rjay

Me too, and if Jason Taylor offered some "tips" he would not be seen as being a trusted employee. In fact I would be very surprised if the club would employ him. We've made our bed this year with Todd and co. and lets just hope they get it right. Time will tell.

These kids look good, Cutler was really good off CHB particularly early in the game. Interesting to see he is a bottom ager, Franetic has a touch of class and Billings has already created a bit of interest with some good performances in the championships.

... and was it Alf Potter who knew how to produce football coverage and with less cameras than we have now he didn't manage to lose the ball. A good feel for the game.

Agree, not sure where he will be picked up. The only knock on him I have is that he likes to ague with the umps a bit much for a kid but it didn't hurt him in the Morrish.

Rolly, I don't think we can afford to separate the 2. Outside run shouldn't be at the exclusion of inside grunt. Players like Dangerfield, Sloane, Fyfe, Ablett, Murphy and Judd for example provide both whilst players like players like Pendlebury, Swan, Mitchell, Kennedy, Selwood etc. still provide plenty of spread. We need players who can hit the contest hard, spread and run.

Thanks guys The tribute to Jimmy has been the highlight so far; congrats to Daniel Jackson, suffers a bit from white line fever but seems a really decent guy off it.

NikNat v Watts?

Well worth it.

You are right there Ben, interesting month or so ahead for us.

I don't think it is that easy; it would be great if we could to have a player like Cloke, Riewoldt or Richardson, but they have all suffered from an inability to convert over their careers and it has made them lesser players than Dunstall, Lockett and Carey for example. If it was that easy they would have fixed it.

I think his is a simplistic view of "The Hawks Philosophy" and would argue that most if not all of these players came to the club as pretty good contested ball winners ith hard at it attitudes. I mean the 3 he mentions from other clubs were all good kicks yes but all hard at it ball winners. This is not something that you just teach, a player must have a strong competitive streak.

The thing, well a few things worry me about Hogan. Has he played any senior level football this year? I know he is in his first year at 18's level but Toumpas played in a senior premiership in the SANFL at that age. Is he really that good? question mark on his kicking for one thing and this is not easily fixed. Should we really risk a high draft pick on him? what can we get from this years draft that may be as good or better and a year advanced? Stringer, Toumpas, Macrea, Membrey etc. I don't know the answers but am not sure about picking him up, it doesn't feel right to me.If I were picking up a 17 yo I would like to have seen him playing good football at senior level like O'Meara last year and not just the colts. I know we need another kpf, but is this just wishful thinking. Plays like Brown, well no he doesn't, for one thing Brown is a beautiful kick of the ball.

He's a strong kid like Darling and leads up at the ball well, excellent kick. He reminded me a bit of Barry Hall with his lead up, 2nd efforts and mobility on the ground.

I guess we will have an insiders view of him with the Viney's. He does look light on but if you look at Fyfe at Freo,does he have that bit of something special. Seemed to bob up whenever something needed to happen in a tight final which is a good sign.

But it was only Essendon again.

Graham pushed his ranking up today along with Membrey. Macrea looks good but a skinny kid like a couple of current whipping boys. Good game.

They needed Tippett to stand up with Tex to expose Hawthorns weakness against tall forwards in defence and he did. Got value for their inside 50's which along with Hawthorns poor kicking kept them in the game.

Again tonight I found the camera angles so frustrating, they are trying to be way to clever and they're not.

The advantage payed to Adelaide when they clearly didn't want it, well looked dubious to me.

Agree with you on the inconsistency of how this is handled, rules on the run. Reminds me of rule of the week which we all know exists and are continually told it doesn't. Deliberate out of bounds anyone? On the knee, below knee one my reading was she thought it was below the knee but wanted to make sure. I think it was her call to get the video ump involved and it turned out to be a good call. In real time I thought it was a goal but the slow mo video clearly showed it was't, this was good use of the technology.

Might be time for doc Larkin to go back to med school. Seems he can't tell the diff between a knee and an ankle. Fair enough at first look but when Richards kept reaching for his ankle it seemed to be a bit of a sign, then he comes back on with no bandage on the knee...well.

Looking at the decision again a few times on Fox it's not so clear cut and that goal umpire is good at her job, she was right on the spot and was probably on the money. Camera angles can be deceptive. I'm starting to sound like an umpire apologist here but I intensely dislike the way the game is interpreted in particular the dropping the ball thing that seems endemic in the game but given what they are working with, tonight the umpires did a good job.

Confidence to use that kick will see him a good player, needs to take the game on a bit more. This year was a bonus for him to get on the park, I expect to see him really progress next season.

I thought they did a good job tonight (based on this years interpretations), the only thing that got me was a pedantic thing about a Swans player running through the mark when the Swans had a kick.

Any chance that the 7 producers can find the ball tonight? KISS keep the camera where the ball is and stop trying to predict where it is going, you're not that good.