melbelle39 wrote:
tommi wrote:
Hey Ms Belle..............
i don't know how to tell you this darl.......but Steve Irwin died.........!
yeah sweetheart....earlier in the week...........!
so the whole...."prime minister" thingy.........i don't think it's
got legs........!
kindest regards tommi
mwaaaa
Tommi - say it aint so....alright then, Peter Brock
I think alot of the problems on and off the field stem from the fact that people have become disheartened - nobody can really grasp how deep in the shit we are, and as a club we're not used to having to endure this sort of stuff for such a long time.
As time goes on and nothing appears to change, enthusiasm and the best intentions wane - its hard to keep getting up off the mat.
I'm not sure what the soloution is - I was a big supporter of the new board, but I admit in recent years I'm seeing the same mistakes repeated - but who will come in - who wants to be on our board for teh right reasons?
I'm not a huge fan of past players - without strong business background (Ie fitzpatrick) its more tokenism, and we dont have room for that right now.
I stilll maintain my stance that I prefer pagan to the other options being floated (including mitchell) we've always said it would take at least 5-6 years to see the benefits of the new regime - we've put up with four years of shit so far (in the grand scheme of things 4 years is not that bad -certainly not pleasant, but historically its miniscule)
In my opinion turfing pagan now would be more destabilising than beneficial. we have to perservere - not just give up when something gets too hard.
And please dont patronise me, I too know many players and people within the club - of course they're miserable its a tough job, but pagan isnt there to be their friend, hes there to push them through this. DO you think Leigh Mattthews or Malthouse or Sheedy are soft and fluffy when it gets tough? These kids are getting paid 50K+ per year to kick a piece of leather around, if they cant handle it then they can chose another career
Bottom line is that theres no magic wand or quick fix - much as I would like to see one. I just believe the current course of action with shit flying everywhere with each party trying to push their own agenda is incredibly destrucive - sure the media looks for a bad story - but we dont make it hard for them
no wonder we struggle to attract sponsors when we cant even manage something like this internally.
I would have agreed with most of what you've written 12-18 months ago Mel but that's changed.
Talk to those who go to training week in week out; antique.
Watch the way we use our interchange bench; stupid.
Watch the way we don't make positional changes when we need to; dumb.
Watch the way we flood over and over because we can't think of anything else to do to stem the bleeding; moronic.
There are numerous other examples.
Footy's become far more professional over the last 5 years and Pagan seems to have missed the boat.
My great fear is that if he survives for the next two years we'll improve DESPITE all the above by force of pure talent (more quality kids etc) and that we'll be stuck with a coach who can berate a bunch of quality kids and get them to sneak into the finals but not much more.
I've never rated Grant Thomas as a coach as he seems incapable of understanding his own flaws. The Saints are out again this morning and I'm not surprised. You can have all the talent in the world but it takes a good coach to make it work. If it wasn't this week it would have been next. When Thomas can see he's not up to the match day role and appoint someone else to do that they'll have a shot. Unlikely to happen though.
Tim Lane wrote about Pagan this morning in The Age and although I think Tim's a bit of a drip these days he did mention a conversation that he had with Pagan that astounded me. He asked him if he ever had doubts. He said no. He asked him again. Pagan asked Lane if he thought he was speaking Persian.
I want a coach who sees a benefit to constantly assessing what he's doing and is capable of changing his actions as a result of changing circumstances. Pagan seems incapable of that.
Better he goes now.