riley is the exception

I know he got that award

But then howcome u never see his name brought up as a possible head coach ??

Lets put that 1 down to an anomoly

Mike Sheehan made a good pt a few weeks back when he said to Ratts his team doesnt play like him

Why doesnt Ratts doesnt build a tough onball brigade amazes me. He has been there what 3 yrs now? 4? Does he have any say in recruiting?

Maybe it is time to build a hard young onball unit - starting with Grigg and Robbo and add Brock when he is fit

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It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

In terms of 1 on 1s dont we all agree it is time Ratts put the whole AJ-at-BP thing in the bin? Or at least drop AJ?

AJ is hopeless 1 on 1 and gets exposed in that regard every week in 2010

I'd be dropping AJ this weekend and giving Browne a shot at BP

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It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

love the passion VB and you make some good points but don't agree with all your comments

if you compare us to the pies. I suggest looking at the experience of their backs versus ours. not only do I think they have a better back 6, they have played together for a long time. that is experience that is significant. the other area is that they have experience bigger body players that play forward. Dawes, Cloke and Brown. Look at the the youth of our forward. Forget the average age stat. My two points above should clearly show you we are years behind and sadly we also don't have the players to develop either which probably even more concerning.

I too listened to Blight and the comments I remember were somthing like
1. ..geez with such a young forward line why are all being played up the ground? they should leave the forward/s in the forward 50 and give them a chance to develop/learn one-on-one football
2. i expected more from an 8th placed team .... but you can see better quality of players Collingwood has all around the ground

to blights first point - it is plain to see we have no forward structure that works. our structure that did work in the first half has been easily foiled and we have not figured out a way to adjust. Ratts is trying but it is not working - pretty desperate if he needed to bring fisher back in. unless we recruit a power forward (highly unlikely) we had better develop a game plan that can cope with our list or we will sit idle for a few years

his second point is our team is plain not good enough. some of this is due to it being young, some however is due to there being too many C grade footballers

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The glass is neither half full nor half empty. Rather the glass is twice as big than required.

You make some very good points and agree with their back 6 and big fwds being older etc

But not sure those things correlate so much with our inability to have anything remotely like Pies' exceptional dfensive pressure inside their fwdline.

And if other coaches have figured Ratts midget-fwdline out, then why doesn't Ratts plonk Waite inside F50 as a target and genuine fwd threat?

Personally I dont know why Wiggins is on the outter so much. I know he gets injured a lot but even despite that he should have had a look in by now given last yr he blitzed early as a leading HFF/small CHF and lets face it he brings hardness to contest too

Wiggins, Grigg, Robbo - all 3 should be in if we are worried about lack of hardness and lack of leading fwd targets (Wiggins)

I didnt hear Blights other comment but I dont dispute he said it

Also, getting back to the hardness/youth thing reaised earlier, I agree Gibbs, Murphy etc aren't naturally hard, indeed I have been saying for weeks they play like bloody millionnaires and need to step up in leadership terms, but then why is it a flower like Daisy Thomas can learn to become harder and tougher but Murphy and Gibbs can't? The Pies' kids throw themselves at it, but ours don't.

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It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

Don't worry. They're rolling out the Youth excuse for the Crows too.....

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Go to http://www.snoutslouts.org/ for a look at the mighty GFC...

in response to highlighted bits

- I have thought several times this year the changes with a relatively immature team esp in the backline don't serve us well because the players just can't settle and get used to playing together. Bower in, Bower out, Bower in, Bower out, Walke in and out and in, Tbird in/out/in/cracking the shits/out, Waite appearing at random intervals, Gibbs floating in and out at hb.

- my old man refers to our forward line as the Bermuda Triangle because we continually go missing and there's flower no-one in our forward 50. I reckon go back to basics and tell em they're playing Goal Shooter and have to stick inside 50 and that every time they set foot out of our forward 50 they get docked $1000 or they have to do 200 extra push ups or whatever.

- slightly OT but sydney also got flogged this weekend so it just seems that the gap between the top 5-6 and the rest is greater this year.

actually our average games was 66.2. The pies were at 84.2 - Thats a significant difference in experience.

Don't forget with our young players they came to the club in its worst point in history. Don't compare us with Collingwood. Thomas and Pendlebury walk into Collingwood and they start with mature men around them in Buckley and Burns. They started at a club that played in two grand finals a few years previously. Murphy and Gibbs start and they have the likes of Whitnall around them, a couple of wooden spoons and a club falling to pieces - see the comparison.

Young players used to walk into Carlton and be amongst John Nicholls, Robert Walls, Alex Jesaulenko, Mike Fitzpatrick, Geoff Southby, Stephen Kernahan etc - all revered players at a club with proud recent history.

The second thing is there are good young players and there are o.k. young players. Our playing list has alot of just o.k. players.

And finally you have to look at the age and the responsibilty placed on them. We want a 20 something gamer in Henderson to be the new matchwinner ... are you kidding. To prove a point our youngest ruckman (kreuzer) is our best ruckman ... tell me that is not a result of poor recruiting and list management ... would there be many clubs who have their youngest ruckman as their best ruckman ???

L.I.S.T. M.A.N.A.G.E.M.E.N.T.

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THEY LIKE TO SEND UP!!!!!!!!

Until each team plays each other the same number of times, the AFL, as a fair dinkum competition, cannot be taken seriously.

He (Mr Swann) said the honour and pride associated with the club's traditional navy blue jumper was priceless.

Is that some new electro outfit?

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STURDYISM!!

Our side from last week had 5 or 6 rookie;s or promoted rookie's play plus another 3 have played during the year weather they have been rookie's on our list or on another teams rookie's list. IMO this where our problem lies most rookie's will only become C or D grade player few will only be B grade players. Most clubs would have 1 or 2 in there best 22 they draft alot better with middle to late draft then we seem to do.

The answer is go for mature age rookies instead of kids....Barlow, Pods etc.

Nah, I really don't have the answer...just guessing like all of us.

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Everyone looks good in Navy Blue

Great stuff Da da. But the sad thing is that this amounts to "rebuilding", and just at a time when we thought we were coming . With GC and GWS soaking up all the best young national talent...........WE ARE FLOWERED for years, or at best somewhere between 8-10 on the ladder. I can see another tanking exercise in a couple of years (how long do these expansion clubs get these concessions for ?).

But Geelong were the best in 2007 - does that mean their average age was even lower?

did they have King? Harley?

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This type of slight is alien in the more cultured part of the world - Walsh. Its up there with mad dogs, Englishmen and the midday sun!