winfieldblue wrote:
Indie wrote:
It seems that everyone likes reading tea leaves to divine the future. Fact is, though, Pratt's comments are deliberately ambiguous. They can't be used to predict the future with precision.
All he's said for sure is that if we win only 2 games for the year, there may have to be a review. And he's said that if we win 10-11 games, that fulfils his expectations. There is a massive grey area in between.
Clearly, he isn't giving any unqualified support to Pagan. But then again, unqualified support tends to mean the axe is about to fall, so Pagan's probably happy about that.
There wouldn't be too many who would seriously think that Pratt will be bound greatly by his comments. If he is able to bring an elite coach to the club next year, I'm sure he won't feel constrained by his own comments or win/loss ratios. If he believes that it isn't worth changing horses for whatever reason, he won't.
spot on
as for pagan destroying the kids
oh yeah.. walker is destroyed
setanta too
bentick and carrazzo as well
simmo has been demolished
etc etc

Pagan doesnt destroy the kids - he fails to develop them.
He shows minimal trust in the kids - gives them virtually no licence to play in a positive manner.
Fisher - was shown little faith in year 1 (dropped at one point), despite showing plenty and averaging in excess of 1 goal/game
Simpson - first few games where he was given minimal game time
Kennedy/bower/russell etc - first few games - spent more time on the pine than on field
Plenty more other cases.
Walker - being played defensively for most of his career, Russell - defensive player for most of his career, Gibbs being played defensively.
Players being retained within the team at the expense of kids who were more deserving of games/gametime at that point in time - Martyn, Morrell, Ackland, Deluca, johnson, bowyer, etc
Overstressing the importance of mature bodies rather than playing youth - prominent example is young - On VFL form shouldnt have gotten a game last week, recruitment of mature bodies for 04 season.
Fact is Pagan is NOT the only reason why we are crap - he is though a significant part of the problem.
Aside from murphy, why havent ANY of our kids been given the licence to play their natural games as thomas, pendelbury, monfries, ryder, franklin, wells, etc have all been given in the early parts of their careers.
When was the last time pagan brought in a youngster from the reserves and gave them a run of 4-6 games with serious ground time and showed faith in them to perform (as opposed to 5 mins/quarter)