadn't earned his right to play. Sure he might have had a case for cheap games like Watts or Wona in Darwin, but he hadn't earned it.Cheney and Bail have played consistent BOG to get back in the side. When Maric finds consistent dominance not just consistent decent games at VFL level I will be calling for him.

I think we're still waiting on Strauss to save the day for the kickouts. Lot of pressure on a guy who has played 2 games and has had a few injuries unfortunately stopping him playing more.

It's why Jordie McKenzie and Trengove are 2 of my favourites because they instinctively do the 1%'s because they strive of the physicality. Also alarmingly I think we are starting to get a few too many guys wanting to kick the long goal instead of hitting up a leading forward. They obviously have lost faith in their footskills and the guy on the lead. At this stage we should cough up goals sharing the ball too much, no too little.

You know that's the same Alistair Clarkson who stuck with Roughead week after week when he was barely getting a touch earlier in the season. It's easy to send lessons to the group when you are off to play a Brisbane in Tasmania without Simon Black. They could have sent a lesson to half the side and still got home. I'd drop Bate if he's not working hard enough and not putting his head over it. At the moment all he is doing wrong is making a few bad decisions, generally when he gets the ball at high half forward, looks to move it on quickly and finds no one up field.

It must have been a huge corky to stop Beamer. Think about it the guy would surely have gone on for a spell at the end of the third/sometime in the 4th quarter just to get some rotations up if he was anywhere near able to run. Hopefully he can get stuck into some recovery over there and be back for the Syndey game. If not if Junior and Trengove are ready to come back that would be nice.

6 games left. 4 at the MCG and two trips to play current bottom 4 sides. If we win 3 or more games then we can start with the could of should of would of. But for now I think we just have to look at it as a year where we still have massive deficiencies but are also starting to build something.

I thought Sylvia and Jones both played great second halves. Sylvia certainly seems to be more at home in the middle now than up forward. Jones was rubbish until probably a third of the way into the 3rd quarter where Bailey had a chat to him. After that he was very strong around the clearances and kicked a lovely goal.Bartram I agree had a good game. Used the ball well within himself and I thought he did a good job on Ballantyne. The stats will say he kicked 4, but one was a push from Davey and some good acting, another a gift from Bruce and I'm not sure of the 3rd. The 4th was the game sealer and Bartram did lose him for a step there but at least had him pinned near the boundary.

You are kind to say it was an accident, I think Davey tried to bluff the ump and his actor skills were not of the same calibre as H. Ballantyne and co. I'm pretty sure Bate got a legitimate handball anyway. But we certainly didn't get any of the soft 50's that we did last week.Rivers' 50 was much more costly than either of Davey's. And you could make a case for the first of Davey's not being paid as Bartram turns Davey away to stop the abuse, therefore highlighting the right attitude toward umpires (which is the exact opposite of why that 50m penalty gets paid).

Yellow maggots and those 3 were all average in the last quarter, but the 19 besides PJ, Scully and Bennell who played in the first half were the guys who cost us the game.

Pressure - Nope Run - Nope Skills - Nope When we don't have any of the 3 we get smashed. Games like this highlight my belief they we desperately need to get more pace and skill into the side regardless of what the short term result is. Also Freo's drafting and player development is just unreal and so much better than ours. That's an absolute fact.

They did take 3 similar players (Harris, Iles and some other guy) at the start of the rookie draft so they obviously preferred them to Valenti.Valenti can certainly hold his head high though. Played some decent footy when given a chance and even got a brownlow vote.

I'll put my hands up for both of them. Bruce I've really respected and he has done a huge amount of work on field in getting this backline set up, but his disposal has gone to shreds up until the last couple of weeks when its come back a bit. Maybe freeing him up on the wing against Adelaide gave him some good confidence. The more he takes the game on himself and kicks the thing the better he actually is. It's his disposal I've bashed the most (especially shocking handballs to players under pressure).Rivers has just been beaten in too many 1on1's this year. And hasn't given much going forward compared to Warnock. He's looked undersized or slow. Against Neagle and Leigh Brown he's looked big, strong and very solid. Just wonder when it comes down to teams with 2 very good talls whether Frawley and Warnock would serve us better (like against Brisbane earlier this year).

Quality players can be moved positions - ie. Murphy (who started back, went forward and is currently back again), Harbrow, Enright, Kelly, Hodge. If Rohan Bail and Jamie Bennell make it as well or even better than I hope they do I see no reason why they couldn't become quality half back flankers to add some class to the back half. Morton is another with no set position. One thing about this thread, I do wonder if Lynden Dunn can just be kept on the list for a special tagging and defensive forward option. His last month of football has again seen him shuffled positions but has been really successful. He played a nice defensive forward role against Coll and StKilda and tagged beautifully today (without conceding free kicks and with getting a lot of his own footy).