poita

Nathan Jones has carried this side for four years single handedly, so deserves to be given some leeway that is not afforded to other senior players. That said, he is clearly struggling at the moment and I really can't see the point in playing him against Freo this week. The week off will do him a world of good, and we can use his milestone game the following week to bump the crowd up to 6000 or so. Roos has put his stamp all over this leadership group. Nice, well spoken young men like Dawes and Lumumba who are completely useless on the football field. I have no issues with Jones and Grimes being leaders, Grimes is a much better player than most around here give him credit for. McDonald and Viney would be the only others I would consider unless we land a big fish in trade week.

Michie will never be more than fringe player because he doesn't do anything especially well. And his defensive work is nowhere near good enough. That said, he was okay with ball in hand yesterday, and probably played himself on to the list for next year. Coming into his sixth year on an AFL list Viv would want to do something special in the pre season to ensure that he is in the round 1 starting side.

Typical Newton game. Does a few nice things, then disappears for twenty minutes. Still doesn't do much defensively. As I said four months ago, he is 23 and in his fifth season of AFL football. People are happy to write off Toumpas, but Newton has had two years of extra development to get to a similar point.

What does Roos care? He is guaranteed a million bucks a year just for turning up to work each day. The club is such a basket case that his legacy will remain fairly much intact regardless of where we finish next year. He'll continue to play his favourites each week, act concerned after each loss to appease the fans, play footsies will his media chums during the week, and bugger off to the US after the season finishes. Until the coach starts holding the senior players accountable for their performances (or lack thereof), nothing will change. Oh, and some semblance of a game plan would be nice.

A typically pissweak, soft and gutless performance by a bunch of individuals who are an embarrassment to themselves, the club and the competition as a whole. Yet again they pick if and when they will come to play. And sure enough the club will come to us in two months time looking for money to pay the salaries of these pea-hearted bludgers. Grimes and McDonald were the only two who tried for the entire game. Stretch was okay in parts, and Michie did some okay things. The rest were poor or worse. Special mentions to Garlett and Dawes who would have contributed more by staying in bed for the entire game. Lumumba had 1 touch in 29% game time, but his second half was close to his best of the season. Cross combined his usual poor disposal with butter fingers and directly caused about 5 goals. Garland was abysmal, the only time I saw him was when he was conceding goals. Gawn has been flogged for three consecutive weeks since signing his new contract. N.Jones is in the worst form of his career. Vince and Viney did nothing of note - why Viney was not tagging Murphy is beyond me. Harmes gets caught holding the ball more than any player I have ever seen, and has poor skills. Brayshaw should have been rested after the WCE game - his form has gotten worse ever since. Hogan at least tried, but was well beaten. We have roughly a zillion dollars worth of coaches on payroll, what do they all do? There is zero sign of a game plan, zero indication that any consideration is given to player matchups or match day tactics. The players have no skills, no decision making, no game sense, no confidence, no intensity, no workrate. We don't even do the basics well - tackle, chase, shepherd. Roos doesn't play, but he has contributed to this malaise by refusing to drop serial offenders such as Lumumba. He is happy to drop the likes of Toumpas and JKH after two quiet weeks, but tolerates continued mediocrity from senior players. Plenty of people will tell you have improved this year. We have won more games because we have brought in players such as Hogan, Brayshaw and Vandenberg who are better than the guys they have replaced. Big frigging deal. We are still miles off being relevant in this competition, and our worst football is every bit as bad as it was under Neeld with a much weaker playing list.

Lumumba, Stretch, Newton, Neal-Bullen, Harmes, MIchie and a very tired Brayshaw = too many players who don't get enough football. That leaves a huge amount for Jones, Vince and Viney to do.

So Carlton reckon Henderson, Yarran and Menzel are all worth first round picks. They'd be lucky to get a first round pick for all three in a package deal, let alone individually. Yarran clearly has a bad attitude, Menzel is always injured and barely gets a touch anyway, and Henderson is probably best as a second or third forward / defender.

You can't honestly tell me that Lumumba has been better value than Matt Jones in recent weeks. A bench containing Bail, Newton, Riley and Jamar is as bad as anything we dealt with last year. Plus Brayshaw who should have been rested a month ago, and has struggled ever since. I can't see that Stretch's average 9.5 possessions a game warranted another opportunity this year either. A half decent side would beat Carlton by ten goals. We might get them by three if we're lucky.

Lumumba has a contested game? All I've seen is him trailing his opponent by 5 metres on every occasion, flailing his limbs about wildly. If he was anyone else he would have been at Casey for the past two months.

He wasn't in our best 22 when he left, so good luck to him for stretching his career for another four years or so. Ultimately he played his best football as third man up - when teams woke up to this and made him be accountable he was found out. Just an average - good player at the end of the day.

Fewer games on free to air TV, more games in rubbish time slots (eg Thursday nights) = win for football fans in the eyes of the AFL. They won't have any fans left by the end of the new deal at this rate. Apparently the networks have no control over the fixture, it is all in the hands of the AFL. If you believe that, you would believe that Vladimir Putin is Santa Claus in his spare time. I can't see why we can't have two games on Friday night, like the NRL do, instead of worrying about twilight games and Thursday nights.

This sort of attitude is exactly why this club has been pitiful for nine years. It doesn't matter whether the players try or not, it doesn't matter whether we win or lose, just pretend it didn't happen and move on to the next woeful performance. Forget trying to attract new members and new sponsors. Forget trying to build a product and a brand that is attractive to the AFL and its media outlets so that we get the TV coverage and publicity and favourable draw that people whinge about incessantly. All that matters is that the same old saps hand over their cash each year so that the club can continue to kid itself that it matters to anyone outside the diehards. Bad luck when the kids of the 1950s die out and our membership is cut in half. This is the first time I've been able to watch a game at home with my 5 year old son this year - he wanted to turn over to the netball by quarter time. And the club wonders why it can't attract junior members / supporters. Sorry to all the lovers and dreamers out there, but every game matters.

Feel sorry for the Ratten family, but any combination of speed, drugs, alcohol, an unlicensed driver, no seatbelts, bad weather and teenagers with death wishes is always going to end poorly. Just lucky they didn't take any innocent people out with them.

This is what happens when you have (a) a coach who has no investment in the club other than collecting a massive pay check each month and (b) a playing group that chooses if and when it will come to play because the majority have no fear of being dropped or otherwise held accountable for their dismal performances and pizzweak efforts (exhibit 1: Lumumba). As soon as we concede two or three early goals we collectively decide its all too hard and give up - won't tackle, won't shepherd, won't chase, won't present to the ball carrier, won't put our bodies on the line, etc, etc. And the coach has all the tactical nous and innovation of a jar of vegemite, so there is no chance of him changing things up to try and change the flow of the game. After conceding the first five goals we should have stacked the backline for ten minutes just to get our hands on the footy for a while, but no we let the Bulldogs run in another 7 goals unchecked. Roosy tells us there were plenty of positives last week, and I'm sure he found plenty of positives from yesterday as well. I'm sure the same old suspects (Bail, M.Jones, Grimes) will be dropped this week and Roosy's pets will live to see another day. PS. Whoever the moron is who lets Cross, McDonald and Lumumba get away with their ridiculous handballing inside defensive 50 on a weekly basis, he or she should be taken outside and beaten. If in doubt, just kick the ball as far away from the opposition goals as possible. Most of their first quarter goals were a direct result of our handling errors.

I still believe Watts will end up being the best player from that draft. He is arguably behind Sidebottom, Hurley, Ziebell and Naitanui at present, but he has made up a decent amount of ground this year. The others on the list are mostly just average (Vickery) to good (Hartlett) players.

It would be an expensive exercise to pay out all those players with contracts for next year.

What were the stats of Michie & Newton in their state league comps? There tends to be a reason some of these guys can't get a game at AFL level.

Trade for Lumumba?

Isn't that how much we are paying Lumumba? I'd take Howe five times over at that price before Lumumba.

I have no interest in Yarran, but if Carlton are so desperate to offload him that they accept a Garlett style deal, I can't see the harm. Anything more than that, no thanks. As long as Roos is prepared to play him at Casey as required to give him a rocket, which he won't do with several high profile players. I'm more worried about us trading out quality players and people (eg Grimes) for next to nothing.

Only six months to resolve an issue with positive tests and admissions by the players? Glad we didn't let that one fester for too long.

Surely we can find something better for Robbo to do than spruik for our sponsors in each break. Howie's Hangers is okay, but the other rubbish is just embarrassing. Were there actually any Melbourne supporters sitting in the bay that won the Demon Shop vouchers?

Out: Michie & Lumumba, hopefully both to spend the rest of the year at Casey. In: Don't really care. Salem and VDB if fit.

Another game lost by a playing group that chooses if and when it will come to play, and to a lesser extent inept coaching and selection. Can anybody name one thing that Roos did yesterday to change things up? Viney, Hogan, Dawes (!) and Tyson can hold their heads high. Not too many others. Gawn was well beaten by Goldstein when it mattered. No disgrace in that, but a second ruckman would have been handy. Dawes did okay in support, but we robbed the forward line to play him in the ruck. We got slaughtered in the centre, particularly in the first quarter, and that was probably the reason we lost the game. Jones had a bloke hanging off him all day, and Vince and Viney play from behind at centre bounces too often. Lumumba was worst on ground and needs to play the next month at Casey. Aside from one decent run and pass inside 50, he looked totally disinterested. I'm sick of his pea-heartedness. Garlett was a very close second. I'm a big Watts fan, but he was very poor yesterday. Michie is not an AFL player, and hopefully we don't see him again. Jetta was well beaten all day. Brayshaw looks cooked to me. The rest came and went as it suited them.

Jesse has been extraordinarily good this year and nobody is saying otherwise, but he turned 20 before the start of the season. The extra two years in the gym makes this a completely different scenario to Franklin or Roughead coming in and playing at 18. Franklin kicked 73.62 in the year he turned 20 by way of comparison.