Jaded No More

Before yesterday's match, Miller is: - 3rd in 1%ers (ahead of Brock, Bruce and Jones) - 4th equal in tackles - 9th in contested possessions (better than Bruce, Bell, Sylvia etc...) - 9th in Marks And the following players have a higher error count than him: Jones, Neitz, PJ, McLean, Sylvia, Morton, Junior, Wheatley, Robbo, Carroll, Davey, Garland, Green, Dunn, Buckley and Bruce. He also averages 14 disposals a game, pretty good given he played his first two matches in the backline, and considering he is ahead of Sylvia, Davey and Dunn. Perhaps he isn't kicking dramatically more than in previous years, but he does not dish off the handball at every opportunity. He has learnt over the pre-season to evaluate whether a kick or a handball are more appropriate to the situation. My apologies for not having the time to find all these stats yesterday, I'm sure you'll find these adequate given that all of your arguments are so factually rich. By the way, it is irrelevant for this argument what Sydney was offering for Miller. The fact that they showed interest in him says a whole lot about his character. As I said, when you're on the bottom of the ladder, honest triers are better than selfish wannabes.

I expect him to just say nothing. What happened to the media-ban? I liked it a whole lot! The right response would be "we're focusing on getting a win on the board, we are not talking about finals and nor should we be". Better still, he should have said "go away I'm not talking to you". The club has to keep the players away from the media, they are eating us alive already.

That's not even something we should joke about. Honestly, if Bailey gives our players the responsibility of choosing the next captain again, it'll either be Bruce or Krusty the Clown. Heaven help us all!

You think that being a condescending little [censored] is going to help you bring your point across? Miller is a very important part of our team right now, and in the foreseeable future. His leadership and his character are as important to our rabble of a team as his straight leading and marking is. And you can complain about it all you want, but it won't change facts. As I said, perhaps most of Miller's marks are not officially considered to be 'contested', but he is one of very few players in the side who can take a mark with an opponent breathing down his neck, and one of the few who will never just run on his own looking for the cheap possession. Is he a superstar? Far from it. Will he ever be a superstar? No. But funny how when I was one of the few defending him last year, everyone was going off at me, and yet Bailey put him straight back into the leadership group and he hasn't missed a match yet. Also I notice that Sydney showed interest in him, a team that certainly doesn't put up with the sort of crap that the rest of our 'leadership' group shows on a consistent basis. AFL Coaches >> Internet heroes.

Jamar vs. Kruezer- If Jamar doesn't fall on him awkwardly and crush him to death at the first bounce, we're screwed. He can then do a Barry Hall on Judd and leave the game as "the guy who knocked out Judd" instead of "the guy who got 1 possession a game over 4 seasons".

I was there displaying schizophrenic behaviour. First came rage, then came disbelief, then came sadness, then came amusement. God knows I could have stayed home to do a logistics assignment due on Monday, but as if watching you team get smashed again isn't better! Besides, I never miss a match in Melbourne. In fact, the Geelong game last week was the first Victorian match I missed since 2005 I think. Can't wait for next week. Going with friends who barrack for Carlton. I don't know which one of us is suffering more right now.

From everything I've heard and read, the game plan is to first and foremost be competitive. Then the idea is to win the contested footy and to run the ball forward as quickly as possible, usually by means of handballing. How difficult is that to execute? The buck does not stop with Bailey after 4 rounds. Heaven help us if a coach doesn't get at least two years before supporters start calling for blood. I think Bailey is trying to turn a bunch of sooks into a decent football team. Unless you can come up with a better way of doing that, I think you should leave the game planning up to people who actually know the players and understand what the team needs to more forward. A lazy, selfish, uncommitted game plan was tried for many years and failed. Time to move on. If our supporters can't handle a rough year the way many rebuilding clubs have experienced, they can go support some rich soccer club overseas where success is guaranteed every season. And how many more years will we survive without winning a premiership?

I said we should make him captain did I? Guess how many players took more than 2 contested marks today? None. That's right, Sylvia took 2 (both in junk time), most took none. Miller marks more often than not. No he doesn't take huge pack marks, but he is not outmuscled very often by his opponent for the mark (when he can't mark, he normally punches, he doesn't let him opponent just take the easy mark). Maybe that doesn't classify as a 'contested mark' in the stat sheet, but it's a more worthy mark stat than players who get cheap marks on the wing with no opponent and no pressure. By the way, Miller was first for marks this week and is 5th overall for the season. He is also 4th in assists, so he does more than his fair share for the team. Also, for anyone who cares, McLean is 5th overall in the league for contested possessions. Maybe he isn't starring right now, but at least he still lays his body on the line for the team.

What round are we playing Sydney? As long as he misses our clash I'm happy

OH MY GOD! You obviously don't understand what's going on if you believe that Bailey is trying to get them to play negative football and not attack the play. Quick ball movement is all about attacking the ball and giving first service to our forwards. Notice how he encourages players to break the lines from the half back flank and take the game on? Buckley was trying to break the lines, but unfortunately turned it over 9 out of 10 times. He is now at Sandy, and rightfully so. Teams who are not accountable, get smashed by 100 points plus each week. Show me one premiership side that lacked accountability. Chasing, tackling and harassing your opponent does not equal playing negative football. Negative football is flooding, which we don't do, negative football is chipping the ball around the boundary, which we don't do. The idea with the handballing is to move the ball quickly. That our players can't handball is NOT Bailey's fault. Short of playing himself, he can't do much when sitting in the box. Where were you last week when we lost to Geelong by 5 goals? Was our game plan flawed last week, or is Bailey to blame for Carroll's three missed attempts at rushing the ball for a point? Bailey's game plan is very simple, and any decent team should be able to execute it. Last week we showed glimpses that things are starting to sink in, today we regressed completely. Perhaps it was easier for our players to execute the game plan on the smaller ground down at Geelong, and maybe they need more time to work out how to play the MCG better with this plan. And before you jump up and down and tell me how well we played at the MCG two years ago with a different plan, let me remind you that we won a grand total of 1 final in that time. Not exactly anything to get excited about. As far as I'm concerned, to keep blaming the game plan is to keep plastering over the massive cracks in the wall. Unaccountable, skilless, soft teams don't win premierships, they barely make the finals. Is that what you want us to be, because Bailey is not satisfied with that and neither should you. Honestly, I don't know why I'm letting this pointless argument distract me from my assignment. UGH!!!

How much more simple can Bailey's game plan be? Win the ball in the middle, move it quickly to our forwards, be accountable going the other way, be competitive at all times. Should next week's game plan read: "be selfish, don't chase your opponent, bomb it long to a 3-on-1 contest, play for glory"? That will sit comfortably with our list and win us a grand total of 0 matches.

I tell you what my solution is not, my solution is not to accommodate inadequately skilled, poorly committed players with a game plan that may see them win some games, but which will NEVER, I repeat NEVER, take them to a premiership. Either you want to be mildly competitive, or you sit through some poor losses until such a time as the players and the game plan go hand in hand. To keep bending backwards to please some truly pathetic players is not the solution. It's been happening at our club for far too long, and it is now Bailey's unfortunate job to remove those who cannot work hard defensively, cannot hit a target and who play for themselves above all. When he does, suddenly the game plan will look simple and everyone will wonder why we didn't employ it 10 years ago The Game Plan > The Players But you keep telling yourself that our players are not THAT bad... that will make everything better.

2007 and 2008 are completely different. For one, Daniher's game plan was based, as always, on previous premiership winners. As always, we were nowhere near as good as past premiership teams and as a consequence we didn't go far. Bailey's game plan is built around where we should be and the way we need to play in order to be successful. We may not have quick runners, but that doesn't mean the competition won't pass us by if we just adjust our game plan instead of finding some runners. Besides, when you get first hands on the ball you always look a lot faster. And our forward line is a complete joke right now. No matter what game plan you use, neither Neita nor Robbo can create a meaningful contest up forward. It's easy to blame the game plan, it's harder to look beyond the scoreboard and understand that we don't have the right mix on the field right now. We don't have the players to compete on the same level as the best teams, but Bailey will not compromise his direction just because some supporters can't handle a few losses. WE CANNOT KEEP MASKING THE PROBLEM FOREVER. I don't want to be competitive, I want to win a goddamn premiership!

The only thing that's embarrassing is your complete inability to see beyond your anger. Bailey may be a rookie senior coach, but he has plenty of coaching experience and he is no fool. Every great coach was once inexperienced you know. To blame Bailey for what is happening is to sweep the main problems under the carpet... again. The PLAYERS are the problems, the players that Bailey did NOT choose, but was unfortunate enough to receive when he took the job. The game plan which everyone is jumping up and down about, is very simple. The idea is to move the ball quickly to give our forwards the best chance of a one-on-one contest. That our forwards can't win a one-on-nobody contest is not Bailey's fault. That our midfielders can't kick the ball or hit a target by hand is not Bailey's fault. Do you honestly think he tells his players to not his targets? A bunch of monkeys can follow the actual game plan, sadly our execution is pathetic and that has to do with our sub-standard skills and application. Just because you can't put an IKEA chair together, doesn't mean the instructions are wrong.

Firstly, his kicking to handball ratio this season is a lot different to previous years. When he kicks, he kicks with some purpose and generally hits a target. Already that's a big plus given he is surrounded by a bunch of pretenders who can't kick to save themselves. Secondly, he is one of the only players in the side who currently takes contested marks. Thirdly, he puts in, week in week out and never drops his head. He is more of a leader out on the field than anyone else right now. So I'll take an average trier over a selfish showpony anyday of the week (think Robbo, Newton, Sylvia etc). P.S.- he doesn't freak when he hear footsteps. Jeff White, take note.

Can you name some incidents where Brock showed a lack of footy brain? His kicking is almost always spot on, as are his handball. He is very good under pressure, unlike say Jones who panics a lot. At the moment he is struggling to adjust to the heaving tagging. We knew this would happen when TJ left. Look at how he played last week when left to his own devices in the first half. He was everywhere and he played extremely well. Brady Rawlings is no dud, he is probably the best tagger in the AFL. He is a dirty player who somehow gets away with holding his opponent at every contest. In the end I think Brock ended up in the top 5 or 6 possession getters today. I think it shows the quality of Brock that the opposition concentrates so hard on shutting him down.

We can win, but should we?

Because he's been at the club for 10 minutes and most of our senior players have been at the club for more than 10 years. In all honestly, how the hell can anyone blame the coach when our players are just incapable of hitting targets? He did not select these players, he inherited them. Now they have a deadline, perform by round 6 or away you go. Bailey is the least of our problems, in fact, I'm glad we're having our downfall now and not under Daniher.

He is playing terribly at the moment and should be dropped. But he is also leading our goal kicking. Just how bad is our forward line??

Was it my imagination or did CJ do a good defensive job on Shannon Grant? He made errors, and that poor kick in front of goal was meant as an attempt to dish it off to Robbo. Showed he is unselfish, but also showed he can't really kick much Jamar- is he a magician? He is the largest man in the world yet he manages to completely disappear when on the field. He is quite honestly just terrible. Miller- anyone who takes cheap shots at you should try and stand up against you in a contest. Not the most gifted player in the world, but tries harder than anyone and took some very good marks today.

Honestly, Sylvia in our best 6? Y_M get off it. I know nobody will give him any credit whatsoever, but I thought CJ did a good job on Shannon Grant down back. Not sure if he played on him the whole match however. But no, lets reward the show pony who takes a couple of marks in the backline in junk time

Pfff Colin Sylvia Try JARED 'the best thing since sliced bread' RIVERS.

Sylvia plays like he thinks he's great. Sadly, he isn't. I liked what I saw from him in the last quarter when he was playing in the backline. At least when you give him a task, he doesn't look so utterly lost in space. However, he will never be a 'gun' if after running for 5 minutes he has to stop and stretch out on the field. While I know this isn't his fault, it's the reality. His fitness is a huge problem, and so is his attitude. Stick him in the backline and make him understand what accountability means. 18 rounds and counting...

If the players can't execute a simple game plan because they have the worst skills in the competition, you get rid of the players, not the game plan. Bailey's game plan is based on where the game is headed. If we can't keep up, we have to change the team. This is exactly the opposite of what Daniher used to do, which was dictate the game plan around the players, and since our players are mostly terrible, we never won anything.

So your suggestion is to bring in another trouble-maker who also happens to be a proven drug-addict to the club? You can watch Cousins like a hawk, but at the end of the day he still comes with a reputation that is going to taint our club's image.