bing181

Agree. In better teams though, the grunt played are made to look better by the quality and skills of the players around them. As for our grunts, I don't mind Rohan Bail, and until he's overtaken by others, I can imagine him holding down a place, even if it's 22nd. Similar to some extent for McKenzie, hard to judge on the limited time he had tonight, but he did have 100% disposal efficiency (admittedly on only 6 disposals). Suspect that his place will depend on match-ups and the role he can play, can imagine him being in/out. He'll get 30+ disposals at Casey each week though ... Can't say the same about Matt Jones, feel he's probably looking at his last season, but Grimes and Garland - too early to say on the basis of one NAB cup game. Garland in particular would be justified to be feeling nervous.

He didn't actually. Carry on though ...

Heritier Lumumba.

You started a thread just for that?

Or a 3 year old boy.

Frost: well worth pick 23.

Salem forward, Frost back.

Oh look, it's the same old hogans_heroes.

Exactly. They TRAIN all year round, they don't PLAY all year round. Not been watching any of the other NAB games?

Kent continuing on where he finished up last year, great to see.

Three goals in a quarter against a decent side. Plenty to like.

Both are in the pool of lawyers etc. that sit on CAS cases. There are plenty of others, including plenty of others who don't even know where Essendon is.

It's within the Tribunal's powers to accept evidence from whoever they want, and give it the weight they see fit. There's nothing in that that would/should fall over at appeal, or even lead to an appeal. If they did appeal on an admission of evidence matter, it would go the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, who are pretty clear on this: "As is the case for many tribunals, the AAT is not bound by the rules of evidence and may inform itself on any matter as it thinks appropriate, subject to the requirements of procedural fairness. (17) While this does not mean the AAT cannot apply the rules of evidence, the AAT does not generally do so. As Justice Hill stated in Casey v Repatriation Commission: The criterion for admissibility of material in the tribunal is not to be found within the interstices of the rules of evidence but within the limits of relevance. (18) Material relevant to the matters to be determined will generally be admitted avoiding the need for technical arguments on what should or should not be admitted during the course of the hearing." ... and a further comment, just to get the flavour : "... because the Tribunal is not bound by the strict rules of evidence, it does not necessarily need to admit evidence in the form of a witness statement, and a letter, for example, may be sufficient." ... and finally: Section 33(1)© of the AAT Act states; "the Tribunal is not bound by the rules of evidence but may inform itself on any matter in such manner as it thinks appropriate"

Whether they understood it was banned or not is irrelevant. Some of the discussion in the last few pages (not directed at anyone in particular ...) turns on a kind of "legalese". But this case isn't either a civil or criminal case, and a number of assumptions being put forward here are just not applicable. The WADA code and its juridic framework is fairly clear. Regardless of anything else, if ASADA can place TB4 at Essendon, and Essendon can't show that it was disposed of and not used, then the players concerned are in trouble - exacerbated by them having signed consent forms for "Thymosin".

No, not just you. Old habits die hard.

Can't imagine a win at all, and not expecting one. While we've been training to improve on last year's shortcomings, it's not going to all fall into place overnight, and I feel that we won't really start to see the fruits of the work that has been put in until later in the season. I imagine we'll be missing Watts, Howe and Vince from the season 22, so that'll put us behind the 8 ball as well, as we can't really cover for any of them. I'll be happy to see some improvement in some of the younger/fringe players, see what the newer players (Garlett, Lumumba, maybe Newton) bring, and at least an attempt at a style of play and systems that will bring rewards down the track. Also expecting lots of mistakes - from both sides.

A furphy. In the expression "circumstantial evidence", you need to be concentrating on the latter, not the former. Circumstantial evidence is still evidence, and every bit as valid as what you refer to as "hard proof". If we required hard proof in every court case, no murderer would ever be found guilty. BTW, they won't get off, so you'll be able to continue posting. If ASADA thought they might get off, they wouldn't have even brought the case.

For me, their actions have centred not so much on the possibility of losing fans, but of losing sponsors. Will be interesting to see how the likes of Kia react if the players go down.

It may seem stupid in hindsight, but at the time, there's an argument that could have been made for all those decisions. We needed to turn over the list, and given where we were at, that we managed to get anyone at all in was an achievement. Byrnes has been a decent pickup given all that - he's still at the club, contributing in a welfare and development role, which was always as much as anything why he was brought in.

Not sure if he was ever on his rocker. Also out of his depth, being neither sports scientist, nor doctor, nor even a physio: he's a rogue biochemist, though there seems some question as to his qualifications and expertise even in that field.

I think any of the players who've been through the MFC in the last 50 years would have been happy with "only one premiership".

Me too. One has given up on footy and now follows soccer, and the other - a lawyer - has cancelled his membership. Still supports the club, but not Hird, Little and the people running it. A third Bombers-supporting friend has become numb to all things Essendon, so hard to even know if he's still on board or not.

In regards to errors, not hitting targets etc. etc. not sure if anyone's watching Carlton/WC at the moment ...

If the three people are athletes, and the eggs are something a little stronger (and illegal), just being in the house is already going to be problematic.

It's the same for all sports - no sport is played 12 months of the year, and any ban will invariably include periods in/out of competition. All athletes can and do continue to train while banned. Of course, if the ban is only 6 months, which happens to coincide with the off-season, it becomes a bit of a farce, but very (very) hard these days to only cop a 6 month ban. It would be 12 months (minimum), which would cover one season, which is all we could expect. Also - at the moment, it's only a provisional ban. After all, regardless of what we all feel or expect, technically they're still innocent. Think they'll get something like 18 months myself, perhaps 12 at a minimum, but just as likely the full 2 years.