AFL Fixture 2008 (see page 2 for full fixture)

[saintrod]

I can't believe how many people think this a great draw.

I would far sooner trade off a tougher start to the season and play 18 games in Melbourne which we should do if we were any other Victoria based club that has not sold home games interstate.

There should be no compensation for a club in terms of make up Melbourne games if they sell their own home games interstate.

[midas_touch]

+:
- Play Carlton, Essendon and the Bulldogs twice.
- First 5 games and 9 of the first 11 at the dome.
- Only play Geelong, West Coast and Hawthorn once.
- 6 6 day breaks

-:
- Play Port twice.
- Travel 4 times in the back half of the year, including two games at Subiaco in three weeks.
- Only two games at the G (would prefer 4 as we have had the past couple of years)

Overall, I'm pretty happy with the draw. Got a favorable draw for the first half of the year, we're definitely capable of being 8-3 after 11. Second half isn't easy, but we should be able to win at least 6 games if we're on our game.

[Riewoldting]

-:
- Play Port twice.

But West Coast just once, plus the home match is in Melbourne for the first time since 2002 or 2003 from memory. Port played above themselves in 2007 but will still be a good test next season of our improvement.

- Travel 4 times in the back half of the year, including two games at Subiaco in three weeks.

Pretty sure it's two games in four weeks. West Coast are returning from a Brisbane trip, Fremantle from a Sydney trip. Same deal as 2007, just got to set ourselves to win one of the two.

- Only two games at the G (would prefer 4 as we have had the past couple of years)

Definitely a negative.

I'm pretty confident we can use the first half of the year to build momentum. We will then be one of the "teams to beat" in the second half and have a tougher draw, so we can be expected to drop a few. That's OK, if we go 8-3 or better in the first half we can use the buffer to alter training loads and gear up for a strong August, a top 4 spot and a decent crack at September.

If we go 7-4 or worse I think we will be back "in the mix" again and will scrape into the finals. Ho hum.

[taz]

we play Collingwood, Carlton and Essendon twice

this will be VERY good for the bank balance because of the attendances our home games will attract

we also play Sydney Freemantle Dogs twice

I suspect that these game will also attract reasonable attendances

[nicko016]

It's a pretty fair draw I think. A great first half is offset by a very hard second half. Should be 7-4 or 8-3 after 11 rounds but can probably only expect 5-6 wins from the second half of the season. Off to Subi twice again which isn't great but hopefully we can use the first half to build up momentum so that these I/S trips aren't so hard. Should be 3-0 which should give us some good momentum to go against Geelong and if we beat Geelong we could really get off to a flyer. But we are going to have to do it opposite to the past few years and have a big 1st half instead of trying to catch up with a big 2nd half.

[Nick_Dal_Santo = ChAmPiOn]

2 Subiaco trips in the last 5 weeks

So an OBVIOUS constraint is St.Kilda MUST always play Freo in Perth every forking year!

When was the last time we didn't play them in Perth?

1994 is my guess, before they existed!

um..2007 season, round 20?

wen bakes got suspended