Pre-Season Recap: Eagles Lose Irrelevant Game; Very Relevant Player

Well, I had planned on writing a pre-game post but this is all I could manage:

Yes, the Eagles have made the faux-Grand Final on the basis of a quadratic equation. Or simple arithmetic. Whatever the case, it's nice that we defeated StKilda and the rest but it's a meaningless game. As long as no important players get injured then a win would be fine. But really it's all about Round 1 in a couple of weeks time. The preseason has rarely been an accurate predictor of actual success throughout the regular season. I mean, didn't Carlton win a 'night' premiership 4 or 5 years ago? We all know they'll never win the real thing. But besides my general apathy, Go Eagles!!!

Unfortunately, we did lose an important player (and the game but whatever). Mark Nicoski suffered a hamstring injury which initially looked like a 3-4 thing but then turned into a ? thing. As in, return date unknown until post-surgery. These things happen, but it's really unfortunate when they happen in a meaningless game. I know it was meaningless from the fact that Josh Hill kicked 6 behinds. I mean...he wasn't actually trying to kick goals was he? That would be embarassing.

I wasn't always a big Nicoski fan, in fact I'm still not. Last year I tweeted at him and he didn't respond!!! But he was a very useful forward last year. His loss is accentuated by the Lecras injury which has left us very short. Step up Hill, Weedon and Hams (gulp).

I do, however, have confidence that we can transcend these losses and still be a real force this season. Our team isn't built on individual brilliance; it's the system. And the system isn't broken. The system may find it harder to operate without these guys but other players must step-up. We play the Dogs in a week and a half. I don't know much about the Dogs, but I expect us to win handily. Because you can't beat the system.

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In other news, the death of Jim Stynes makes this a very sad day. From all that I can gather he was an amazing player especially for a guy that didn't learn the game until 18 (244 consecutive games, Brownlow) but even a better person. He was such a positive force who could teach a lot of modern stars lessons on how to approach life.

R.I.P Jimmy.