Diamond_Jim

Interested to hear your experiences with the Optus streaming product. Have seen a few articles in the media saying it has some problems. Anybody getting good coverage on ADSL and how is it when you play it on a big screen .. say 70 inches. Must say at $15 you cannot complain about the price if the product is good. The TV here in my Kazan apartment is a 17inch cathode tube model which doesn't make for optimum viewing. Will head out to watch the bigger games. Our remaining games in Kazan all start at 9pm local time which will make for late nights ?

Welcome PT.... it's great to see another face on the board. Peru v Denmark... what can one say... Peru should/could have won 3-1 but they lost 1-0. Socceroos v Denmark..the game of our tournament ? Beat Denmark and who knows !!

The VAR was like a kick in the guts... At the ground you see the ref wave play on... you sigh with relief and then a minute later when the ball goes over the line for a regulation out all hell breaks loose. You see nothing on the screen until maybe 3-5 minutes later. Some rough justice with the hand ball call. We had great seats .. 10 rows from the fence (just right for seeing over the dugouts) and on about the 25 metre line. Without any running track or the like the view was fantastic. I'll post a little more about atmosphere another day. It was different perhaps from what I had expected.

It was enormous ..at least three times the French support. We had at least 10k of the 40k crowd and the Russians who made up about half the crowd were mainly behind the socceroos. A point would have been so good for the Aussies. The clock moved so slowly from that 75 minute mark. Not sure if it is the same at A league but the scoreboard does not count down the injury time so I was doing a lot of watch checking during that 5 minutes of injury time.

Fantastic atmosphere at the stadium... great game. France full of individual brilliance but we played as the better team perhaps. We have avoided the opening round thrashing of the last two world cups... all in front of us now. Interested to hear from you experts as to whether you think we played differently today than we might have under Ange. Today was not the time for Tim C in my opinion.We simply didn't have enough of the supply he needs. My son is hoping for an Argentine draw with Iceland as that way the round of 16 match we are scheduled to watch could be France v Argentina. That Spain V Portugal draw has pretty well done for the other teams in that group bar some big upsets. Cheers and great to interact.

After the two relatively dour early games the Spain v Portugal match was one for the ages. The goal by the lone Spanish player against two defenders and the keeper was astounding. Blue skies and sun here in Kazan with a match commencement temp of around 17... a perfect day for football

It's building in Kazan. Summer is coming and after a week of 14 it hits 18 tomorrow !! My son has headed for the bars of Bauman street which will be full of Australians. I just realised that although I have seen many Aussies I am yet to see a Frenchman. Perhaps they are waiting for the knock out phase a la Hawthorn supporters. Both games so far today decided almost at the death. O that own goal by Morocco(Met a lovely Moroccan couple based in Dubai while standing in the Aeroflot check in queue in Moscow... they must not be happy.) Spain v Portugal kicks off in an hour. I am becoming an expert (not) in the Russian TV commentary.

Wow... what can one say... Saudi Arabia thrashed by the unranked home team. KSA were so bad ... even when they were 3-0 down they couldn't get any attacking play going. Could Russia have the fairy tale of making it out of the group stage. Egypt v Uruguay tomorrow completes Group A's opening round.

Overcast in Kazan and around 16 degrees. I am staying in what they call the new city which is over the river from the old Kazan. The good thing is that it is on the same side of the river as the stadium and the fan zone which are both within walking distance. As is my norm I am doing airbnb's and the Russian apartments have proved to be interesting and different. I think it is to keep out the cold but the street doors to the apartments are dual chambered solid steel doors that one opens with a magnetic key disc. Then the apartment itself has two more doors with strange keys. Would definitely be challenging after a night of over indulgence. Went to the big supermarket this morning. Much the same as ours with some different products. Try as I might I couldn't find the margarine.What took my eye though was the entire supermarket aisle (one side) of different vodkas!! My son arrives from Melbourne tomorrow in time for the opening match in Kazan. Tonight I will go off to the fan zone to watch the opening game of Russia v Saudi Arabia. Being the opening game it may be full in which case I am sure I will find somewhere to enjoy the world's beautiful game.

Kind of understand the conflict of interest but it seems to be an over reaction. Hard to think of it as other than chest thumping. Mind you as our Ange demonstrated the coaches can be as prickly as the Associations.

A Night at the Bolshoi... When in Moscow one does what the Muscovites do. The Bolshoi ballet is certainly no longer the "people's ballet" with tickets at a few roubles but it was worth the money to see this wonderful company. I'm no follower of ballet so there was a lot of googling beforehand to work out what was going to happen.Even with my prior research I nearly left before it finished.How you may ask.... well after about two hours or more we got to a spot where the whole cast took a bow etc with everyone clapping etc as they do at the end of a show. Strange I thought they haven't done the "Shade dance" which this ballet is famous for. Off to pick up my backpack from the cloak room and the Russian matron said, "Not Finished". Back I went and watched the last act. It seems that as many of the dancers don't appear in the final act those not needed take their bow mid show and go home !! The ballet was called La Bayadere one which the Bolshoi made famous and the spectacle of the final act as the corps de ballet descends from shade into light is stunning. To ballet aficionados it rivals swan lake as one of "the" scenes in ballet. While the dancing was great , the theatre itself is a star. Completely renovated and re-opened in recent years it looks like when it was visited by the czars. A great night and worth the obscene price. And yes .. it went for three and a half hours!!! Arrived in Kazan today ...more on this city almost bordering Asia tomorrow.....( The Aussie training camp is behind a very high wall so no free views.)

Sure did ... and very good it was. My favourite however was at the Central market where they sold little dishes like Tapas and ice cold draught beer. The fresh sardines were delightful. In Moscow the Doner Kebabs are an artform and are everywhere.

Just a little more: Russia as you all know is an enormous country. Luckily the games are being played in the western third of the country but that area is probably at least one half the size of Australia. The days are long. In Moscow it's sunrise at around 3:30 am and sunset somewhere after 9pm. The night games start at 9pm local time presumably to go into Europe at prime time of 8pm. There are no real traditional Russian bars. There used to be vodka joints but they have been largely replaced by sports bars and themed bars .. Irish, Bavarian Belgian .. you name it. There are very nice tea shops that sell beer and food at quite reasonable prices.

Greetings from an overcast Moscow where the temperature is a a balmy 14 degrees or so. The weather next week is supposed to improve to low twenties which should be pleasant. Today, June 12 is Russia Day. It's a public holiday where people look for something to do but there's not much on. (Think Moomba). The day commemorates the announcement of Russia as a country or put another way the end of the Soviet Union. When you think about it that way you can understand why most don't think of it as a great day of celebration. The traditional May day is way bigger. Moscow is a very impressive city and I can thoroughly recommend some time here. With the devaluation of the rouble it's not too expensive although my ticket for the Bolshoi ballet tonight was serious money. Security is everywhere but the people and police are very pleasant. Nowhere near like the officious stereotype. Food is good but the local food is way outnumbered by just about every franchise you can think of. KFC and McDonalds have pride of place at the entry to Red Square !! Tomorrow I head to Kazan the capital of Tatarstan and my base for the next three weeks.

agree ... I had posted to point that out and then noticed the question marks on the posts above... totally confused me at first. As one can't delete anymore I went for ??? Cannot see him getting the nod.... his time will come I am sure as will Oskar Baker's

???

Understand...could have made myself clearer... they all play the same/similar position in different ways

Interesting with Bugg, Garlett and Kent in the seconds and Spargo playing well. Hard to see us keeping all four. Dion J is another on the cusp. The others almost answer themselves save for Balic who may choose to walk if he does not think he is on track for a senior spot.

I suppose that is the reason he would be offered for trade this year if he wants to go. If Freo wait until next year he could just refuse a contract and put a price on his head assuming his desired club finishes low enough on the ladder. BTW I assume the draft picks for the delisted players etc are not tradeable. Would not be hard to manipulate the system if they were. PS: I'd never heard of Ed Langdon before today !!

How many games do we have at the MCG post bye. A membership package that made those available irrespective of whether it is home or away might be a very good seller especially if it was marketed of the back of a QB win ....no emails before the game from the club please!! Realistically I hope the promotions people are working at it because if we win on QB the lid will really be off.

As a restricted free agent Gaff will probably come at a high price simply because the likes of North Melbourne and St Kilda will bid up his dollar price. (Correct me if I'm wrong but I assume Eagles only have to match the price of the club he wants to go to. In other words if there are three clubs bidding for him and he picks the lowest offer it is that offer that the Eagles must match.) From today's Age: "Melbourne, despite the club’s enviable young list, have the salary-cap space to make a strong bid for free agent Andrew Gaff should the star West Coast midfielder decide to come back to Victoria. The Demons, who successfully fended off other Melbourne rivals to land Jake Lever last year, are understood to have enough room in their salary cap to have a tilt at Gaff – or another seasoned recruit – despite having their own free agent, Tom McDonald, still to sign and the emerging Angus Brayshaw out of contract." https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/demons-have-room-for-andrew-gaff-20180529-p4zi9a.html

Bugg is mad if he doesn't start looking for another club. He's on the cusp but it seems he is out of favour. I'm sure both he and his manager are doing the rounds looking at where he would fit on the other lists. Balic may not be the easy re-sign either if he continues to perform at VFL level and can't crack the senior team. Good problem to have when players are too good for VFL but can't make the senior team. Could also see Stretch ask for a trade at year's end. At least we have the "slowing down" of Lewis and Vince to offer as hope to some of the up and comers.

Leaving for Russia this weekend. Having a few days in Moscow on the way to Kazan so I will try and give you some colour pieces as I travel. Our tickets arrived this week.. luckily as I was not looking forward to having to collect them in Russia. As one poster put up on another forum... What could you expect when I am in Australia going to a game in Russia buying tickets from an organisation based in Switzerland that has them printed in Italy... what could go wrong.

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.

yeaa!! let's get it to the magic million You do realise the other clubs play games to up the price of the retaining club