AFL 2010

[Guest]

AFL 2010

Fremantle assistant Chris Scott is the shock appointment as Geelong’s new coach. It had been thought it was a straight choice between Brenton Sanderson, a current Geelong assistant and the recommended choice of outoing coach Mark Thompson, and Ken Hinkley, a former Geelong assistant now with Gold Coast. Both Sanderson and Hinkley are also ex Geelong players.

Scott played for Brisbane and is just 34. His twin brother Brad is North Melbourne coach.

[jason voorhees]

AFL 2010

Inca alerted me to Mocksession, with pictures that MA may want to turn his head away from...

[jason voorhees]

AFL 2010

And another one:

[trimster]

AFL 2010

Collingwood fans.... a horrible sight!!

[Guest]

AFL 2010

The 2011 draw was released this morning – the most striking feature being that St Kilda have 6 MCG fixtures compared to 1 in 2009 and 2 in 2010. I’m happy about this – over the last couple of years, with the all the big September games, I’ve come to realize that I like the G much more than Etihad Stadium (the food’s better as well).

The other thing I’m pleased about is that we’ve got an away game on the Gold Coast. I’ve wanted to travel to an interstate game for some time now and had resolved to do it in 2011 fearing that Adelaide might be the best option. However, I can take my wife and daughter to the Gold Coast, dress it up as a “holiday” weekend and not be made to feel guilty about wasting money on “bloody football.”

[Guest]

AFL 2010

Before this year’s grand final, the Herald Sun ranked the two sets of players from 1 to 44. St Kilda youngster Robert Eddy was ranked 44th. After the game, he was ranked as the 43rd best player on the ground ahead of ruckman Michael Gardiner who got injured early. The Herald Sun said he “would not have to cancel his holidays” ahead of the replay. He got selected again, though, and was ranked 44th best in the replay.

St Kilda delisted him today along with Luke Miles who won the grand final sprint and played a grand total of 2 AFL games.

[Guest]

AFL 2010

Oh, and Mark Thompson who resigned as Geelong coach due to “burn out” seems to recovered quickly - he was appointed assistant coach at Essendon today, the club where he was a very successful player.

[jefe]

AFL 2010

North Melbourne wants to play 7 games a year in Tasmania? Why not just move there then?

[Guest]

AFL 2010

At the moment, Hawthorn have a very lucrative deal to play 4 games a season in Launceston in Tasmania’s north - $16.5m over 5 years paid for by the Tasmanian government. The Tasmanian government has decided to renew this deal rather than switch to North Melbourne playing 7 games split between Launceston and Hobart (in the south of the island). North, however, are to press ahead with discussions with Cricket Tasmania to play 4 games in Hobart, a move supported by the AFL.

For North Melbourne, this is all about money. They are one of four AFL clubs relying on handouts to survive (the others being Melbourne, Western Bulldogs and Port Adelaide) and have previously sold home games to Canberra and the Gold Coast. Proximity to Essendon, Collingwood and Carlton in Melbourne’s northern suburbs means it is virtually impossible for them to grow their supporter base. A few years ago, the Keep North South campaign fought off the AFL’s attempts to relocate the club to the Gold Coast and membership rocketed to a record 34,000. However, it has since fallen back again to be the lowest in Victoria.

In the next few years, I think Tasmania will get an AFL club. The question is will it be a new 19th club or a relocation of North Melbourne (Hawthorn are far too big in Melbourne to relocate). It will probably hinge on how successful Gold Coast and Greater Western Sydney are. If they require huge financial support (GWS certainly will), the AFL may decide to cut support to North Melbourne and force them to move. If the new clubs do well, expect a 20 team league with Tasmania guaranteed the 19th spot and WA and North Queensland fighting it out for number 20. Canberra is going to be a major part of GWS with a 30 game deal over 10 years already agreed so they won’t be contenders.

[Guest]

AFL 2010

At a glittering ceremony in Sydney later tonight the name and colours of the AFL's 18th club will be revealed. The Herald Sun, however, has leaked the details.

The club will be called Greater Western Sydney Giants and this is the strip:

[trimster]

AFL 2010

AFL's Port Power and SANFL's Port Adelaide Magpies have finally merged. This should ensure Port's survival in SANFL- they have been struggling financially and finishing close to bottom in the last few years. And it should put an end to the eternal debate of "which club is the real Port Adelaide?"

Let's hope it doesn't mean that Port Magpies become a Power reserve side in SANFL and dominate the competition...

[Guest]

AFL 2010

The 2010 national draft is tonight on the Gold Coast – an appropriate location given that so many of the players will end up there.

Gold Coast’s draft picks include 8 of the first 13 – 1,2,3,7,9,10,11,13.

The concensus on the draft is that it’s strong, particularly bearing in mind that Gold Coast pre-selected 12 players as 17 year olds last year who would otherwise have been in the 2010 draft. The top 25-30 picks are rated highly with the quality not expected to taper off until about pick 50. There are 37 “recycled” players in the draft ie those delisted at the end of the 2010 season hoping for another chance. Very few will get picked.

St Kilda don’t enter the draft until pick 24 while Collingwood’s first selection is 45 – they gave away pick 25 in trade week.

[Guest]

AFL 2010

Gold Coast have selected Western Australian midfielder David Swallow, whose elder brother Andrew plays for North Melbourne, as the number 1 draft pick.

West Coast, who would have had the number 1 pick in a normal year as wooden spooners, must have been particularly frustrated that the top 2 picks were both from WA.

St Kilda acknowledged their most obvious deficiency, lack of leg speed, by using 3 of their first 4 picks on speed merchants, before stunning everybody by finishing off with the recruitment of Ryan Gamble, delisted by Geelong and Dean Polo, let go by Richmond. Incredibly, this is the second year in a row St Kilda have recruited a Richmond reject despite Richmond finishing 16th and 15th in the last 2 seasons. It didn't work last year with St Kilda delisting Adam Pattison after 1 season.

[jefe]

AFL 2010

So St. Kilda makes the front page of Deadspin, with naked pictures everywhere.

WTF?

[Guest]

AFL 2010

Ah yes, “Dikileaks.”

I thought I’d got beyond the stage where I could be surprised by this city’s obsession with all matters AFL but yesterday was a remarkable day – Nick Riewoldt’s cock generated more interest than any other non-story I can ever remember. What we need now is to hear revelations that Nick Riewoldt has been having an affair with Shane Warne and Melbourne will go into meltdown.

A few months ago, a 17 year old girl claimed to be pregnant after sleeping (separately) with 3 AFL players – 2 from St Kilda, 1 from Collingwood. The players have never been officially named but everybody knows who they are. It was briefly a scandal because she claimed she met the St Kilda players at a school clinic which could have led to charges of underage sex but she admitted to police that she lied and actually met them at a nightclub where she got admission through lying about her age. She claims the baby was stillborn in October but it’s not clear if she really was pregnant.

Yesterday, 2 pictures appeared on her facebook page. One is captain Nick Riewoldt in full frontal nudity. The other is midfielder Nick Dal Santo apparently having a wank. Once again, she has lied claiming she took the pictures. In fact, they were taken in Miami last year by defender Sam Gilbert, one of the players involved in the pregnancy story. He told Riewoldt he had deleted the picture but it was on his computer. During their relationship, the girl found the pictures and has now made them public. She claims to have 21 pictures of AFL players in compromising positions and has said Sydney and Carlton players are next in the firing line to be followed by Collingwood, Richmond, Hawthorn, Melbourne and West Coast. Whether this is true or she is trying to remain famous for a few more days, we will soon find out. Yesterday, she was interviewed by just about every tv and radio station and her tweets were being followed by thousands. She claimed in one of her tweets to have done 33 interviews and is clearly loving the attention.

The thing is, there is no suggestion that any of the sex was non-concensual so there really is not much of a story here.

Incidentally, we now have a recently retired Carlton player working in our office. He says that when AFL players are on post season trips – “you wouldn’t believe what goes on.” Apparently, all this nude stuff is perfectly normal behavior.

[trimster]

AFL 2010

I would believe anything about end-of-season trips, MA... having once shared a cruise ship from Fremantle to Singapore with a certain WAFL team!

The furore will soon die down and everyone will have forgotten all about it by the start of next season.

Just on another topic...I see the AFL's idea to establish a "champions' league" for state league teams has not been well received. The top five SANFL clubs have declined to enter- only the sixth, seventh and eighth placed clubs have shown any interest!