Diamond_Jim

oh hell.........let's go for first and home finals all the way !

Ditto OD for a "pass mark" .... for a "good season" I have 6th and one finals win as my benchmark

so right OD .. we have a very low bar to beat

Ah.. is this the prelude to the "training the house down" thread. A normal MFC pre season ... hopefully not a portent for a normal MFC season.... Not sure I can take another 2016/2017

Don't recall "the depth" shining in 2017. Three Casey regulars have their AFL careers on the line. Same with Vandenberg.

Makes one think the AFL has an agenda.... and guess what.. MFC is not part of it

Have often wondered about the economics of SEN especially outside the AFL season. Talk back personality radio is a high price model by comparison to say Smooth FM where you just have one presenter to the whole of Australia who "pretends" to be in each city.

They did indeed.... I still have nightmares about the "rent a crowd" cheer squad dressed as orange bananas !

10 points for who they beat...

Have we....?? I see a lot of potential but none of them have taken a match by the scruff of the neck as yet.

Could be right there LdC.... Had a look at their membership site and they sell a special package to ACT members. Strangely enough the ACT could turn into a better market long term for GWS than Western Sydney. Manuka stadium is very well located and the ACT population of 400k (mostly middle income) is a reasonable base to work with as a one team city (Brumbies and Raiders aside). Also offers the possibility of road trips for Victorian based fans thus avoiding high priced air fares etc.

Vale the Zephyr for 2017 ... may he come back and sweep all before him in 2018. In the "old" days there would perhaps be talk of putting him over the jumps but alas no longer

HI Drunk'n.....Casey is 54k from the CBD. Most people thought Waverley was a fair drive but that was only 27k from the CBD. Most of the VFL grounds are within 10k of the CBD and have a lot of character. Williamstown on a sunny day is fantastic... a short train ride from the city and some great fish and chips. Coburg is similarly well located and the list goes on. For a CBD based team Casey was always going to be a hard sell. PS I think my favourite is a trip to South Melb market and then a short stroll to Port's oval. At $5 with your MFC membership it's a fun day out. Not sure why we can't share Punt Road with the Toiges on playing days (or perhaps Princes Park) and then have all players train at Gosch's paddock. I suspect the reality is that we get a cheap deal out at Casey and fan following/comfort is not a priority for this competition. A pity because it could be community football at its best with a little work.

Interesting figures for GWS membership. It shows a membership of over 20k for 2017 but I cannot remember them attracting crowds of much more than 13k for any of their home games not to mention their 15k for the final against West Coast. Must be some arbitrage system on GF tickets at play methinks.

I went to about 6 VFL games this year featuring Casey but did not venture out to the Casey ground itself. Really enjoyed the experience but based on the attendances it is hard to see a case being made for substantial investment unless the various grounds can be turned into multi use facilities. Not sure what the future is for VFL but it certainly needs some changes if it is not going to die a slow death.

The Shanghai game was a loss making game that was subsidised to the tune of around 2million by the AFL. That equates to a subsidy of around $200 per attendee. It was a flop and will probably be worse this year given the lack of novelty factor. Port may have grossed $4million but the costs were extremely high. The ones who made a little bit of money were the Suns but as they are an AFL funded club it was just one pocket paying the other.

Interesting Dr G... I very much agree Geelong is a god case in point. Would not be surprised if they play some of their bigger games down at Karidinia Park and make it a high priced ticket affair. I suspect that they would do better with 35k ticketed game as compared to 65k at the MCG where 20k or so are MCC and AFL members

In a country that carries the death sentence for drug trafficking this has to rate as a way out means of marriage proposal: IPOH: This Christmas Eve would be unforgettable for 20-year-old administrator Yew Kar Yee after she saw the love of her life hauled away by auxiliary police personnel for the possession of an illegal substance at the Sultan Azlan Shah airport. But that is not the reason why it is particularly memorable. She was overwhelmed with relief and happiness when she learned that it was all just a staged act, planned by her sweetheart Cheung Chan Choon, 30, who popped the big question to her. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2017/12/24/boyfriend-arrested-for-drugs-turns-out-to-be-an-act-for-proposal/ Merry Christmas guys from the Equator

Minneapolis StPaul has a population of around 3.3 million according to Wikipedia and the stadium capacity is 67k for the 8 or so games of NFL. Many years ago I lived in Washington DC. Even then tickets to a Redskins game were impossible to obtain. People literally left their entitlements by will to family members. I managed to get to a practice game two rounds before the start of the regular season. The stadium was full even for that. In the year before I went to live in DC, Congress passed a law requiring the NFL to broadcast matches into cities where they were played if no tickets were available. This was almost 15 years or so before the AFL allowed live broadcasts of the Grand Final when they were sell outs. We are very lucky with our ability to attend games and the price while not insubstantial is low by comparison to followers overseas. I often wonder how traditional supporters of the likes of Manchester United and Liverpool ever afford to follow their teams.

you post a selfie of yourself at the event of course.... No selfie...you were never there ! In Asia at present ... went to Star Wars movie last week. The pre movie ads featured two long ads for phones both highlighting their selfie taking ability not to mention the ability to photo shop your selfie. Nothing about whether it worked as a phone !!

why not... they had a good crowd for the darts except it ended a little abruptly when the big brawl started. In reality they would probably be at the stadium watching it on their phones.

From Wikipedia... Most commonly, eSports take the form of organized, multiplayer video game competitions, particularly between professional players. The most common video game genres associated with eSports are real-time strategy, fighting, first-person shooter (FPS), and multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA). Tournaments such as The International, the League of Legends World Championship, the Evolution Championship Series and the Intel Extreme Masters provide live broadcasts of the competition, and prize money to competitors. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESports The global eSports market generated US$325 million of revenue in 2015 and is expected to make $493 million in 2016; the global eSports audience in 2015 was 226 million people.

Read recently an article on virtual restaurants using Uber as the food selection/delivery method. The idea is that a well known operator sets up a stand alone kitchen in a low cost industrial area. Food is ordered online and then delivered by Uber. Uber takes a cut not only of the delivery fee but also the food itself. Apparently these kitchens can be set up for around 200k as against fitting out a top notch restaurant at around $1M. Also reduces the staff costs which are often a killer even in the best restaurants. This concept is a big step from take away which is a mere add on to an existing full service restaurant.

we can only go up (touch wood) after Round 23 2017.

I found the KB and Dr Turf coverage of the Spring Carnival really very good. (Apologies to the third presenter whose name escapes me but was also good.) Perfect background to wandering the garden etc and then watching the interesting races on TV. While they had a lot of in jokes it all seemed to work ... bit like listening to cricket commentators during a rain delay.