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Yeah Sophie did a very good job, especially with the match day experience - it's gone from.a place that lacked atmosphere to some.saying it's got the best match day experience in the competition. The foundation is there but I feel theirs still work.tk be done such as the pre match functions. A few were good with big attendances but most only had a handful of people turn.up. 

Good work doing the numbers Spiny - with 5 positions left ild look at 3 quality forwards and 2 rucks (ideally ruck forwards like we lost) and not worry about other positions as we seem ti be adequately equipped in other areas - that includes the big name midfielder that's rumoured to be linked to the club (ild have him in the side definitely but not in place of a quality forward). 

Owen Mulady has re-signed. That brings us to 40 list spots confirmed as filled and 4 remaining. (Still counting Bedendo in the 40 since Mega got confirmation of his re-signing, so when his re-signing is officially announced, that won't change the count.) We should have much better depth for the wing position than we did last season. At this point, the only player who was usually best 23 last season that we haven't heard about one way or the other is Ned Cahill. 

I definitely agree, Mega, about how we should fill the remaining list spots. Now that there are 4 positions left, I'd say 2 good key forwards and 2 rucks. Agreed that we should be set for other areas. In a vacuum I wouldn't say no to the experience the rumoured midfielder would bring, but in practice we should have good midfield depth already and desperately need rucks and tall forwards. I'm inclined to think that nothing has come of the rumours or there would have been an announcement by now.

Yes agree with that the rumoured pick up now sounds unlikely and truth me told i feel he would of been more beneficial from a pr and advertising perspective than on field as I've noticed him slowing. Is my memory playing tricks on me ?.I thought Cahill had re signed? It's interesting with him, he gave up.on football all together at the start of 25 saying he lacked motivation only to rejoin the demanding vfl.

Would be great if the club could update the list as they put pen 🖊 to paper.

There's been no word on what Cahill's doing. I checked back through this thread, which we've updated with each VFL signing and re-signing. We did keep Charlie Clarke and Roy George, who were our other big midseason small forward signings. Yeah, I'd wondered if Cahill would play this season given that he initially hadn't been going to play in 2025. 

You're definitely remembering right about the other rumoured signing. I'd thought he could be a good addition from a coaching point of view but wondered how much he had left to give as a player. He didn't have much impact when he played against us last season, though that was in part because Tom Hird did a great job on him (while also winning quite a bit of the ball himself); then again, said rumoured signing didn't have much impact in any of his VFL games. But he'd had some injuries that season, so if we had signed him I'd have figured that, well, there was no telling how things might go after a full preseason and with a clean run at it. But he was definitely slowing down, enough to make the idea of him being signed as a player surprising. In any case it seems to be a moot point.

Yes, it would be great to have more regular updates on the list. I suppose they're spacing them out for better social media engagement, but I've wondered if the club has signed the talls we all want and just not announced it yet. 

Port Melbourne's first preseason game has been announced for 5:30 pm, 20 February, against St Kilda at RSEA Park. Hopefully by then we'll have heard of some ruck and key forward signings, but if not we'll at least be able to see if the squad named for the match includes any new talls. (Also, Mega, I realized I misread your last post and you were not in fact looking for additional confirmation of your thoughts on the rumoured signing but only asking about what we've heard about Cahill - sorry about that.)

No need to apologise - you’ve done nothing wrong but thanks all the same. He was on SEN yesterday but unfortunately was on a job and wasn’t able to listen in - don’t feel like I missed much as I’m almost certain that theirs no chance that he is signing.

Hoping for a livestream of the practice match against St Kilda - it will be at 7:30 am for me, which (just barely, to my mind) qualifies as a manageable time for watching live. 

I didn't hear the interview either but from the reports what he said in it and in his retirement announcement it does sound like you're right that there's basically no chance he signs. More list spots for talls, hopefully.

Well, the women's side has signed a ruck! We've mainly been talking about the men here, but Nene McInerney has an interesting background that seems worth a post - the club's announcement just mentioned her playing soccer growing up in London, but as I found when I looked her up, she's also played footy for the West London Wildcats (not sure for how long). It's actually pretty likely I saw her play at a European tournament a couple years ago, but unfortunately I don't remember anything about individual players!

There's a wide spread of player quality in European footy, with a few players who I do think could potentially make it at Australian state level if they tried. One obstacle to overcome would be the gap in fitness required; there's also fact that unless she's faced any former state league players (which is a possibility), she'll never have come up against the level of opposition that she will in the VFLW (and even if she has encountered former state league players, that's not at all the same as coming up against that level of opposition every week). Footy in Europe, with at least one exception in the Transatlantic Cup tournament in which she has competed, is played 9 a side (plus interchange bench) on rugby fields, so there will be some adjustment there as well. [EDIT: disregard the sentence about it being 9 a side; just looked up AFL England, and the London comp does play 18 a side - not sure if the women are also 18 or if they're 16 a side like women's footy in Australia. I should have guessed that since England obviously has cricket fields. Apologies for the error.]

She was signed with Maroochydore in the QAFLW last season so has hopefully had some chance to adjust to 16 a side and playing on proper footy fields [EDIT: looks like she would already have been used to either 18 or 16 a side, which means she probably was playing on cricket fields - that will help with match fitness as well although a purely amateur comp will still require lower fitness], but there's no record on playhq of her playing any games, so it's possible she's coming off a long-term injury (I don't know - speculating based on lack of game records). So I would not expect a lot from her this season - if she can play a couple games and look like she has some idea what she's doing, that's what I'd expect as her ceiling for this year. But hopefully she does well enough to keep a list spot and is able to stay in Melbourne long enough to develop as a player. It would be really neat to see a player from European footy make it in the VFLW.

Not often do you get overseas players playing vfl - good on her for making the side. Their were 2 American.elite college athletes that tried out at Port a few years ago bit nothing came of it. She will be the 2nd person I know who ia currently at Port whose made the transition from.soccer to footy - the other being Hird who impressively played down the road for the sharks. I say impressively as when he played for Port they were in the 2nd best competition in the country and were very competitive when.he was there- they have since been relegated. For the overwhelming majority of us we don't get anywhere near playing in the nation's 2nd best sporting competitions, Hirds manages to do.it in 2 sports. Surely we get a few more announcements in the nest fortnight as the season begins next month, who knows - could we get some.big name announcements?