La Dee-vina Comedia

Is JT carrying an injury? Osteitis pubis, perhaps? There's no run, no lift when he tries to jump off the ground and no power in his kicking. Looks a lot like Luke Ball when he had OP - all guts, but unable to deliver the quality we are used to.

6. Bate 5. Bail 4. Rivers 3. McKenzie 2. Morton 1. Jones And Magner's game was interesting. Form ball hunter in Rounds 1 and 2 to stopper in Round 4. Neeld doesn't swing many changes during a game but he's clearly making modifications between matches.

While I don't know the value or length of this sponsorship deal, basic economic theory is that the car industry doesn't work on short term plans. Or to put it another way, big companies don't do small things well. So, OPEL would likely have a long term strategy - meaning at least 10 years - to try to crack the Australian market. Hopefully they'll be very long term sponsors of the club. But we will need to work hard to maintain and strengthen this relationship.

Not a great performance but much, much better than all our previous games this year. More effort shown and really only skill deficiencies let us down. So wholesale changes shouldn't be made. My changes would be: Dunn (so what if he held Murphy to 6 possessions - he has no idea where to position himself when the opportunity arises). Replace with Sylvia, if he's ready (which I doubt), otherwise Petterd. Joel MacDonald can't be retained, His skill errors are woeful and he has the fumbles at the moment so he goes out for Grimes. I know Tom McDonald also disposed poorly, but I'd keep him in to get more experience and to match Stanley's height and pace which none of our other defenders, bar Frawley, who's needed elsewhere, will be able to do. Martin (if fit) to come in for Clark (if he doesn't play); otherwise he comes in for Sellar who tries hard but is just too slow.

Not really. Grimes has to be replaced as a defender. Joel Mac wouldn't have been my selection, but I think I see where the match committee is coming from. Who else would take Grimes' spot? Tapscott, maybe - but Neeld seems to want him to play midfield/forward. Bail? Again, Neeld is playing him as defensive forward. As it happens, I would have moved Bail back for Grimes and played Couch in stead of Joel Mac. But I understand the selection...just don't agree with it.

Not quite. MFC confirms bench as Dunn, Morton, Sellar and MacDonald with Emergencies being Petterd, Couch and Fitzpatrick.

I think Dunn positions OK when the ball is coming into the forward 50. But he appears to me to have no idea where to go when the ball is on its way out. Once again, a player who doesn't read defence. Whether it's his own deficiency or that of his coaches I remain unsure but I think it's the latter, because he's not alone in that regard.

Should have put this in the positivity thread

Has anyone at the club ever confirmed Caroline Wilson's ongoing assertion that Camerson Schwab was to be ousted just before Bailey was instead. She's written about it and talked about it many times and I honestly believe she believes it to be true. But is it? But has anyone else ever confirmed it to be the case?

Being a professional footballer has a number of responsibilities beyond playing the game. The club seeks exposure in as many forms and as often as possible to satisfy the expectations of sponsors who want their brand exposed widely and frequently. Hence the club will push players forward. That they speak like robots is hardly surprising given the rapidity with which any journo or blogger will jump on anything even mildly controversial. And not all players have the ability to sound interesting - we recruit them to play football, not to lead the debating team. In summary, if we want good paying sponsors, we need to ensure our footballers are front and centre in the media whether we win or lose and irrespective of how they sound. PS: I'd much rather a robot than a Jason Akermanis (with respect to media comments)

I think the Herald Sun is tanking so as to get a better choice for Chief Football writer to replace Mike Sheahan. Jay Clark's ridiculous (almost/actual) defamatory comments about Luke Ball last Saturday night and now the cowardly approach of raising tanking but then declaring "it would be ridiculous" to suggest it bring the Herald Sun to a new low.

They're probably thinking US dollars

And for something else to do, I can identify Ronald Reagan and George H W Bush (second from right). I assume Eddie McGuire must be just out of shot.

Interesting tweet from Melbourne FC this morning (18 April): "The Demon Shop has lots of new casual wear available. Guernseys will be for sale when 2nd major sponsor is signed" I'd like to think they know something about an imminent sponsor signing...but I suspect they don't.

Jurrah's fitness and availability to play is a completely separate issue from his court case. There is far too much uninformed comment about the legal matter which leads to misunderstandings. I don't know the situation and I certainly don't know how the legal system in NT works, but as I've posted elsewhere, if his Court appearance in May is to be by video link (as has been reported in the media), I suspect it will be nothing more than a mention to set a date for the hearing. But I don't know. And until someone does know, we should stop speculating about what impact the May appearance may have.

One of the reasons we look slow and are slow is the structure of the team. We went in to the Richmond game with a big side. That could work if the tall timber were also as quick as midfielders (such as Watts). But Jamar, Sellar, Martin, Rivers and Bate are not which leaves too much running to too few. Perhaps the grand plan is to have the talls dominating in possession by kick and mark footy - and we certainly had a large differential in our favour in contested marks. But when foot disposal is as poor as ours it won't allow a game style such as this to be successful. I suspect if we replaced a couple of the slower talls with relatively standard smalls whether they are particularly fast or not (such as Couch, Bennell, Petterd, Green, Blease, Sylvia, Gysberts, Jetta) we would be better balanced and neither look as slow or be as slow with the run-and-spread workload more evenly spread. Of course, many of those players are not available right now, but a shift of perhaps two talls out and two smalls in (plus a small for a small in the case of Grimes) might be sufficient to redress this imbalance.

I actually think we were worse in 2008. And with even less to look forward to then as we still had too many Daniher-era leftovers, some who had been good but past their prime and others who weren't that good and held onto for too long. I therefore think that as bad as we are (and we definitely are) the turnaround should this time be quicker. In 2008 there was no young talent of significant note. Now we have Watts, Trengove, Grimes and others. I suspect we feel worse now because our initial expectations were higher in the lead up to the season. And if we feel this bad, imagine how St KIilda supporters felt in the 1980s and Richmond supporters for most of the last 30 years.

Players who have leg speed need to use it when they don't have the ball, not just when they have. When (if) Blease, Jurrah and Bennell can rectify their deficiencies in this regard, we'll look a lot better. And Moloney, too. In fact, the only players I can think of who consistently chase as hard as they run when they have the ball are Bartram, Nicholson and Frawley. Perhaps there are others and I'm being harsh. (To my mind, Davey does it, but not consistently).

Should take the penalty as he's unlikely to be right for next week anyway because of his concussion. Slightly off topic, but is the MCC as ground manager considering whether they've got the playing surface right? Both Daniel Jackson (Grimes' sling tackle "victim") and Grimes himself (ironically when tackling Jackson) were concussed by landing head first on the artificial turf outside the boundary line. Maybe the MCC should be suspended...

So what do you do after a hard day's work? Do you unwind at all? Does that mean you don't give a f*@k? I don't support players - or anyone - drinking to excess, but I have no problem with players enjoying themselves "away from the office"

I don't value Malthouse's comments at all. Example 1: On Channel 7 GameDay yesterday he was asked a simple question by John Anderson "Fletcher or Scarlett". He answered "Fletcher". Just one hour later on 3AW he said Scarlett was the best full back he'd ever seen. One hour later he said Silvagni was the best full back he'd ever seen. Example 2: On 3AW yesterday he was asked to comment on Collingwood's situation. He said he's not in a position to know because he no longer works there. And he's probably right. So why would he have any credibility about comments he makes about Melbourne?

Before the season started I wished that after Round 3 Melbourne would have one win fewer than Geelong and Collingwood. My wish has come true, but not in the way I wanted.

Rather than worrying about individual players I'm more worried about the structure of the team. Why did we play all of Jamar, Martin, Sellar, McDonald, Clark and Rivers? That's far too top heavy (perhaps it would be acceptable if all are bona fide stars but clearly they're not). We need much more pace and better skills particularly in the midfield. So I would definitely keep Davey, Morton and Bail in the team even though none of them are doing as much as they should. And I'd like to add Blease and Bennell but I'm not convinced either is showing enough desire at the moment. I'm hopeful, based on what I saw in Round 1 that Tynan will make it, but he's not got the requisite aerobic fitness base just yet. I don't think Neeld would do it this way, but I'd drop both Martin and Sellar and use Mitch Clark as backup for Jamar. When Clark rucks, move Watts to full forward; when Clark is at full forward play Watts midfield or on the wing.

The best moment of the weekend was when Aaron Davey apparently spontaneously put his arm around Mark Neeld at the quarter time (or three-quarter time) break. Misreported (I believe) in the Sunday Herald Sun as Davey "comforting" Neeld. Rather, Davey was doing what players close to their coach do. He put his arm around him during the coach's address so as to get in physically close and allow players behind to also get closer. If there was any bad feeling between Neeld and Davey there is not a chance that Davey would have put his arm around Neeld like he did. On that basis alone I'd have Davey playing next week - and unlike others on this forum, I didn't think Davey played too badly on Saturday. Or, rather, there were plenty worse. I'd still like to see Davey used in the midfield for a couple of minutes each quarter to add pace and skill to an otherwise one-paced, slow bunch of sloggers.

Now that he's been picked to play, I'd like to see him spend a couple of minutes each quarter on the ball. It adds speed, variety and skill to what is otherwise a midfield squad which is a bit one dimensional. And it would allow Davey to do more than waiting for a crumb in the forward line. I'm not, however, advocating a role for him on the backline.