Random Task

Well most people usually melt when he's in the team so I'm predicting generalise apathy with a hint of confusion.

I like him, don't get me wrong. But his freo game was well below the standard before he got concussed. Expected inconsistencies given its his first year. Not an automatic selection for mine at this stage of his career. I suspect he'll be a permanent best 22 player next year though.

Just going by your videos. He was training with the seconds team in the bottom two videos you posted and I didn't sight him in any of the clips with the senior team.

Can't believe they've dropped Laurie after his game last week. Didn't think Tholstrup was playing great footy to be an automatic inclusion and if Hunter comes in off poor form and recent injury then it's just baffling. No disrespect to Hunter but would rather see Woewodin or Howes on the wing than him.

Sounds like we're going to be very active this off-season. Just hope we have some picks left over for the draft.

Suspect so, only GWS player that fits the profile of young key back that hasn't played a game.

I thought we were keen on Wilmot who went to the Lions at pick 16?

How did Jeffo go?

Outside of the dees players I'm keen to see how Stone, Gruzewski, Leake and Angwin play.

Any player you like in particular if we keep a pick in the 7 - 16 range Chaser?

Just need someone to photoshop a dees jumper on

So in: Gawn, Laurie, Woewodin, Out: Salem, Sparrow, Tholstrup Interesting changes. Woey to get a full game as the 7th defender?

Interesting if true about Lever and May being sore. Our emergencies have no talls.

Paging @adonski

I agree we've underachieved. 2023 should have been ours. But that shouldn't take away from what we have achieved and what the likes of the Lions, Power, Swans, Blues, GWS can only hope for. A premiership and multiple top 4 finishes. This is the type of success we could only dream of back in 2014. Does that mean I'm happy with where we are right now, of course not. We need to be doing everything in our power to maximise and compliment the talent we have on our list now. As to what that looks like in terms of the "right calls..." I wish I had the answers for that. Covering off holes in the list with best 22 talent is a starting point. Is Houston, Cumming, some draftees and a back up ruck part of the solution? Looks like a good starting point to me. Does our coaching group need review with perhaps new staff and ideas coming in? Does the gameplan need further refining without moving so far away from contest and defence with which we struggled earlier on this year. There's no simple answer and multiple things have to be done right to achieve success. And the reality is we might not know how successful our post 2024 moves are for a few years as well. Take the introduction of Lever and May as an example, we don't win a premiership without them yet it took a few years after acquiring them and the tension around losing Hogan and two first round picks was palpable. All I can say is strap yourself in and enjoy the ride while we are still competitive, you never know when we might suffer again like the current Roos, West Coast and us of 2008-14.

2008 birthday so his draft year will be 2026. Must be a talent if he's making state squad at u16s level. Looked up the U16s state results via the Coates Talent League app. He was named in the All Australian U16s team in the forward pocket. Country played 3 games and he was named in the bests in all and kicked goals in each game including 3 against South Australia.

Fair points, well made and can't disagree for the most part. Particularly about the players we've traded in. There was clearly a lot of risk involved with some of our long term deals and in the context of this season we are being stung. There must also be acknowledgement of the risks of not signing up players long term, which is now a common practice. We don't offer long term deals to Oliver and Petracca then they could have very well been wearing a Blues and Pies jumper respectively. Is 2024 a fail for the MFC in isolation for our list management team, quite probable. However, we've been provided a premiership and a top 4 list for the past 3 years which is no easy feet and in a competitive industry is well above the norm. A lot of angst on this forum in my view is coming from the perception that we have underachieved and perhaps that is true. In my opinion, we should have taken out last year's premiership and that failure lies on the players and coaches, not the list management team. Our list is no longer the same as 2021 and we're in somewhat a state of transition. Will our list management be a fail from 2021 - 2029 is what I'm interested in. We still have an amazing core and now room for aggressive trading and drafting. I'm holding off my judgement of our list management team for now as I believe with the right calls at the end of the year we will be right back in contention.

Sadly, if we miss finals we could end up with a pick between 6 - 10. An option maybe to split our pick. Freo currently have theirs, ports and pies first rounder. Could enable us to split say 7 for 12 (port) and 15(freo) with some balancing if required. 12 for Houston, we retain 15... or vice versa. Of course this doesn't work if we get on a roll and win the flag

Hustwaite was reported to have had a foot stress fracture.

In defence of Lamb, our priority was clearly re-signing our premiership team which he did well. We secured Petracca, Oliver, Pickett, JvR, Lever, Rivers, Brayshaw among others in what we hoped would keep our core team together for a long time to challenge. This can be picked apart in hindsight, in particular the Brayshaw deal and Oliver's issues, but it was clearly a well supported move that most here were happy about. As such, we were playing on the fringes of trades with what salary cap we had left. Players left for more opportunity and we had limited salary cap with our stars signed up long term, so we scouted the fringes of teams of what we could afford. Were there other targets that could have improved our list or provided better depth, most definetely. Could we afford them from a salary cap position and did they want to come to us with best 22 spots limited and the prospect of spending the majority of time in the two's? That's another question. The good news (sort of) is we have best 22 spots opening up on the list and salary cap space now to hopefully lure some talent.

Out: Tholstrup, Salem In: Gawn, Howes Billings probably gets Tholstrups half forward spot after his performance. Woewodin, K Brown or Laurie potentially brought in as sub for someone else if they want to make further changes.