binman

I'm glad we have now progressed from 'accepting mediocrity' to 'applauding mediocrity'...

Next step is celebrating mediocrity. I have a lot of experience in that department having followed the dees for 40 years. But seriously i predict we'll be celebrating Watts unique skill set for years to come and the early knocks on him will be seen as a weird anachronism.

My prediction is that he will end up being a better player than Hurley and Natanui. Both those boys are near their best already i reckon, certainly in terms of how big they will get. Watts has more upside (though i suppose Natanui will improve his reading of the game) and will continue to get a fair bit bigger. He won't fully fill out 'till he's 24-25 and when he does he will vindicate his number 1 draft selection

2 Goals, 26 possessions (that's 26 ...) and named in the best. Think I could live with that.

There's only one Jack Watts. If he becomes the first 196 cm small forward, so be it. So much of the criticism of him comes from expectations of what he should be. Perhaps we should just give him a chance to be what he is.

I absolutely agree. I don't understand this obsession with him being a KPF (i include Neeld in this). So that's what we drafted him for - so what. Why (partic at this stage) force him to play a position where we won't get the best out of him? He is such a good user of the ball (in a team of mainly spuds when it comes to effective use of the ball) i would rather he has 25 kicks per game (and 3-4 goal assists) than 8 and one goal as a KPF. He also doesn't get nearly enough credit fro how unselfish and team orientated he is. Last night he sounds he gave several goal assists in a game where he could have been excused for trying to shore up his own chances of round 1 selection with a bag of goals.

I recall people happily comparing him to Hird. I for one wouldn't mid a player of that ilk running around for the dees. In any case static KPF's are a thing of the past and we spent 600k per year for a big lug in Clark so we don't need him in that role at present

I'm in as The Phoenix (i rise from the ashes)

The media and football cognoscenti have short memories.

I totally agree. This is a huge bugbear of mine. There is 50 times (almost without exaggeration) journalists covering footy than say 20 years ago and there is wall to wall coverage (something the AFL carefully orchestrates and to my my mind is a big part of the problem) yet the analysis is woeful and so often the media seem to operate in 24 hour cycles of rubbish and are amazingly lazy.The real concern is when footy fans swallow the media rubbish without applying some intelligent filtering.

I'll say it again, i was critical of Watts before last season, partic in regard to his intensity. I thought he had a good season last year and worked hard on his deficits. There seem to be general consensus on this at the time and his numbers clearly support it. Now all of a sudden he's "out of form" after 3 NAB games (i thought he was ok against the Hawks BTW, certainly no worse that some others) and under pressure. Just nonsense.

As an example of the rubbish that gets trotted out the headline in todays sun is " Watts must earn his place back". This despite the article quoting Need who is adamant he has not been dropped so therefore has not "lost his place".

So Watts is the new easy target. I thought Trengove didn't play well against the Hawks. What happens if he doesn't fire in the next few weeks, does he too come under fire?

Sometimes too you can't win

The only people i dislike in my street happen to be the only other Dee's supporters in the street

And they live dead opposite

That'd be me!

Nah only joking

i can feel a funny sense of deja vu coming on

I was wondering what CARP I was reading until I saw the Dates of the posts. Sept 10.

I don't understand bumping the thread. Is Dandeeman just trying to prove a point that Nat is not as bad as a lot had thought?

And we should all give them time to improve.

RPFC I hope you are being facetious again.

You're right - sounds a bit fishy

According to the NT Court website. He is up at 10:00 NT time or 11am EDST (now)

http://www.nt.gov.au...y/crim/ras.html

Thanks for that. Some of the issues the communities in central Australia face is eloquently described in the range of charges listed in that doc ( all of them. not just Liams). Tragedy piled on tragedy.

One potential positive out of this awful situation is that it might open eyes (including mine) to the scale of the problem in remote Indigenous communities and provide some real insight into the barriers Indigenous Australians face.

I have no problem with the leave so long as Jurrah is not being paid. He is welcome back any time, and to being paid when he rejoins the list.

If, however, he is being paid for his "leave", then it is just plain [censored]. The MFC is not a welfare agency.

Yeah too right and whilst we're at it lets get rid of paid: maternity leave, paternity leave, compassionate leave, carers leave and even sick leave. All that leave is just plain [censored]. Employers are not welfare agencies! (oh except the ones that are - and they don't have enough money to pay for the namby pamby frivolous leave listed above)

Why?

Because he is in our best 22

Absolutely in our best 22 and would be shocked if the coaching panel don't share that view. Watts is a lock for Round 1 (unless injured).

You'll regret that statement Old Dee .Big Time

I agree Biff. In 5 years time any discussion about "should have" taken Hurley or Kit Kat will be a funny reminder of the lack of long term perspective that dominates football analysis at present

As long as his form isn't just static

These puns are shocking!

Jurrah's injury becoming a concern. Just seems to get longer & longer

Yeah it is. And for it to happen in a dull scrappy game against GC at the [censored] end of a dismal season gives it added poignancy. I remember seeing him come of in discomfort and thinking hell i hope hasn't broken his wrist. The post match reports seemed to suggest it wasn't that serious but for it still to be an issue 6 months later is a big worry.

One positive is that he has been able to work on his aerobic capacity and i would presume his overall strength, at least in in his legs and core (obviously limited how much upper body work he can do). I don't reckon he'll take long to get his ball handling skill up to speed.

Make no mistake he is an absolutely key player for us. In a team lacking real a graders or players with an X factor a fit, firing LJ is vital

In two weeks that list will be halved, what's your point?

Re-rookie Evans, he shown a bit. People are always trying to extrapolate something from injury lists, well guess what? This is a contact sport. Moving on..

A bit unnecessarily narcy i would have thought.

And by the by we'll see if that list is halved in two weeks - how often does a a 2 week injury magically blow out to a 6 week injury (see Jurrah, amongst innumerable other examples over the last few years Melbourne).

Also how did Evans hurt his back and why is it indefinite?

Which muppet put in 11?

Just call me Kermit. My favourite time of year is pre season. We haven't lost a game, i'm always full of hope. My experience in following the dees has been the season usually provides more than its fair share of reality checks so i'm sticking with 11 wins in a row to start the year.

P.S - how many games did Wet Coke win out of its first 11 last year?

I also think that the radio coverage was unduly harsh on certain players. Watts, despite his low numbers, was actually not bad. He put a lot of tackling pressure on and presented well in the forward line.

Couldn't agree more. I listened to SEN for the first game and watched the replay this am. Watts's intensity was fine (despite what is being said on the Jack Watts thread). I watched the second game live down the pub and again thought his intensity was good. Sure Brennan out bodied him on one occasion but thats to do with his strength not his application.

I was a pretty big critic of Watts' intensity in 2010 and felt he really needed to step up in this area to make it as an elite player (little lone fulfil his potential). As i have written previously i thought he was terrific in this regard last season. I can't quite understand the pretty negative vibe of many comments about his game (s) last night or where he's at

Each to their own; I used to post on both forums fairly regularly but got bored of the personal vendettas that I felt sidetracked too many of the Demonology threads.

There seems to be a fair bit of similar nonsense on this site as well unfortunately

Just went to my lifeless suburban Tavern and found another Demon who didn't have Foxtel sitting up close to the flickering TV .

We had a few ales and watched the scrappy game/s and found out we were cricket rivals in our comp .

Anyway ,this guy ,who goes under the name of Stinga in 'ology is a fan of our site here and will join up soon .We might go to a few games together this year .

His observation was that some of the Moderaters are immoderate and that there should be a little more freedom of expression here .I explained to him that we are not living in a democracy and that some opinions are more freely expressable than others .He lived near the Mortons in Richmond and said the Dad has some muscles .So there is hope in that dept .

Nothing more heart warming than a blossoming love affair

Ha! This is going to be a funny year on Demonland.

Get used to watching games like that. Everyone was so keen to get a defensive coach, but as soon as they see us playing defensively they are gobsmacked.

We will hug the boundary, focus on stoppages and strangle the opposition. Honest players will play before silky players and we will have low possession numbers and low mark numbers because of our style.

Get used to it.

Yep

The sad fact is that Eddie has a lovely forum at TripleM where he can have his say completely unopposed with no fear that a rival club president is going to get the chance to reply. He feels free to launch into thee little rants and portray himself as a tough guy because he knows that there is no chance of being called on it on air.

Yep. Really, who does he think he is with a quote like:

The only issue I have with the penalty is the rationale for suspending him. If Sam Blease failing to attend his meeting has damaged his development, and the selection of a young player in the NAB Cup is good for development (no doubt it is), then hasn't the suspension simply compounded the negative impact Sam's non-appearance has had on his development as a footballer?

The coaching panel's aim is to create a professional environment, but surely their ultimate goal is to win a Premiership. Any sanction that interferes with that goal - and I believe denying a player the chance to develop match-fitness and experience does interfere - is an incorrect punishment. A large financial penalty or some thoroughly unenjoyable training would be better for Sammy's development (and the development of the team, keeping in mind it's ultimate aim) than denying him and the coaches the chance to see what he can do or where he would be best suited to play.

Sorry chook can't agree with this. Sammy, like the rest of the team, has been busting a gut all pre season and again like all his team mates would have been dying for the chance to have a proper game of footy. Denying this reward will do more for his development than 18 minutes of quasi game time

Has nobody ever been late to work due to factors beyond their control? From the information we have been given, he was simply late to a morning meeting. This happens, hardly a fineable offence

I have heard it mentioned that 'His preparation was improvised' meaning it was probably his most important meeting of the week. Understandable to miss the game for this reason, but not a fine.

My preparation is often improvised

I believe there is a strategic reason why they didn't want to post footage of our game online for the whole world to see.

I know it wasn't a closed training session, but you still don't need every club and their dogs sniffing around, picking apart moves, tactics and game plans.

Perhaps not but it would have been great to see some edited highlights of the game. As we move increasingly to an online, muti media future media such as dee tv will need to actually start producing some real content, not just silly interviews with our newest supporter from the US. Already clubs such as Man U, et al have 24 hour pay tv channels and whilst it is fanciful to think we would have something similar at the very least, in the next 2 -3 years, we should expect to see some serious online visual content (eg proper vision of training and practice matches, video analysis etc)