Earl Hood

Gee being an old bastard I can remember reading about the Wedge in a Surf Magazine when I was about 10 years old and surfing at Scarborough Beach Perth all that summer. Great memories.

I wouldn’t bet on that. Hey, your avatar, is that Kelly Slater pulling out of a wave at Bells last week?

With that ball drop he did well to make contact!

Hey we turned the disposal deficit around that quarter.

Dear Uncle i am sorry I am not living at my Fitzroy address as I suspect you may already know! My inner city warehouse was invaded back in February this year by the Special Operations Group on an anonymous tip-off about synthetic drugs. The damage done is still being dealt by my insurance people, trade persons and talented designers. I am currently living in witness protection down on the Surf Coast!

No he has ability, der!

I see Jimmy Toumpas is available for the mid season draft! Just saying.

Gary Lyon then??

Please Ernest I can’t be blamed for this catastrophe! These days I keep a low profile just trying to help those less fortunate than myself. As you know I was lately vilified by the Banking Royal Commission where my greatest contributions to neoliberal finance which had gained me admission to the International Bankers Hall of Fame, the Laurie Connell award for financial acumen no less, were trashed in full view of everyone as being borderline criminal! Please! I mean I pioneered the concepts of “fee for no service” and “life insurance for dead people”. These new financial services revolutionised the industry. But now no thanks to Justice Kenneth Hayne AC, QC, my name is mud amongst my former financial and political peers. You soon learn who your real friends are after such a fall. Do I hear from Uncle Bitter these days? Oh no, he denied my very existence three times after Haynes final report. And as for Daisycutter and Moons, enough said! These days I distribute bananas to the poor from my bananamobile!

At this stage I disagree with any talk of delisting Frost. We turned over about a third of our list last year after finishing 4th! Not saying they were all wrong but we now struggle for depth so we don’t have the luxury of dumping guys like Frost just yet. Unless we have identified better replacements from other clubs. yes Frost is not a natural footballer, he is an athlete and a quite extraordinary one at that, big, strong and fast and he can catch a ball and he can kick it long. Just not a lot of finesse. at the moment we need him down back but if Lever and May come back, can we potentially use him elsewhere? If not the midfield, what about the wing where he can chase and block the opposition transition? Geelong have developed Bliscalvs in that role. Does he have more footy I Q? To stress I am not saying this is ideal, it is just trying to make full use of what limited resources we have.

He should be part of our outside run and class to compliment the inside dominance of Oliver, Brayshaw and Viney. For some reason we haven’t developed a game plan to make this possible. Instead we have Jones and Lewis playing wing, tried then dropped Stretch after one game? I think Tracc should start on the wing, go into the midfield for short bursts. Being on the wing means he can drift forward as well. Who knows if this will work, we know the kid has plenty of talent but how do we give him the best chance to realise it?

Another Anthony Ingerson would be even better!

Why are we drafting these types, small forwards who don’t kick goals and don’t have too many tricks, that is X factor?

Three first round picks in the last draft! Looks like it’s transformed the team. I also note how well their no name backline played because they are organised and work as a unit. And we coughed up 3 first rounders for 2 key backs who can’t get on the park. Just an observation.

Rosee the new Brett Heady?

On that north performance, bottom is where we belong until we get our act together.

Umm they are looking a lot better than us with 4 minutes to go.

North actually going OK in the last quarter or so. Looking more organised than us. Of course Rosee is putting a nail in!

Who else, there is not much in the Casey cupboard?

But how come they are always cashed up? Everyone plays for peanuts down there. O’Meara, Mitchell, Wingard, “he who shall not be named”, McEvoy, Chip, are all on Newstart. Smith, Roughy on the pension?

Let’s go to the draft for some early pick potential talent for a change.

Can’t blame Taylor completely but our trading strategy is starting to look second rate. We have coughed up 3 first rounders for key defenders obviously believing we had the other bases covered, e.g. no need for some leg speed, outside run, I.e. quality wingers, small defensive forwards. We now seem to have deficiencies everywhere and with our injuries, no depth at all. Looks like it is back to the draft and hope to find a first round gem.

Yes interesting that we always had issues up forward and down back but our midfield kept us more than competitive last year but it too has now collapsed into mediocrity, no cohesion, just every man for himself.

He might get angry but a lot of this is sitting on his shoulders. Our game plan, systems, cohesion is [censored]. Professional, full time footballers playing together like they are a group of wheat farmers up in the Wimmera who are lucky to get to training once a week during harvest time.

Frustrating to watch full time professional footballers play like suburban amateurs. They are trying but the skills are deplorable and they work together like a group of tradies that get to train once a week together, if they have the time. There are no systems down back, up forward and now our midfield group doesn’t seem to have any cohesion.