Rogue

I'm not taking it personally. I do however feel that this simply reinforces a negative stereotype of our Club that's not helpful. Every team has these.

No surprise to hear Neitz is retiring at the end of the year, but it's good that the speculation is out of the way (now we get the captaincy speculation instead). I thought it was interesting to hear that Neitz was still part of DB's plans, as some on this board have felt that he shouldn't be getting another gig this year. Your continual slagging off of our supporters just serves to reinfoce the pathetic media-driven stereotype of MFC supporters that (almost?) reduced you to tears last year. It's been going on since the preseason, so maybe it's time to direct that anger somewhere else

On one hand you say that it's more about the cost of the membership they buy. On the other hand you're saying that the money from memberships isn't really that important. Which is it? Fwiw, I've written before on this one, and suggested that it's not really the money from members, but what that then represents to sponsors. So the AFL gets even more money than the NRL, we have more members than Rugby Clubs, and yet we're labelled as a laughing stock of a sporting Club with no supporters, etc? Hmm. I agree with this. Not sure I'm with you on the rectangular stadium being the death of us, though.

I think you're in the same boat as most of the posters on here, but it doesn't stop them speculating on the captaincy

I didn't say otherwise. As I pointed out, it seems Holland and Yze have already been sidelined by DB. However, I think it's silly to put a line through good and better than good (do we have those?) senior players - not the Ward's of the world, but players I mentioned above.

We were doing that earlier in the season. Our forward line was far too big/slow, IMO.

I agree with the sentiment, but you're going too far to the extreme. I'm not sure why you're writing off Meesen. I also don't agree with discarding Wheatley based on age, either - he's still got plenty left in the tank if he's good enough. I think that the culture at the Club would be pretty poisonous if, regardless of form, many good/good+ senior players had no chance to play senior footy. I think White, McDonald, and Whelan deserve an opportunity to play, providing they are playing decent football. Bailey's already sidelined Holland and Yze. While I want to see us develop our younger players, it's important not to give young players a free ride if they don't deserve games.

Drawring a realllllllly long bow there.

Source: MFC site

Yes.

I'd be interested to hear what Buckley's workrate and defensive efforts were like. I think that's what he needs to improve on to get promoted.

That was terrible.

Yes.

Could be right - MFC site not updated last I checked, but teams were supposed to be finalised at 5PM. Decent changes either way

I agree. That said, often these things are easier said than done. PS. Just read that he's a "sports-loving Brisbanite" Anyhow, the second link that QueenC provided - Conversation with a Chairman - gives some insight into Argus' character. It sounds like he's community minded, and Argus mentions that if he left the world of big business he'd look to contribute to the community. Perhaps being the President is something that'd be down his alley. This is a good attitude for our next President to have.

I don't see what harm there would have been in a new thread with the official team, instead of a thread subtitled 'official' which in fact starts on April 12. It's quite a pain IMHO. (Point taken Rogue!) Anyhow, back to the footy...

In: Frawley, Moloney Out: Miller, CJ EM: CJ, Garland, Warnock That said, can't hurt to give CJ enough rope to hang himself. NB: This forum's moderation is a bit annoying sometimes. The 'official sides' thread starts off with discussion from last Saturday - I assume someone merged the official ins/outs into the middle of this originally speculative thread.

It's understandable, and I'm sure they're riding the wave of euphoria after the win last weekend.

Membership #s are interesting. How many do you actually need to have? What's an acceptable total? Does it need to grow every year? Is it all relative to what other Clubs are achieving? I read an interesting article that was comparing the football codes in Australia not too long ago - I think it was in one of the Melb dailies. In the article, the author asserted that the AFL Club with the least number of members still has more members than any of the rugby sides. I haven't checked this myself, but if true it's quite interesting. Fwiw, I don't think a 'call to arms' is going to be too effective while we're playing the type of footy we have been dishing up over the past eight weeks. At the start of the season I saw an article featuring captains from all sides in the AFL. In the article, they had to nominate teams - apart from themselves - that would make finals. From memory, we were at the bottom. PS. Why do members have to pay to be part of the Cheer Squad?

Which station would you choose?

Yes, this is the root cause of the handballing malaise we've seen at times.

How do we do that when we're looking at a 500,000 loss?

H & co. are right re: our list - whoever suggests we need to apply some band-aid 'fixes' to our list for some short-term and ultimately unfulfilling success are kidding themselves, IMO. Yes they have. I mentioned it in my post - around the fourth or so reply to this thread - and another two posters mentioned it before you joined the thread.

Oh God. I understand desperate times call for desperate measures. However, unless we can somehow play enough games in Melb AND turn Carrara into a fortress, aren't we as good as dead anyway? Somewhat good news. The article also states that the AFL has offered staff, expertise. Furthermore, they've offered to temporarily take the reins of the China project, while Team Melbourne is on hold.