WB Game Day V Fremantle R19 2019

[Yankee Hotel Foxtrot]

I fwar the worst for Dale Morris. Dale you are immortal. You are up there with the greats in contesting, competing. Thank you.

What makes me really angry at the footy gods is that Moz showed before he went down was that he looked no closer to retirement in terms of how he was playing than he did when he was 26!
In fact his return , allowed us the ability to move Cordy up forward to negate their best intercepter in Ryan. That's not a guy who is hanging on for grim life at the end of a career. That's someone who is still a valuable and integral perforner.
This could be the wine talking..but I say if he wants to go through the rehab, then let sentimentality prevail; give him another year.

I reckon Moz would keep going til he's 40, and his conditioning and attitude would allow that.
I know it's not reality......i just really want him to go out on his terms and I fear we'll never see the likes of a Moz in my lifetime and that's depressing

[G-Mo77]

You'll have to excuse me, I have something in my eye.......

[bornadog]

You'll have to excuse me, I have something in my eye.......

After the game:

[Twodogs]

Haha, that makes me remember. One of the few times we were on the TV. I met Dougie alone at a bar in Doncaster. In the company of my beautiful partner told him that like EJ he was not recorded on TV like other greats, the TV missed a lot of their brilliance.

I've told this story a few times but I will briefly tell it again. Back in the late '70s I was at the Western Oval watching training and kicking the footy with my mates on the terraces in front of the Gent stand. Charlie Sutton and Ted Whitten were standing roughly 20-30 metres away from us both staring intently at the contents of a folder Teddy was holding.

Anyway the ball goes flying over my head and bounces toward the two of them so cheeky me yells out "excuse me mister but can we have our ball back please?" Neither of them looked up but Teddy moved his foot almost imperceptibly and flicked the ball with his toe end of his shoe and the bloody thing flew at me like a tracer bullet. It was going so fast that it knocked me off my feet and as I got up they were both having a bit of a giggle and I heard Charlie say to Ted "oh EJ, you've still got it old son".

[Twodogs]

What makes me really angry at the footy gods is that Moz showed before he went down was that he looked no closer to retirement in terms of how he was playing than he did when he was 26!
In fact his return , allowed us the ability to move Cordy up forward to negate their best intercepter in Ryan. That's not a guy who is hanging on for grim life at the end of a career. That's someone who is still a valuable and integral perforner.
This could be the wine talking..but I say if he wants to go through the rehab, then let sentimentality prevail; give him another year.

I reckon Moz would keep going til he's 40, and his conditioning and attitude would allow that.
I know it's not reality......i just really want him to go out on his terms and I fear we'll never see the likes of a Moz in my lifetime and that's depressing

I get what you mean about the footy gods and what could have been but I reckon that if you said to Moz when he was Rookied in 2004 that he would retire with 250 games, a premiership and be the most respected player in the competition he may well have taken that.

I have come to praise Moz, not to bury him. Let's celebrate a wonderful career rather than be sad that it looks like (I'm not game to count him out while he still has two legs, actually make that one leg) it's over.

[Yankee Hotel Foxtrot]

I get what you mean about the footy gods and what could have been but I reckon that if you said to Moz when he was Rookied in 2004 that he would retire with 250 games, a premiership and be the most respected player in the competition he may well have taken that.

I have come to praise Moz, not to bury him. Let's celebrate a wonderful career rather than be sad that it looks like (I'm not game to count him out while he still has two legs, actually make that one leg) it's over.

Even as I was writing, my mind turned to the GF and 'the tackle' and that moment franked his career.
I just never want Moz to retire okay. I go to sleep most nights trying to configure ways in which Moz can find a way to play til at least his early 60's...
It consumes me; surprisingly to my wife's encouragement..I don't know why she is so supportive in this endeavour??

[Twodogs]

Even as I was writing, my mind turned to the GF and 'the tackle' and that moment franked his career.
I just never want Moz to retire okay. I go to sleep most nights trying to configure ways in which Moz can find a way to play til at least his early 60's...
It consumes me; surprisingly to my wife's encouragement..I don't know why she is so supportive in this endeavour??

During the 16/17 off season I was at the footy ground and I got talking to a couple of Irish backpackers. Due to the number of Irish players in the AFL nowadays they had developed a slight interest in the game and they had added a trip to a footy ground to their bucket list while they were backpacking around Australia.

Anyway I was just showing the club museum when the playing group walked past en masse. The Irish guys were particularly taken with the physicality of AFL football and wanted to know who the toughest player was out of the guys walking past. I pointed to Dale Morris and they said "Him? The one with the big ears? He cant be the toughest out of all those blokes" so I told them the story of him climbing off the deck and taking a rampaging Buddy Franklyn (who they had heard of) down in front of 100 000 people with a broken bone in his back to help win us our first premiership in 62 years. That's more physical and mental courage there than you could poke a very large stick at!

[azabob]

At the game English seemed to break even.

How did other posters see his game?

[merantau]

At the game English seemed to break even.

How did other posters see his game?

I thought he played really well. Certainly timed his centre bounce leaps a lot better and was very good by hand and foot. And he did it against three big guys too. I think Bevo and the Club would be really happy with his performance.

[Sedat]

At the game English seemed to break even.

How did other posters see his game?

He was great around the ground but our mids saved his arse at the stoppages with a brilliant display of sharking opposition hitouts.

[jeemak]

Just watched the first quarter again, and as I've always been, I'm actually a Ross Lyon fan and I think he almost has a team that can be good enough to reach the pointy end of the finals within the next couple of years, and still make them this year.

Fremantle had a few key players out today and were ripe for the picking, with the good thing being we picked them off. But, when they move the football well they cut through everyone. I got back on to this thought when I was thinking about how awesome we are when we have it on our terms, Fremantle are the same but they just do it differently.

We got them on a good day.

[Murphy'sLore]

Never thought I'd be walking out of such a thumping win with tears in my eyes. Not surprised the wind went out of our sails after Morris went down. What a beautiful man he is.

[Go_Dogs]

Bailey Dale is an interesting player. He has proven he can kick 4-5 goals on about 3 or 4 occasions now, so quite clearly he has the ability to play well at the top level. The question is can he consistently deliver and become that goal kicking HFF or does he need to be able to push further up the ground?

Question marks on his defensive game / ability to win the ball, but he’s a smart player who moves well and has very good skills.

My opinion has seemed to change on him multiple times, from thinking he won’t make it, to thinking he can become a very dangerous forward, to thinking he has too many deficiencies to then seeing him produce two great games back to back.

Will be interesting to see where he’s at in 2-3 years time.

He's been our best leading player for about 3 years but hasn't had the opportunity for continuity there due injury and encumbents. He's going to make it.

[Bulldog4life]

I have memories of the versatile Merrington switching forward and kicking bags of goals.

Yep played full back a lot. I remember Chooka kicked 5 goals in one of the "Night Premiership" matches we played at South Melbourne. We were pretty good in those too winning a few premierships.

[Bulldog4life]

At the game English seemed to break even.

How did other posters see his game?

I thought he did well against great odds. Bevo said he loved his game.