I often wonder why it is that I don't like reading some of the football related stuff on this site... then I read some of the "brown colour glasses" crap as seen here, and I remember why.

Halfway through the year all the BCGB (Brown colour glasses brigade) were all about how shit Pagan is because of the flood and not playing the kids.

Now we're playing the kids and we're not flooding. We're trying to play an attacking style of game that we've clearly not yet got the skilled or developed personnel to do. Other sides know this, so the common plan against us is to sit back and wait for us to make mistakes and hurt us on the rebound. Not a plan that's going to win you a premiership, but it's a plan that's going to beat a team of developing kids.


So why would another ordinary team like Essendon* be able to get away with this plan?

Because of the very fact that they are bottoming out with older players, and we are developing the kids. A midfield with the experience of the Johnsons and Peverill isn't going to get you far in the next few years, but it's still going to be good enough against a team that's developing... and a team that's only recently changed it's game plan from defence to attack.

So realistically, yes, our skills are bad, and because of that teams just sit back and wait. Going forward though, we are playing the kind of footy (in terms of the plan) that will get us to where we want to be soon, and with another pre-season in the kids, plus another couple of quality kids into the side next year, we're not as far away as the BCGB would have us believe.

A realistic take on the way we are does not need to simply mean "we are shit".

We lost because if we are to get a priority pick before the 2nd round, effectively we can only win one game out of 6 from here on. Would have been good to win two games to get to 16 points.

This isn't true.

We would've only qualified for a first round priority selection this year if we had four wins or less in consecutive years, not an average of four wins.

That's why the club were disappointed a few weeks ago when the AFL ruled that 4 wins and a draw ruled us out for a first round priority selection this season.

I often wonder why it is that I don't like reading some of the football related stuff on this site... then I read some of the "brown colour glasses" crap as seen here, and I remember why.

Halfway through the year all the BCGB (Brown colour glasses brigade) were all about how shit Pagan is because of the flood and not playing the kids.

Now we're playing the kids and we're not flooding. We're trying to play an attacking style of game that we've clearly not yet got the skilled or developed personnel to do. Other sides know this, so the common plan against us is to sit back and wait for us to make mistakes and hurt us on the rebound. Not a plan that's going to win you a premiership, but it's a plan that's going to beat a team of developing kids.

A midfield with the experience of the Johnsons and Peverill isn't going to get you far in the next few years, but it's still going to be good enough against a team that's developing... and a team that's only recently changed it's game plan from defence to attack.

So realistically, yes, our skills are bad, and because of that teams just sit back and wait. Going forward though, we are playing the kind of footy (in terms of the plan) that will get us to where we want to be soon, and with another pre-season in the kids, plus another couple of quality kids into the side next year, we're not as far away as the BCGB would have us believe.

A realistic take on the way we are does not need to simply mean "we are shit".

So why would another ordinary team like Essendon* be able to get away with this plan?
Because of the very fact that they are bottoming out with older players, and we are developing the kids.

Yes it is true. He's saying that if we win more than one game now we'll miss out on the priority pick before the SECOND round. If we get 16 points or less this year we get a PP before the second round (pick 18 if Essendon* finish below us) and then our normal second round pick 20.

If we finish with 4 and a half wins we don't get the PP, so if Essendon* finish below us and get the PP and we finish 15th we'd have only pick 19.

We have one of the highest paid coach's in the leauge and have done so for over 3 years now and we have gone nowhere!
If Kouta can cop criticsim for not delivering what he should for his high pay-packet, then Denis should too!

Excellent post.

Don't you want an extra 2nd rnd pick?

If you cannot see that we're in a better position now than we were three years ago then I feel sorry for you.

will second that jw

excellent post

i for one am actually enjoying watching us at the moment (skill errors aside)

they still make me frustrated, but i find its the skill errors coming from the likes of Stevens, French, etc.. - who are old enough and have the experience to know better that frustrate me more than the kids.

watching setanta in the first quarter i was petrified that pagan was going to take him off, he didnt, and in the end i think Setanta had probably his best game for us.

i can accept errors and bad judgement from the kids, they are developing, and developing nicely IMO.

i was a bit critic of pagan at the start of the season, but IMO the game plan, and his willingness to play the kids in roles that suit them has been great.

we are far from the shit side some would want us to believe.

mark it in your diary now when i said this.

this year we will continue to make errors.

next year (07) will be about honoralbe loses

(08) will be about either just making it or just missing out

(09) will be about in it for sure

(10) will be about having a dead set crack at winning a flag

My thoughts exactly Prez.

This season, while frustrating, has some hidden rewards if you just scrape beyond the surface of ladder position and scorenoard results.

Anyone want to provide one? - I didnt catch any of the match due to other commitments but was expecting to win and win comfortably (as would most posters I'd imagine). However, from my perspective - irrespective of how you rate the individual players - Essendon* was missing 1/3 of their first 22 (as they would select the team).

Hird
fletcher
Mcphee
Lloyd
Johns
Lovett Murrey
Rioli
Ramanaskus


It's fairly depressing to see how much we have lost in terms of pride - that we can be satisfied with scraping home a draw against a bottom side with 1/3 of their best players out (compare that to our 2 outs - a 1st year draftee and a journeyman). Whilst murphy might be one of our top players - if you asked most football followers to list essendons top 5 players, then hird, fletcher, lloyd and mcphee would be firmly entrenched within most peoples list.

So - if we hold off on the positives thread (basically youth getting more groundtime/experience) - how did people really see the game? Where are we at? Do Essendon* (on #players injured throughout the year) deserve to be ranked higher than carlton? (much like 2002 when injuries made us look a lot worse than we were)