La Dee-vina Comedia

I've heard similar things said about Tom and in particular his attitude during the trade period last year where he understood what was going on and appreciated the way the club handled it and communicated with him. You can build a good team around good people.

I'll assume you meant "decent" and not "deficient".

I can't find this covered elsewhere, but Robbo has his annual top 50 published in today's Herald Sun. We need a thread just so we can criticise his choices. I haven't got the list in front of me, but there are 4 Demons: Gawn, Petracca, Oliver and May. I think Gawn and Petracca are both in the top 10, Oliver is (I think) number 33 and May is in the forties. Congratulations to them. And may the criticism of Robbo begin... Mark Robinson’s 2021 pre-season top 50: 1. Dustin Martin (Richmond) 2. Patrick Dangerfield (Geelong) 3. Nat Fyfe (Fremantle) 4. Lachie Neale (Brisbane) 5. Marcus Bontempelli (Western Bulldogs) 6. Christian Petracca (Melbourne) 7. Patrick Cripps (Carlton) 8. Tom Hawkins (Geelong) 9. Nic Naitanui (West Coast) 10. Max Gawn (Melbourne) 11. Liam Ryan (West Coast) 12. Brodie Grundy (Collingwood) 13. Scott Pendlebury (Collingwood) 14. Jack Macrae (Western Bulldogs) 15. Harris Andrews (Brisbane) 16. Lachie Whitfield (Greater Western Sydney) 17. Jack Steele (St Kilda) 18. Ollie Wines (Port Adelaide) 19. Jordan De Goey (Collingwood) 20. Travis Boak (Port Adelaide) 21. Dylan Grimes (Richmond) 22. Matt Rowell (Gold Coast) 23. Hugh McCluggage (Brisbane) 24. Luke Ryan (Fremantle) 25. Nick Vlastuin (Richmond) 26. Joe Daniher (Brisbane) 27. Jeremy McGovern (West Coast) 28. Jeremy Cameron (Geelong) 29. Darcy Moore (Collingwood) 30. Toby Greene (Greater Western Sydney) 31. Luke Shuey (West Coast) 32. Tom Mitchell (Hawthorn) 33. Clayton Oliver (Melbourne) 34. Michael Walters (Fremantle) 35. Jayden Short (Richmond) 36. Caleb Daniel (Western Bulldogs) 37. Luke Parker (Sydney) 38. Tom J. Lynch (Richmond) 39. Shai Bolton (Richmond) 40. Nick Haynes (Greater Western Sydney) 41. Jake Lloyd (Sydney) 42. Mitch Duncan (Geelong) 43. Zach Merrett (Essendon) 44. Taylor Adams (Collingwood) 45. Steven May (Melbourne) 46. Jacob Weitering (Carlton) 47. Sam Walsh (Carlton) 48. Jordan Ridley (Essendon) 49. Bailey Smith (Western Bulldogs) 50. Jy Simpkin (North Melbourne)

Thanks. To be honest, I didn't mind Bruce's commentary. I'm less enthusiastic about some of the other TV callers, though, but whether that's enough for me to go to the effort of synching radio with TV is questionable.

Is the radio sufficiently in sync with the TV pictures? If so, do you use analogue or digital radio?

This is Scott Gullan's "Bold Prediction". Really? Any player getting into any team's top 10 in the B&F is an approx 1 in 4 chance. Bold? Hardly!

The approach allegedly taken by St Kilda makes sense to trial in a practice match. However, I'm not sure of its value as it automatically gives the player with the ball an extra 5 metres added to their kick. It would also allow the player with the ball more freedom to kick on any angle as the man on the (new) mark will be too far away to stop it.

Tried Google Translate with this and it couldn't detect the language. Anyone able to interpret?

It was quite a long time ago, possiby 20-30 years ago or so. It wasn't long after the year the ABC had the sole rights because I can recall the discussion referred to the ABC style, which was more like the English soccer version.

The Captain and the Major called on 3KZ (which subsequently became Gold FM when it switched from the AM to FM band).

I suspect Essendon already knew it wouldn't happen. Strengthens my view that it's all part of Essendon's long game to move to the MCG as a permanent tenant.

Derek Eggmolesse-Smith really is a Melbourne Football Club name.

I would have thought they would both agree because (1) Saturday night TV exposure on FTA is better value than Sunday afternoon TV exposure on FTA and (2) slightly more time to recuperate before round 2.

The title suggests he has been invited to train, but the OP doesn't actually say so. Please clarify...has he been invited to train or not?

Didn't I read somewhere that clubs are limited to three unlisted players to add to their training group? If that's true, and I'm sure someone here will know, does that mean if Declase has been added, one of Daw, Farmer or Smith have gone?

I wonder whether Essendon is actually playing the long game here. They have effectively admitted they made a mistake locking themselves into the Docklands ground thereby limiting them to maximum capacities whenever they play there of 55,000, or thereabouts. It has been said many times that they would like to relocate their tenancy to the MCG. This could be all part of a plan to (1) convince the AFL and the MCC to allow that tenancy relocation to occur and/or (2) make the AFL, as owner of the Docklands stadium, work harder to retain them as anchor tenants.

My apologies to Jason Bennett who I called Nathan Bennett in an earlier post (which I now can't edit to correct). And on SWYL's point about the English style of commentary versus what he called the "invasive" style of Channel 7 (good description, by the way), like it or not, we're stuck with the current style. Why? Because Channel 7 has admitted they've tried both and found that overall, their audience prefers the "invasive" style of calling.

There's your title

All good players, but I wonder how he compares with Robbie Flower? Stats aren't helpful for players from different eras because the game styles are so different, so it has to be a subjective view, but I wonder whether Flower or Oliver had the more impressive first 100 games. PS: The more I think about it, the more I don't care. I'm happy to accept that they've both been remarkable and worth watching.

To be fair, BT changed his presentation style when he moved from Saturday night to Friday night. On Saturday's it was a more "blokey" style; on Friday's it's a more conservative, straight-down-the-line style of presentation. This suggests to me that BT calls the game in the format required of him by the program's producers. I expect Brayshaw to do the same and therefore lose the "blokiness". Having said that, I would have much preferred if Bruce McAvaney was replaced with Nathan Bennett. I'm not anti- James Brayshaw. I just think Nathan Bennett is a better caller.

There's a State election in WA on 13 March. On current projections, the incumbent government will win comfortably and primarily because of its "tough Covid approach". So, don't expect a change in the WA Government's quarantine rules before 13 March. I wouldn't be at all surprised, though, if Gil has received a "nod and a wink" that quarantine rules for porfessional sportspeople will change sometime between 14 March and Round 1 of the AFL season.

Does Gawn get downgraded because of his slow start? It's really only the second half of his career which has been majestic. Flower, on the other hand, was superb for his whole career. I'm too young (don't get to say that very often these days) to remember Barassi, but I suspect he was a gun from day 1.

I generally like your analysis Deespencer, but don't always understand it. What do you mean by "shape around the clearances"?

Thank goodness for Demonland. Some of us are working and can't be seen by our wives, I mean work colleagues, to be accessing the livestream. What's the relative strength of each side? In other words, which key players are missing for each team?

Demonland exclusive! Photo of Angus Brayshaw warming up: