Where will Geelong finish in 2012?

[McRooster]

Harder to pick than a broken nose I reckon.
Body language was ugly against the Pies, similar to Brisbane after their GF loss in 2004 to the Power and they began their slide from there.
A core of very well drilled, strong men who block, set and run from a well structured gameplan - a gameplan very well headed for a change due to player departures.
A focus on a youth policy implementation to cater for their ageing list is also now likely.
Who will stay, who will go? Ablett or Selwood captain next year? Such an important next few weeks for the Cats to manage the fallout of 2010 correctly so as to arrest any possible slide in 2011.

[DazBurg]

i think even if they lose ablett and milburn and such they still a good enough side to make the top 4 again

[bunyip]

Agree. Geelong have won plenty of games without Gablett.
This is my theory. Say Gablett is a 10, Selwood is an 8, Bartell an 8 and soforth for the centerline rotation until you get to say Kelly, we'll give him a 6. If Gablett leaves they all move up one so instead of a 10 at the helm we have an 8. So Gabletts replacement comes in, Hogan frinstance, and, lets be harsh, is a 3. He will quickly build up to be a 5 or 6 and, hey presto, we may have only lost a skill factor of 5 or 6 across the whole centerline rotation,with, at least in Hogans case, good prospects to improve.
This is assuming we don't recruit a replacement from another club. This is very simplistic, but I don't see that we will lose a skill factor of 10, we will lose a great player, but he will be replaced by Selwood, not a novice.

[EAGLE4LIFE]

i think even if they lose ablett and milburn and such they still a good enough side to make the top 4 again

also chappy is aging though

[bunyip]

Some players have had useful careers up until their mid 30's. Look at Harvs. Who would dare say HE'S past it.

[McRooster]

Not to directly compare the two, but look at Adelaide - everyone said they were looking at top four in 2010, they kept their fab four ageing players and look what happened.

[DazBurg]

Not to directly compare the two, but look at Adelaide - everyone said they were looking at top four in 2010, they kept their fab four ageing players and look what happened.

differance between adelaide an geelong is....yeah some aging players but i wouldn't say it's their fab four.....even if ablett goes
there's selwood,bartel.chappy,enright and heaps more which i'm sure your aware of so don't need to go naming the whole list...lol....

[benjy251090]

will probably have something to say in september, might not be dominant though

[bunyip]

Pretty right Ben. We'll be back in the mix. I think we'll be a good side without being dominant.

[Fletch74]

will probably have something to say in september, might not be dominant though

2nd half of the top 8 for me. They only play one game style, and the loss of GAJ will hurt them

[bunyip]

WE CAN LEARN ANOTHER ONE 

[bunyip]

Considering whats happened today, it might be worth while running this poll again

[roo boys!]

Wooden spoon now only joking of course

[Alex7089]

They will finish 4th-8th IMHO.
Todays news won't make a HUGE difference of course it will leave a hole but he has taken rests before and Geelong didn't suffer.
I think their game style has run its course, it went longer than I expected anyway

[Milton]

I reckon we need these changes .. and they are a blessing in disguise that might stop us from bottoming out

Gaz going frees up a sh!tload of money  .. the big thing about Collingwood is that they bat deep and it was very obvious that their bottom 6 was a hell of a lot better then St Kilda's bottom 6 .. probably the same with us and with the extra dollars we can strengthen that aspect

We need to make a few 'hard calls' on the list for the future and maybe Bomber felt it would be hard to make them due to the loyalty factor .. ?? … when they play for 20% under what they're worth how do you sack them ? .. whatever, it will certainly be easier for a new coach to make these calls