Slartibartfast

I won’t have to wear my protective vest! Phew!

I think you’ll find “started an}d finished before” has been interpreted as Wight finishing before Stynes played, hence the confusion. I met them both, played golf with Sean, just so talented at golf as well. Terrible end for both.

They move the boundary line regularly to avoid that. And the trainers will put down cones to move the running line inside or outside the boundary to avoid the grass wearing out. The ground is in very good condition Yesterday’s training was consistent with other sessions but most pleasing to me was seeing Tommy Matthews joining drills. He has fan favourite written all over him. Accepting he was under little pressure his skills were very good and he was clean with his hands and particularly his kicking. Also notable is his ability to kick longer than his size might suggest.

GW ignores CFOT's.

Please, give some of us a little bit more credit. Your comment is verging on insulting😃. Or have I misinterpreted your comment?

Gator, but like me, he's mellowed.

Those who remember back to the good old days of Demonology will see this as nothing more than good humoured banter! How we've mellowed over the years that we now see this sort of stuff as requiring comment and posturing. Bring back a full on Hannabal and you'd know what confrontation was all about!

From Bailey Laurie's draft: Will Phillips (3), Denver Grainger Barras (6), Elijah Hollands (7), Tom Powell (13) and Finlay Macrae (19) are pretty much all busts and taken before Bailey Laurie in his draft year so no, not everyone can draft quality players with high draft picks. JvR (19), Judd McVee (rookie), Xavier Taylor (11), Latrelle Pickett (12), Xavier Lindsay (11) all in the last 5 years outside the top 10. Outside that Turner (midseason draft), Jai Culley, Jake Bowey (20+), Howes, Rivers, Fritsch, Sparrow, Petty and Chandler all picked outside the top 20. You seem to think drafting is easy, it's not, and Taylor has done remarkably well. Further players like Tholstrup, Jefferson and Adams all have varying chances of being successes. I say well done JT.

Or you could watch him train on multiple occasions if you have the opportunity. I do, I did, I believe.

That’s tough for a number of reasons. The match sim/ball movement drills don’t really showcase talls and there hasn’t been much genuine match practice at Gosch’s. Early PS I thought Tmac was the standout but I haven’t noticed him as much lately. Turner has been very good and Roo has been active but those hard hands…. If you classed Fritta as a tall (I don’t) then he’d be the clear standout for me. Lever has also been good. They’ve all had their moments and Jeffo hasn’t been the least of them. Checkers and JvR are locks forward for me and if we go with another tall I favour Jeffo. Luca is too similar to JvR and AJ isn’t there yet in my book but it’s line ball. Down back Disco is a lock and I think Petty and Lever are the other two. But you wouldn’t worry if May and Tmac were picked. The way I see it is we have a lot of options at both ends but we need a couple to become elite. In 3 years my two “most likely” would be Luca and Disco. I’d be very interested in other track watchers views.

I’ll give you the drum Werridee, Windsor will be one of the first picked. He, along with Culley and Kos, have been the standout this preseason.

Training on 14th January Gosch's confirmed on the website.

My major disagreement with you Picket is you're demotion of Chandler. My view is Chin is likely our next captain and I can't forget his sensational game against NM last year at Marvel albeit I acknowledge there wasn't much more to remember other than the tragic injury to Jeffo that clearly cost us the match!😄 There really isn't a weakness in his game. He's got clean hands, good speed, a very good kick and makes good decisions. I think he's been under utilized in the past and his development has been hindered by Oliver and Trac taking so much midfield time and Langdon's inability to play other than on the wing. If King frees the ropes I think we will see what Chin's impact can be on an ongoing basis. I also can't see Melk playing much footy. Checkers clearly plays as will one (or two) other talls be it JvR, Kentfield or Jeffo. Fritta also, more on him to follow. I can't see Melk playing much as he's already shown last year he struggles with the pace of the game. In his favour will be a much less structured game plan which will help a very smart footballer. The extra person on the bench may also help. At one point when asked King suggested that while they were uncertain how the extra player would work it could be used to extend the career of older players as they wouldn't need to spend so much time on the ground. Melk could be used as the wildcard later in the game. But I think King will want to give experience to younger players to see what they've got this year which will be largely to explore the list's potential and that won't help Melk. Back to Fritta. He and Clarrie were joined at the hip and clearly in our best 22 last year. At captains runs they would just wonder onto the field and have a chat and perhaps a short gentle kick to each other. Fritta didn't train that hard in PS (when he was fit) but this year is completely different and he's starring. I think he may well have a "break out year" based on last year and will return to 2021 form or better. I think not having his mate Clarrie about has taken the smokescreen away and he's now exposed. And it's a contract year.......... As for your favourite I'm one of the few who is still buying shares albeit at a large discount. People judge him harshly because he's a first round pick and they were told he's a KPF. But I don't think he is, he's more a taller Fritta type player. He isn't a break packs player and doesn't need to be, he needs to kick goals. He's done this at Casey and every year he's got better. Why is it that people don't understand that some players take longer to feel they belong in a men's competition? It doesn't mean they aren't good enough or lack courage; Shannon Neale didn't exactly dominate in his first three years and he has Hawkins and Cameron running round taking the pressure off and teaching him. Jeffo wasn't that lucky and still has a chance.

I'm sure Picket will be very motivated to give us all a report after all the rubbish that is thrown at him.....

Picket nobody is happy about Clarrie's demise and we'd all love to have a 2021 version of him playing but since his hammy he really hasn't been the player he was and I doubt if he'd stayed at MFC he could have got back there. I was very happy when both he and Trac returned to full preseasons last year and thought we were a genuine chance to make an impact in finals but I was very wrong and while Trac was good (but not by his highest standards) Clarrie was ordinary. It's also true that many of my friends warned me that Clarrie and Trac were very poor for the change room but I dismissed their concerns thinking that was not really important. I was wrong. Last year when I watched Captain's runs it was very apparent how Clarrie particularly and Trac were not "part of the group". Clarrie would engage with nobody but Fritta and Trac just went about his business with little or no interaction with other players. You can kid yourself that this sort of thing doesn't matter. You can convince yourself that "if we'd won the close ones" we'd be much better than we appear but the reality is that over two years we were bog ordinary. Clarrie and Trac were no good for the change room and no good for the club. Goody, who I still love, was well past his used by date, another judgement I got very wrong. Getting rid of these three and refreshing the list and the coaching staff give us a really good chance to reset. Like you, Clarrie was an absolute favourite of mine and I'll be forever grateful for his enormous contribution to the club but I also recognise we gave him many chances which he declined to take. If he "shoves it down our throats" this season then it will be just more evidence of how he really failed to apply himself over the last couple of years and will justify his trade. As a side observation I've never seen Fritta train the way he is this PS. He's in everything and training like his future depends on it. Joining the dots I think not having his best buddy Clarrie there has removed a bit of a screen for him to go at less than 100%. I'm picking Fritta (along with Windsor) to be most improved this year based on training form and that's a big prediction given his very high standard.