La Dee-vina Comedia

Alan Johnson must be felling a bit schizophrenic (although in a good way). He's been compared with both McVee and Windsor today (see the Windsor thread). High praise indeed...to all three players.

Should be in the lookalikes thread with Luke Darcy

The Todd River in Alice Springs generally doesn't have water. The suburb in Melbourne called Bayswater is nowhere near the coast. The army has its base on the coastline in Darwin while the navy in the same city is situated inland. And red heads are called Bluey. That's what I like about Australia - all sorts of things can be the opposite of obvious.

Is it 3-2-1 per game or per team? Because if it's 3-2-1 per team, we must have really been spreading the running around.

Not picking a first gamer to be the sub made sense when the sub was medical rather than tactical. Staring a first gamer as medical sub meant that they may not even get on the ground which would be a major disappointment for the player and his family, especially if they had made a long journey from their home to wherever the game was being played. Now, though, the sub gets to play some part of the game, even if only a small portion (yes, I'm aware of Schache in the final last year -but that's truly an anomaly). It means first-gamers can be the sub and their family can be confident they will see him play at some stage on that day.

Is this photo from today's training?

Excellent word.

Do you mean they are supporters who were alive and supporting Fitzroy pre-1996? Or are they younger supporters who still hold an allegiance to the club formerly known as Fitzroy? I ask, because if it's just the former, I wonder what will happen once that group is no longer around?

It's arguable. See here: https://www.liminalpages.com/ellipsis-spaces-dots

As an ethical alternative, I've always found a bottle in front of me to be better than a frontal lobotomy.

What a wasted opportunity. This thread would have been much better if posted in the off-season. We could have gone to town on "um" versus "umm" and argued back and forth about whether an ellipsis has space between the dots or not.

You make a good point. I suspect that one of the reasons the AFL and SA Government came to a long-term agreement last year was to encourage investment in infrastructure, such as additional accommodation and conference facilities for Adelaide.

I think the economics is a bit more complex. Firstly, the SA Government benefits from their own people choosing to stay in Adelaide for school holidays because of Gather Round, rather than spending their dollars outside SA. Secondly, I assume Gather Round is a hook for other events such as conventions, conferences and business meetings that wouldn't otherwise occur in Adelaide. I was dubious about the Gather Round concept last year, but am now fully on board. My bigger problems is that the footy calendar has become too spread out with games all over the week rather than with consistent scheduling. With Easter, Gather Round and Thursday night football (and ANZAC Day and eve to come), there is too much football on non-traditional days and particularly inconsistent timeslots.

6. Petracca 5. May 4. McVee 3. Gawn 2. Sparrow 1. Lever

Forget Taylor Swift, Ed Sheeran, Elton and Pink. Whenever I see it written as "The Gathering" I keep thinking of Diana Ross and the Supremes singing "The Happening"

I often wonder why the broadcasters don't include a retired field umpire on their calls occasionally to explain the rules.

Somewhat disappointed that this thread was not about Whispering Jack changing this first name to Hungry as some sort of sponsorship deal for the club.

It's a bit weird knowing we have been in Adelaide for more consecutive days prior to this game than the team called Adelaide.

You mean on Demonland or on the field of play?

Never thought about it before, but the surname's a bit of a give-away.

Completely agree with you regarding it being an error by the umpire. I don't agree, however, that one instance of an umpire making a mistake warrants his demotion. I'm not being critical when saying this, but umpires make mistakes regularly. That's because it's a hard game to umpire. The best we can hope for is that the number of mistakes made by umpires is minimal. They'll never completely disappear.

I fully expect May to be selected this week. Whether he'll play, though, is a completely different question.

I'd love to see the re-instatement of a proper reserves competition. However, how would that work in the northern States? Where would Gold Coast and GWS find enough players to make up a seconds squad? I suspect that may be one of the main reasons for the mess which is the VFL competition at the moment.

Apart from Clayton Oliver

Maybe it is. Salary caps mean not all our players can be stars. Just maybe he's the best player available at that price range.