Every side uses the Premiers as the benchmark of the competition.

So what can Carlton learn from the dawks?

Here's my thoughts on what we need to do to address the areas the gap between us and the Premiers:

- We need sustained hardness at the ball by every player - for 4 quarters
- We need to be a very hard running team
- We need to be skillful by foot and hand

The dawks showed with an average defence (with the exception of Hodge), you can still win a flag. Their onballers, whilst mostly were soundly beaten on the day, they still applied the pressure on the Cats with their hardness, chasing and effective tackling.

Anyway, these are my thoughts.

Interested in others' thoughts.

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For some silly reason, you people want to assassinate him, and it's just rubbish. You people. All of you, ALL of you!

The stats clearly show that despite having the best contested ball winner in the comp our club has a tonn of work to do when it comes to putting your body on the line for the team and going in hard during every contest.

This is where the acquisition of Judd is most valuable; his presence should influence the kids to play in the same manner.

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Circumstance has no value. It is how one relates to a situation that has value. All true meaning resides in the personal relationship to a phenomenon, what it means to you.

Good post Wangers, couldn't agree more.

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The problem with Socialism is, you eventually run out of other people's money.

The lesson learned is that tanking will pay off in the future

Was just thinking of starting a thread like this myself, you stole my idea!

We go on and on about how we're the youngest team in the comp etc, but the fact is the 2nd youngest team in the comp won the flag today. Our journeys have been very similar to this point. New administrations, cleanouts, new coaching staff, solid trading and drafting, a focus on youth, rising memberships and revenues etc. But we're at least two years behind the hawks at this point in time, which should mean we'd come into quality form when they're probably at their absolute peak.

The key is toughness and fitness, and we couldn't have the boys in better hands than Cordy for this. Our pre-season this time around was interrupted, but I'm confident with a full pre-season to spend with the team we'll have them in tip top shape for 09. I'm sick of seeing our players monstered around, and sick of seeing them fade in and out of games. Sustained run and aggression is the key. The boys showed this year they're not afraid to stand up for themselves, but even against soft teams like the bombers and saints, we still sometimes manage to look like boys against men. This needs to end.

Importantly we need a key forward. Hawthorn's success owes much to its forward line, both through actual and 'perceived' results (as in, focusing too much time and energy on one and having another bite us in the arse instead). Yes, they benefitted from having some decent forwards to choose from, which are rare nowadays, but we need to be smart. The fact is that Buddy and Roughead will be around long after Fev hangs up the boots, so we need someone to help him out in the meantime, with a view to succeeding him at the end. Kreuzer is crucial to these plans, but we need more. One more bad year could see Fisher given the boot, and Edwards/Hartlett SURELY are on their final straws. Some assistance for Betts would be nice too. The hawks have two KEY targets (Franklin and Roughead), two backup targets (Williams and Brown) and now a geniunely classy crumber (Rioli). They've done their homework.

Our backline is looking after itself nicely, with flexibility and run a key factor. But who else here is sick of seeing opposition ruckman going forward and having days out against us? We need an actual key defender, not another medium/tall playing out of his weight division (Jamo/Bower/Thornton). This is why I'd love to get Hurley. We also need a Hodge, someone to set up our attacks from HB while at the same time being capable of stopping an opponent himself. Scotland fills part of this role, but we need more accountability, not to mention the gaping chasm between Hodge and Scotland in terms of disposal. Waite would be perfect, but again his disposal lets him down. I don't know what we can do in this area.

But above all, we need to learn how to flowering kick straight. Look how well that worked for the hawks today. As Geelong showed today, all the class in the world is no substitute for poor kicking.

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WADA medical director Dr Alan Vernec describes Essendon* FC drug case as biggest scandal in team sport the world of sport has seen. #WC2WB

#GUILTY

I guess no-one can trot out the old "no team has ever won a premiership by bottoming-out for draft picks" argument now.

Today's lesson: draft to strategy, draft players who can kick, draft enough mongrels, don't get sidetracked.

Get highly skilled, tough and nasty bastards like Hodge! At the moment we have no one of this type that I can think of.

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"our electorate seeks less to be informed and more to be validated." Sad times.

QFT. And not be scared to trade away dead wood

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"I had to eat"

Strange game...Geelong controlled the ball for most of the game but couldnt finish any of their work. Mitchell and Lewis were ordinary so where does the old adage of midfield domiance apply?

Guerra, Gilham, Ladson,Birchall, Young etc are nothing special but all kick the ball well...ditto for porky Dew whose kicking is superb.

Hawks have a variety of goalkickers of all different shapes and sizes ie Franklin, Roughead, Williams, Rioli, Dew and some hardnuts like Hodge, Brown, Lewis and Sewell.

We lack variety in attack, dont have the hardnuts as yet and our field and goalkicking is substandard in comparison.

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"When you have the attitude of a champion, you see adversity as your
training partner."
- Conor Gillen

need to be more hard nosed
Need a couple of power forwards
Multi dimension forward line
Need to be at least competitive in the ruck and ruckmen make a contribution when it hits the ground - warnock a must
Draft and use early picks - keeping no 6 in this draft is important
Sagacious use of late picks/rookie ie dew guerra gillham and some low level trades for players from other clubs
Take your chances -hawthorn did geelong didnt
Scoreboard pressure -kicking accurately for goal is essential

Wiggins runs backwards.......
or isn't very quick!

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Stay tuned We're in for a BUMPY ride

I agree.
Hawthorn had plenty of "footsoldiers" out there i.e. Guerra, Young, Birchall, Osbourne, Ladson, Campbell, Gillham and Dew but they all do their part and have good skills. Renouf appeared to be their only weak link.

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There is no footy god

Players with a willingness to bust a gun.

What they have done:

Tanked for 2 years straight (2004 & 2005) and picked up essentially TWO early 1st Rd picks in both these years (as a consequence the AFL changed the rules and we a rabble of a team circa 2006 got our concession pick in the 2nd rd)

Stooged North into giving up early picks for a depressed Thompson and a washed up J Hay.

What we should do is raid their list for those young players unable to get a game. Perhaps Simon taylor may be a start?

watching todays game made me think, this is why we need guys like wiggins to hang around for a while.

sure he's not the most skilled but it that type of hardness and willingness we need in our team.

a lot of players need to lift the intesnstity levels to match guys like wiggo.

then and only then will we start the transition from pretender to contender, but we are on the right track and it will still take a few years.

we also need to weed out a few guys with dodgy kicking and pick a few more elite foot skil players.

i was actually thinking that in a way it was probably better for us that the hawks won today, winning won early may make them not quite so desperate in a few years time. also means the weight of expectation is now on them to continue to get results.

things turn pretty quickly in footy and while the hawks are very young it only takes a few problems/injuries and form lapses in a few areas to cause big issues.

i mean who though the cats would lose today - not too many.

the "baby" bombers of 93 couldn't quite back it up, how will the hawks go, especially now with a hell bent geelong next year, and any other improvers.

guys like scarlo, milburn and harley will be working hard to give it another tilt i'd suspect.
in away todays game gives us genuine hope for 2010 all going well i reckon.

big congrats to crawf by the way.

Yes don't give away your first pick away,draft kids and if there is a one in a blue moon chance a champion is available get him if his available at your pick in the pre season and forget the bad mistake he did.

But geelong didn't look like they went their to win,Bartel was a sleep and mostly in the backline and Steve Johnson.

We need a good CHF,you never win flags without them Carey,Browne,Roughead,Brereton and the list goes on. I'm not sure who will be our man there but you can forget Cloke even thou he try,not sure if Kreuser will be it being a Ruckmen go forward deep but may get a big body to do it in a couple of years or more and not lose speed.

lol he come last in the sprint that was sad for us,was he our quickest,god help us,lol.

Campbell Brown
Shane Crawford
Rick Ladson
Sam Mitchell
Michael Osbourne
Cyril Rioli

All of these players are at 17X cm tall, they are all hard running type. Plus they have Sewell and Williams who are at 180cm tall. Small players are vital!!

We have 4 players on our entire list that are 17X cm tall. Murphy, Browne, Blackwell, and Betts. Only Betts and Murphy are on our regular starting list.

We need more of these type of players!!