La Dee-vina Comedia

I'm not sure if Acquire Learning still functions, but wouldn't it be amusing (or not) if there was a link between this story and Acquire, given the role Andrew Demetriou had at Acquire.

Did you forget Salem or do you see him as a midfielder/wingman?

If we can include Nathan Bassett, why not also include Darren Jarman? Drafted by us but never played a game.?

Probably worth mentioning again: everyone in the AFL lies. Goodwin might not be lying this time, but equally, he could be.

Given the state of it's list and the extent of injuries, with six wins, it's quite conceivable that Alan Richardson could be both coach of the year and sacked, both in the same year.

The whole spine will look different, too

I'm not even sure I know what the free kick was for as I don't think it was high contact. Is there a rule about front on contact when the ball is not in play? or something about rough play? or did it fall into the "it's not a good look, so we'll pay a free kick" category?

I think Lewis has been playing a different role at Casey. Against Collingwood he was on ball and I suspect that was also the case against Coburg. In that role he is not as accountable for defending as he would need to be if he replaced Wagner. I'm not so sure Lewis's good Casey form as an onballer at Casey would be replicated if he found himself on the half back line in the seniors.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make. Ed Langdon has played 59 games to date compared with Oscar's 71. Are you claiming that Ed's a better player but has played fewer games because he's a slow developer?

I love the language of the AFL. I assume "for clarification on" is intended to be a synonym for "to complain about".

Surely Wagner is slower than Hibberd? Wagner has some useful traits, but I don't think pace is one of them.

63 posts and not one person has commented that we might not see Oscar again because he pro-actively seeks out and succeeds in being traded at the end of the year. I'm not saying that's what will happen, because I have no idea. But by now surely we all know that it's not just a decision for the club alone to make.

But that would be logical. Earlier this year I remember a game where a short throw-in was grabbed by someone other than a nominated ruckman and in so doing gave away a free kick. I can't remember the game or even whether Melbourne was involved.

I don't think a social club is necessarily required, but for the sake of completeness, is this land in the 'Dry' area of the State? Would it be able to get a liquor licence?

I wonder about this. I suspect the confidence damage of being dropped for any player would be greater than any confidence gained from playing well at Casey. In addition, having watched a few VFL games this year, it is noticeable how different the pressure and pace is compared with the seniors. I am not convinced that playing in the VFL necessarily helps any player make it in the seniors. And the longer they play there, the harder I suspect it is to acclimatise to the seniors once a promotion is achieved.

I seem to recall many more ball-ups in the past when there was a possibility of a free being awarded both ways. I suspect the powers that be would rather that a free kick be paid to avoid the ugliness that ball-ups tend to bring to the game so have instructed the umpires to pay a free whenever possible. And here's some free advice for the AFL. To get rid of some of the ugliness in the game, get rid of the ruckman being nominated. Too often the game is delayed, particularly for boundary throw-ins, while the field umpires wait for the lumbering nominated ruckmen to arrive. Another problem occurred in Saturday's game, too. Viney had to run away from a short boundary throw in rather than do the intuitively smarter play which would have been to just grab the ball and play on. If he'd done that, he would have been penalised for not being the nominated ruckman.

I think he dropped the ball before he was tripped. One of the quirks of the rules of our great game is that for some offences, the first rule breach applies; for others, a subsequent breach applies, and I don't think there's any science to it. It's just what the umpire decides on the day. For example, in this case if I'm correct and Hore had dropped the ball before he was tripped, the first rule breach was penalised. On the other hand, how many times on Saturday did we see a player caught holding the ball but receive a free for a subsequent push in the back when he collapsed from the tackle?

Maybe we should stake a claim on Victoria Park and seek to have that redeveloped as our base. Hopefully the Collingwood morons, sorry, members, would be up in arms and 'force' the Magpies to reclaim their home territory and leave the Olympic Boulevard properties for us.

Surprised that he didn't get a lifetime ban for blocking the view of people sitting behind.

6. McDonald (even though he made some horrible errors, he was the difference between the two teams) 5. Oliver 4. Viney 3. Lockhart 2. Gawn 1. Frost

A team that has gone from top 4 one year to bottom 3 halfway through the next has "significant issues". It might not be solely be due to the players being out of form or unfit/injured. Perhaps also the coaches, as a group, haven't got their act together. Changes to the coaches (whether that means to individuals, roles or just the way they coach) may be just as necessary as changing playing personnel. It's just that from the outside, we can't see what the problems with the coaches might be.

Eddie's half-right. It's not the punishment that Stephenson received that will drive players "underground"; it's the rule that says they can't bet. The rule is there for a very good reason which is why any player who bets on football, whether legally or "underground", needs to be "clobbered". In my view Stephenson got off lightly. He should have been penalised for the rest of the season, including finals. There's an article in today's Age which argues that Stratton's suspension should have been more than 2 weeks because the offence was "not a good look" for the game and then seems to suggest that Stephenson's penalty was overkill. That's missing the point - while I agree that Stratton's offence was not a good look, Stephenson's goes to the heart of the integrity of the game. That's much more serious.

"...and will sue the club"? You have inside info?

What's really troubling is when the opposition lose players during a game against us and we still can't beat them when they have reduced rotations because of it. How often does that happen!

I absolutely detest Thursday night football (other than when the following day is a public holiday). I'm not ready for it and it also diminishes the enjoyment of football on the subsequent Saturday and Sunday because there is one fewer game to follow. Having it in the same weeks as some teams have a bye and there is football on a Monday (Queen's Birthday) just makes it worse as the football product just seems sporadic rather than intense. But maybe that's just me...