Diamond_Jim

wonderful news ... hope he plays a blinder !!

Would be interesting to know what real attempts are made to co-ordinate the AFL/VFL schedules. Not sure what the clubs prefer and putting aside interstate games and short breaks it would be good from a supporter viewpoint if there was no clash between the competitions at club level. Harder I know but it would be good for the schedules to be synched occasionally from an opponent aspect. Would be great to head out today for example to Box Hill Oval to see the Demons play the Hawks. Not whinging but the VFL has to work harder at its competition. What about a free youtube channel with all the non televised games. Sure there is a cost but you are not talking sheep stations especially if you used two or three automated camera positions for each match.

St Kilda remind me a little of North.... never the perpetual basket case like a team we all know Imagine having three or four (now only two) senior players that are automatic selections for 15 odd years thus allowing the luxury of building the team around them. Wins against Hawthorn and GWS in consecutive weeks is not bad..... Hopefully the MFC can show us similar strengths over the next six weeks. On the game Mumford was not dominant in the ruck and GWS just didn't take those key marks like they did against the Bulldogs.

Do you barrack for Geelong Ted because a Geelong supporter just rang into the 3AW footy show with the same point. A few minutes later the commentators came up with "Tom Boyd at the Bulldogs"

Saints have 4 Friday night games this year MFC have one.... time to win some respect this season

Participation does not always equal following Basketball is the classic example.... one of the highest participation sports among youngsters but following is almost non existent Soccer is the one that will take off if anything ever does Soccer is the perfect sport in that it can be played by almost any number of people at varying skill levels with minimal facilities required Just think of the park leagues with a few backpacks as the goals

Norman Wisdom is one of my favourites .... scintillating mid fielder:

The Donations are now just a little over $2400 of the desired $3000 Come on let's get it going and give Andrew and Nasher a great weekend and a big thank you for this wonderful site

Interesting season developing perhaps.... last year the top seven or so were almost decided by round 8 approximately given the gap between those teams and the rest. Much harder to get a feel for how the ladder will look around Round 15 let alone 22/23. Even trying to pick one team who cannot possibly make the 8 at this stage is not an easy task save perhaps for Carlton. For what it is worth I am prepared to identify the following in order of my certainty: Carlton Brisbane Freo Collingwood Then you throw in the Swans, Hawthorn and North who despite being out of form and perhaps on the way down could come good.

Might head along to Docklands tonight to watch the Saints and GWS. Unlike last week it should not be too hard to find a seat. Could be a good game and GWS skills (even if you hate em) should be on show under the roof. Pity Mc Cartin is not playing.. would like to see him first hand There are a few games on this weekend that will tell us a bit more about the season: Port v WCE WB v Richmond Syd v Brisbane Freo v Essendon

know how they must have felt......... hell I am sick of being empathetic !!

Beware the Old Lion or in this case the Old Hawk.... they may be slower but they still know all the tricks Need to kick straight and win our share of clearances. MFC have taught us never to be confident DubDee .... it's the emotional blanket we all wear to protect us against abject disappointment

bit early for that call... Freo send their regards We need this win and say 3 more out of the following five which would have us at 7-5 half way through the season. The unknown is how the structure holds up without Gawn and Spencer. The Bombers ruckman was not exactly on fire so our Pedersen and others game plan is yet to be put to a real test.

Cost of $4Million to stage this game Crowd maximum 11, 000 with minimal tv audience (and probably given to the network for no charge) http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/sport/afl/teams/port-adelaide/china-game-will-leave-no-red-ink-for-power-says-keith-thomas/news-story/956aeddd60ed97a1c8138c050329affd I'm sure there is a good deal in here for some people but I am sure it is not the AFL

Thanks fat Tony... I thought that might be the case As an aside what was the difference with Hurley's positioning in the first and second half. In the first half he was loose in our defence but he seemed far less effective in the second half.

Last week we played O Mac and Frost so I assume we played T Mac as an extra (somewhere) or did I miss a backman who was absent last week. So many changes !!

Ok... 14 pages and now Wednesday night It seems Hogan will play So who goes out for Hogan? Most posts seem to be suggesting a small.... JKH or ANB which is interesting. Does Oscar Mac hold his place? Has Wagner done enough to replace Melksham Will Stretch return? Would hate to be a selector because I have no real idea given the up and down form of this team.

The Chinese money man (sponsor) who is substantially underwriting the costs was/is a partner of Gina Rinehart in the acquisition of a major (massive) tract of rural land in Australia. Their first attempt to buy the land was rejected on National interests grounds. IIRC the second attempt was approved after a rejigging of the shareholding in the JV vehicle to increase the Australian shareholding. The game sponsorship was announced between the failed bid and the one that was approved. Not suggesting anything untoward but if a foreigner is trying to curry favour with a government the sponsorship of a major sporting event is a good place to start.

E Games have now been added to the Asian games as a sport Now we need to get AFL as a sub category of those E games and we are well on our way to global domination

Good points. Hockey did try something a few years back by way of an IPL type tournament which I think they were trying to leverage into India. Cricket is interesting... they get the crowds for the IPL but the test crowds are virtually nil. The recent Australian v India series was played in the equivalent of regional centres (think Ballarat, Bendigo etc). Was thinking of going to a test or two but there was little on the internet for the self traveller so I gave it a miss. bad decision !! Would be interested to hear from any about why Port thought this to be a wise business opportunity.

Strangely enough the WA teams are perhaps probably the best placed to spearhead a push into Asia. WA is in the same timezone as Beijing and by air it is 2-3 hours closer I have always thought it strange that WA supporters have for years been willing to accept their game start times based to suit Eastern Sates TV times

Please feel free to discuss the attempts of other sports to crack foreign markets. One that interests me is soccer and India. One billion plus people ... a middle class of around 150 million English speaking... a marketers dream... but no sport has really cracked it. The EPL plays with Asia but no team has played for premiership points as I understand it. Indeed few businesses have cracked the Indian market. NFL have been pushing into Europe via the UK with two or more games there a year. From a crowd attendance viewpoint they appear to be successful. Interesting how it is done. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NFL_International_Series

As a frequent Asian traveller I am very interested in the experiment of taking a game to China. My first thought is that it is mainly a property development/ political influence play that like a meteor will shine at best for a few moments but I could be wrong. Would be very interested to hear the thoughts of others and particularly that of the Rev as to the coverage if any the game is getting in China. Good to see that Port lost the Jumper War http://www.afl.com.au/news/2017-05-01/suns-get-green-light-on-red-jumper-for-china

we are both right... it was called Fountain Lakes in the TV series but it was filmed at Fountain Gate https://moviemaps.org/movies/41

Considering the population of Victoria is around 5.7 million and at least 70% of Victorians would have a team to support that averages out at around 400,000 per club. If you look at the bigger clubs they have memberships of around 1.5 times our levels so we probably now have 300,000 followers while the big clubs have around 500,000. Big numbers but of course only a small number are active followers let alone members