rufus

I've heard that he may have already signed a heads of agreement type thing to join the Saints in 2015. Probably nothing but a rumour...who knows. I haven't read the whole thread so excuse me if I'm bringing up something that has been suggested before, but how do people reckon Frawley would go in the midfield for us? Just seems to be very strong in the core, pretty good low to the ground and able to break a line from time to time. The question marks would be fitness, cleanliness of his hands at pace, disposal which seems to have dropped off and his propensity to take people on a bit too much. But still, I could see him being a help in close at clearances and being able to extract some ball to the outside for us (yes we struggle for outside mids too but the more quality ball you get from the inside, the easier it is for our developing outside players). I just have this sense that if he spent time in the middle he could develop into a real quality player in that area of the ground. Might also rejuvinate his enthusiasm for the club and the game a bit...feel more like he can influence the outcome rather than having it handed to him each week....

Other teams get their run either from half back, or from behind stoppages. They come through at pace and are able to break a line and link up and make their next kick a creative one. We are all stagnant, handball to someone standing still and our next kick is off balance either directly to the opposition or to a contest near the boundary line. When we take a mark, our players stroll in and out of space. If they actually ran in and out at 100% they would create some opportunities for each other, but they don't. Our ability to defend opposition kick ins is the worst thing I have ever seen in all my time watching professional sports. I cannot understand how, after 20 odd games in charge, this coaching regime still hasn't managed to teach our players how to ensure there isn't one loose player, usually perched somewhere near the corridor, at every kick in. Unfortunately it looks like our players are being taught defensive structures (and ordinary ones at that), rather than defensive principles. That's in addition to being taught an offensive style cashes in on momentum with a massive rush of 1 to 3 goals in a quarter. It even looked like Collingwood felt inconvenienced to be out there today. It was like they were a bit annoyed to have to deal with us. Worst coached team I have ever seen. I understand our board and CEO are in a sticky situation but unfortunately we need to make a move soon. We will be a 6 to 8 goal better side with decent coaching. Most of our biggest problems can be fixed...but they are not being fixed right now.

Yep, and as dazzledavey states I can't understand why kreuzer isn't under scrutiny as a number 1 pick. Don't rate him at all. Having said that, kreuzer does give 100% every contest so we would probably take that at this stage (similar boat to Hurley in my opinion). Do people think the supporters have an important role to play in how these players are scrutinised? We put a lot of expectation on our high picks and tend to turn on them quickly. I reckon Ess and Carl supporters last a little longer before they pillage one of their own. Mind you, I've spent much of the last 15 years defending the people who have represented my club and I've kind of run out of motivation to do it anymore. I pretty much just agree with whatevet negative comments anyone throws my way about the MFC. I hope something gives me reason to snap out of it sometime soon!

Yeah it's the tightening of the defensive aspects that is probably counting against him more than anything. Our defensive side is atrocious and even worse than it was when Bailey was there. There is so much wrong with the way our club is being coached right now. For example, who in the fricking hell is responsible for our structure in defending opposition kick ins? Aren't they seeing what we're seeing from the stands each week (I.e. the oppo having at least one completely open player at each kick in and subsequently cruising from defense to attack like a training drill). Seriously, I could live with watching the insipid offensive style we've employed if we were at least stopping the oppo from scoring in any way shape or form...but we're not. Having said that, I don't mind what has happened today. make it clear to the coaches that things need to change as of right now...so go out there and find a way to get our list competing...or you leave us with no choice.

Yep. Needs to have winning as part of his key measurements, as should every single person involved in a professional sport. Hiding behind development and training standards is a joke. There is no reason you can't win games, or play in a way that facilitates some kind of opportunity to win games, whilst 're-building'. In fact, it would be the best way to lay the foundations of a 're-build' IMO.

If we could somehow get important players re-committing then I'd be ok to give Neeld more time, but with a changed mandate (i.e. you must start finding ways to win games). I desperately want at least the playing group of our club united and playing for the jumper...and the coaching side of it can be taken care of in due course.

Maybe Neeld is going to be sacked and McLardy is going to resign as a sign of taking responsibility for the mandate that Neeld was given (if what Neeld explains is the full truth). Because, if Neeld was given that mandate and it was not made clear to him that he needs to do it whilst maintaining professional level output on the field then the board has to be held accountable in some way. Then again, they probably would have liked to think he'd assume he needs to maintain some modicum of respectability on the field while he enforces his changes.

True. Freo were instantly a better team as soon as Ross Lyon walked in the door. I can't quite swallow that there would be no improvement from our team under a proven coach. I might just be that Neeld doesn't have what it takes to be a capable AFL coach, and the disastrous results surely provide some evidence towards that. If a 95 point loss is considered some sort of positive then surely the alarm bells are now taking over!

Yep and it might just be coming too late to save this coach if the rumors are true. I'd love tomorrow to be our 'line in the sand' day. Either move the coach on or commit to him for at least the rest of the year, but behind closed doors find out which players are dead against the move and they can remove the jumper right now and take a paid holiday for the rest of the year. The players at this club who have been playing politics during the last 5 or so years may well end up with the blood of a 150 year old football club on their hands if things don't improve soon.

These are my thoughts exactly. How refreshing to hear someone offering some constructive ideas instead of taking the easy option and writing cheap stories about the 'basket case' club. The AFL media mirrors the sport well for mine...has much too high a view of itself when on a world scale it is a blip on the radar...and more constructive reporting might actually help improve the game and see the standard rise to something that can justify the claims to being an 'elite' professional sport. Whether people agree with what Crawford says or not , at least it offers a constructive opinion.

You make some good points, but it's just my opinion that the desperation and intensity is drilled into the players by the club, and specifically by the clubs figurehead (the coach). I honestly believe that on the flip side to what you suggest, i.e. if our list was to represent Sydney this year, there is no way they would be seeing the kind of performances we have seen. It just isn't accepted at that club. On a tangent, I had an experience myself of being the captain/coach of a suburban cricket club for a couple of years. I felt that whilst in the position the guys in my team didn't really seem to care about winning as much as I did. When I gave the job up, someone else came in and instantly the same group of players were doing the little things you need to do to be a successful team, culminating in a finals appearance. We were grand finalists the year before I took the job and the club has been really competitive each year since I finished. I see this as an absolute failure on my part, I no longer believe it was the fault of the players at all. I wasn't able to get the message across about the expectations in a way that the players gravitated towards. As the figure head of the club, they clearly didn't heed my message.

I guess my question around 'how long' isn't necessarily in terms of seeing scoreboard results, but more about turning up to the ground and seeing that our players are desperate to fight for our club...I don't believe it's happening at the moment and it's what worries me the most. It is the fundamental element of football and in theory should be the simplest thing to implement. This to me is responsibility A1 of the coaches. I hope they start to turn that aspect around tomorrow, but still don't know why it hasn't been there every week since this coaching regime began.

I agree that it's going to take time to become a really quality unit whichever way we go...but the question is, how long is it going to take to produce competitive, desperate efforts for the club and the supporters. Right now our club is being dragged through the mud because of what is being produced on the field. I am not anti Neeld, but I am with 'Return to Glory' in that I am anti what is being produced on the field at the moment. I can accept that if we are trying to teach our players zones and all these new age things that it might take time (as it did for Clarkson when he began and Worsfold when he made major changes). Our players are producing football that is nowhere near the quality that those clubs were producing even when they were going through their changes. It really boils down to the effort we see from the players at the moment. And if there is a belief that the players are giving 100% intensity every game and have bought in to the program then surely that would suggest that the program, from a gameplan perspective, is somewhat flawed.

Interesting last point. That being the case, I can't for the life of me work out why the players aren't rabid with their attack on their opponents and the ball every week I mean they basically hold neeld's future in their hands...and I just can't accept that the want and will from the playing group is reflecting positively on the situation. Could it be that our playing group is divided (again!). If so, when are all these politics going to stop and these guys just go out there and give 100% for our club and our jumper? Why do the supporters need to suffer through whatever the hell is going on down there!! Oh the confusion of it all!

Yep it'll come down to something like this again. I'm prepared to chip in more again, and hopefully there are still enough passionate ones out there who are not totally fed up and will do the same. Let's just hope the club does it right this time and sets us up in a way that it can sustain itself. Someone else pointed out on another thread that it's a precarious time to do fundraising...don't want it to look like you're building a 'sack the coach' fund. Once the coaching landscape becomes clearer I'm sure we'll all be asked to chip in again...

My genuine concern is that it won't be 10-12 goals this weekend, it will be 25+. It surely seems clear the message is not going through to the players, neither on a motivational level nor on a tactical level. Whilst a loss like this will surely see the end of Neeld, do we really need to do more damage to our players and supporters by putting them through that? If Neeld must coach this weekend, he has to be told to change his approach. We can't be expected to turn up to watch the slaughter that will occur if our players are told to 'guard space' against an efficient kicking team. It really doesn't have to be like this. It is garbage. With proper instruction and motivation our list is capable of competitive performances. I know the club is in a hard spot on this one, and I can understand with the recent admin changes that they want to be seen to act reasonably and give the coach a chance to show improvement, but if a decision has been made on this bloke (and given the opposition we are facing in the coming weeks) perhaps for everyone's sake we should just make the change now.

Bang! Great call. It shows the care the players have for the jumper doesn't it. I suspect Buckley just doesn't quite 'have it' as a coach (felt that he wasn't really a team man as a player which might not reflect well in his coaching message), however all credit to him and his club that they clearly still get their players to exhaust every effort in every game to give themselves a chance to win.

Yep. It's a sad state of affairs when I look at the fixture and am relieved to see we're interstate so I don't feel abliged to have to go to the game to support the club. I like to watch good competitive sport and what we're doing aint that. Look at the dogs today...even if our players bring the right attitude to a game they aren't being coached to play in a way that can generate enough scores to beat anyone other than expansion teams, particularly when coupled with the idea that whatever our players are being taught around the defensive aspects of the game is also a disaster.

I agree with the sentiments here and wish we had a football media with some decency that would raise points like these. Unfortunately the idea of a guy being loyal and giving back to the supporters is not as appealing to them as a guy looking for a "fresh start". I personally can't fathom how someone could walk out on a club that has afforded them such great opportunities before they have given much back. Whilst I accept what some are saying in that he may have been put under some unfair scrutiny by his coach and perhaps the previous admin, what I'd love to see is Jack to be one stands up and says 'I want to be part of the group that turns the culture of this club', instead of being another who walks out on it. I've heard stuff first hand from former players about their disgruntlement at various aspects of the MFC and I've always thought well why not be someone who does everything they can to change it??? If some players don't like the coach well so what. The coaches position will be sorted soon enough if he's no good. It's the players who are long term custodians of the club and it's up to them to own the improvement. I read somewhere (may have been here on Demonland) that Watts might be frustrated with the fact that he gets booed by his own supporters. I will say that I think it's a disgrace to boo your own players, but might add that if he ended up going to Carlton he might find a supporter group that can be even less appreciative if they feel they aren't getting 100% effort.

I think the issue so many people currently having is that whilst it might take time to become a consistently good side, it shouldn't take this much time for us to see some of the basics of a competitive football team coming together. E.g. tackling like you actually care about the outcome of the game, moving the ball in a manner in which the opposition can be put under a modicum of pressure. And whilst we've turned over a number of players, it's ludicrous that we can be this much worse after a season and a bit of Neeld vs. what we were under Bailey. Whether the players aren't playing for the coach, or the coaches directions are flawed, or whatever else it might be, there is clearly something wrong.

I reckon WCE's position on the ladder in 2012 was well correlated to the home town umpiring bias. When the microscope went on it and the umps had to pull it back the eagles weren't winning as much anymore. Sounds like it's creepung back in.

Our players lack the courage to exhaust themselves with the required effort for 4 quarters for our club. In other years they've genereally afforded the supporters a quarter or two, it averages about 5 minutes a game now. Plus we have a terrible coach. 20 goal plus loss for mine.

Agreed. If he has been given some sort of assurance by the club at this stage then I think I may have lost the last bit of faith I had left. I just can't get my head around the people still trying to argue that this is all part of the plan. If anybody heard and can remember Neelds somewhat arrogant radio interview just before the first round match against Brisbane on 2012 where he talked about how he'd taken our boys to "Football University" and how we were going to be a hard team to play against you'd know that he was not expecting to be going down the path that we are now. At the 2012 commencement dinner he mocked the football media for questioning the style he was trying to implement by saying 'apparently you're not allowed to experiment in the NAB Cup' when it turns out the style he served up in that NAB cup was exactly what we entered the season with. One of the Brisbane assistant coaches actually publicly stated before that match that they know exactly how Melbourne are going to play and as such it's not a hard game to plan for. The 'out-muscled by Gold Coast' and constant reference to our lack of experience are enough for me. It's actually embarrassing now. I think Grant Thomas, Shane Crawford and others who were questioning what Neeld was doing right from his first coaching effort were right, he's just not the man for the job. Let's hope someone in a position of power gets it sorted because I share the sentiments of others in that it's hard to fathom how us supporters will continue to turn up to the games to watch these ridiculous performances....and that will spell real trouble for the club.

If players are telling their parents that the coach has lost them it really seem to me like an opportunity for the parents to do their kids a favour and provide them some advice (which may well have happened):- 1. If the coach has lost the players because they believe he doesn't know what he's doing, then go out there and give 100% every week for your club and your supporters, and the holes in his coaching will show soon enough and his position will be sorted. 2. If the coach has lost the players because he was mean to some of your friends, then go out there and give 100% every week for you club and your supporters, and soon enough we will know whether the coaches tough approach resulted in the club losing players they couldn't afford to lose. His position will be sorted soon enough. Who knows, maybe with the massive effort you guys put in you might turn around after a while and go 'hey, you know what, the coach was right, we did need to harden up and make some sacrifices and do things more like other clubs are doing them'. If anybody can tell me the playing group was giving 100% on the weekend then I will go he. The neutral people aren't blind...Wayne Carey stated early on in the game on Sunday that the players should have stayed home and watched Gossip Girl...and the Herald Sun had a cartoon of players wearing our jumper being too weak to run through a tissue paper banner. Slightly amusing but embarrassing to be affiliated with. The players have played the politics game before and it didn't end well. Whilst the point they have may well be correct, the approach is extraordinary and something I'm struggling to think has ever happened at a professional sporting club before. Having said all that, it appears as though it's gone too far now and the club has no choice but to replace the coach very soon. Having watched the way we've been coached over the last year and a bit it looks like it was going to happen soon enough anyway (e.g. our structures and ball movement ideas appear to be a good 5 years behind all the other clubs), but the process of reaching that point has shattered a lot of people, and put the club in a seriously dangerous place. Once this coach is dealt with, who knows what happens next? If what you say about the coach losing some of the players is correct then it appears our playing group is definitely divided too because Chris Dawes has written an article questioning the efforts of the playing group. Some players might not have liked that....maybe they will put up the white flag in matches going forward until Chris Dawes is frog marched from the club too?

Hmmm maybe I am remembering that interview wrong but I thought he had insinuated that he had dodged a bullet by not coming to Melbourne (perhaps he was talking with hindsight)...either way we would have no chance...