Cranky Franky

One of the gutsiest ever.

Lets leave this matter for historians. I'm a bit concerned at the timing. It's got the potential to shift the focus from the GF. This week let's concentrate on the best of Melbourne.

Cancel culture is hardly a right wing term, its a real thing and happens far too often. You disagree with someone and instead of arguing your position you ban them from appearing and boycott them.

Fully agree QB - to call Barassi and by implication Norm Smith "non thinking" coaches is patently absurd. Sure it was a different era where discipline was king & coaches were much tougher on players in particular Kennedy, Jeans & Hafey but both Smith & Barassi were acknowledged as great motivators, creative and innovative and brilliant tactical coaches.

Agree - the number of decent players that left from late 60's to the late 70's didn't help - Kenneally, Jacobs, Groom, Dillon, Parke, Kerley, Thorne, Keenan, Callery, Fitzsimmons, Hardeman, Alves, Wells, Elshaug.

Not sure where you got this from ?? Farmer was sought after by almost every Club in the VFL. Did you confuse him with Doug Wade ? whom we did knock back. Ditto for Baldock another champion sought after by most VFL clubs at the time. There is a story Melbourne signed him when he was young but there is no actual evidence about this.

I think your theory is a bit simplistic. Smith was certainly tougher on his top players including Barassi but also on the others like Spencer, Ridley, Williams, Mithen etc. He won 6 flags because he had great teams & coached well. Ditto with North - they won because they had a great team. In fact Blight wasn't in the best players in either of their flag sides.

+1

Agree Oliver is clearly the RDB of today. A clearance beast who goes all day. Not the most polished player going round but a relentless pressure machine.

One of my all time favourites Ross Dillon left in his prime & went to Norwood. Part of the reason for our decline was that in the late 60's & 70's lots of promising players left for greener pastures. Stephen Kerley also left Melbourne for Norwood & Greg Parke also had a stint there.

Its a waste of time having an argument u can't win. The decision if up to the AFL.

Certainly an outstanding contested ball winner but comparisons with Flower are awkward as they played in very different positions in different eras. The best current comparison to Flower would be Ed Langdon.

6 Oliver 5 Lever 4 Gawn 3 Langdon 2 Salem 1 Pickett

Technical point - he didn't actually go to the UK with the team. The other interesting point of course is that Tom's family was killed by Aboriginals in Queensland & he would also probably have been killed except he was away getting supplies. Definitely an interesting, complex & flawed individual.

Just can't admit you're wrong can you ? You made a statement that a player who finished 3rd in the Brownlow, playing as a mid is too slow to play as a mid. Its just a demonstrably incorrect statement and you are probably the only poster to believe that.

That's an outstanding painting mate. Should be hanging in a gallery. Congratulations.

Ian Stewart, Adrian Fletcher & Greg Williams all say hello. All were just as slow or slower than Gus & all ruled the centre square.

For people to point out obscure statistics as proof that a winger who got 6 touches actually played a good game is something new for me. Poor old Oskar Baker picked up 15 touches on a wing v North & was dropped.

Think the failure is masked by the team's success. He should be elite, up there with the best mids going round. Goodie is extremely stubborn. He stuck fat with Oscar McD for ages & persisted with Fritter & Harmes played out of position long after most supporters had worked it out.

Agree - he was terrible & has been ordinary all year. Gets good PR from his podcasts & is a nice guy which seems to mitigate the criticism he receives but has been a failure as a wing

Well Demonland posters are always making assumptions without any evidence. Its because they don't understand epistomology and logic. Hopefully it was just a brain fade by Majak a bit like Paddy McCartin earlier in the year.

Another long winded sermon. I never thought I'd see Demonland used to defend the entitled, pompous, windbag Yasmin Abdel Magied. I recall her on Q& A telling us Sharia Law was great for women & that Islam was actually a Femminist religion. Abdel

Maybe you spend too much time in la la land. You do realise that in Australia abortion facilities have been attacked and people working there killed. Women attending have been abused and called murderers. It got so bad that exclusion zones have now been set up outside abortion facilities. In the US of course its much worse and many health workers have been killed and abortion facilities bombed & been set on fire.

Mate they are not interested in fixing stuff. This forum provides platform where they can show they are smarter & more virtuous than the rest of us. And it allows them to deliver a long winded sermon. There's about half a dozen on here all furiously agreeing with each other in an echo chamber. And you find that they hardly ever actually address any difficult questions put to them. I would also wager that very few actually have any Indigenous friends which while its not a crime is certainly interesting in view of this conversation

Reading some of the absurd historical revisionism by some of the posters here is probably enough to push moderate readers into becoming conservatives. Especially those trying to impose 2020 morals & standards on previous generations and historical events. I always thought that part of Trump's appeal was a reaction to the more bats$h!t crazy views of the extreme left. Plenty are alive & well on Demonland.