I was at work tonight pumping out a few thousand schnitzels for the lovely customers of the Belair Hotel. I love our customers.
At about 8:15pm as I stare before plates for 6 chicken schnitzels (one no slaw add veg) 2 chicken parmys 2 beef schnitzels 4 kids nuggets 2 kids burgers 2 kids wraps 3 fish (1 grilled, gluten free fries) 4 salt and pepper squid a bowl of wedges, my mate working out in the bistro leans over the pass and let's me know port are getting pumped and it's not even half time.
But what I once would hear in shock and feel optimistic for a comeback in our more successful times and really disappointed with what was happening I now hear and I just don't even care. Don't get me wrong, I still check the score updates after every game I'm at work for (it's been most of them this year). But at the moment, it feels like it's just out of force of habit more than anything.
Maybe my interests in life are just changing, maybe the afl as a product just isn't appealing to me anymore. But I can still pick out mistakes that repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and I'll stop now but gee whiz I mean why can they not see these things that we all see and if they can then why aren't they doing anything?
#1 I've had a personal conversation with a player at the club and he has flat out admitted to me that some of the players don't like Voss, including himself. But that's just rumours, right? There's no proof of that? True. Even still, the fact there's many people out there who are questioning Voss' ability even without hearing that surely hints toward a fairly obvious thing that we need to get right.
Either these players that don't like him need to leave, Voss needs to leave, or they need to be honest with each other, air their grievances, learn from each other and work as a ******* team. Done, simple.
2: The handling of John Butchers career so far as a representative of Port Adelaide. When I got home tonight I checked the magpies SANFL score today and was pleasantly met with a pretty good scoreline. Then I was going through the players stat's hoping to see a lot of sausage rolls for Butcher but when I saw 13 touches no goals one behind I genuinely felt sad for the guy. Why has his kicking action still as horrendous today as it was when we drafted him 7 years ago? If it's all mental, why have we not let him play every game anyway and show an unrelenting confidence in him instead of this bullshit of giving him 3 games here and then sending him to the magpies for 10 weeks before giving him another go or two before sending him back to do the exact same thing in the magpies as he does in the Power. We've seen this guys talent. We know he's got it in him to be a great player. Some won't agree with me, they'll say the same thing the club seems to think, that he's just not good enough yet or has things to improve on. But he's never even been given the chance.
Does the same selection policy apply to Butcher as every other player on the list? Actually think about that one for a minute. Because I've seen O'Shea as one player for example that's seems to have been given games in Power colours a lot more than Butcher has despite relatively similar outputs. You don't have to agree, but I think the whole thing has been handled pretty pathetically.
These are just two of no doubt a much wider range of issues that first came to my head when I lay down to write this.
It's pretty simple I reckon, you see your issues, you fix them, they're no longer an issue. Start with these two, it can literally be done in one day. Sign Butcher up for 2 years, play him every single game he is available for. We should have done this year's ago but if we've just wasted 7 years of our time with him. Now we owe him 2 years.
Get everyone at the club together, spend a day and just sit down and talk with each other honestly about what they are feeling frustrated or let down by and problem solve those issues.
If this group can't do something as simple as that then there needs sto be a massive broom pushed through the entire club, who's going to be pushing it?
At about 8:15pm as I stare before plates for 6 chicken schnitzels (one no slaw add veg) 2 chicken parmys 2 beef schnitzels 4 kids nuggets 2 kids burgers 2 kids wraps 3 fish (1 grilled, gluten free fries) 4 salt and pepper squid a bowl of wedges, my mate working out in the bistro leans over the pass and let's me know port are getting pumped and it's not even half time.
But what I once would hear in shock and feel optimistic for a comeback in our more successful times and really disappointed with what was happening I now hear and I just don't even care. Don't get me wrong, I still check the score updates after every game I'm at work for (it's been most of them this year). But at the moment, it feels like it's just out of force of habit more than anything.
Maybe my interests in life are just changing, maybe the afl as a product just isn't appealing to me anymore. But I can still pick out mistakes that repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and I'll stop now but gee whiz I mean why can they not see these things that we all see and if they can then why aren't they doing anything?
#1 I've had a personal conversation with a player at the club and he has flat out admitted to me that some of the players don't like Voss, including himself. But that's just rumours, right? There's no proof of that? True. Even still, the fact there's many people out there who are questioning Voss' ability even without hearing that surely hints toward a fairly obvious thing that we need to get right.
Either these players that don't like him need to leave, Voss needs to leave, or they need to be honest with each other, air their grievances, learn from each other and work as a ******* team. Done, simple.
2: The handling of John Butchers career so far as a representative of Port Adelaide. When I got home tonight I checked the magpies SANFL score today and was pleasantly met with a pretty good scoreline. Then I was going through the players stat's hoping to see a lot of sausage rolls for Butcher but when I saw 13 touches no goals one behind I genuinely felt sad for the guy. Why has his kicking action still as horrendous today as it was when we drafted him 7 years ago? If it's all mental, why have we not let him play every game anyway and show an unrelenting confidence in him instead of this bullshit of giving him 3 games here and then sending him to the magpies for 10 weeks before giving him another go or two before sending him back to do the exact same thing in the magpies as he does in the Power. We've seen this guys talent. We know he's got it in him to be a great player. Some won't agree with me, they'll say the same thing the club seems to think, that he's just not good enough yet or has things to improve on. But he's never even been given the chance.
Does the same selection policy apply to Butcher as every other player on the list? Actually think about that one for a minute. Because I've seen O'Shea as one player for example that's seems to have been given games in Power colours a lot more than Butcher has despite relatively similar outputs. You don't have to agree, but I think the whole thing has been handled pretty pathetically.
These are just two of no doubt a much wider range of issues that first came to my head when I lay down to write this.
It's pretty simple I reckon, you see your issues, you fix them, they're no longer an issue. Start with these two, it can literally be done in one day. Sign Butcher up for 2 years, play him every single game he is available for. We should have done this year's ago but if we've just wasted 7 years of our time with him. Now we owe him 2 years.
Get everyone at the club together, spend a day and just sit down and talk with each other honestly about what they are feeling frustrated or let down by and problem solve those issues.
If this group can't do something as simple as that then there needs sto be a massive broom pushed through the entire club, who's going to be pushing it?
