rjay

I thought Morton was ok in conditions that don't suit him, he gave us a bit of run that has been missing and he did get involved with some good tackles. Tommy Mc did the job tonight, I thought he probably should and would have been dropped but by playing him the selectors showed some faith that we here often don't. Get more games into him and Morton and the like and these guys may reach their potential and become the players we want them to be.

Not a bad mid, Buddy.

Interesting to see Toumpas jump up the rankings, they had him down around the late teens, 20's last year when he was a premiership player with Woodville West Torrens seniors as a 17yo. The whole thing will move around as the year moves on but Toumpas is worth keeping an eye as it Haynes and Vlastuin, along with Viney I wouldn't be disappointed with any of these.

I'm not sure it ended up happening.

Mids

With you on that one.

What would concern me the most is if the coach, in this case Neeld has a strict adherence to a game plan. The game is changing at a pretty rapid rate and I would hope the coach has the flexabilty and strategic capability to not only cope with this but to in fact start to set the agenda and not just follow it. Get some basic fundamentals, players, fitness levels, development, skills etc in place and become leaders not followers, if we continue to follow we will always be one step behind. We were caught out by the press and I hope we are not adopting another outmoded game plan.

Nah, was in the MCC next to a pie fan on Queens Birtday in their premiership year and he was continually yelling at that ............ Wellingham. All clubs have total D...Heads as supporters, I still remember the Dee supporter I challenged at the G calling Greg Heally gutless when he was playing with a broken cheekbone. I try not to get sucked in anymore, they aren't worth my waste of breath. By the way "Who" I'm sorry your kids have to put up with this rubbish.

The article is a beat up with a bit of help from Jamars management (or the journo doing a favour to his management) to get a longer term deal from us. If you look at it clearly then Geelong will not be in the bidding, he is not a replacement for Ottens, they already have West who at 24yo is starting to come into his prime along with Vardy (injured this season), Dawson Simpson, Stevenson and at a pinch Hawkins as a back up. Geelong are in the process of quietly regenerating their list at the moment and have been travelling under the radar and anyway they like to grow their own, with the exception of Ottens. The age difference between him and Jolly is not that great anyway so I don't think Collingwood would be a serious contender, I don't think they would be offering a 3 year deal and neither should we. Mark is struggling to get off the ground at the moment and his best football may be behind him. He is not tradeable anyway as he is a free agent and the compensation available for loosing a player to free agency is not very well defined in the AFL rules, so who knows what it would bring. I think he will play out his carrer at Melbourne as long as the club treat him with some respect and don't take him for granted.

Scoreboard is the KPI

Hodge will make a difference and they really need a key defender, they are putting a lot on getting Gilham back into the side. I'm not convinced about their precision kicking game plan either, not making a call just yet but want to see how it stacks up in a real pressure situation. The ultimate cop out from me is a premiership this year and it's a winner, no premiership and it's a fail.

Ross showed the way by stopping Del the other night, didn't worry about the others. It won't matter to much for us so we may as well use the learning experience, play Watts on Riewoldt to show him how it's done and same with Trengove on Haynes and don't let Goddard fun free, might be time to try Garland somewhere else and have him follow Goddart around.

I think you are on the mark here. Frawley is still doing the defensive stuff well but when he gets the ball he seems to be over thinking it and thinking is not his strong suit. We are not getting any drive from him, I hope this turns around.

I think it's time for Petterd to come in for a few games, not this constant up and down. Let's see him settle and string a few games together, same with Morton. We need to work out the keepers. Grimes will be back for one of the Macs and Couch deseves a game but with our one dimensional midfield he doesn't bring a point of difference. We really need a Nicholson, Bennel or Blease to step up to add some leg speed but they just haven't. Maybe look at moving Garland forward or even in to the mids, Watts is probably our best user of the ball so maybe he could develop as a running half back a bit like Murphy. No matter what, it looks like a long year ahead.

It's called experience.

Me too

That just about says it all for me.

Interesting to hear Mark Robinson talk about a dinner with Cam and our prez a few years ago where Cam detailed how he thought football and as an extension the type of player required to play that game was going, we selected that type of player and here we sit. Was he reflecting or directing the football department?

Another comment he made during that interview rings true for us and it was about Freo getting a win against the Cats helped with player buy in to the new approach he brings. The loses we are having must make it harder to get buy in from our players, it's human nature and will make Neelds task all the harder. Let's hope a win this week get's things moving in the right direction.

Looking forward to seeing him play at Casey, has a ready made body for AFL and hopefully he can step up by the end of the season.

I thought I saw the same thing. Tom didn't have a great day, unfair to put that one on Riv.

Yep, that's part of it along with technique.

and a 2 club premiership CEO.

No, it's nothing to do with size or strength. It's about wanting to lay the tackle (desire) and the technique to do it and maybe as others have pointed out not knowing where they should be positioned, over thinking the game.

In a seperate incident I would have been more concerned about Jackson dropping his full weight on Jack's head.