Lucifers Hero

2027 takes him to when he qualifies for free agency. Very happy with an 8 year commitment to the club. Can't ask for anything more than that. Hopefully, he will have a few more premierships. People can relax about the 'Go Home' factor!!

Typical Essendon: want their cake and eat it too!! DONS’ CAP PLANS FLAGGED Essendon reportedly has about $2 million of salary cap space, but is reluctant to trade away any of its top draft selections to lure rival players to the club. The Bombers’ stance - reported by the Herald Sun - comes as the side makes an impressive start to the season under new coach Brad Scott, winning three of its opening four games. Given the side is reluctant to trade its high-end draft picks, it leaves the door ajar for the pursuit of free agents. The Bombers are the only club with multiple restricted free agents this season, with midfielder Darcy Parish and defender Mason Redman yet to be re-signed beyond 2023. The decision of both will likely have a significant impact on the club’s salary cap. Well I hope they lose Parish so any compensation pick they get is diluted by the value of the FA they get in. They would be hoping for a 1st round pick for Parish. They might change the strategy outlined above if that gets watered down!! An insufferable club in every respect!!

Freo are probably thinking they should have let us have North's 2023 2nd rnd pick, rather than their own, in the Jackson trade.. Keep going as they are and will finish higher or near North. We end up with the better of the 2nd round picks!!!

Reported this morning that he is in contract talks with Freo. Freo letting their captain, 2 X brownlow medalist walk would be a crime far greater than what we did to Junior. It would take a long time for their culture to recover from letting Fyfe go.

I'm sure they will come to life. Last year they were one of the nastiest lot of comments of all the clubs.

That is because the Victorian big or successful clubs didn't want to play another Victorian big or successful club interstate. They want their fans/crowds at those marquis games back home. So the games this week are either 2022 finalists vs 2022 non finalists or Vic team vs i/state team! There was never an intention to have a marquee game in Adelaide. By quirk of the current ladder three games feature teams currently in the top 8.

😮 Just as well this isn't in

Very slim pickings so far from two fan websites! Preoccupation with selections and impact of Cyclone Lisa. Forecast shows Friday and Saturday in Adelaide as very wet. The oval will probably be a mud pile for our game. Not detecting much optimism. As and aside, training today is a good time for us to practice wet weather footy. Bomberblitz/Bigfooty After watching Melbourne yesterday this game is going to be ugly, they're are just so clean and tackle so hard, they are going to score so many goals from turnovers They were playing the Eagles, relax Don’t be so so silly. Stringer is no aerial threat, his strength is his bullocking work at ground level. Playing him as a marking target is an invitation to disaster, May and/or Lever would dominate him in the air. Good chance to pinch this one if wet, our small forwards are dangerous, in good supply and would be hard to stop if pill on the ground a lot. Have you not watched essendon in the past 15 years. Worst team in the wet by a country mile! Boggles the mind that anyone could have watched us over the past 20 years and think wet weather … yep that suits us. If the forecast stays true then I am taking out a mortgage on Friday arvo and putting every cent on the dees at $1.25. My Favourite (if I have to choose one) At least their match winner from last time we met will be sitting in the stands wearing an Essendon blazer this time… I'll check in later in the week and see if there is something interesting.

Maybe but by then their eastern seaboard talent will have moved back

While browsing the Ess forums for the 'What they are saying...' I came across this banter: Of course we are a chance, but we have had the easiest draw in the comp so far, and when we played a half decent team in the saints…we lost. I think we could stay with them for a qtr or so, but then they’ll over power us. Out: Weid, Davey if injured In: filthy weather. Hobbs, Snelling and grabbers into the forward line. No long bombs How do the Dees generally handle wet weather footy? You would think well based on their contested ball winning ability. However I do remember they drew to hawthorn in the wet in 2021 when they were premiers and hawks were near bottom. Better than us. If the weather info is correct, I hope we are training our wet weather tactics with a greasy, heavy football. We have been caught out several times in the last few years by slippery conditions. With this weather forecast and Weideman and Wright out it will be interesting to see how man tall players we take into the game.

It is an assumption on my part. But reported info: Fyfe didn't want to relinquish captaincy Brayshaw coveted the captaincy but was overlooked Brayshaw contract signed before he became 'elite' for less dollars than he would now be getting Mundy didn't want to retire. Fyfe doesn't want to play fwd Jackson doesn't like to play fwd Please don't ask for the articles. I'll leave it to posters to do their own research. My guesswork is: how the above and Jackson's trade, $, list impact affect other players and what they might earn. To me that is reasonable 'deductive' reasoning.

I saw that. It looked a very meek defence of a 20 year old kid who was under seige. I would imagine Goodwin's commentary would be very different if it was one of our players under seige.

As I said, Jackson looks like a 'Captain's Call' by Bell and they are reaping the full impact: unbalance list, unhappy players, potential sal cap issues etc. I'm not sure they have misread where the game is at. Longmuir was on the way to a successful game plan etc. Last year they worked on 'defence' and often kept teams to around 10 goals: the same goal our defence used as a criteria. They had a good 'contest' aspect to their game plan and he was building the next phase 'atttack/'offence' into this year. However, he lost is fwd line and it has all gone off the rails for the reasons I have mentioned several times: lack of on field leaders, decimated list, lack of experienced players, disgruntled players etc

Unlike some other coaches recently who have defended players (Fagan/Daniher, McCrae/De Goey) I've heard little from Longmuir defending Jackson. Guessing that he thought the impact on the experience/age profile of their list wasn't worth it. So most likely that Jackson was a 'captain's pick' by Bell. Freo has the feel of the Schwartz/Connolly era: meddling in list management, retiring Mundy 'early' is like mfc retiring Junior, demoting Fyfe like mfc and Green. Freo seem to think that much loved players make good football administrators; something many clubs including ours have fallen for. They have learnt little from other clubs' mistakes!! The more I learn about them the more it looks like they have messed up a golden opportunity to regularly contend at the pointy end.

We think alike rpfc! Buried in the op at the top of this thread were my thoughts 6 months ago: My thoughts haven't changed much since. Like you Kozzie and Rivers are still my priorities. I would now add Chandler to that list, especially if we lose Kozzie. What might help the OOC players is that Harmes and Tomlinson (OOC 2024) explored options last year and might do so again. It would be a shame if we lost them, JJ or ANB but realistically we have or are training the replacements. And if they get regular games or better money good on them as it would be the only reason they would leave. I'm pleased for Hunt, Baker, Bedford and Weideman who are getting regular senior games at their new clubs. So I'm now fairly pragmatic about loosing players. It hurt me deeply to lose my =#1 fave, Hunt but deep down, I knew it was for the best. We need to keep making room for the talent coming through and only a handful of players are 'non-tradeable'. And we have a great draft hand this year to use at the draft or trade in high end talent so we need to shed players each year. We no longer have players who aren't AFL standard so the players we lose won't be delistings but we need to move players on and trades are the most likely way to turn over 5 to 8 players each year.

Welcome back Kozzie!!

I guess 'boo stadium' will be out in full force today. They were complaining about the umpires in their 'game day' thread. Hopefully some of the WA fans we picked up in 2021 come out and cheer for us.

We could almost pencil the Saints in to make the 8. They've won four (Freo, WBD, Ess and GCS) and have 2xHawks, 2xNorth, 1xGCS and 1xWCE to go. A dream fixture!! Very good chance they will win all those, especially as they get more players back, giving them 10 wins. Only need to pinch a couple more to make the 8, which may require an 'extra' win than as there are 23 games this season.

Yes, a lot of the comments were identical to pre 2018 DL

Did this info/idea come from my post in the Freo Death Riding thread!?

Jayden must be really hurting inside to be playing against the dees. Really feel for him, especially being my =#1 fave player since he started❤️. Hope he has a good game, not good enough to be BOG but enough to make him happy.

If computer is connected to the tv the Casey game will also be on the big screen.

Was their game that far different from an impact point of view. Someone took their main playmaker, Warner, out of the game. It was hard to see who that was at the ground. Can't help but think it was Sparrow's job to run with him. If so he made a big contribution to our win. Did anyone see who was on Warner for most of the game if not Sparrow?

With all their list changes there hasn't been much club-to-player loyalty so one wonders how that and their lackluster performance this year affects player-to-club loyalty. They are lucky they signed Brayshaw to 2025 and Serong and Hayden to 2027. As Pearce is just 27, I don't see much chance of Brayshaw being captain in the foreseeable future. Also there was an article saying when he signed his last contract it was for less than he would have a year or two later. There is every chance Serong and Young are getting very good $$$ as they re-signed last year. Unless Freo upped Andy's $$ last year he has a few reasons to be unhappy. Andy will be a Free Agent in 2025. Its time for mfc to go to work on him and get him to join Gus We can build our next gen midfield around Andy!

In addition to the 'deeestruction' 🙂 of their list Freo have kicked a second own goal: Leadership team. Brayshaw was quite vocal about wanting to be captain. Captaincy went to Pearce. Does anyone know who he is? Brayshaw is a shadow of his 2022 self; peeved at being overlooked, perhaps? O'Meara is traded in and goes straight into the Leadership team. Other noses out of joint, perhaps? Mundy wanted to stay but he was moved on. Bitter taste with the players? They are rudderless on field with seemingly unhappy campers out there. Add the loss of valued teammates to make room for Jackson and his mega $$$$ it is easy to see the green envy 🤢 monster kick in. They need an attitude change, fast. But alas I feel it is already too late to redeem this season. Their chance to bank a few wins is all but gone.