Deecisive

GC and GWS will find it hard to keep players, they already have a few home sick kids and others who are not happy with a few stars getting all the $$'s, bless you Tom Scully. They will also need to start to trim their lists soon, and will need to release players to draft new players. Other clubs will circle them like vultures next year and pluck them senseless. I heard a rumour that Ablett wanted to return to Vic at the end of his contract I'm sure others will go the same way.

So if the compo pick is supposed to be representative of the nett loss due to players leaving a club, does that mean if we lost Bate, Rivers, Maloney and someone else, then subtract Brynes does that mean we get a 1st draft pick for the nett loss, and would such a pick be after our initial pick 3, after all the saints are calling for their compo pick to be immediately after their first round pick?

Clark has proven himself more than capable at ground level to suggest otherwise is foolish. Neeld WANTS a big forward to help Mitch out (dont we all) Pederson is an option, but probably has not really been tested in a key attacking position week in week out, Dawes has worked in that space so knows the drills, and how not crowd his fellow forwards, etc.. he provides body contact and create contests at centre half forward so that we dont see the ball bouncing straight back out of of our 50 and down the other end. Obviously if Dawes does not want to come across we want to have a contingency plan, Gumbleton is a posibility for that contingency role so they are talking to him. good thinking, if you dont have a backup plan should you fail on your primary target(s) then you will soley be relying on whats in the draft pool, which could be someone fantastic but given we will probably take a quality mid with no 4 that leaves us to pick someone good at 20 there may not be any reasonable talls in pool by then, or if so they may not be worth pick 20. So recruit one or two now and also hope you pick up more in the draft.

Enough of the baloney on Moloney, the guy made his own bed and now has to lay in it, everyone sees his value regardless of what Melbourne has or has not said against him. Moloney's worth will be judged on his past performance and the offer obviously put to him by Brisbane, if they are paying him peanuts then compensation is likely to be low. he had a great year last year that will count and the fact that he had a bad year this year because he could not meet Neeld's game plan does not necessarily mean that he is a bad player, but rather one (of many) that does not fit our new game plan and one that wants to go from the club. Obviously him wanting to go helped us decide not to waste time playing him unless he was keen which he wasnt too often. what ever we get for him is better than nothing because if no one took him up he would probably have just disappeared into the draft or off to the VFL, resulting in zero compo. We have had a most excellent draft so far, and hopefully the trend will continue, I have a lot more faith in the trading team now after the Hogan deal which I believe gives us scope to draft two more good players with 4 and 20. I think Barry's value in the draft increased significantly after his testing and the Dees did well to get him included in the trade. Interest now is in who else they sign up and who else unfortunately needs to go. Frankly the club has needed a good clean for a while, too many players coasting, this sweep out should put them on notice perform or look for somewhere else to coast. Glad we have a coach and support team not affraid to do make the hard decisions, and sadly we must thank past coaches and players for our previous poor performances that resulted in us getting some bargaining power in this draft.

Let dawes go to the dogs, he would be getting too expensive for us, for what we want, no point paying overs in the HOPE that he can recapture form. A few clubs including us still need to delist, so some more good average players maybe available soon. Pederson would be a good pickup you would expect at a reasonable price. Just need to do a couple more swaps over the next couple of weeks, then the draft.... Hopefully we may get another decent compo draft pick for Baloney and others who may depart under FA.

Can anyone remember who the Brisbane Lions chose with the draft pick we gave them for Clark?

Hogan, Viney and Wines are all melbourne supporters so great to see we are attracting quality players who WANT to play for OUR club. GWS will take lots of good youngans from this draft and good quality youngans will be hanging out in the two's looking for a game come this time next year everyone will descend on their list like vultures. Their recruiting strategy of just getting the best playsers they can through the door will probably destroy them once concession time is over and $$'s are dangled in front of them.

I would not mind Hogan, Wines, Viney, all Melbourne supporters in the team that would probably introduce a lot more passion and leadership into the team. As for GWS if they weren't interested in Barry its of no concern to them to chuck him in as a sweetner as long as they get 3rd pick its not as if its costing them anything to do so. I must say I do like the way this draft is going so far for the Dees.... keep it going boys.... thought of possibly adding Ray, Pederson and Dawes if he can be bought across for a reasonable price to the time is exciting... This will be a very different team next year and the year after. So how many days to footy season?

I guess you have to look at the context of defensive, is that defensive like the swans lock it in, ball up, lock it in, ball up, or defensive like Hawthorn, Geelong and Collingwood i.e. if the opposition gets the ball they better get ready to be tackled. Melbourne for me plays too much zoned football looking for easy kicks, and dont trust each other enough to kick to a contest, so we kick across goals, turn it over and go down another goal. I would like to see a competitive melbourne not giving an inch, i.e. no easy kick ins around the boundary, seen footscray run it from kick in down for a goal too many times without a melbourne player getting a touch. Neeld's sentiment is excellent just need to make sure the game plan is our own using the strengths of our players and not just a carbon copy of Collingwoods.

Hopefully we can keep pick 13 for another good draft pick, trade 45 for Ray and use compo for Maloney or Rivers for Dawes, though if our luck is still with us maybe we can traded someone for Dawes or Ray thereby preserving these other draft picks. Now that would be a bonza draft.

Too many choices.... Not a lot between Toumpas and Wines by the look of it. I do like the idea that Wines and Viney have played a lot of footy together, are both ferociously competitive and love the Dees. With the closeness of players tagging these days, I think I would prefer stronger body Dustin Martin type over players who maybe a little faster, as you have to get the ball before you can run with it.

Getting Pederson should reduce any perceived desperation to get dawes so it may help collingwood come to their senses, but then again we are talking about eddie, nah he will still insist on pick 4 just for dawes

Looks as if he has lost his mojo and does not know how to get it back. I hope he does he would be great linking up with our new midfield next year and other crumbing forwards

Can we get someone in the trading department call the suns and see if we can interview a couple of their star midfield players, maybe ask how long Garry has on his contract, just in case they consider nominating viney as their first pick?

This is a suggested deal that appeals to both Melbourne and Collingwood, Collingwood would obviously like pick 4 for their two super star discards, while Melbourne needs to keep the discussions open and insisting pick 26 before possibly going down to pick 13. I personnally think Collingwood is more desperate to off load them than we are to take them with low picks. I like the fact that Eddie is probably salivating over Collingwood having draft pick 4 and welly is saying No, No, No. Must be playing havoc with eddies blood pressure. I doubt anyone from Melbourne would seriously consider both the above discards for pick 4. While we definitely need to rebuild our team this needs to be done over several years and drafts so we need to keep an eye on future drafts (and mini drafts) to see what we believe we can gain from those that provides us with a long term options. The draft and trade may shake out some other forwards who can fill the Key forward position until we can get Hogan or another up and coming forward. Eddie keep on dreaming, Welly keep thinking WA, WA, WA... I like the idea of wellingham but not if he does not want to play for us, and we need to remember its easier to get good stats when you are in a quality team that shares and delivers does not mean he can reproduce that in our team.

The fact that he cannot kick is not too big a problem at the moment as most of our guys cann't mark so its a lot easier if he just kicks it somewhere where they can run onto it. Which is why we need to get midfielders who can run harder so that we can actually get tp it first.

I thing it would be great PR for melbourne to get a couple of internationals on their list, it would help generate a lot more interest in our club overseas as no doubt a few canadians now know one of their own played in our grandfinal and performed well, it does not hurt that these guys are pretty good athletes as well.

Melbourne has repeatedly stated they know his worth, meaning yes we will take him first if we have to, but maybe, just maybe we may not therefore creating a very small doubt in the GC's mind. That small doubt in GC's mind will determine if we get three top 5 picks or two, so who wouldnt try to keep that doubt alive until 10:05 Monday morning.

We are all picking players based on likes and dislikes, needs and perceived needs. The footy dept has obviously been over the stats and identified our strengths (??) and weaknesses (lots), these are the same things everyone here is stating, midfield, crumbing forwards, 2nd banana big forward, running backs, etc.. While we may not agree with all of their choices we need to acknowledge they are making their choices based on a lot of background work that none of us would have done. This will help them identify and prioritise who can fill those needs, what are the greatest needs and what they need to fill first. For some players we may need to pay overs, for others we may get cheap, but at least there seems to be some analysis going on to get the sort of players Neeld feels he needs as opposed to just getting a whole lot of top draft picks that dont give us a team. We need a balanced team if that means that we take dawes with pick 13 (aaah) then so be it. MFC under Neeld is obviously still a work in progress so he needs to keep an eye on the future i.e. young draft picks against bringing in experienced hard bodies to fill short term needs who can play the sort of fierce football we all want to see the club play. Trade period will help determine how many of these harder bodies we can pick up prior to the draft. For me the expectations of this years draft are probably higher than any previous drafts due to Free Agency and possibly the prospect of picking up JViney and a few other really exciting and talented footballers in the next month or so.

Strange to hear so many people talking about having to wait a year for hogan to come along... how many of our young midfield and other picks played games in the last 2 years. quite a few of them spent more time running around with Casey than with the seniors. While hogan can not play for us he can play with our team members at Casey, train with them etc in much the way viney has, this has got to be an advantage over just drafting another 18 year old next year who we will probably need to have run around the 2's for a year or so until they get AFL fit and ready to play their first game, where as hogan should be raring to go from round 1.

I dont mind taking dawes if it is for a reasonable cost to Melbourne. Problem is that Eddie seems to think that anything out of Collingwood is worth 4x the market value even if they dont want it. He will want a top pick for his discard and Dawes will want top $$ to come to us. I would be inclined to pass if they are asking too much, Melbourne has seldom had any luck with big named recruits, i.e. for those that remember past failures Diamond Jim Tilbrook, Kelvin Templeton, Peter Moore, etc.. Look at what other options are available, they maynot be as big as Dawes but they may have other attributes that give them real value.

I would like to see melbourne play Stef in one position for awhile other than ruck and let him learn it. I believe he has the talent now he needs the training in how to play a ONE role, as a tall mobile forward who can push up to the wing he can drag a tall lumbering backman after him and give Mitch and the crumbers a bit more room. I recall Jamar took awhile to get himself into playing decent football.

Cale has shown glimpses of real talent, but has had some issues over the last couple of years by the look of it, while there have been injuries I suspect it is more attitude related. Maybe he needs to get a mentor who can help him out, given we have so many young players maybe we need to get a few older/retired players to help mentor some of our newer recruits and help them deal with AFL football at senior level and the demands placed on them by coach, club and fans.

There are a few good midfielders in this draft this year and probably a few more in next years, but there are not many really top notch forwards from what I have seen. Melbourne is likely to pick up at least two good midfielders this time around, so I suggest investing pick 4 in Hogan.

He does look a good prospect, I hope we dont go wasting pick 13 on mature body that is over priced, when we could get a player hopefully like Kennedy or Stringer who has potentially far greater ability. We should be able to pick up harder older bodies with later draft picks, there is likely to be a flurry of players who cannot be traded who will be dropped to make way for new/fresh blood.