La Dee-vina Comedia

If it's true Preuss wants to come to Melbourne, he's taking the alternative option to Kent...come to a successful club but possibly not play too many games in the seniors. I'm not sure that's a wise plan for him (but good for us).

While money and length of contract might have something to do with it, surely any footballer wants to play football at the top level. Going to St Kilda gives him a much better chance of playing consistently in the seniors than staying with us or going to another strong team. I see this as a sensible move by him and I hope we can facilitate it for him. I have found him to be a frustrating footballer. Has shown some excellent cameos but too often has also "gone missing" for extended periods. He's also held back by his inability to kick on his right foot.

There's a strong hint in today's Age newspaper that he will take up a role within the club although it doesn't say in what capacity.

He's already had the longest first year for any Demon since at least 2006. That's a fine start to what will hopefully be a long and illustrious career. And for what it's worth, I think in the last couple of weeks he has looked like the long season has finally caught up with him.

Anyone know how Neil Crompton got his nickname of "Froggy"?

And it would mean we play each final at the MCG rather than having to go to Perth.

It's worth reminding people that there might be more to coincidence than meets the eye. While you might be right, as this chart shows causality doesn't always correlate with outcomes:

If those stats were presented out of context as those of an unnamed KPF, you might think they belonged to Reiwoldt (either of them), Roughead or Goodes. That's my way of saying he belongs in the big time.

Another enjoyable way to beat Collingwood in a Grand Final would be to see Harmes knock the ball back into play when it is arguably over the boundary line in the forward pocket in front of the members which then leads to the winning goal.

Chicken or the egg. I wonder which came first?

Are you saying he's buried next to Dominick "Big Trin" Trinchera or Dominick "Sonny Black" Napolitano?

Stop the presses! It took a Melbourne supporter to find Jimmy Hoffa. And there was a clue in his disappearance all along: "Hoffa disappeared on July 30, 1975, from the parking lot of Red Fox restaurant."

I'm not sure I can agree with this statement. Generally I think Goodwin has given players at least two weeks to prove themselves. There have been exceptions (White last year and Petty this year come to mind, but both looked well off the pace in their single game).

Heart in mouth when he played on yesterday and kicked with his left when he didn't have to which resulted in a goal. I suspect that means he is brimming with confidence (which I didn't share at the time).

So, which club now has the longest streak of not playing in finals? I'd just like to know who I can look down on.

We should keep this thread going until the positive thread has more posts than this one. It will remind us of the dark days and what we've had to survive to enjoy going to the footy again.

It's time we replaced this thread with a positive one: "Records: Oldies but Goodies Being Superseded". I know that actually seems like a headline from when iTunes first came on the market but I love hearing about how this modern team is making its own positive statement. For example, yesterday's first quarter score was our highest Q1 since ??? (I can't remember. Was it 1972?); When was the last time, if ever, we beat opponents by more than 90 points three times in a single season? etc

Mark Knight is surely Australia's greatest cartoonist. The poignancy of this work is amazing - look closely and you can see Lyle's wife and kids.

The article is, like his coaching, a bit incomplete. It says that Neeld "admitted that in hindsight he should have trusted his own judgment more when implementing the Demons' plan to rebuild once again" but doesn't explain if it wasn't his, whose judgment he did rely on. I suspect there's a fair bit of dissembling going on. I hope he can find a proper future. He's never going to be a senior coach again and he probably should never have been one, but I don't for one moment think that he wasn't trying to do his best when he was with us.

I just read this post as "take down the tranny that is the AFL!" Very disturbing imagery.

Nicely said.

I'd go one step further...if their feelings are hurt that much that it affects their performance, then they are probably not CEO material in the first place. I'm not for one moment saying that any of them feel that way. Hopefully, each has seen the opportunity to be considered to have been an honour in itself.

We don't know about that. My suspicion has always been that giving up the pokies was the price to be paid for getting State and/or Federal government support (cash and perhaps expedited planning approval) for our new admin and training base, wherever that might be. And if we can make money out of the new site as well, all the better.

We made a mistake a few weeks ago when we stated we were getting out of pokies. What we should have done was consolidate that announcement with this one by stating that we were intending to move the pokies from Oakleigh to a new social club to be built over the Jolimont railyards next to our new training oval. After an expected outcry from East Melbourne residents and Ellen Sandell we would then "back down" by withdrawing the pokies component. The East Melbourne residents and Ellen Sandell would have had a victory and may then have accepted the rest of the proposal. I'm only half-joking.

I rather like the idea posted earlier of replanting trees which have to be removed on the site of the Punt Road Oval which is the real eyesore in the precinct.