TOPIC:

anchorman wrote: I think on the weekend we saw some signs that there are dangerous forces close by in the form of the Suns and the Giants(Raj Nesshies).
Both sides played very good football over the weekend.The Suns recorded a good win over the Roos and the Giants played very well against one of the premiership favourites Geelong.
The suns look a really well drilled team right now,with players missing.Next season they add Jack Martin to an already dangerous mid field.Martin they say is going to be better than O'meara,even before he has kicked a football at AFL level.A scarey prospect.
The Raj Neeshies frightened the crap out of Geelong for 3/4,but Geelong eventually ran over them.But with some players still to come back I think the Giants played well enough to show they will be a force in the not to distant future.

GWS lost by 59 points. Kabooki led for almost two miles in the Perth Cup. It didn't win the race. The best thing going for GWS is that Sheedy will no longer be their coach next year.

A/man how did Gold Coast go against Freo earlier in the year?

anchorman wrote: Swan they got beaten by 40 or so points,but don't forget that Freo have beaten most this season and drew with the now premiership favourites Sydney on their own dunghill.
Don't worry about what the results are right now loom ahead and see what they have stored there with the extra games and the hardening of their bodies.
It is all too easy to say they aren't winning games right now but you have to look forward.Suns have won five so far this season and it doesn't matter who they have beaten just the fact that they have won five games is an improvement.They beat the Roos easily enough on the weekend and lets not forget that the Roos were considered to be top eight by most experts.

So how good are St Kilda pushing the Eagles to 4 points given that there were some who suggested that the Eagles would finish top after the qualifying games?

With respect to GWS and Gold Coast I can envisage a scenario where there will be a number of quality players who will be able to earn more at other clubs to those two as they will all be of similar age and hence will want top dollar at the same time.

As a side issue I noticed that there was another wonderful crowd for the GWS game.

anchorman wrote: GWS and GC have almost all their stars re-signed so the vampire can't get them. GWS have a large amount of money to lure Buddy.Franklin,Patton and Cameron.How does that sound for starters at the Neeshies!!!Not a bad attack.They have signed all those they are keeping.They have weaned out those they don't want to keep.They have money in store.Make no mistake they will be a force very soon.
The Suns have as I said before re-signed the vast majority of their young players so not much threat.They are playing a very hard attacking style of football at the moment.They will be a force.
you have to look ahead not at what they are doing right now.What they are doing right now is very impressive,but down the track it will be even better.

A/man they may well have re-signed most of their players for generally another couple of years. I am talking about when they are getting to be around 23-25 years of age. In most clubs you have a staggered age group consisting of some older players and some younger players; what GWS and Gold Coast will have is a group of players who, in the main, will be the same age and as such when they get to their peak earning capacity they will have a significant number together which will presumably preclude those clubs from paying what they would get in the open market.

Specifically with respect to the GWS I wonder whether some of those players will also be lured by the prospect of playing in front of significantly larger crowds than what they would if the continued to play for GWS.