Slartibartfast

Your quote I think applies to many and I think it's a natural part of being a footy supporter. Certainly I'm a different and more sceptical supporter than I was but I believe many go through a cycle of enthusiasm. You shouldn't be too hard on those in a trough at the moment and your quote reminded me of your past post where you said:- Even the most resilient have had their doubts. But when I re-read the post I looked at the date, 18th April 2006 after our third loss of the season and we sat without a win. Your observation on our coach was as follows:- The thread was short lived. We won 11 of our next 12 games and ultimately lost to Freo in the 2nd semi final to finish the best performed Victorian team of the year when we lost some important players in the win over St.Kilda. Don't be too hard on those that are flat after 6 years of crud Ben, you were there after two years of finals and three losses. Thankfully you only had to wait 7 days for the light to shine.

I responded to the put down. I do agree with everything else but the rider is that I've seen other clubs do things particularly well but I've rarely seen us do things particularly well. You can forecast all you like but we'll actually have a pretty good idea by mid season. I'll wait and see. Edit: the three VFL standard players are Rodan, Byrne and Pedersen. Dawes is clearly AFL. Of those Rodan and Byrne are close to the end of their careers and I'd be surprised if they had as good a careers at MFC as Richards, Kennedy and McGlynn.

I wish I had your confidence. Let's hope you're right.

There was a bloke on Demonology once who stated he'd lost his passion for the club. Caused quite a stir.

He sacrificed his coaching career for the Club. He may not have made it anyway but he certainly didn't give it his best shot and put the club first. Blind Freddie could see that. And yes, I admire him enormously for that. I'll also not criticise him here beyond saying that I agreed with his termination (although the manner of it was appalling and IMO is one of our darkest moments - so poor and so easily avoided which would have voided the tanking inquiry). I know him and he's a good person and whatever insights I have certainly don't need to be aired in a public forum. My loyalty to him goes far beyond "calling it as I see it" at D'land. If that casts me in a bad light, fine.

It's a pity Caro isn't around to tell us what the AFL have. =)

Yes Ben, shallow maybe. But in the end footy is about improving against your opposition and simply/(shallow) "winning". I'm not really interested any more in how good our culture is, whether players were injured, whether we have improvement in our young guns with potential or whether we understand our game plan. I want to win and I think that is how I'll judge us this year. I'll leave the in depth stuff to you and I think you're input so far this season is terrific, I hope it's matched by the team. I'll also allow others to pontificate about how Toumpas, Viney and Kent may go, ponder the benefits of Strauss v Terlick, try and pick our most likely to improve and guess about the impact 3 players who were basically VFL standard last year will have. Put shallowly, after 6 years of crud I'd like to think we can win more games in 2013 than we did in 2010. Is that unreasonable?

Good post H_T and yes we are still in the youngest quartile for age and experience. But that only tells part of the story because things like the talent and list balance can have a significant impact. I've said repeatedly that it's our 2 - 5 year experienced players where the major improvement can come from. Also important is the age and experience of your best (say) 25. Bailey got his results being in the bottom 2 or 3 of age and experience and it's why I think his achievements are underrated and his vilification is so unwarranted. What I think is also significantly underrated is the loss of our leaders like Bruce, Junior, Green, Davey and this year Rivers and Moloney. They weren't much good but they were better than talented 2 and 3 year kids. It's interesting to look at how Neeld matured during last year. Post Brissy he was spitting chips at the players calling them "them" and publicly scorning them. Toward the end of the year he'd jumped on board the "age" and "experience" train and could find positives in the most insipid of performances. That was so much better.

We are basically in agreement but I think it's naive to think Bailey wouldn't have developed the defensive side of the game and as the players matured they would have been able to play that style of game better. When you've got boys playing men there is no point trying to out muscle them. Interestingly we played the 2011 Collingwood gameplan last year when every other side had moved on to quicker ball movement and use of the central corridor. Also interesting that whilst most argue how much better we are now nobody wants to suggest that winning more games than Bailey did with a terrible list, poor fitness and a "terrible game plan" is a minimum reasonable level. Go figure. I'm sick of saying this but I support what Neeld is trying to do. He's trying to make us more competitive and he's trying to change our culture. I like what I'm hearing from training and I like the LM and I think he's improved out of sight compared to last year which you'd expect from a first year coach. But I won't accept 2012 as a benchmark, I'll accept 2011 as a benchmark and we must improve on that. If others are going to wax lyrical over a 9 win season given our cushy draw that's up to them, I won't.

I know this is a commonly held view on Demonland but it's not necessarily one I agree with. Bailey coached close to the youngest group in the AFL in 2010 and 2011 and he coached to their strengths therefore maximizing their chance of success. And while this was based on fast ball movement and a very attacking gameplan there is no reason to suggest that as the players got older, fitter and stronger they would not have developed the defensive skills and running ability of the top teams. I know that Bailey's strategy led to large swings in results and we regularly got beaten up by teams such as Hawthorn, Geelong and WC but it also showed some very significant promise against Swans and Collingwood. It also allowed us some big wins against other clubs such as Adelaide and Freo at the G and some consistent performances against the likes of Richmond and Essendon. Young teams getting beaten up by older powerhouses is to be expected but the significantly good performances against others showed more potential than anything we saw this year. I know that in order to feel good about the Club it's necessary to blame Bailey for everything and praise Neeld but it's not that simple. In 2012 we focused on defence and the groupthink round here would have it that this was a necessary first step. But we conceded almost exactly the same score against us as the previous year albeit that we played three games against development clubs compared to two the previous year. To compound the situation we kicked 400 less points and had a 20% drop in percentage. Despite putting all our efforts into stopping the opposition scoring and blowing us away our losing margin increased significantly. I'm very happy to forget 2012 as a learning year. Much went wrong, Neeld was new and learning on the job and the players were dealing with a new game plan. But the reality is we now have a significantly better list than Bailey had in 2011, we have significantly more resources within our footy department, the players have had time to learn and implement a new game plan and we have several years benefit of the facilities of AAMI. I know that setting a benchmark for Neeld is difficult because we all want him to succeed and we all want success. Setting a benchmark which he fails to reach will threaten all of us because we are all utterly sick and tired of failure after 6 years. But that doesn't mean we should go easy. He's certainly not going easy on the players and he wouldn't expect us to go easy on him. Can anyone really suggest that we shouldn't be better in 2013 than we were under Bailey in 2010 and 2011? Given our draw that must mean 10+ wins although with the responses to this thread I get the impression that not many think that's possible. The stat that does tell the whole story is 15 wins for Bailey in 2010 and 2011 against non development clubs and 1 for Neeld in 2012. That's just a plain fact and it's a pretty terrible one. It's time for the Club to produce.

It depends how long your memory is. In 2010 and 2011 Bailey had a winning ratio of about 35 to 40% against non expansion teams. Neeld has a winning ratio of about 6% against non expansion teams and this year has a better list, more resources and hopefully this year a more settled club. Let's call last year a "bedding in" period and a terrible environment not of his making to operate in but now he has to perform. If he can't match Bailey's 2010 and 2011 record against non expansion teams, the period where Bailey wasn't "experimenting", I'd consider it a fail.

How about closing this thread. Surely everyone had a chance to have their say..

Who was the last gun midfielder who moved clubs for other than ridiculous money (Ablett and Scully) or to go home (Judd and Caddy)? Clubs don't give them up and IMO whilst you do what you can the likelihood of getting a gun mid is negligible. It's why Bailey and Prendergast erred so much in only taking 3 genuine mids (and I have my doubts on Trengove) with the 8 top 20 picks they had over 3 years. Sadly two of those have gone and it's put us back 3 years. A golden opportunity lost. Let's hope the current crop can do the job.

The 12th best side in the competition last year was Richmond with 10.5 wins so if I'm reading you right you think that is our base line starting point at R1 and we should improve given the influx of mature recruits and the development in our 2 to 4 year players as well as FD personnel and preparation advantages. Is that right? We have an arguably better draw this year only playing GWS, BL, GCS, WB and Freo twice whereas last year we played BL, Richmond, ST.K, GWS and Freo twice. You've got to say we've had a very easy draw in both those years. So if our benchmark is 10.5 games plus improvement, and given average luck, how many games do you think we should win?

All that could be said has already been said in this thread I reckon.

If we were this hopeless how do you explain Bailey's winning percentage of about 40% in his last 39 last games with only one against a development team? Before everyone says "agenda" it's a genuine question that nobody has ever really been able to explain. I understand the "change of culture" "get rid of the bad apples" stuff, but if we were that terrible how did we win 4 out of every 10 games?

I wonder how that would change if you used a "best 22" basis. I'm surprised our midfield is ahead of GC as Ablett, Swallow and Bennell would cover anything we've got I'd have thought. Edit: Sorry, hadn't seen the GC comments prior to his, I obviously agree.

Whoever would have thought!!

Is it that you genuinely haven't understood the arguments here or is it that you're just trying to misrepresent me?I support the moves. Got it? If he gets it wrong then I get it wrong. Got it? The difference is he's a professional and paid to get it right and I'm not. If he's got it wrong we are worse off. I don't think he has and if he (and I'm) right I'm sure you'll be on here telling me that my attempt to undermine him has failed. How amusing that a thread basically in support of Neeld is causing such a response. I'm sure you're a nice bloke Robbie but you really are struggling. There's no (hidden) agenda here, stop looking under pillows.

My choice and my reasons. Admin knows why and that's all that matters.

It's that separate matter that was the point of the OP hence just looking at the players we have brought in, in the light of the purpose of the OP, is simplistic and why I responded the way I did. Apologies if I caused offence, there was none intended.

Fan, on 11 Dec 2012 - 11:58, said: I'm on record of being in total support of just about all list management decisions this year and whilst I disagree with some ... My only major regret in that lot is Gysberts and to a lesser degree Rivers, but I'm glad he has a chance to play meaningful footy after 6 years of crud.

Just as Prendergast was judged on the performance of the players he selected I think the FD can be judged on the performance of the players they rejected. It's not all encompassing but it's an indicator. How would you feel if his selection do wonderfully and his rejects do nothing? I'd feel good. If it was the opposite I'll feel bad. One will reflected well and the other poorly. I also fully accept that players can thrive in one environment and fail in another so that must be taken into account. The point I was trying to make, besides bring down the club with my political agenda by raising this point, was that we are in a unique position to do this given that only two of the PL players we delisted/traded/FA (excluding those that retired and Jurrah) were not picked up. And I also don't agree that the only reliable measure is win loss ratio. I think the draw, injuries and other factors influence this. Dandy I'm not going to play your game but I'm happy to debate by PM. I note to date you've not taken that option so spare us all this petty stalking and name calling. As Binman has shown, it can be done.

Sorry Maurie I missed this. Of that list I think 6 or 7 have played at other clubs. We delisted 12 from our PL (I think). 2 retired 2 left for FA but we didn't fight for them. 1 was a reasonably unique situation in Jurrah. Of the remaining only 2 didn't get another go at another club (Bate and Cook). I haven't got time at the moment but have a look at Richmond who made 11 changes. How many of their players were given second opportunities. I support the changes but it does give a reasonably unique opportunity to evaluate our decisions.

Oh for heavens sake's. I started in my first line of the OP saying I supported what Neeld has done and it was much better than Bailey. I've said that a number of times. I wouldn't change any list management decision he's made. I've already praised Neeld and you say you can't see me coming on DL and saying it's proof of Neeld's sound decision making. Sorry, I've already done it! And now is NOT the time to judge whether we've made the right moves, the future will tell us that. That we largely agree is to say our judgement is the same, not that it's good. I rate Gysberts, Neeld doesn't, the future will tell. I'd back Neeld by the way but I'll stay true to what I believe. And I'm not setting up a criteria to bag Neeld, I'm setting up a criteria to evaluate his performance. I'll praise Neeld if I think he does something well and criticise if I think he does something bad and I'll apply the same principle to the whole club. I reckon you're better than falling for this agenda stuff. Dandy if you want me to answer some questions send me a PM. I'm not going to bore others or ruin this thread by derailing it with political agendas.