CBDees

Elsternwick is a suburb of Melbourne?

That's the spirit Clint!

Whilst l have no argument with that, it seems that such a move would take us into reverse gear in the short term in relation to our alliance with the City of Casey and the Casey Scorpions. With closer integration of the coaches (including Shanon Byrnes as a playing coach), l was actually getting quite excited about following the fortunes of Casey FC this year. If we go to Elsternwick Park, surely that is heralding that we also intend to join the ranks of having a stand-alone team in the VFL and may even end up as a prelude to all the Victorian teams reverting to having fully-fledged 'Reserves' teams, (hopefully playing occasionally as curtain-raisers to blockbusters games such as our Queen's Birthday clash with the Pies)!

And strengthening our alliance with Casey on previous years! The St. Kilda scenario is no less strange!

We trounce the Suns in Round 1 by such a margin that we end up on top of the Ladder (& then we stay there all year)!

They don't have to be in our top 30 to be on our list, merely in our top 44! Bear in mind that they were 3rd & 4th in the B&F post 2013 season and we haven't recruited 27 players that would see them exit our top 30!

Why are you astounded that the two players who were third and fourth (3rd & 4th) in the Bluey were given contract extensions? Although their skill levels may have been below some others, you could never accuse them of not having a dip!

And all four are upgrading our culture and on-field performance (albeit that Byrnes will be doing it as a playing coach at Casey)!

I fully agree. It still is remarkable that there have already been 400+ views of this post in just over four hours, whilst only 32 members were shown as logged in. A slow news day l expect (or tragics with nothing else on NYE)?

Checking out the profile of Dee supporters viewing this site, currently there are 45 members and 85 others. I am surprised that the numbers are not reversed? It seems amazing that there would be 2/3 voyeurs versus 1/3 participants joining in discussions? If you are a non-Demonlander reading this, why don't you join up before logging off?

I think that you are seriously underestimating these two lads. Wait until you see them in the NAB Cup before you finalise your team! From what l have observed at training, they have the bodies, the skill and they are dying to mix it.

Watching the Heritier Lumumba interview on the Club website gives me great confidence in the strategy of our recruiting department. Considering the fact that most Demon supporters had no idea that we were likely to get any compensation for Mitch Clark's departure, to get somebody of the calibre of HL is a masterstroke. I think that the recruitment of HL was inspired and I suspect that he will 'walk the walk' rather than just 'talk the talk'. I am feeling very comfortable with HL (and his attitude) inserted into our back half and feel that a combination of him and Frost will more than compensate for the loss of Frawley (and Brayshaw as steak knives completes the picture). Welcome to the MFC Heritier Lumumba! http://www.melbournefc.com.au/video/2014-12-31/heritier-lumumba-interview

I hope that you are right Pepperama!

Not to mention Oscar, Newton, Stretch, Garlett, Vandenberg and White!

Are you trying to highlight the fact that we suddenly have so much depth in our midfield that we have the luxury of leaving out guns like Truck and Brayshaw?

I like this but I suspect that one of either Brayshaw or Petracca will get a run. At whose expense I am not game to speculate!

Frankly, I supect the reverse might be the case. 4.40pm Sunday is an absolute disaster, too late in the day to enjoy lunch at the ground and too early for dinner. I am single but it must be a nightmare for families. I am happy to give Monday night a trial, it is not as though it clashes with anything else.

I would say that both Salem and Toupas have more chance that M. Jones if they keep training as they have been to date [according to TDI's reports] and I suspect that Petracca similarly has as much chance as Brayshaw.

Demonlanders are an interesting lot. There will always be a group that maintain that we should have picked Natanui (9th in the West Coast B&F for 2014) rather than Watts (10th in the Demons B&F for 2014). Similarly there are those that say we should have picked Wines (a Jack Viney clone) rather than Toumpas (an elite outside playmaker). When Roos gets us cranked up both these players will play valuable outside roles, particularly now that we have Brayshaw and Petracca coming on stream in the midfield. Have faith in Roos!

Why drop Grimes when you already had him in the first 18. Did we secretly draft Dylan or something?

And it is always granted isn't it? I only wish they would make the same request of us [and that the AFL would listen if they did]!

I am strongly tempted to agree with this ATM and have modified my team (post #4 above). Although injuries over the next few weeks will determine the team, it is certainly harder to exclude players than it has been for a few years.

It will never happen until we again repeat the dominance we enjoyed over them of the late 1950s / early 1960s! Collingwood will never have an 'away jumper' Collingwood will never have their games scheduled for 4.40pm of a Sunday (the time they played a single game in that time slot they demanded $500K compensation) Collingwood will never have to play 'home games' at Etihad (instead of their spiritual home ground) Collingwood will always dominate in the Friday Night/Saturday afternoon time slots (we have barely played these since the Gutnik era for some reason) Collingwood will always have most of their games 'free-to-air' (despite rarely playing away from the "G") Collingwood will rarely have to travel interstate Collingwood will never have the indignity of seeing other teams have preferential treatment on their own traditional 'home ground' (i.e. we started life as the MCCFC)

Problem with that article WJ is that it mentions that Ollie Wines is 'training the house down' for PA but neglects to mention that Jimmy Toumpas is similarly 'training the house down' for us. I am fearful of what this post might attract over the next 24 hours.

Some quite respectable teams above however I suspect that after reading training reports from January/February and watching the NAB Cup, many will be tempted to include Toumpas and Brayshaw.