Macca

... Ricky Ponting won't rule out Ashes series recall

Spurs through after sweeping the Grizzlies ... highlights ... Parker had another big game. June 6 is the 1st game of the finals so they've got a bit of a wait. Game 4 of the Miami/Indiana series tomorrow. Heat leading 2-1.

Win or bust for Memphis tomorrow. Would like to see them win at least one game for their fans. Miami way too strong for the Pacers today ... highlights

San Jose extend the series to 7 games. ... highlights The Bruins and Pens are through whilst Chicago and Detroit go at it tomorrow (the Red Wings lead 3-2) That Boston/Pittsburgh series should be a beauty.

French open starts Sunday evening (our time) Andy Murray is out with a back injury whilst Sam Stosur is seeded 9. Sam is in Maria Sharapova's quarter of the draw, so they are drawn to meet in the quarter finals. In the Ladies, the top seed is drawn to meet the 4th seed in the Semi-finals whilst the 2nd seed is drawn to play the 3rd seed. In the Mens, the top seed is drawn to play the 3rd seed in the Semi-finals and the 2nd seed is drawn to play the 4th seed. This means we could get a Nadal/Federer final (in theory) What it also means is that Novak and Rafa must meet in a Semi-final if they both progress that far. For further news on this story and more ... ... Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic in same half of French Open draw Mens seeds ... Novak Djokovic Roger Federer Rafael Nadal David Ferrer Tomáš Berdych Jo-Wilfried Tsonga Richard Gasquet Janko Tipsarević Stanislas Wawrinka Marin Čilić Nicolás Almagro Tommy Haas Kei Nishikori Milos Raonic Gilles Simon Philipp Kohlschreiber Ladies seeds ... Serena Williams Maria Sharapova Victoria Azarenka Agnieszka Radwańska Sara Errani Li Na Petra Kvitová Angelique Kerber Samantha Stosur Caroline Wozniacki Nadia Petrova Maria Kirilenko Marion Bartoli Ana Ivanovic Roberta Vinci Dominika Cibulková

2 tracks from 'Moby' ... the first song is from 'Letterman' and features Gwen Stefani Macca 13.1

Yeah, saw the highlights. You're right in it now. The Red Wings have surprised. Next one at home for them. Might be a case of whoever wins the next game, wins the series (which could also be the case in the LA/Sharks series) Boston look all but home in the East and the Penguins should win their series. They shouldn't have dropped game 3 though.

Suppose the 2nd in '54 adds to the record as well. Not far off winning 7 flags in a row, BMc Interesting that the Cats only won a total of 20 games (+2 draws) from 1957 to 1960 and were firmly entrenched at or near the bottom of the ladder for those 4 years. Those Geelong fans must have envied us then like we envy them now.

Spurs win game 1 vs the Grizzlies ... highlights San Antonio looked good. On a mission? Meanwhile, over in the East, the Pacers coach had some interesting things to say. Don't poke the bear? ... LeBron responds to Frank Vogel From LeBron ...

Dawes spoke about 'effort' being on the players. We saw some effort on Sunday but where has it been before that? These blokes are professional sportsmen and whilst I'm not a big rap for the coach, there's absolutely no excuse for a lack of effort, anytime. The Richmond game proved that we can give effort. Makes you wonder about the mindset the previous week and certainly in the first 2 games of the season. In all the previous games really, apart from the odd quarter or two. I go through the list and I just see one under performing player after another (in the past year and a third) We have to show up in all the remaining games of the season. Whilst we'll struggle to get near the top sides, we're not 20 goals worse than any of them. Not in my belief anyway. And we're quite capable of winning games in the 2nd half of the year. We play the Doggies twice, the Lions here and have games against the GCS and GWS. All winnable. The Saints are no world beaters either. There's such a thing as professional pride. We played ok against the Tigers, but we're still miles off our potential (best)

But we now know that loss might have been a player driven thing. Our team hasn't played much better since. Not necessarily sticking up for Dean, just looking for fairness. I was not a Bailey fan. It would be nice to know the actual truth behind what happened that day. If we knew for sure, it might explain our current day happenings. I reckon many of us have drawn our own conclusions though. I've definitely mellowed in my stance on Dean. In this thread, not all the blame was apportioned to Dean ... ... Dean Bailey has been sacked

Well, if Freo employ the 'press' as they would be expected to do, there ain't gonna be a lot of room in our backline to clear the ball out If Jack is in the backline, he's probably in for a lot of work. If he wants to work. It's up to Jack. It's not a coaching thing in his case. He's been given every opportunity to play well. I'd still prefer him in the forward line and hope like hell we can get the ball down there enough. We need more targets in our forward line right now.

I'm happy to agree with you on your side of the argument . Both mindset and natural ability are related, I'll give you that, but you'd have to agree, our players are lazy (and I'm talking about our observations with regards to the last year and a third) It goes back further than that, but the current coaching staff aren't responsible for that. Ellis for them yesterday - he did not stop gut running all day. 39 touches for an average player (right now) One of our blokes gave up on a chase. That is a mindset thing. Pure and simple, Ellis didn't give up, our bloke did. That's the difference and if you couple that with all the other things we're mentally weak at, we won't win games of footy. We were much better yesterday but we're judging yesterday's performance against our otherwise putrid efforts this year. You and I saw Northey turn average players into much better players. There is no doubt that Norm Smith turned average players into much better players on a constant basis (from what I've read!) Good coaches get the best out of the best and the most out of the rest. What do they say? At this level, it's above the shoulders. They also say - you can't turn the 'proverbial' into strawberry jam.

If you're looking at things in pure talent terms, I won't argue with you on that score OD. We're a long way short and you're spot on. But what about the mindset things I listed (there are more that I could list) That was the crux of my argument. Look at how hard average players work for the Swans, Cats, Pies etc. Actually, they are not average players, they work so hard, they turn themselves into very good contributors. Our mindset is pitiful. Leaving talent aside.

Yeah, reasonable point, but a lot of what they don't do isn't necessarily related to natural ability. Gut running, tackling, making position, shepherding, blocking, playing in front, hanging their heads, not chasing with intent, 2nd and 3rd efforts, lack of talk, manning up etc etc are a mindset. Our midfield is under performing because they don't work hard enough and they are poorly coached. We could and should be a lot better than what we are.

We can question Royal now. He's either incompetent or has very little influence. Either way, he's not performing. Can't see him lasting. Nobody can oversee a midfield for this long without being called to account. Actually, on paper, we do have some talent in the midfield. Not great, but some talent. Their output is totally abysmal though and that is on their heads, Neeld's head and Royal's head. Someone has to take responsibility. Passing the buck achieves nothing. Grimes, M Jones, N Jones, Sylvia and Viney can all play. Terlich could almost be included amongst those 5. Maybe Magner as well. To a lesser extent, Evans, Davey, Jetta, Trengove, Howe, Nicholson, McKenzie (tagging) and maybe Bail, Blease, Strauss and Toumpas (when ready) can all be contributors as well. But they don't perform as a group. No proper teamwork when we've got the ball. Not much better when we haven't got the ball. A lot of them are lazy or just don't work anywhere near hard enough. Again, who's taking responsibility for this situation?

Last round of the season. Interest lies with the Champions league spots Currently ... 3rd Chelsea 72 points +35 (GD) 4th Arsenal 70 points +34 5th Tottenham 69 points +19 Chelsea are at home to Everton Arsenal are away to Newcastle Tottenham are at home to Sunderland There is a chance that Arsenal and Chelsea will end up equal on points and goal difference. They would play off for the automatic Champions League spot if that happened.

Watts may not deserve a spot straight away but I think we have to play him. Hopefully he gets played deep forward. He's had enough time in the backline and it isn't working anyway. He's a great kick for goal and lets face it, if he gets 6 or 8 kicks in the forward line, he'd probably kick 4 goals. He'll have Dawes and the resting ruckman (Jamar or Gawn) for company so he could easily be used in a floating/decoy type situation. Jack's name did come up in the after match press conference, so he's a possible starter. Byrnes and possibly Blease will push for selection. You can't have too many in your team with poor disposal skills so there a few likely candidates that could make way.

Well why not? They're very important questions. Our lack of teamwork is a huge issue. If we used the ball a lot better today, we might have won the game. Though it was a much improved effort. I don't believe he gets grilled very hard at the press conferences anyway. Not considering how putrid we've been. Anyway, Mark's future is in his own hands. I genuinely wish him well. Don't mind having to change my mind.

Not if the right questions are asked and the right answers are given ... These are the sort of questions that could be asked at the press conferences ... "Why does your team not use a lot of teamwork when you have the ball?" (like other teams do) ... and/or ... "How do you explain the huge discrepancy in uncontested possessions that your team has in comparison to the opposition?"

I would prefer it if he was much more careful with his words. You can tell he's not trying to say anything of note but things just keep slipping out. The references to Toumpas and Viney in the back of the box next week is a case in point. Pointless and not related to anything of any importance. A silly distraction. We don't need to hear that stuff. The supporters are wanting answers on why we have up to 100 less possessions a game and why we don't play an AFL brand of footy. Yet we have to continually hear rhetoric and excuses. One minute he's perhaps being brutally honest about our future and at other times he's talking us up and we're apparently going places. Check out all his quotes for the evidence. And it's not about hating with me - it never has been. It's about evaluation. I don't dislike the bloke.

I saw the press conference as Dawes intimating that Neeld is responsible for everything else other than effort - "That's on the players" Dawes said. Dawes remarks could therefore be interpreted as placing the onus right back on Neeld to get the team playing winning football. Clark also had some interesting things to say today about Neeld's 5 year 'Rebuild'. Dawes came across as well spoken and quite smart. Neeld was just being his usual self. His remark about Toumpas and Viney sitting at the back of the back of the coaching box was questionable. "See how hard it is" or words to that effect. Why does he continually make these type of remarks? What's that got to do with winning games of footy? We're copping all these putrid losses here and he's making silly references to how hard his job is? Give us a break. And how many references to how young and inexperienced we are? Can he just give it a rest? He uses it as a mechanism early and goes back to it at various times. Maybe he should have made a greater effort to keep Rivers and Moloney - there's a bit of experience. He doesn't seem to be at all upset about losing and he never talks about winning. Does he even know what he's been employed to do? I blame the Board and McLardy as well. They are virtually silent on the subject of winning games. Neeld is here to win games of footy - the rest of it is just filler. He will lose his job unless he wins games.

They got 120 contested possessions today against our 112. So we're not far way with regards to winning the ball. We continually get cleaned up in the Clearances ... 45 to 29 today. Magner got 7 and N Jones 6 but we obviously need more ball winning ability at the stoppages. Our biggest issue is that we get killed in uncontested possessions. Reason - we don't play well enough as a team when we've got the ball. The post below by CB sums up the reasons very well. Our lack of teamwork has been an issue for more than just this season.

6 - Terlich - worked really hard 5 - Magner - made a difference out of the middle 4 - N Jones - as usual 3 - Garland - played well 2 - Jamar - his best game for the year, showed good aggression. 1 - Davey - kicking skills were impressive. Much better performance by the team and we didn't give up - some positive signs. You're always going to have injuries but our outs really hurt us. Ellis was damaging for them but otherwise, our match-ups worked quite well. Need to back it up next week.

How could I forget that pearler? Added !