There's Dees, there's Tigers, but we are COLLINGWOOD

[Mugwump]

^ for once, I agree with KM. i'd have said that the proven best 22 players out yesterday were Moore, Adams, Reid, Elliott, and Fasolo. That is a hell of a list, amd much more potent collectively than their outs. I guess you can count Swan, but he seems a different case insofar as he will not make the team different and better in the future. Broomy, Langdon, Ramsay are all fringe players at this stage. And Schazza is more of a bald player than a fringe player.

[AN_Inkling]

[Pies4shaw]

Good pick up, there, JC. We absolutely must keep Witts and try to get them working as a team. A couple of speedy, crumbing forwards would be required - both of our guys are better than Ceglar and McEvoy and just as mobile. The problem isn't them playing up forward, it's the lack of persuasive contest at the fall of the ball.

[Tannin]

What a bunch of whinging <snip> some of you are.

Why did we beat Geelong and GWS and WCE but lose to poor teams like Richmond and Carlton? Because we are a young side and young sides are always erratic, up one day, down the next. Fact of life. Basic fundamental of football.

Does this mean that, as our team matures, we will start winning consistently? No, of course not. We will be more consistent - you can back that in - but no-one knows yet whether out consistent level will be top 4 level, top 8 level, or less than that. Inconsistent young teams settle down after a couple of seasons, but the level at which they settle down is never known until it happens. You have to wait and see.

My guess is that Rudeboy is absolutely correct: we are going to be a powerhouse, but nobody knows that for sure yet.

We have great midfield strength - possibly the best young midfield in the comp with the likes of Adams, Treloar, Aish, Crisp, and DeG backing up still-youthful champions in Pendlebury, Varcoe, and Sidebottom. (Not too much wrong with Greenwood either.)

We have excellent small/medium defenders in Ramsay, 'Berg, Maynard, and one or two others.

We have outstanding small forwards in Elliott and Fasolo, and a tremdous ruck division.

Our weakness is the talls at either end. Brown is past his use-by, Reid is injured most of the time, Moore is Reid Mark II, and Cox is still an unknown quantity.

That leaves White as our best tall forward (unless Moore happens to be fit and/or Cox makes the position his own) and Frost as our best tall backman, with young Marsh starting to make his presence felt too.

Best case: Cox is as good as he seems, Moore learns how not to get injured every third week, White plays the way he did in the second half of this year, Reid plays more often than not, and Keefe picks up where he left off. Result: genuine premiership contenders.

Worst case: we struggle along with Brown down back (there are worse players than Nathan Brown holding down key defender posts at other clubs, so it's not the end of the world) and less-than-fantastic key forwards. Even that is not too bad though. At least we are rid of the Cloke disaster (Cloke is a great player and has a few years left in him at Hawthorn or Freo, but with him in the side at Collingwood our forward entries are crap; we absolutely must have a more mobile and creative type, even a Fasolo or an Elliott at FF if we can't find a big man that suits) and we have an excellent midfield coupled with outstanding half-backs (assuming Ramsay and Berg are fit). That still gives us a fair shot at it.

Stop whinging. Stop dreamin'. Just look at the facts and take a balanced view.

(Crikey! What am I saying? This is Nick's Collingwood BBS. We don't do "balanced view" here. Sorry. I forgot.)

[Krakouer Magic]

[Mugwump]

^ KM's post
It was a great performance against a premiership side that had a top four spot at stake. As Leigh Matthews said in the last quarter, it was finals-like. But we did well, so the opposition could not have been trying. Are you for real ?? What a bizarro post.

[Mugwump]

[Stevo75]

Great post Rudeboy, always love your work. I'm extremely optimistic about next year and can't wait for it to get underway. Surely we are due for some luck on the injury front after having 3 years of injuries to KEY players. We've had no continuity which hurts and doesn't help build that cohesive team unit. If we can get our best team on the park for most of the year we will win more games than we lose. Big pre seasons from Elliott, Moore, Treloar, Adams and Fasolo will have all of them joining the elite with our captain and hopefully a fully fit Ben Reid. Exciting times.

[Krakouer Magic]

[What'sinaname]

[RudeBoy]

[jackcass]