La Dee-vina Comedia

Keep in mind what was written may not include everything Hibberd said. He may have made very positive comments about our club and supporters but those words might not have made into the published article. And it may not even be the journo's fault. If those words had been written they may have been cut by the editor.

I thought we liked players speaking honestly? And not with endless cliches. I'm more than comfortable with Hibberd's comments and his personal motivation. I look at it this way...if a former Melbourne player who'd been with us in the dark days and ended up playing for another team in a Grand Final had said he was motivated by the thought of all his former team mates caught up in the "tanking scandal" I would have said, "good for you".

Warning - I'm about to come across as a curmudgeonly old fool. I like everything about this thread except the use of the word "hero". A hero is someone who fights in a war, rescues a baby from a burning home or puts themselves at risk of catching a disease by assisting others who are sick. Footballers are not heroes for being footballers. Now, having got that off my chest, I'd like to nominate Harmes as the "unsung" player who will do something extraordinary on Grand Final Day. Whether it's a Heath Shaw rundown smother or a Dom Sheed kick for goal, Harmes strikes me as the player who best typifies the player who can pull something special out of the bag when it's most needed.

I'll guess that the redback jumper was being used simply because we need our players to be in clean club gear every day and on this day the property steward had a spare set of redback jumpers to use.

I think it's already been reported somewhere that each team will wear its traditional strip, with the Bulldogs in white shorts. Edit: https://www.afl.com.au/news/676720/looking-good-what-the-dees-dogs-will-wear-in-the-2021-grand-final

If it were a brain buster, it would be on the Training thread.

Always enjoy these challenges.

Two NFL teams now require fans to be vaccinated. I imagine the outcome will be the same here for season 2022, but whether it's made mandatory by the club, the venue manager or Government remains to be seen. https://thehill.com/changing-america/well-being/prevention-cures/572337-two-nfl-teams-now-require-fans-to-be-vaccinated

"The learnings we learnt" made me laugh. And the rest of your post not only made me smile but made my day. Thanks for giving the rest of us our necessary fix.

Add to the coincidences, in the movie Contagion, Vaccine #57 successfully protects the lab monkey from infection. (That's about the only fact I understand from the Wikipedia entry for the number 57.)

Captures the "skiing" and "leafy green suburb" stereotypes perfectly. Just a pity there's not a Range Rover parked adjacent.

I'm pleased we were able to get him to 300 games. It's an interesting aspect of the club over the last 50 years that even when not in contention to play finals, we were unable to be appropriately respectful to so many players. His loyalty deserved to be rewarded and that we as a club were able to be loyal in return says as much about how we're now travelling as does the position we find ourselves in with just one game to go.

I'll be shocked if Lever gets any votes. He should, but umpires seem incapable of giving votes to anyone who doesn't start in the middle of the ground.

I'm just trying to think this through. Do you mean "middle finger" as in the traditional name for the third finger, or "middle finger" as the one half way between the two Goody is using which would be the...err.

As far as I can tell, the club gives 10 awards for players each year starting with the Bluey Truscott Medal for the B&F. Of the remainder, seven are named after players who had all finished playing for us by 1964 (Sid Anderson, Ron Barrassi Sr, Ivor Warne-Smith, [censored] Taylor, Harold Ball, Ron Barassi Jr and Ian Ridley). The remaining two are the James McDonald Esprit-de-Corps Award for Best Team Player and Troy Broadbridge Award for best VFL Player. I don't wish to remove any of the above, but there's a lot of living in the past with these. I think we should freshen up the awards with an award (or two*) named after a more recent player. And I think that player should be Nathan Jones. But what should such an award be for? Any ideas? My first thought is for the team's Most Consistent Player, which would have to be a subjective assessment by the coaches or Match Committee. It could be awarded to anyone, including the same player who might also win the Bluey, but, equally, it could be to a role player who does his job, week in, week out. Any other ideas? (*And there should be an award named after Robert Flower, too.) Edit: The censored word is the common abbreviation for Richard. Given the sensitivity of the auto-censor I'm quite surprised the next surname on the list made it through unscathed.

I'll give this post an 81/2.

Craig Kelly (the pollie, not the ex-footballer) probably has a cure for that.

Meanwhile, spotted on a scooter heading west on the Nullarbor is someone who looks a lot like this...

Given this award could be won by a player who doesn't win a Premiership Medal, it would have been better to call it the Gary Ablett Sr medal. Probably the best finals player never to have won a Premiership I've seen.

Can I just be sterotypical for a moment and point out many of the Melbourne ones are professional jobs while the sole Bulldogs one is a painted rock.

Actually, I think it's more a James Hird vibe. Like Hird, Bowey seems to know what he's going to do with the ball before he gets it. It means that he already know who's around him before he's got the ball, what he plans to do once he has it, and he also has the skill to execute. Very few players I have seen are like this. By contrast, Petracca is more like Pendelbury and Dustin Martin in that he appears to have more time than most to decide what to do once he has the ball and then executes beautifully. Two different styles, both highly effective.

Growing up in the late-60s, I remember that both Barassi and Whitten were called "Mr Football". I often wondered why they both were given the same nickname as it seemed odd to me then. Nevertheless, two genuine superstars of that or any era, so I can live with it. I'm just glad that with the demise of the formal honorific, we're not hearing today's equivalents being called "footy-bro".

Um. I suspect I might if I had that body.

The commentators (can't remember which ones) suggested the first two goals he kicked in this game were the best he'd ever kicked. I'd argue neither are the best goals he's ever kicked against Geelong, let alone of all time. Only a few weeks ago he'd kicked a goal after the siren to allow us to win the Minor Premiership. I think that's the best of the lot because it was done under the most pressure. Happy to argue with anyone which one is his best. It's an argument with no losers and anyone involved will have a smile on their face reminiscing.