Diamond_Jim

another weekend with the 7/8 man bench Thursday selection is becoming increasingly irrelevant for the Sunday games. Pedersen, Spargo, Garlett, Tyson, Hannan ...and another two/three for the bench. I assume McDonald gets named on the ground and becomes a late withdrawal

Even if it's only a few weeks with the injury together with the Weid being out, Viney returning etc it would be nice for the team to settle down for a decent run together ....

almost instant these days if you have the doc (as I am sure they will have) there to read the scan results. A little longer if you want second opinions etc

If T Mac doesn't play which is likely given the precautionary attitude they will almost certainly adopt I would play Hogan forward and try to use Pedersen or Smith in Hogan's upfield role. IMO Hogan's upfield play has been one of the big pluses this year but until Tom Mac returned we just couldn't kick goals (which is the aim in AFL).

please don't give them ideas. TBH I now refuse to use the names simply because they change so often.

4-6 coming up.. it's always our luck

And of course there was the rise in the centre of the ground that meant if you were near the fence on the wing you couldn't see the other side of the ground. But of course there was the state of the art black (more brown) and white electronic scoreboard with video

welcome back

As an aside I was reading yesterday that Etihad (the airline) is not sailing as well as it once was with route reductions and a removal of the large government subsidy it receives from the Abu Dhabi government. Makes sense that they have stopped the sponsorship...

yep.. agree... the frequent name changes have made sure that it is forever known as Docklands. Hell.. I still think you get off at Spencer Street Station

5 goals last week for Casey with one miss IIRC

a very serious milestone indeed ....

Ethan ... that is almost worth a lifetime ban !!!

We've been busy singing the praises rightfully of a few players lately but I think the form of Nate Jones my be missed by some. His 2017 form was nothing flash but he is certainly back at his best this year if not better. No one deserves success more than Nathan.

Perhaps not any more... Hawks killed that when they cleaned out the "older players" two years ago. In their heyday the Hawks had a great internal ranking system that determined pay. It was simple ... no one got paid more than the best player in the club. Those days are well and truly gone. Now it's market forces.

Could not agree more. Visit Adelaide a lot for business. Crows supporters are "special." The closest we come to them in Victoria is probably the modern Hawthorn supporter. They really expect to win the flag most years. Port supporters may be rabid but at least they are philosophical (think Collingwood). Have not spent much time in Perth but I wonder if Eagles supporters are similar to those who support the Crows. Go Dees !!

The last big forward to sign was Joe Daniher in mid 2017. It was widely reported that the contract was $2M for three years. Equally it was acknowledged that Daniher had accepted significantly less than he could get on the open market. Daniher at the time was flying so to speak ... much the same as Tom Mac. On the flip side you have the ridiculous figure offered by the Dogs for the relatively untried forward in Tom Boyd of a reported $1M a year not to mention the figure of $1.4M that is being spoken of for Brisbane Tom Lynch.. Whatever we pay Tom Mac will also set an internal benchmark. One hopes that like Essendon we get a loyalty bonus similar to what they got from Daniher but frankly Tom Mac owes us nothing. As others have pointed out this is his "payday" contract and it is not as though he is 21/22 and can expect a few more bites at the ever appetising cherry.

Jonathan Brown in that article on Tom Mac Donald: “I’d be surprised if someone offered him more than a million dollars,” Brown said of the soon-to-be restricted free agent. Certainly hope he's right !! Little wonder the contract renewal is taking a while if those figures are being talked about.

burst speed (the first ten metres) was extremely important but with the press and congestion I suspect it is now more about maneuverability and agility.

Has there been any more updates on Weideman's injury .. thigh or calf muscle strain if I recall was the original report. Thanks

I think it was last year I noticed a lot more use of the tap by the MFC. It suits our present game plan but it also needs the recipient to be moving at the time of receipt if it is to work best. Many might feel that the worst disposal is the handball back into traffic to the flat footed team mate . If you think about it ..it's not always a bad move in that the kick to advantage is not presumably available and if the holder keeps the ball he will give away a free kick for holding the ball. By handballing to the static team mate who is immediately claimed the result is a ball up. The play which does not work as well anymore is the high looping handball. GWS at their best are experts at this but equally other clubs know they will do this and accordingly they do not over commit to the ball carrier and wait to attack the recipient and hopefully cause the turnover. I thought we were very good at causing the turnovers against Carlton even though we had a few turnovers ourselves.

And that's the point. The long term salary projections for Tom Mac have been thrown up in the air by his movement from a "reasonable backman" to a top 5/10 forward in the space of one season. Not impossible but it's not as though there is a bottomless pot of money to deal with contingencies. Everything comes at a cost.

Interesting... I think there are a few clubs that play the loyalty v the dollars thread very hard and included in those are Adelaide and West Coast. Hawthorn used to be masters at it but after they dumped the leaders at the end of 2016 I suspect they are very much back with the pack.

Love the nickname mono

I think this the key... the players mentioned will probably command together at least $300k per year more than we would have budgeted at the end of 2017. That $300k plus whatever say Tyson is being paid at present is probably what we have set aside for Gaff. So .. how do you find the money... pay cuts, future loading the youngsters, asking one of the well paid senior players to take a longer term view (coaching) and then there is the least attractive ... trading a good player for a draft pick and salary cap relief. Very hard decisions needed.