poita

Signing a 7 year contract on huge money comes with a significant amount of expectation and pressure. It would be fair to say that Grundy hasn't come close to performing at the level that that contract requires over the past three years. If he signed for five years at $700K, I reckon he may well still be at Collingwood, but he and his manager pushed for maximum value. Ultimately the next move is his. He can stay at Melbourne on his current deal and fight for a spot in the senior side, or he can agree to terminate his contract and look for another club. I'm sure plenty of clubs would be interested, but he might have to price himself at $600K for three years. What's worth more to him - the security and money of his current deal, or being a number one ruckman again?

As far as I can tell Jordon has played predominantly as a central midfielder over the past two weeks, for 11 possessions on each occasion. For all the talk about the lack of opportunities that James received earlier in the season, he has been given a massive opportunity here and he has been very disappointing. He simply doesn't impact centre bounces in any way, and he was clearly opposed to Martin for a number of Richmond's clean centre breaks early in the game. He is clearly not an instinctive player, and you can see the wheels turning every time he receives a handpass or a short kick and is required to make a split second decision. Given his lack of improvement over the past three years, I see Jordon as handy depth but not someone I'd be rushing out to resign if he gets offers elsewhere. I think we can replace him through the draft pretty easily if required.

https://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/teams/north-melbourne-kangaroos/afl-draft-2021-trade-news-north-melbourne-rejects-offer-for-pick-1-adelaide-offers-three-firstround-picks-jason-hornefrancis/news-story/c04e020fec2fe228597559746741b62c They were stupid enough to draft a player who made it pretty clear he didn't want to go there. They only have themselves to blame.

A couple of practice matches locked in: Saturday 12 August - Carlton v Melbourne at IKON Park, 12pm Saturday 19 August - Melbourne v Hawthorn at Casey Fields, 2:05pm https://www.womens.afl/news/121126?_ga=2.225260698.1412232811.1690420280-113156352.1690420280

Our forward line finally starts scoring with some consistency and we drop Brown. 🙄 If we're judging purely on goals and marks, then clearly he is struggling. If we're judging on how the forward line has been functioning as a unit in the past fortnight, then the decision is just plain dumb. Petty at least is a reasonably straight swap, although his form and fitness are a major concern. Smith for Brown would represent yet another structural change, which is getting ridiculous at this time of year. I too would have liked to see Dunstan get a run, even more so now that Sparrow is out. We can't keep asking Viney to carry this midfield each week, and Dunstan can at least share the load. Our midfield looks very light on now, even if Harmes does come in. I called for Hibberd to replace McVee earlier in the week, and hope that change happens. I can't see any reason to bring in either Grundy or Spargo, either now or prior to the end of the season.

Congratulations to Kate & Tyla, some big shoes to fill, but I'm sure both will be excellent in these roles.

There is some speculation that Tayla may have a facial fracture as a result of this fight. I'm all for players having interests outside of football, but not one that can potentially cause serious injury a month out from the start of the season.

The hardest of hard passes for me. I don't care how good he is against players his own age, you'll never convince me that a 170cm player is worth a high draft pick. That's especially true when we have no young midfielders coming through, and ageing KPs and rucks. We have far bigger needs.

I've been able to understand the voting in most games this year, but not so this week. There is no way we win that game without Viney.

Hunter has been diabolical for weeks, he needs a fair amount of time at Casey. Maybe Jordon back to the wing, because he is completely ineffective as a central midfielder. I'd still love to see Dunstan get a chance whilst Oliver is out. I thought McVee may have been wearing concrete boots yesterday. He has had an excellent season, but looks due for a rest. Bring in Hibberd for him this week and reassess. I really like Woewodin as a player, but he's just not getting enough football. Time to bring Harmes back. As much as it would be great to see Brown taking 8 marks and kicking 5 goals, that's just not where he is at right now. But our forward line looks significantly better with him in it. We do need another marking option, because it is asking too much of Melksham to be that player consistently.

The bigger concern than having suitable picks for Kynan, is the number of available list spots. Perhaps Jordon, Harmes and Tomlinson leave, but the club is just as likely to recontract Hibberd and Melksham, and then we're back where we started.

You could hardly blame Adam for looking elsewhere given the way he has been treated this year, but our key defensive depth would be critically low without him. Turner may end up being a decent player, but he doesn't look like a replacement for May or Petty to me. I'm not sure what happens if one of those two is unavailable and Tomlinson is no longer on the list.

Jordon's problem is that we have already offered contracts for 2024 and beyond to a number of players who are lesser players than he is. Spargo, Laurie, Schache and Smith are four obvious examples, plus arguably Harmes given that he is currently out of favour.

https://www.womens.afl/news/120862?_ga=2.6926130.1607083853.1689569774-109191650.1689569774 Melbourne play 6 of 7 finalists from last season, the most of any team. Fremantle and West Coast play 3 of a possible 8. I agree that we are better off playing quality teams than beating up on the also rans, but don't forget that we missed out on a home GF last year by a single goal. Could the extra game against a weaker side for Adelaide or Brisbane end up gifting them a home GF?

Only if we revert to a top 6 with teams 5 - 8 playing in the wildcard round. Anything else just rewards mediocrity.

So we play 6 of last year's top 7, missing only Richmond who were eliminated in straight sets last year. Meanwhile Carlton don't have to play any of Melbourne, Brisbane or Adelaide - that sounds fair. The 5pm Friday fixture in Frankston in round 4 and 6pm Thursday fixture in Geelong in round 5 remain. Bad luck for those players with other jobs to think about.

A ten week season is a joke, but I'm glad for the players that they will soon be able to start planning with certainty. There were rumours of some terrible fixturing decisions in previous draft fixtures, such as games being scheduled for 5pm on Friday nights. Hopefully these have been removed.

Why the kerfuffle on this issue? Should Gold Coast have to move their game against Collingwood to the MCG so that 60K Collingwood supporters can attend. If the answer is no, why should Geelong have to move their games to that Essendon supporters can attend. Perhaps at some point in the future Melbourne will have so many members attending matches that we can lock away members out of our home games. As to why the ground currently only has a capacity of 21K after twenty years of constant redevelopment, you'd have to ask the state minister for pork barrelling.

I don't care whether we list Grundy as rested, managed, omitted, injured, unavailable or anything else, the fact is that the two rucks experiment isn't working, hasn't worked all year and won't work in the finals. We need to push on without Grundy in the team and find a combination that does work. If he is upset by this, bad luck - he hasn't held up his end of the bargain this year. As I posted last week, I would play JVR and Brown as permanent forwards, with Schache to play as a roaming forward / back up ruck. That probably doesn't leave room for Melksham, so either he or Smith should be the sub. Neither is part of our future, so I'm not desperate to get games into these players at this time of the year. Our small forwards are a major problem, but surely Chandler has been marginally less ordinary than Spargo and offers more upside. I would strongly consider playing Dunstan this week as well, with Jordon to come out of the midfield group.

I'm not sure why people get so worked up about membership numbers - it is the membership dollars that matter. We could buy our way to 70K members by giving away $10 memberships for the last three home games, but what does that really achieve? My son gets a free 3 game St Kilda membership with his SMJFL fees each year. That is potentially several thousand kids included in St Kilda's membership numbers each year that neither barrack for St Kilda or contribute to the club. As an aside, they also gave him two free tickets to be used during the year, so we used those to attend Saturday's game for nothing. Thanks SKFC.

The mean man on the telly didn't say nice things about my football team. Mummy, please make him go away.

Truly moronic changes by a coach and his assistants who are totally clueless and out of their depth. We haven't kicked a decent score for 6 weeks, so let's not play a forward line at all. Jordon and Spargo have both been putrid all year, but let's give them yet another game, Spargo having played 30 mins (poorly) since King's birthday a month ago. Melksham should have been retired 2 years ago, but 5 touches a week are enough to keep him in. Meanwhile JVR, who is part of our future, can't get a game. And clearly Goodwin is going to go down with the Two Rucks ship, and take the rest of the team with him.

Do Melbourne members have to pay for away VFL games, or are these covered in the AFL membership also? I used to love getting down to TBO to watch Sandy play when we were aligned with them. That 3-peat of premierships from 2004-06 were fantastic to watch.

Great news and well deserved. I feel like he is one of those players who, while they might not become a champion, will just find a way to become a really good player at whatever level they are asked to play at.

The club needs to come out at some point and give us the full story, because this entire episode is completely unacceptable for a supposedly professional sporting club. Firstly, allowing Oliver to play on after the initial injury. Then, allowing an infection to get bad enough to result in a lengthy hospital stay, having him train in the cold and wet after the Geelong game, taking him to Alice Springs for no reason, and every other ill advised training session he has done in the past 7 weeks. Finally, the lack of meaningful updates that resulted in the ridiculous rumours that circulated a few weeks ago. Goodwin needs to shut up and stop saying every Monday that he is a chance to play this week, before he is then ruled out two days later. It reflects badly on him and the club.