Jaded No More

I still think that the midfield engine is ultimately the most important thing to a team, which is why McLean probably shades Bate at the moment. However Bate is incredibly important to us structurally. He and Miller leading up the ground is really helping the game plan and moving the ball quickly and with purpose. Bate's chase and tackle on Sunday was a thing of beauty. He was timid and at times lazy when he first started, but he has really grown up and matured and his work-rate is terrific at the moment. He made every contest on Sunday and his disposal was spot on. This is precisely what we should expect from someone of his talents. With Bate coming on nicely, and Garland, Frawley and even Warnock showing promising signs, we can finally start to assemble something that resembles a decent spine... something we haven't had since the Neitz/Ox/Gary era. Now all we need is a FF, and no Newton is no FF. Edit: I wish Bate would kick for goal when he's 60m out. He needs to practice those long shots at goal, because too much sharing around usually ends up in complete failure.

Including driving from home to the train station, roughly 40 minutes, sometimes 30. Just depends on which train we take.

I hear what you're saying about Green, and maybe you're right, but can we not achieve the same result up forward by playing Sylvia out of the goal square? At least he'd give the Saints' defenders a physical contest, plus he is a better overhead mark. I just cannot justify bringing in someone who is past his use by date when we have younger options available. And although Dutchy was very productive on Sunday, I still can't see any benefit in playing him for the long term. It's not as if winning games is the key here.

It was a disappointing turnout, and those who stayed home when they could have easily made it to the match, because they thought we'd get smashed, really need to rethink their status as Melbourne supporters. Sunday was just a great game of football, not just because of the way we played or because we got to farewell Neita. I actually lost my voice and have yet to regain it... got out of doing a uni presentation which is great At the end of the day we just don't have a strong enough or large enough supporter group and we have to go find new members, be it in Casey or on Mars. We cannot rely on the majority of people who classify themselves as Melbourne 'supporters' because the truth is they are not really supporting the club in any meaningful way.

I really REALLY want to like him, but I get extremely irritated with players who play like millionaires but can't get the basics right. Still, he's got plenty of time to improve all that... and at least he's quick

Once again I raise the question to those advocating Yze's return, who will he replace up forward? Even if Robbo doesn't pull up this week, Yze and Robbo are completely different players and I would suggest we need to possibly look at playing Green at FF as a marking target. Yze is in direct competition with Aussie as far as I'm concerned. I know who I rather have playing.

Clever use of Buckley by Bailey. Playing him in defence, making him accountable for his man. Still takes on too many opponents, still can't hit targets consistently enough.

Dutchy > Franklin. Better kick for goal too!

That's spot on IMO. Wouldn't mind Dunn instead of Sylvia, but that's just a small change. Jamar is good in the ruck and he did get EIGHT disposals yesterday, but too many fumbles at this level are costly. I feel for him because he works hard in the ruck and even gets a few clearances himself, but he has to start believing that he can play the game at this level, or he will never establish himself. Mind you he is getting better, which is encouraging. Wheatley, if fit, is also an automatic selection.

Not if he keeps kicking to the opposition McLean is going along nicely. Set for his first of many B&Fs.

A lesson to all that you just cannot make a judgement on a player who has only played a handful of games. You just can't. Unless they are incapable of actually connecting their foot with the ball, or they are clinically blind, they deserve time to develop. Look at the improvement in Warnock's game in just the space of 3 weeks or so. Garland was great defensively, but his disposal under pressure was also fantastic. A few times it looks like he was ready to stuff up, but managed to get a clever handball or kick away just in time.

You can laugh all you want, but for once Yze_Magic is right. Bruce had a shocker yesterday. His disposal is getting worse and worse. Terrible kick for goal, kicked into the man on the mark, sold his teammates into trouble with stupid handballs... very disappointing for a senior player. But enough of the negativity. 6- McLean 5- Green 4- Bate 3- GARLAND 2- Davey 1- Aussie If I hear one more person complaining about Hawthorn missing key players yesterday, I will scream. We kept the Hawks to under 100 points with a backline that hasn't hit puberty yet. We were missing Whelan, Wheatley, Carroll and RIVERS, not to mention Jeff White. To their credit, Warnock, Frawley and especially Garland did a terrific job. Garland beating Knobhead Franklin one on one was the highlight of the day (what a frontrunner Franklin was yesterday). His cool calm disposal under pressure and some of his spoils were River-esque. :D

We do not ignore any complaints. As I said, if a member writes a silly post, it gets deleted. If the matter requires immidate handling or suspension, that often gets done ASAP as well. However if there are particular issues that you want us to look at, you can alert us to them. We cannot possibly read every word of every line of every post on every thread. I don't feel that as a moderator I am responsible for the stupidity of grown individuals. As a site we are legally responsible for the general content, but we cannot be held accountable for every brain fart made by one of 1,668 members.

Yeah look he's pretty much a straight replacement for Jamar I would say. A big forward decoy, except every once in a while he can take a big grab... just shut your eyes if he's shooting for goal and you'll be fine

If you have an issue with a specific member, you need to bring it to the attention of a moderator via PM and we will most definitely deal with it. Unfortunately, as I said, we are not around 24 hours a day and sometimes we'll quickly delete a thread and not look into the matter further. So we do need help from members.

We delete anything that is illegal or inappropriate, however we are not around 24 hours a day to read every single post. As moderators, we look after the forum for free in our own time because we want to, because we love the club and we feel this site is very important to a lot of Melbourne supporters. If posters make serious allegations which could get this site into hot water, their post gets deleted and more often than not they get suspended or banned. However, we cannot suspend people if they only make 1 poor post, or let me tell you, there won't be anyone left. If we go too hard, people whinge, if we're too soft, we run the risk of getting into serious trouble, so basically, we're damned if we do, and damned if we don't. We try to be as fair as we can, and we often make the decision to ban someone as a collective group. If some idiots feel the need to write things that they cannot substantiate, which are wrong, hurtful and illegal, then they are not only doing the wrong thing by the club and our players, they are also running the risk of getting the private owners of this website into a lot of trouble.

Oh please NO! He needs to settle up forward. Holland and Yze, very confused about those but lets wait and see the final team. Our backline is going to get smashed without Rivers against Franklin, Roughead and Williams. Ouch!

Precisely. Nobody here has actually give a reasonable suggestion as to which player gets dropped in order to allow Yze into the team. Given that Yze can only play up forward these days, and given that he is mostly a small forward, giving him a game would come at the expense of Aussie or Maric (if he's ready). Personally, I can't justify that sort of change. We're on the bottom of the ladder, what is the use of playing a senior player whos career is nearly over, and who in 2 years has done very little when given the chance to perform at senior level (and hasn't he been given a million chances!). If we were going into a final and we were looking for some experience, I could possible understand the desire to play him, but we gain nothing in the LONG TERM by playing Yze now. Absolutely nothing.

The bottom line is, we can criticize players, but we need to do it in a way that is not personally offensive. I'm sure every AFL player has been heavily criticized and sworn at by their coach, so it's not the actual criticism that is the problem. It's when people are writing personal or overly abusive messages that it can get really hard. If for example someone wrote: "Bruce's kicking is letting him own. His kicking is seriously terrible at the moment", it's very different from someone writing: "Cameron Bruce is a crap footballer who has female genitalia and he'd be a better player if he chopped both his legs off". Thankfully we don't get a lot of that being written here, and the bits we do get usually get removed. On BigFooty on the other hand, people send death threats to players and take it way over the line. To say that supporter forums in general are poor is a misjudgment. Demonland and Demonology both do a lot for the club, especially in terms of raising much needed funds, and the fact that our club allows one of their players to attend a function run by these websites is a great indication that on the whole, we have a positive relationship with our football club.

Must remember to pack some tissues before we leave for the game. Hopefully every Melbourne supporter comes this Sunday. Our captain deserves a standing ovation from more than 58 people :D

Ricky = 426 The curse continues. Rivers better be fit for this week, or Franklin will break the all time record for most goals kicked by an individual player in a single game!

How can you justify dropping a youngster (lets be honest, who else would you drop for the sake of playing Yze) in order to play a veteran who is on the verge of retirement and is struggling for form? I rather bring in a raw Maric than an over-cooked Yze.

Your greatest post to date!

What a sad day for our football club. Feels a little numb knowing we'll never get to see our great captain in action again!

You better be making that up!!!