Deecisive

Anthony and Freo have come to an amicable decision for him to get out of his 3 year contract early, I wonder what Neeld thinks of him?

How did Davis and Jetta train?

I suspect MFC has committed to wines, believing Toupas was taken. Wines maybe a better fit for what Neeld wants from his midfield. We are after the best player for MFC not the best player available.

I think if you put any club who got priority draft picks under the microscope like they are doing with MFC then you will find much the same behavior, mixed emotions about winning, resting players, jokes about loosing, speculating about who you will get with your priority pick well in advance of the end of the season, people who have left the club complaining, etc.. Which is why i think we see no real criticism from other clubs etc other than from JKennett, because they know what they themselves did and dont really want any investigations on them. Broke Mclean opened pandora's box to not just tanking issues but general scrutinized for unfair behavior Juddies VISY deal was an obvious unfair advantage provided to Carlton. I would love investigators to start to ask about the Kruzer cup, if so I wonder how well popular Broke will be with the blues.

New FB dept regime and draft team are taking mainly players that can play now, not skinny kids who could be great in a few years after they have had time to build a body and develop. The highlight reels of a lot of players look good, I would expect that our draft team would have looked at draft camp results, match stats, health, viewed all the video there is to view, seen matches and interviewed their prime candidates. I am extremely pleased with the players we have gotten so far, Neeld and team have done a great job getting the recruits they have while a specter of potentially loosing draft picks from the background tanking investigation was going on in the background. I cannot wait to see who we land, and the Dees begin the 2013 season.

So the age has to trawl social media sites now to try to splatter mud on the dees, i doubt this is of any interest to anyone.

Melbourne players fitness was pretty poor in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 and that the MFC was not happy with Adam Paulo hence why they sacked him. but then news items like melbourne not happy with fitness coach does not attract the attention that fitness coach not happy with MFC does.

Major list overhaul has seen a lot of dead wood and poor performers moved on. New work ethic being instilled into existing players and new players recruited in part for their work ethics. Greater leadership and mentoring with Rodan and others buddying with other younger players to encourage and assist in their development. Skills are the key area that we need to address, if we can reduce turnovers in our backline and get more of the ball in the forward line, both achievable with the players we have we will a lot more games. Our draw is not as hard as some, in the end injuries will play a part on the finals campaign for all sides, we now have added depth to cover the loss of key players like Clarke. I think we are good chance to make the top 8, after that who knows. Confidence and camaraderie and a desire to show CW and others what we can do could see us though. Go DEES

Rumour has it that CW is working on another story that melbourne gave players mandarines instead or oranges in the last two games at 3 quarter time and that they watered down the gaterade. The orangeboy and drinks attendants have been interviewed 3 times each.

the leadership team should be something that all players should be aspiring to attain, membership must be earned and deserved otherwise it erodes its value. So I am happy with what ever measure they use except for age. Age should be no barrier, i.e. either too young or too old. If Viney or Rodan are the best men for the job then go so be it.

we have pick 3 in the psd so will are likely to use that in preference to a high pick in the national draft.

I agree with the Dawes and Rodan - we need guys with experience to help show the way, and help shoulder the responsibility

Jetta has not really set the world on fire, he would have to be being considered to be dropped. and macdonald while serviceable could be redundant with Gillies arriving. I would think how they conduct themselves at training in the next week or so will have a big bearing on their future.

I like Rivers a lot but not sure he can hold down fullback like scarlet, i think Geelong may have gotten this one wrong.

Taking a legal position Melbourne has now signaled to the AFL that we are not going to line down and be penalized for something all clubs have done. And what have they done. They played players in new positions, sent players for operations, rested players, etc. That is not tanking. That is trying to squeeze extra effort out of players and to help teach them the game they know the season is over for them and are trying new things for the next year. I dont believe any club has asked their players to not play, and I doubt that there are any players out there who throw games on the hope that they may get some new 18 old superstar coming in to take their place. Every player knows they are playing for the spot on the roster so everyone would be playing not only for the club but to ensure they are not given the flick at the end of the year. The AFL's investigator must think he is still in Africa with stopping and starting his tape to record or not record what he wants, demanding answers and threatening, I am sure the Melbourne QC will love to get this guy on the stand and find out who sanctioned what, may actually be able to ask a few people about who leaked what to the newspapers. I do not see the AFL being able to win this, no matter what penalty they give Melbourne they will be called to answer in public why other teams have not been looked at and why. I think the AFL needs to negotiate a suitable outcome with the MFC before this goes much further.

The spotlight will be shone brightly on the AFL and its process and the need for it to justify why Melbourne and not others re being questioned. Good move Dees.

I wonder if Neeld is going to do a second cut after they go through the FA's and have a look at the draft prospects. Does anyone know who has not signed a contract yet!

We have added a lot of depth to our side for next year which will help us win a few more games as we should score more heavily when we get the ball into our forward 50. But other clubs will also do well from the draft GWS and Bulldogs are going to get some good pickups this this from the draft so that will help them be more competitive. What we need to do is tighten up our defensive pressure. Looking at a couple of this years games on Foxtel and you can see the lack of pressure as teams just ran us ragged with their loose men and the endeavor/effort from some players at times left a lot to be desired, the Nth Melbourne game for instance saw them score something like 12+ goals from turnovers. This is the part of our game that kills us, guys hand balling the ball out of bounds and getting pinged, kicking out from defense and putting it over the boundary, or swinging back across ground and getting it chopped off, kicking it into our forward 50 to a 2+on1 contests. Our skill level and possession level has to improve, if it does then we have the potential to challenge most sides. If it does not then next years cull will be even more savage.

Not sure the AFL can find us guilty and fine us without giving us a right or reply to their findings. This will hopefully take this past the draft period, penalties would then hopefully be applied to next years draft.

If Wines is there we will probably take him, he is a tough nut that we need, if he is not there we will have plenty of other quality young players to choose from, and hopefully Wines will want to come home from Sydney to play for the dees in a year or two.

Not an impossible dream, obviously injuries will play a part in who makes the finals. I watched a few reruns of games from this year and we seemed to have lots of entries into the forward 50 for nil return, and lots of stupid turnovers. Both of these could be reversed with a good preseason, a full list and the quality inclusions we have. Dream the Dream Demon.

OD, maybe not, but I think it would be well worth the MFC at least trying to see if they could snag a double header with Casey (hogan and co).

I like the idea of Casey scorpions wearing melbourne colors, people will naturally link melbourne/demons with those colors, so no need to call them demons and [censored] off existing fans. I like the idea of our players going around to the schools and helping younger kids with football clinics, this is a great way to introduce kids to the MFC and pick up more members. Getting local people supporting Casey and the red and blue will translate to some at least following the MFC. And I Love the idea of Casey playing games before the Dees. I used to love going to the footy early to see the reserves play before the main match to see who was pressing for selection, see the new kids, etc.. I would think Hogan and others in our VFL side would get more bums on seats and introduce them to melbourne supporters. VFL is also televised and watched reasonably widely, so having Casey play in red and blue would improve brand recognition.

I agree that we should start proceedings against CW, it would probably not cost a lot to at least start proceedings, it has to get her (and hopefully her editors) a little worried about the possibility of loosing as well as no one can ever truely feel safe in our legal system. But if we do so, can we at least leak the story to another rag first!

sadly for Bailey he opened this can of worms when he did his exit interview with Melbourne, Broke Mcleans statements by themselves would have done nothing without Bailey's own words prior to that. He is obviously fighting the charge of tanking as even if he was given immunity this would tarnish his reputation and result in him not getting a job in football again. So he has to continue down that line of I did not tank. Much is made of the meeting in the 'vault' this use of the term vault seems to imply secret mens business and clandestine meetings to plot, where in actual fact it appears to be the usual place they hold meetings. The meeting in question obviously needs to be seen in context was this a normal meeting where statements on draft picks were made or a special meeting to decide how to tank. I think the later would be stupid to involve half the football department in such a discussion as is being implied by CW. Also was this meeting the only time that draft picks were ever mentioned. The AFL said that the information from Melbourne staff does not align with information provided by others, presumably disgruntled ex employees well go figure, who would have thought that people with an axe to grind may put a different inference on things mentioned and may actually leave out their own part in the process. The fact is no two people will have exactly the same recollection of any meeting and everyone will have their own interpretation of what the words actually meant. As far as Bailey goes, he was at the meeting, just because he was there does not mean that he agreed to tank. He could obviously show some signs of going along with that by experimenting with roles and making positional changes and things like that. It does not in its own right mean he was attempting to loose, he may have still talked to the players before and during the game as he expected players to do their very best and encourage them to win, as far as I can see he has done nothing significant that could be interpreted as a deliberate action that stopped the players on the field from winning and there is No evidence that he asked them to not try. As for the other teams, I am amazed at the support and statements from some of the other clubs, including Eddie. Which kind of tells me he is trying to tell the AFL that this is sort of thing is not a big deal, meaning they did it and therefore dont see any need for any real investigation, lets just forget about it.