Webber

Yes, but shhhhhhhhh.............

When good management and a whole s***load of luck combine, you get a short and promising injury list like this.

If the AFL had the heart of the game as their absolute first priority, we would have an AFL team in Tasmania, and in Canberra, and the lack of profitability would be born by redistributions from other areas/clubs. What we have however is a 'business' approach as the first priority, where profit and growth growth growth of that profit is primary. There is a begrudging acceptance that clubs need to be helped, prices adjusted, and the supporters who go live to games given a modicum of consideration, as against the TV audience, which has greater power than it should. This is not to say the AFL don't act well in some areas, such as gender issues and indigenous engagement, and they are not the worst national sporting organisation by some margin, but a focus on 'The Game' and the people who love it should be held above all else. That's not about money.

Yep to both.

Parochialism be damned. This is our indigenous game, and should be Australia wide. Expansion clubs are part of that. They are going to absolutely suck up funds for some time. Unless the AFL is prepared to redistribute funds by taking from the rich and giving to the poor, it's going to be a progressively two tiered competition, which is NEVER going to draw crowds and support in new territories. They just don't get it though.

Agree.

Yep. Grimes and Matt Jones were both very good yesterday, and certainly in our best. Both suffer from the perceived past indiscretions not allowing them to be as good as their last performance. Which was Saturday, and they played well, got a lot of it, and used it well. They will both be part of Roos squad of 'first selected' each week, whether some can see it or not. As for the oft repeated refrain that Van Demon, Newton, Michie, Brayshaw etc etc 'going past them', most of those usually mentioned have played nil or just a handful of games, so they are UNKNOWNS. Bail didn't see as much ball, but was good when he got it, and McKenzie same.

According to Dom Tyson, Dan Cross is enormous in his influence over every aspect of how to be a footballer. It's as crazy that the Doggies let him go as we did Junior McDonald. Wiser heads now prevail thankfully.

Both he and Salem showed they are in an elite level of skill and footy sense. The same is true of Jack Watts. All will have their time, maybe this year, maybe next, but they are seriously talented boys.

He's been very good. As has Jimmy Toumpas and Chris Salem.

I want my team to play like the Doggies. With heart, intensity and purpose. They just do NOT know how. It's like an illness.

Wow. A gutless effort reminiscent of years past. Very sad.

He's the best of his draft year, and if he improves on last year, he'll be elite/AA/ Brownlow contender, etc, within a couple of years.

Saw 90 minutes of training (after the Vince/Howe show), and saw Oscar McDonald nail 3 successive set shots from close to the boundary all between 40-50 metres out. Beautiful relaxed economical kicking style. Watched Angus Brayshaw nail all but one of his foot passes, and I still don't know which is his dominant foot. Thought JKH moved and handled the ball beautifully, with a couple of understandable fumbles. For me, his movement and reading of the ball stand out. Seems other opinions are available

He didn't come back after 16 weeks.

dpositive, I'd doubt very much if the players are being told to 'stay off' their heels, or deliberately spend more time on their forefoot, other than the fact that 'leaning' forward when sprinting has been a mantra to improved speed for decades, and as we increase speed, we use forefoot strike more anyway. So they'll be getting running technique coaching to that effect where it's needed anyway. The whole issue of 'barefoot running' has become a trend since some recent studies showed that habitual barefoot runners (pretty much only African) are no more at risk of overuse injuries than those running the same amounts with shoe support and control. The biomechanical argument is then that we trust our shoes too much to cushion us for heel strike, and thus heel strike too commonly. What we do know is that people who move from full shoe control to barefoot type levels of freedom cold turkey, are prone to problems. Exactly how and what the method is of weaning off control hasn't really been established yet, and I'm not sure how it would impact footy, where kicking and gripping the turf are key issues with boot design.

The reason the youngsters look so good is because it's an INTRACLUB, and you're just simply wrong about Matt Jones kicking.

Well done TDI. The observers who translate one miskick into many, or amplify the 'mistakes' of their favourite whipping boys drive me a bit nutty, so I like reading your more objective reality. Matt Jones is the biggest victim I reckon. I think his disposal is actually good, and his decision making very good, and I base that on last year. The other one is Grimes, who some imagine is not going to get a gig for round 1. He will.

and you aren't the only one.

They're both ahead of Brayshaw and Petracca (def now!) I reckon, on account of having played senior footy. I've had a feeling since we drafted Stretch that we'll see a lot of him this year. His size will become irrelevant very quickly, as his physique looks remarkably mature to me....very low body fat, just a classic running build.

And there I was thinking you might have been just a presumptuous smart**se.

A couple of different issues here. Traumatic injuries such as ACL rupture, hamstring tear, shoulder dislocation and more are hard to objectively blame on youth, other than the fact they statistically happen more commonly in the young 'uns. There are theories that relate to pure tensile strength of the structures being greater as we move into mid twenties, then the 'balance' and harmonised function of the muscles being something that improves with age. I'd say it's a combination. Then again, they'll always happen at any age because sometimes Barry Hall is running at you and there's no getting out of the way. Crunch, crack, rip. 'Overuse' injuries such as Osteitis Pubis and stress fractures are a function of repeated load on a structure where it is still arguably immature, and where the dynamic balance as mentioned above are sub optimal. Something like OP is both prevented, subverted and treated much better now than 15 years ago, because we've targeted the muscle function and coordination of the muscles acting at the pelvis....Abs, gluts, adductors, hams, quads ('core stability'). Weight bearing loads are managed more diligently now to keep ahead of bony stress reactions much better also. There's no accounting for individual variation though, and sports science is constantly looking for correlates between certain injuries and specific physical markers, e.g. hamstring flexibility and hams tears. As such, would love to know if there is something in Petracca's physical makeup that could have indicated he might do his ACL in his teens. No such knowledge as yet.

It's something that will become a key factor in managing player loads. Skeletal maturity, muscle strength and the balance of function between those muscles grows through to your mid twenties, where injuries become less frequent. It's a pretty wide spectrum of variation to that generality though, such as Nat Jones, Ollie Wines. What we need are physiological markers that identify those predispositions to injury as a general group. There are no markers to indicate predisposition to ACL rupture, despite years of looking for them, so it remains a bit of a raffle.

What? Computer generated? What's your point?

There is no greater incidence of hamstring injuries post ACL reconstruction where the hamstring is used as the graft. The hamstring 'group' (3 muscles) compensate as a collective to take over the progressive loads imposed during rehab. The surgery is a very elegant and efficient process. The graft length is computer calibrated to be anatomically correct, and anchored to the bones top and bottom of the knee (femur and tibia). That graft is initially dead tissue, but over the period of 5 to 6 months, the blood supply re-establishes through the bony attachments, such that it becomes fully vascular, and therefore a self regenerating tissue. It is 'living' and able to absorb the stresses applied. Fully competitive, full speed multidirectional sport is allowed at 9 months. At the elite level, there are seldom variations to this timeline, and the outcome is as if the ACL had never been damaged.