Sack Wallace!

[froars]

If anyone on this board disagrees with this post, they are ********ed in the head.

Excuse me 1980, but i must apologise to you. I have just invaded your personal space. You see, i looked at your profile to see what you were up to, just in case you were doing what i thought you were doing. Yes, you were ****** yourself.

Haven't you been saying all along that we should be up where the Dogs and Hawks are, crying like a baby that the bloody Hawks are so far advanced than us. ANd now you support Jake saying that he'd be happy with 12 to 15 finish this year. I wouldn't be happy with that, but I'd be accepting if i knew we were going places.

Men

I'm going shopping

 

[Terry Tan]

Wallace is not going to be sacked now or later. He will see out 5 years. That's Greg Miller reality.

But I'm worried about a lot of these players and where their headed. The way things are going, it's not TW that is going to get sacked, but the under performing (there's a lot of them) players.

 

[Bojangles17]

we were desperate and TW had us in a corner and got himself a five year contract - good on him. but now that we all know that there'll be no improvement this year - indeed, we'll probably go backwards - it's time for the board to sit down with wallace and let him know that the club made a mistake giving him a five year deal and that if he doesn't get Richmond in the finals in 2006, his contract will be terminated.

And in the meantime, we should be actively and openly looking for another coach - no lies, no skullduggery, just an honest admission of error and a demonstration that we at Richmond demand results.

his appointment was not an act of desperation it was the product of a methodical search that flushed the very best available talent and with Eade and Ayres around ...there was no shortage of choice!

To assess his performance 2 weeks into his second season would be the most simple minded short sighted decision ever and would wreak of panic from a place ewith no sense of direction.

I understand you are an ex player ...just stick to putting out the cutlery at the pres lunch pal and leave the thorny issues to those who can apply a little objective thinking ....

 

[Darth_Tiger]

hes probly someone that wallace sacked when he got there. By the way weaver, best post ever.

 

[IDGAF]

IDGAF, seriously, you're right. But what surprises me most is how many people got fired up about it on this board, instead of just laughing it off. I think it says something about how some richmond supporters think we're travelling with an overreaction like that.

But I also reckon 5 year plans are get out of jail free cards. Frawley had 5 years. Takes 5 years to become competitive? Just look at Wallace himself. He turned the dogs around from the first day he was appointed coach there. He made them competitive in his first 6 months. Bulldogs went from 15th in 96 to 3rd in 97. 3rd again in 98.

How long before we see it at Punt Rd? 3rd is a stretch, but what is it we should be aiming for this season? 8 wins? 8th place? Just please not 9th.

76er has been naive posting about sacking wallace, but he's made some relevant points about seeing the team progress. I dont believe for a minute in anyone getting get out of jail free cards. Thats exactly what Danny Frawley had. If Wallace can do one thing, its get more out of the existing player list. He's proved it before with the Dogs. We saw signs of it last season. Recruiting quality is a top priority, but the players that walk on the ground every weekend must give their best, and its the coaches job to make sure they do. We'll be a far better club if we get more out of the list we've got, instead of just selling future plans like a dotcom. I was more convinced we were last year than this one.

Fair enough 1980 , everyone should be accountable . That is what all forms of life are about in this modern day and age . But i don`t think it is being fair to Wallace to compare him to what he did at the Bullies in the mid-late 90`s over there and the job he has at hand now .

Different list- different circumstances-different times

I concur with you in that the first round was just plain and simple ... not acceptable . I don`t care if you are playing AFL or running around for the seconds at Nunawading , you do not throw in the towell like we did in that game , it goes against the grain of what this whole competition is about . And your right ... for the first time in his tenure at Punt Rd.... Terry Wallace deserved and had some very serious questions asked of him . Because the buck does stop with him . And i agree , his job ultimately is getting the best out what he has .

But i ask you this ...." Is it possible to polish a tur.d ? "

I don`t reckon . You flush it down the dunny and you start again .

That is what we have to do . It aint gonna happen in one , two or even three years . All the old turds have to be slowly flushed away and replaced with blokes who can play the modern game .... non turds if you will .

Wallace underperforming V`s a list full of turds ? ..... My faith is still with Wallace . Watching a good chunk of senior list still underperforming after all these years is the money shot for mine . And while they underperform , it just makes all that much harder for the kids , who we are all starting to question now

 

[GhostofJimJess]

The impatience, irrationality and sheer single-minded blindness of many Richmond supporters is largely responsible for the mediocrity of our once great club.

Too many people don't have the patience to do the genuine hard work needed to build something from the ground-up. 1 or 2 years into a rebuilding plan and there is a clamour for results-now and coaching changes.

Every time we begin the process we shoot ourselves in the foot as the club officials run scared of rabid and moronic fans.

Instead of having the self-belief, competence and leadership to continue building a side, Frawley felt the hot breath on his neck and topped-up with veterans to try and get immediate success. Instead of having the sense of security to let a Gaspar or Holland go, he couldn't face the Richmond fans after a poor season so kept his veterans at any cost.

Greg Miller is a guy who can stare down these fans. Form a plan and stick to it. Terry Wallace is a guy who can stare down these fans. Neither is going to run scared of coteries, player groups, sponsors or guys with trucks of chicken waste.

Neither guy is going to let the players run the club as happened in the past. Both have the reputations and status to make tough decisions and not need to apologise to anyone. Both can give the one finger salute to the fans and get on with the business of running the club ... which is exactly what we need.

The Richmond plan is clear to anyone with eyes who cares to look.

We are going for pace, pace, pace. Guys who run like the wind and kick the ball well. These guys Deledio, JON, Casserley, Tambling, Meyer, Raines will be brought in every year and we will keep turning them over until we have a 15 man midfield. It will take time. These types of players need 4 years, not 1 to get up to the standards of AFL fitness and competence.

We are developing mobile key position players. Guys like Thursfield who are running, rebounding defenders. Guys like Hughes who play more like Tarrant than Rocca.

The plan is there. For the first time in 25 years we have genuine leadership at the club who are committed to sticking to a plan and bringing it to fruition. Not a bunch of nuff-nuffs who will change and panic at the first sign of fan unrest.

The plan might not be he right one, but at least we have blokes with a vision of how the AFL will look in 5 years time and are building a team for that challenge.

Guys who are trying to build a team to challenge for premierships in 5 years and not caring about a finals appearance this year or next.

Eventually people will see that this year and next don't matter. That players like Gaspar, Tivendale, Chaffey and co don't matter. They are not part of the planning, they are not part of the future. They are simply place-holders. Taking the bumps and punishment (and losses) while we develop the kids to take their place.

They'll do their 1-2 years of service and then be pushed aside when the kids are ready. In exchange for being well paid duds for the past decade, they get to suffer the punishment of ending their career as fall-guys attracting the anger of the fans and losing most weeks.

Instead of having rabid fans pointing the finger at Tambling and wondering why he isn't a game-winner by 19, they can take out their anger on Tivendale while Tambling gets to take his time and grow into a player.

Finally thing start heading in the right directions and idiots who want success yesterday only want to tear it all up and start again.

Weav, I want you to take this post and get it gold-embossed, and then thrust it into the face of anyone lingering around the club impersonating a genuine supporter who might be demanding a quick fix over the next couple of years. And if you're not there to do it, please allow me the honor.

Great stuff, mate.

 

[GhostofJimJess]

No-one's going to argue with that Weaver.

But we dont live in a silo, and we do play against other teams. The signs are that the Dogs are not just ahead of us, but WAY ahead. If the Hawks pull ahead and their own youth policy, which mind you started earlier than ours and goes much deeper, brings them results in year 3 instead of year 5, where will that leave us?

Surely we need to be close to where the Dogs are, and well ahead of where the Hawks are. And the question is, are we???

Surely you're putting too much emphasis on one game, 1980. The Dogs possibly are ahead of us, but not because they belted us in Round 1. That was just an individual result on a single day of footy. Surely they must also have been ahead of us last year when we beat them, which again shows that the results of a single footy game are not the most accurate indicator?

Were we miles ahead of Carlton and Port when we poleaxed them both last season? Probably ahead of the Blues, probably still behind the Power. Yet we have done nothing to suggest that our long-term plan is any less sound than it was then - it's just that our players were playing better at that time. Surely the loss of Wayne Campbell, Mark Graham, Rory Hilton, Greg Stafford and Mark Chaffey since those two wins hasn't been a blow to our long-term objectives?

If we do this properly, we could be in for some real arse-kickings over the next couple of seasons. Probably more so when we start phasing out the on-field responsibilities of the likes of Gas, Richo, AK, Bowdo and Johnno. But you can bet that those occasional victories we do have which become more and more attributable to the 'new guard' of Deledio, Tuck, Raines, Newman, Tambling etc will be all the more sweeter for the previous bouts of pain.

 

[Weaver]

But I also reckon 5 year plans are get out of jail free cards. Frawley had 5 years. Takes 5 years to become competitive? Just look at Wallace himself. He turned the dogs around from the first day he was appointed coach there. He made them competitive in his first 6 months. Bulldogs went from 15th in 96 to 3rd in 97. 3rd again in 98.

Falling victim there to spin 1980. Wallace took over after one bad year. He did not inherit a team that was genuinely on the bottom of the ladder. Dogs had finished 3, 9, 6, 7 before they went 15th. He returned them to the top-8 where they should have been. Didn't really turn a team around.

 

[Weaver]

Wallace is not going to be sacked now or later. He will see out 5 years. That's Greg Miller reality.

Its also simple, financial common sense. We are in a large amount of debt. We are barely breaking even every year. We are not going to sack a coach and pay-out 3 years of a contract, plus the cost of hiring his replacement. Not to mention the contracts of his support staff like Royal. We simply don't have the $2m we need to make foolish decisions like that.

Similarly in the real world you can't simply up and sack guys like Gaspar and co. You have to wait for their contracts to expire.

 

[Terry Tan]

But has Richmond really slipped so much from last year?

Last year we were close to the Dogs (beating them once), lost to WCE by 2 points in a great match, but did get thlogged by the Saints.

If TW is planning on getting rid of the older players, why not do it quicker? Why does he still persevere with the old hacks that have let us down for years and drive us supporters mad?

TW said he did not believe in bottoming out like the Hawks, so that's why he combines experience with youth. But the experienced players are mostly now a liability.

Whereas the Hawks have now gelled and are playing decent footy, the Dogs are rampaging, and even the Blues are playing with resolve, but we look flat and deflated, our confidence totally shot. We can not hit a bloody target, we turnover the ball, and senior players still make the same mistakes they have mad forever, they will never learn.

It's great to rebuild but it seems we have been rebuilding forever and never getting anywhere. Northey, Walls, Geischen, Frawley, and now TW. What happens if TW fails too, what do we do then? Another 5 years of patience wasted.

We are just scrapping by financially, if we do have more lean years, will we survive? We don't have a Prez like Eddie to make us a truckload of money with mediocre onfield performances.

Will stars like Deledio still want to play for our club?

What's going on at the moment with our club????

 

[cub]

Ok 76er, maybe you ain't a troll, but niether are you a very good supporter.

OK Round 1 was non acceptable in every way and the buck does stop with TW.

Round 2 was an "acceptable" performance against one of the challengers.

Round 3 how many teams win at Subi against the Eagles, once again "acceptable"

Now I am not happy but FFS it is 3 rounds into the season, we will win around 8 games or so and that is we are at ATM.

"Supporters" like you that call for Wallace's head after 3 rounds are not what the RFC need at this stage. We have been down for years and dug ourselves a hole. This includes a very un-amusing merry go round of coaches.

We need STABILITY at this stage, sacking Wallace will not only financially Frawley us up the arse, it will also send a clear message to anyone who wants stable employment to stay the Frawley away from Richmond. How could this be any good for the club.

See where we are at in 5 years time, this year and next we will be on a rollercoaster and TW has said this.

Look I am as frustrated as any supporter out there, been around seems like forever and it is sometimes gutwrenching copping the continual mediocrity and slagging off from opposition "supporters", fairweather as some of them are.

That said I will be there till the last gasp - That is what makes Richmond unique in it's own way. WHAT Club could continually get the support that Richmond does when it has been down so long, I doubt not many if any.

We must stick this one out "unless" 3 years in we are seen to be going nowhere and I mean going nowhere, then it obviously needs to be looked at, NOT NOW.

How awesome will it be when we are back, and to get there Stability is what we need ATM.

GO TIGES

 

[1980]

Falling victim there to spin 1980. Wallace took over after one bad year. He did not inherit a team that was genuinely on the bottom of the ladder. Dogs had finished 3, 9, 6, 7 before they went 15th. He returned them to the top-8 where they should have been. Didn't really turn a team around.

Just goes to show you then the merits of sacking a coach for having one bad season!

 

[1980]

Excuse me 1980, but i must apologise to you. I have just invaded your personal space. You see, i looked at your profile to see what you were up to, just in case you were doing what i thought you were doing. Yes, you were ****** yourself.

Haven't you been saying all along that we should be up where the Dogs and Hawks are, crying like a baby that the bloody Hawks are so far advanced than us. ANd now you support Jake saying that he'd be happy with 12 to 15 finish this year. I wouldn't be happy with that, but I'd be accepting if i knew we were going places.

Men

I'm going shopping

I'd be happy finishing 12-15. I just think we should be beating teams like the Hawks and not get smashed by 115 points by the Dogs.

You do realise that it is possible to beat the Hawks and still finish 15th, dont you?

 

[1980]

Surely you're putting too much emphasis on one game, 1980. The Dogs possibly are ahead of us, but not because they belted us in Round 1. That was just an individual result on a single day of footy. Surely they must also have been ahead of us last year when we beat them, which again shows that the results of a single footy game are not the most accurate indicator?

Were we miles ahead of Carlton and Port when we poleaxed them both last season? Probably ahead of the Blues, probably still behind the Power. Yet we have done nothing to suggest that our long-term plan is any less sound than it was then - it's just that our players were playing better at that time. Surely the loss of Wayne Campbell, Mark Graham, Rory Hilton, Greg Stafford and Mark Chaffey since those two wins hasn't been a blow to our long-term objectives?

If we do this properly, we could be in for some real arse-kickings over the next couple of seasons. Probably more so when we start phasing out the on-field responsibilities of the likes of Gas, Richo, AK, Bowdo and Johnno. But you can bet that those occasional victories we do have which become more and more attributable to the 'new guard' of Deledio, Tuck, Raines, Newman, Tambling etc will be all the more sweeter for the previous bouts of pain.

I'm putting way too much emphasis on one game.

But I just get the feeling from watching our first 3 games that this is the year we are going to bottom out. I was hopeful we'd improve on last year, and show some progress, but it could be a possibility that we'll win less games this year than we did last one.

Which is OK. But if that's going to be the case, I just want to see Wallace smash a brick against Gaspar's dunny brush head. I hate watching some of those senior players having a picnic out there

 

[froars]

I'd be happy finishing 12-15. I just think we should be beating teams like the Hawks and not get smashed by 115 points by the Dogs.

You do realise that it is possible to beat the Hawks and still finish 15th, dont you?

And i think our priorities are to worry about what's happening at Richmond, rather than worrying over what's happening at other clubs. WGAF what Hawthorn is doing?

 

[Weaver]

If TW is planning on getting rid of the older players, why not do it quicker? Why does he still persevere with the old hacks that have let us down for years and drive us supporters mad?

You can't sack guys under contract. You can't replace your veterans all at once. You can't just throw kids into the team. We are replacing the veterans but we have more of them, and fewer guys in the key 21-26 age range to rely on.

You can't come up with a new team all at once. You have to replace guys in batches of 2 or 3 at a time.

Our turnover of players is huge.

From the team that took the field in round 1 2003 - we have gotten rid of Campbell, Hilton, Blumfield, Cameron, King, Fiora, Vardy, Rogers, Zantuck, Houlihan. That is 10 of 22 gone. Half a new team inside 3 years.

TW said he did not believe in bottoming out like the Hawks, so that's why he combines experience with youth. But the experienced players are mostly now a liability.

He can't get rid of them until we find their replacements.

It's great to rebuild but it seems we have been rebuilding forever and never getting anywhere. Northey, Walls, Geischen, Frawley, and now TW. What happens if TW fails too, what do we do then? Another 5 years of patience wasted.

None of those guys tried to build a team from sratch. None of them tried to build a team with a view of what footy would look like in 5 years time. They all tried for immediate success.

What's going on at the moment with our club????

We are being run professionally and intellegently for the first time in 25 years.

 

[CoggaRules]

From the team that took the field in round 1 2003 - we have gotten rid of Campbell, Hilton, Blumfield, Cameron, King, Fiora, Vardy, Rogers, Zantuck, Houlihan. That is 10 of 22 gone. Half a new team inside 3 years.

relax Weave, with all due respect, shouldnt that be half a new team that replaced the half of the old team that was only half a team. Apart from Cameron, Campbell, and to an extent Rogo, the rest well, i wont go there.

 

[duckboy]

Those that are quoting the Hawks and Dogs as teams that have "leapt ahead" of us in rebuilding are kidding themselves.

DOGS
Still rely heavily on the senior group (Johnson, West, Grant, Smith, Darcy) that have carried them for years, although thats improved greatly in the past couple of seasons. The big improvers on their list who in my mind have made the difference (Gilbee, Cross, McMahon, Giansiracusa, Murphy, Harris etc) have all been around for 4-5 years and were drafted during the time we were trading for *******s like Biddiscombe and King. Their recent season recruits (i.e. those recruited in the time RFC have been rebuilding) have not had that much of an impact, Cooney and Griffen excepted. They have a key group in the 21-26 age group, great core of senior players and a bunch of promising kids. We have a tiny group of 21-26ers, Richo, Brown, Johnson and Bowden as the only key seniors and a bunch of kids. Of course we're behind them, always have been. They started rebuilding 3 years before we did.

HAWKS
Simple answer here. When the Hawks have their senior guys out on the park, they're not a bad side. Hodge, Mitchell, Everitt and Crawford is as good a starting midfield as anyone (maybe WCE excpeted). Their senior guys missed a heap of footy last year and exaggerated the "bottom out". Add to that the imposing number of kids they've taken as 1st and 2nd round draft picks in the last four years and they're well on the way to having a competitive team again. Like the Dogs, they started before we did, unlike the Dogs (like us), their 21-26 age group is also fairly weak.

So for people to say we've been leapfrogged doesn't wash. We had a bit of luck at the end of the 2002/2003 drafts (Newman, Raines, Jackson, Hartigan) after trading early picks for Browny and Sugar. We seriously started to rebuild in the 04 draft and continued it last year. Its early days!!!

 

[CoggaRules]

Those that are quoting the Hawks and Dogs as teams that have "leapt ahead" of us in rebuilding are kidding themselves.

DOGS
Still rely heavily on the senior group (Johnson, West, Grant, Smith, Darcy) that have carried them for years, although thats improved greatly in the past couple of seasons. The big improvers on their list who in my mind have made the difference (Gilbee, Cross, McMahon, Giansiracusa, Murphy, Harris etc) have all been around for 4-5 years and were drafted during the time we were trading for *******s like Biddiscombe and King. Their recent season recruits (i.e. those recruited in the time RFC have been rebuilding) have not had that much of an impact, Cooney and Griffen excepted. They have a key group in the 21-26 age group, great core of senior players and a bunch of promising kids. We have a tiny group of 21-26ers, Richo, Brown, Johnson and Bowden as the only key seniors and a bunch of kids. Of course we're behind them, always have been. They started rebuilding 3 years before we did.

HAWKS
Simple answer here. When the Hawks have their senior guys out on the park, they're not a bad side. Hodge, Mitchell, Everitt and Crawford is as good a starting midfield as anyone (maybe WCE excpeted). Their senior guys missed a heap of footy last year and exaggerated the "bottom out". Add to that the imposing number of kids they've taken as 1st and 2nd round draft picks in the last four years and they're well on the way to having a competitive team again. Like the Dogs, they started before we did, unlike the Dogs (like us), their 21-26 age group is also fairly weak.

So for people to say we've been leapfrogged doesn't wash. We had a bit of luck at the end of the 2002/2003 drafts (Newman, Raines, Jackson, Hartigan) after trading early picks for Browny and Sugar. We seriously started to rebuild in the 04 draft and continued it last year. Its early days!!!

woe, far out man, is he thinking about retiring yet? seeing he is one of the senior group at the hawks?
By the way, here is a curly one, how do you rely on someone that you a forced to not rely on? think about it...

 

[duckboy]

woe, far out man, is he thinking about retiring yet? seeing he is one of the senior group at the hawks?
By the way, here is a curly one, how do you rely on someone that you a forced to not rely on? think about it...

Didn't mean to call Hodge a senior player, just pointing out the strength of their midfield. Understand my point probably wasn't well made.

I take your second point about Darcy. But IMHO they won't be a serious Premiership threat until he's back or someone else can be as good in that Ruck/Fwd role as he's been.

 

[RHAS]

Everyone should sit back and take note of what Weaver is saying. We need all of the five years that we have given Wallace just to get back to a solid core of good players.

We just can't use number of games won as the barometer of how we are progressing. Other things like numbers of games in the kids and general improvement in skill level have to be considered

And on us losing our first three games we will NOT be the only teams to lose all games to the Bulldogs Saints and Eagles. It is just we have played all three first up.

Sacking coaches early was tried in the 90's and didn't get anywhere. So how about we do something different. We are finally seeing some positives come out of Punt Road. We have better people in charge of the club and all they need is some time to change what was a rabble of a club.

 

[CoggaRules]

Everyone should sit back and take note of what Weaver is saying. We need all of the five years that we have given Wallace just to get back to a solid core of good players.

We just can't use number of games won as the barometer of how we are progressing. Other things like numbers of games in the kids and general improvement in skill level have to be considered

And on us losing our first three games we will NOT be the only teams to lose all games to the Bulldogs Saints and Eagles. It is just we have played all three first up.

Sacking coaches early was tried in the 90's and didn't get anywhere. So how about we do something different. We are finally seeing some positives come out of Punt Road. We have better people in charge of the club and all they need is some time to change what was a rabble of a club.

relax RHAS, i would suggest there are about 2 max here who are on the level about wanting TW sacked, so you need to chill out and see the lighter side and have a laugh.

 

[1980]

Fair enough 1980 , everyone should be accountable . That is what all forms of life are about in this modern day and age . But i don`t think it is being fair to Wallace to compare him to what he did at the Bullies in the mid-late 90`s over there and the job he has at hand now .

Different list- different circumstances-different times

I concur with you in that the first round was just plain and simple ... not acceptable . I don`t care if you are playing AFL or running around for the seconds at Nunawading , you do not throw in the towell like we did in that game , it goes against the grain of what this whole competition is about . And your right ... for the first time in his tenure at Punt Rd.... Terry Wallace deserved and had some very serious questions asked of him . Because the buck does stop with him . And i agree , his job ultimately is getting the best out what he has .

But i ask you this ...." Is it possible to polish a tur.d ? "

I don`t reckon . You flush it down the dunny and you start again .

That is what we have to do . It aint gonna happen in one , two or even three years . All the old turds have to be slowly flushed away and replaced with blokes who can play the modern game .... non turds if you will .

Wallace underperforming V`s a list full of turds ? ..... My faith is still with Wallace . Watching a good chunk of senior list still underperforming after all these years is the money shot for mine . And while they underperform , it just makes all that much harder for the kids , who we are all starting to question now

I dont reckon you're a 100% convinced about Wallace either. Maybe you've got the same niggle I've got that if things arent going well in his 3rd season, he'll turf it for a media job.

Should we go ask the Dogs board what they reckon ???

 

[CoggaRules]

I dont reckon you're a 100% convinced about Wallace either. Maybe you've got the same niggle I've got that if things arent going well in his 3rd season, he'll turf it for a media job.

Should we go ask the Dogs board what they reckon ???

naaa 1980, just get the year of the dog, and play it in slow mo, noting down any perculiar, twitches in TW's face, any signs that we can then cross reference to what we see now.
Once you have done that,play it in reverse, just in case TW himself was doing the Death Metal thing and giving the sign that way?

 

[Crumden]

The most prominent coach in waiting seems to be Mark harvey. That fact alone should be enough to kill any speculation about sacking coaches.