Lucifers Hero

WOW. Both Stretch and ANB start on the ground. A vote of confidence in the young lads! Hope they have fun, listen to the coaches and have really good games.

Interesting. If Carlton end up 18th they could take him in the preseason draft with their first pick, so no trade value for us. I get that he wants more AFL game time. But he would be going from the 'frying pan to the fire' and spend another 5 years at a bottom of the ladder team. If that is what he wants so be it. Hopefully, he would do the right thing by us and ask to be traded to Carlton. His recent AFL games may be to say 'ok, this is what you wanted; he is your chance to show what you can do'. But it may be to 'showcase' him to other teams that generates trade competition at eos. (eg WB, EFC need a ruckman) It would really peeve me tho if he went to Carlton and we get zip in return.

Not meaning to criticise but the way Max King is going he is a very similar type. Max, soon to be 20, 200cm, can kick a goal. (Kicked 5 today with Scoprions) Just needs some experience! Max can be our Mitch Clark, or Kurt Tippet or ...

Looks like King and Harmes are well on the way to earning an upgrade from rookies to the main list at eos! It might take a couple of years but King could be the Clark replacement to line up with Hogan. These two have huge upside so both bode well for the future! All the others have reached or gone past their peak.

Harmes and King playing well at Casey so at this rate we may need to upgrade 3 rookies: Vandenberg, King and Harmes! Each is certainly making a case for upgrade. Otherwise another team might pinch King and Harmes!

3 Qtr time. Freo 5.11.41 vs GCS 5.2.32 Freo kicking keeping GCS in the game. Even so Dockers seem to have lost their gloss over recent weeks. Shame it wasn't when we played them. Edit: Dockers hang on to win by 7 pts ...GCS have 16 players out

He played under Neeld for half a season for a handful of games. Hopefully we can trade him but his value is limited: Is 27 with a calf injury since 2011 so can't play a full season. Has averaged 1 goal/game with MFC (1.2 at Pies)...poor for even for the 3rd forward. Being paid over $500K pa (unless contract front-ended). Works very, very hard but for very little impact. So, can we get anything for him? Doubt it...steak knives maybe (and we would still have to pay part of his salary). We are stuck with him...a depth player till end of contract in 2016.

WOW! MFCSS in the extreme! Just wish the kid well then que sera, sera

Thanks ttwt...have fixed post...memory not so good in the mornings!

A timely article by Garry Lyon on injuries: http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/afl-injuries-the-hurt-factor-that-no-one-wants-to-talk-about-20150612-ghmghg.html According to AFL injury list (a few minor changes since publishing): Brisb 18, Cats 16, Suns 14, Saints 1, Dees 7 (list adjusted for Dawes/JKH in and Garland out), Others 4 to 9 Ours are Garland, Vandenberg, Trengrove, Salem, Petracca, Kent, Frost I see every reason to be very conservative with their recovery. If we rush them back players breakdown again sometimes with dire results (Trengrove/Clarke). Player welfare is also an issue...a quote from Judd this week: "... he recently literally felt nauseous at the thought of having to play sore." I like that we are looking after our players especially the young guys. Misson and medics are doing fine! On the positive side it gives experienced players a chance to show why they should stay on the list and new recruits a chance to get a taste of AFL.

When a club 'rebuilds' or decides to 'play the kids' fringe players will, fairly or unfairly, miss out. Some get delisted (Cross, Chapman) and picked up by another club, some get traded (Cooney, Podsiardly) some stay on the list as depth. Its all a natural part of every club's list management and there will be aggrieved players. We have an unusual number of inexperienced players who need to be developed and when ready play senior games. That is not good for the more senior players that aren't regular 22. Player development and experience will be given priority and whether it is Roos or Goodwin it is what I would expect and want them to do.

An interesting/strange bench: I/C: Billy Stretch, Viv Michie, Aidan Riley, Alex Neal-Bullen Special moment for ANB and Stretch when they go out together (and when they relay the ball down the middle to get ANB his first goal! )

Purple actually has something decent to say about a Dees player: Melbourne we're talking about Sam Mitchell ... ... we pose this question: is his title as best exponent of an opposite foot kick under threat? Yep, it is. Angus Brayshaw has arrived. The media have not been our back to much of late. I guess there are other fish to fry (Suns, bombers, blues, lions). Nice to see other clubs getting some heat. But also we have been playing some good footy so there is no reason for the media to beat up on us.

BB, here is Toumpas MFC history: Year 1: Development year played 14 games - not bad for 1st year. BTW MFC forgot the development part. Year 2. Development year Played 4 games, then went to Casey then missed half the season injured (appendix I think) Year 3. Worked bl..dy hard on his weaknesses, has played 6 games. Has earnt his spot!! Looks a decent track record in really difficult circumstances!

Terlich Neal-Bullen Newton Stretch Grimes Spencer Michie All named in the Dees squad for i/c options but also in starting 22 for Casey who play on Saturday so we will know early who will get a run on Sunday.

Hip hip hooray!

The whole squad is: Melbourne team: round 11 B: Daniel Cross, Tom McDonald, Jack Fitzpatrick HB: Jeremy Howe, Lynden Dunn, Neville Jetta C: Jimmy Toumpas, Dom Tyson, Heritier Lumumba HF: Jack Watts, Cam Pedersen, Jack Viney F: Jeff Garlett, Jesse Hogan, Angus Brayshaw FOLL: Max Gawn, Nathan Jones, Bernie Vince I/C (from): Billy Stretch, Viv Michie, Aidan Riley, Alex Neal-Bullen, Jack Grimes, Jake Spencer, Dean Terlich IN: Jack Grimes, Dean Terlich, Jake Spencer, Viv Michie, Dom Tyson, Alex Neal-Bullen, Billy Stretch OUT: Colin Garland (hand), Aaron vandenBerg (hamstring), Ben Newton, Matt Jones Surprised to see Terlich. Guess he deserves the right to show what he can do to keep his place on the list. If he plays hope he has a good game Spencer must be a backup for an injury otherwise far too tall. Hope either ANB or Stretch get a run

Pretty much agree. Grimes, Terlich and Spencer are contracted till 2017. Grimes has probably done enough to stay as depth. He may request a trade to play more seniors. Tigers, Ess, Bulldogs might be interested. Spencer has trade currency as a few clubs looking for ruckman eg Ess and Bulldogs Howe may opt to go. Garland may be gone as UFA. Would add Dawes for a trade (admit to my bias here). Riley (and maybe Mitchie) is OOC this year so they are vulnerable. That is 10-12 changes before any serious trading.

Unfortunately for us other teams would have noticed his courage and the resilience he has shown over the years. The sooner he/we sign a contract the better.

Thats a good pick up Akum. We are getting close to the 10-12 on-ballers that top teams have. Add to those 5 named: Salem, Brayshaw, Petracca, Vandenberg. All are B graders, some to become B+/A/elite. Add ANB, Stretch and a B+ trade in this year. That is 12 and an outstanding list! Then there are the smokies/depth in Harmes, Hunt, Newton and include Jetta and JKH as on-ballers. So while delighted with the development of our on-ballers we need a ruckman of equal/better quality who can ruck against all comers week in week out while King develops. Re the survey, I would keep Gawn as back-up/depth but trade-in the 'first choice ruckman'. As another poster noted the Freo WAFL ruckman not getting a game could be a happy hunting ground! Also, Freo have stockpiled on their list, on-ballers (some Vics) who can't get a seniors game who might be tempted across the nullabor! Edit: forgot Kent!

He won't get away with it. He has already lost the players...they know who really dropped them in this cesspool. It is only a matter of time before Hird loses his supporters. Their signs won't say 'Stand by Hird'. It will be: 'Bye, Bye, Hird'!!

Misson: Surprise from the game: Garland broke his hand in first qtr an dplayed whole game with broken hand. Had surgery yesterday Huge effort. Team player extraordinaire!!

Jolly asked to be traded because he couldn't get a game with White in the team Martin was traded for non-football reasons. Max lacks a tank, in part because he smokes (or has recently given up). If Max's about to expire contract isn't renewed soon it would suggest he doesn't feature highly in clubs plans. The next month or two will tell.

We need a ruckman to match the class of our budding midfield ala GWS. So, we need to trade in a 'first choice' ruckman. Then keep one of Gawn, Spencer, (or Fitzy ?) as depth while King develops. Our ruckman have good currency: someone said WB interested in Fitzy, Ess only have a C grade. So can't vote for any of the 3 options.

Roos strategy was to keep Cross as our extra back. Crikey, he had to Cloke was tearing us apart! Then our mids and forwards had to work hard to get fwd, man up on Oxley and 'bring the ball to ground'. One might ask why wasn't Cross as effective as Oxley? Answer: Pies mids and fwds worked harder to get fwd, man up on Cross and 'bring the ball to ground'. Sound familiar. They did what our players didn't. They were also smarter on how they moved the ball fwd to nullify Cross. It wasn't poor coaching. Roos strategy was sound. The players didn't execute it. They didn't work hard enough. The 'players didn't listen comment' was possible the kindest thing he could say in public. Everyone learnt some lessons.