How is Balme feeling today? AND Chocko you are a GOOSE!!!

[labrooy]

Lazza,

No-one is saying Judkins doens't make mistakes. He does. However to label him incompetent on one mistake when he has made many great picks for both Essendon and Collingwood is stupid.

Players like McGough and Lokan will help win premierships. No-one even suggests that we should depend on them. We have the likes of Bucks, Tarrant, Rocca etc to do the great stuff but we have to rely on the lesser lights to help us get across the line. The salary cap makes us do that. I defy anyone to come up with a system that allows us to play 22 players of the quality type. It can't happen.

Finally not trading does not mean the match committee is sitting on their hands doing nothing. There is still the draft to come. MM is not stupid and knows that having lost the last 2 GFs we clearly don't have a team capable of winning without adding to it.

You guys should show a bit of faith. This match committee has taken us from last to 2 GFs in only 4 years. They haven't always participated in the trade week but have still managed to improve the list. Sometimes I think all you guys want to do is whinge. What happens when we win the big one? I bet there will be a core of people who will claim we didn't win it by enough.

[dilly5]

I think the arguments of those looking to blame one or two people for "bad decisions" just shows how little they must know about the club hierachy and how decisions are made at national sporting clubs (or ANY national organisations for that matter).

You can't seriously think that the decisions you find questionable are made solely by one or two people??
To claim that ANY administrators should be made to justify their actions to armchair experts like you because of one or two outcomes that you don't agree with (not knowing any of the circumstances), when you make no mention of the possibly exceptional contributions they have made to the club (some we know about, others I'm sure we don't).

I'm talking about people like you, Lazza and Magpie Greg. SURELY you're not ignorant enough to think that MM says "it's up to you Balmey and Judkins- make any decisions you like- I don't know much about this recruiting caper. You can come up with the ideas from scratch and go ahead with them without consulting anyone else"

[dilly5]

Not to mention fellas, your obvious lack of knowledge re: how trades work. To reduce it to a stament as simplified as "we have now missed out on Misiti and Stevens" (therefore, someone must pay for they are SURELY incompetent) does nothing more than make you look like an idiot if you seriously think it is as simple as "we want Stevens therefore we should get him and if we don't it must be because our administration sucks".

Most of us have accepted by now that to get what we want in trade week (eg. Stevens) we have to give the team in question what THEY want. If we're not willing to offer that (I would have LOVED to read your comments if we had traded Didak and Presti, which was the only thing Port were ever going to accept), there is NOTHING a club can do, no matter how good their administration.

Not that hard to understand guys- somehow everyone else has figured out how it works and isn't looking to behead someone in order to make up for a painful GF loss.

[ScottyMac]

If you look at the last prob 3 seasons at Trade Time Collingwood haven't been that big in terms of actually getting players.... I think we are on the right path by keeping draft picks we have and using them to our advantage....

Don't think there have been too many mistakes... those that didn't come haven't been missed that badly... those youngsters we have picked up have done the job for us. What more from a club position could we ask for???

[labrooy]

Too right. Two years ago we missed out on Joe Misiti. Would he have had much senior time this year if he was with us? Somehow I think he would have been at Willi for much of the season.

Stevens would have been a great acquisition but we made two grand finals without him. Who knows, pick no 17 may be the player we need to go that one step further.

[JLC]

You can look at most clubs and they will look foolish when it comes to certain draft selections.

It took clubs many years to get the 1st pick in the National Draft right after Banik, Alex McDonald had been selected in the early years and Travis Johnstone recently.

Overall i am pretty happy with Noel Judkins record with draft picks. He has managed to use late picks in the draft to pretty good effect. Lokan may not be a superstar but he has potential and has shown a bit which is pretty good for pick 70. David King looks like stepping up to play senior football and Tristen Walker who was also a late pick in the draft has played senior football.

Judkins also had a pretty handy record at Essendon when it came to recruiting.

jlc

[GreekLunatic]

to be honest would stevens make us go one better next yr he isnt a goal kicker we should have recruited a goal kicker not a centre man so i dont think we came out bad not getting him all the felt bad was we got no one and also i reckon we should have chased N Brown harder we would have had him

[TheGaffer]

Magpie Greg,

Who would have given up for Stevens that would have satisfied Port?

I know Eddie said one thing and another thing, but he probably thought that they had Stevens in the bag way back then. In hindsight they probably should have targetted Brown but I guess they had been after Stevens for years and he had now became available and felt he was an easier pickup. You live and learn.

I really cannot see how Stevens would have made us a much better side anyway.

Brisbane didn't go out and trade players left right and centre. They used the draft. So I can't see why trading is the be all and end all.

I heard the same negative comments on this forum back in 2001 when we failed to make a single trade.

Can't see how a window is closing when we will probably have the youngest list in the league next year. That one really puzzles me.

The teams in 77 - 81 and now cannot be and should not be compared as they are totally different.

[MOTR]

[dilly5]

Quick, someone make the call to Collingwood- sack the coaching and recruiting staff and put Magpie Greg in there. He has the uncanny ability to make the calls from his armchair with the limited information he reads in the Herald Sun.

It must be fabulous for you Greg, to be able to sit back and pull out the most obvious and simple solutions and berate the professionals for not coming up with it due to their incompetence. It has to be as simple as you make it, and couldn't be due to any other factors we will never know about. Because whatever the media reports must be the extent of the story. I suggest you go back to whatever it is YOU'RE really good at and trust that you don't know enough about any club's or player's situation to be able to make judgment calls about things that were or weren't done that dared to arouse the ire of Magpie Greg.

If you refuse to accept anything but the best and are resigned to the fact that ANYTHING less is unacceptable, maybe you should call the Lions, because the rest of us have the humility to have a bit of faith in the professionals and are patient enough to wait our turn to be the best.

Don't get me wrong Greg, I respect your right to express your opinion. But personally, I think you're coming from the wrong angle altogether, and looking to burn anyone at the stake for things that you consider to be gross oversights is presumptuous and completely ridiculous.

[Sultan of spin]

Anyone who believes the crap that is written in the press during trade week is revealing their ignorance. Everyone knows that the majority of reports on proposed trades in the press during trade week are crap and anyone who takes these reports as gospel is the one who is truly ignorant.

[Lazza]

dilly5. labrooy, the gaffer & some others, I'm not too sure what planet you guys live on but to say that we are NOT letting the window of opportunity pass after 2 consecutive losing grand finals (3 if you count the pre season comp) in just the last twelve months, you are in planet denial where everything is rosy and Collingwood win all their bloody games. Look, MM has talked about his famous football clock where flag winning teams are around the 11 - 1 mark. We are now at about the 12 mark and time is running out WITH the likes of Bucks, Burns, Wakelin etc. We can always replace them with young draft picks but that is not the point. Stevens would have added a fantastic player to a team at its prime to win the flag. But we needed to trade aggressively to get this player. As much as I like Cole, he and draft pick 17 would have got Steven to Collingwood. Now that opportunity is gone forever but apparently we are not supposed to blame Eddioe, Judklins, Balme, MM, the match committee or the boot studder!! Lets blame the victim, Stevens!!
I hope that draft pick no 17 will become a Magpie superstar but I wont be holding my breath that this will help Bucks, Burns and co.
Like Magpie Greg said, maybe the really cynical ones are us older supporters who have heard all this crap before and had to endure constant bloody failures since before the Seventies. Maybe you young guys will be saying this stuff in about 20 years!!

Lazza

[natkingcole]

Lazza, MG,
Cole will be a superstar in a couple of years time but I bet we won't hear a beep out of you when that happens, just as we don't hear anything now of our fans who were knocking Johnson a couple of years ago. Lazza, I don't know why you think we stand at 12 o'clock in the cycle when we sit as the 2nd youngest side with the the possiblity of going youngest by this year's national draft. Our time will come, but it might come by years 2005/06/07 by which time you will have all but forgotten your words of criticism of the CFC. Just as nobody remembers Jarman being dragged in the 1991 GF just after half time when he struggled to get a kick. Have faith.

[Newelly]

We are on paper one good player away from a premiership but hell, peoples lets not forget one thing. Rocca didn't play that game and that alone could well of accounted for the 9 goal difference. Its not just to be measured in the goals he would of kicked. Its also to be measured in the ones he helps create for others by taking the best defender. The confidence he gives the younger and smaller players around the ground.. The confidence that would not of been lost in the week leading up to the Grand Final. The fact Mick Malthouse would not of even thought of asking the players to do any major alterations to the game plan that worked well against Brisbane in the Qualifying Final. Through all the nastiness and oneupmanship and shite that goes on here and the "trade for star players" v "no need to trade" mass-debates we are losing sight of that fact. If Rocca goes down we are in trouble at this stage, but who knows by finals time next year other players may have stepped up. Truth is with Rocca in the team we had a team that was capable and likely of winning the flag against the Brisbane side put forward on that day in September. Also anyone think Ben Marsh would make a handy backup? Is he better than Stunning Steven?

[Lone Ranger]

One small problem with Cole suggestion ... he would not go (guardian here in Melbourne for one thing). If the player doesnt want to go, there is no trade.
There was no player who was prepared to go that Port was interested in. Hence there was NO alternative but to offer 17 and 35.