Essendon considers dumping Bendigo

[table tennis]

i'm hearing what you're saying, i'm saying that ideally, we should be pushing for stand alone. we should be fighting for it.

curtain raisers are pipe dreams though, i know.

Curtain raisers are out of the question, your right.

My biggest fear with an improving side, that the day we do go deep into the finals, and bendigo cannot put up a whimper, we will have players playing AFL finals with no match fitness for blokes that are out of the selected 22.

So if injury was to happen, we would have to pick players that haven't played for a week or so.

 

[ant555]

Ant, the only thing I would question is whether they're upset at the way to article is written or the fact that it got out in the first place.

I think the review is big news, because this is the first time it's actually not being conducted for the sake of a review and a move is seriously being considered and is at the forefront of thinking.

There has to be a better option.

The review they did before the last contract signing had a similar sound to it. There was a look at other options then and a bit of news about it.
Even after last years review there was a bit of noise about the standard needing to be lifted which lead to the cleanout of the list and the new football setup with the regional coaches in Maryborough, Sheparton and Melbourne.
I know that the club is not impressed that a lot of stuff was used out of context. Like it or not Bendigo is still one of the options and they do not want to burn that bridge just yet.

Of course there could be a better option but things look limited at the moment as there is not a lot of room to manoeuvre. The club would love to get a stand alone licence at this stage but currently there are a number of things that need to happen to get that off the ground.

I think the Bendigo model can work but it would take more funding to get it going and the Bendigo end is limited as far as finding a lot of funding.
I guess they have to weigh up how much value for money and how much extra cost will be involved with making the Bendigo part work.

 

[ant555]

i'm hearing what you're saying, i'm saying that ideally, we should be pushing for stand alone. we should be fighting for it.

curtain raisers are pipe dreams though, i know.

They will enquire about a stand alone licence. They did last time the contracts where up as well.
Like i have said i am all for it but i am not going to get over excited about it becasue AFLV have the say in that one and they will do what they think is best for Victorian football and not what is in the best interests of the Essendon FC. The licence is very much out of our hands. We can only apply for one. Thats as far as we can go with it.


One thing i do notice and this is a broad issue for all suporters and that is i see people saying they would support a stand alone side and get to games at WH. My question is why havn't people bothered to go and see the Bendigo games in Melbourne ? I know it is Bendigo by name but most weeks they do/did wear an Essendon jumper and most of the venues are easy to get to.


I also want to add this for all to read and that is if we had a stand alone side this year and had the same injuries to the Essendon AFL listed players and the equivelant injuries ot Essendon VFL players that Bendigo have had ( Bendigo has been without 4 or 5 of the better recruits for most of the year) the Essendon stand alone side would be struggling to win games or be within 10 goals of the stronger VFL sides anyway.
There is no magic wand that says the stand alone side would be stronger if they had injuries.
As someone else mentioned being worried about going deep into the finals and having to pick players who are not match fit i would have to say that a stand alone side is not certain to be playing finals. Geelongs did when they had a lot of depth and a number of players who had been on their senior list for 5 or 6 years (players like Playfair, Charlie Gardiner etc) but it fell away quickly once those blokes where moved off the list. Collingwood has not looked close to being a finals side either.
While it would prove to be better than Bendigo this year i would not be expecting a finals side from an Essendon stand alone side. Not when the focus is on player development.

 

[ant555]

Curtain raisers are out of the question, your right.

My biggest fear with an improving side, that the day we do go deep into the finals, and bendigo cannot put up a whimper, we will have players playing AFL finals with no match fitness for blokes that are out of the selected 22.

So if injury was to happen, we would have to pick players that haven't played for a week or so.

There is no way that a stand alone side would be certain of going deap into the finals. Geelong have on a couple of occaisions but they have spent just as much time in the bottom half. They are 2/5 this year.
Collingwood has not really looked like being a genuine finals side either. They are 4/3 this year and looking at the bottom end of the 8.

If you look at 2008 Bendigo where 5/15 , Geelong 7/15 and Collingwood 7/13 so there was not a lot of difference there.
Unless you build a really strong list , remain injury free and have 6 or so really good quality VFL players the stand alone side is not going to be a strong finals sides.
The fact that when Essendon have had a better run injury wise , Bendigo have performed ok (2005 and 2007 playing finals). You will find that will be the case with a stand alone side.

 

[bombers_4_ever]

The BB don't train together as they live in different parts of Northern Victoria. So it can be a bit hard to get a bunch of blokes to play together.