James McDonalds Hit

[Lucky Knickers]

For one of the only times in my life I was right behind Mike Sheahan as he gave to Gerard. I was absolutely disgusted that McDonalds hit was applauded and called "leadership" whilst ignoring that a young player on the brink of a massive year, who has put in an outstanding preseason, now had the start of his season derailed.
I love Horse.

[BSA5]

Weak statement from a weak player. Bailey has been criticised for dumping him. I think he got that one right.

While I don't think nearly as poorly of McDonald as you seem to (seems like a pretty honest player and a good leader to me), it's fair to say that the bump's intention was a bit misdirected. There's not too much intimidation in an experienced player breaking a 19 year old's jaw. If they'd wanted to make a real point with physicality, nail someone like Bolton, Goodes, Kennedy, Jack, Mumford, the experienced blokes. Not a 19 year old in his second season.

As for the penalty, 2 weeks is deserved, and on recent MRP form, he can count himself lucky it wasn't 4-6 weeks.

[Cpt. Kirk]

The second replay during John Longmire says it all, reckless, high contact, high impact. Should have been more, parker went for the ball mcdonald went for the player. All credit goes to parker and good luck to him because of the dog act that was done by mcdonald, parker will be drinking soup out of a straw while mcdonald misses two games of football.

If what McDonald did is showing an example there team will have no players because they will all be suspended.

[MightyBloods]

I too was extremely surprised and disappointed in Healy's comment. It was obvious that he didnt have all the facts as it appeared he took a backward step when Sheahan mentioned that Parker had a broken jaw (be it a hairline fracture). I'm always interested to see the reaction of other players after an incident like that...from memory no swan remonstrated with McDonald and at the time I was sooo pissed off at our own players to back up one of our kids (be it considered a fair or illegal bump at the time). That being said, we have a special player in Parker....reminds me of a young Dane Swan (there I've said it with the comparison)...and exciting that Tom Mitchell is yet to hit the field (another Sam Mitchell ? but with a penetrating left foot). Our midfield for the future is looking very exciting!

[BSA5]

I too was extremely surprised and disappointed in Healy's comment. It was obvious that he didnt have all the facts as it appeared he took a backward step when Sheahan mentioned that Parker had a broken jaw (be it a hairline fracture). I'm always interested to see the reaction of other players after an incident like that...from memory no swan remonstrated with McDonald and at the time I was sooo pissed off at our own players to back up one of our kids (be it considered a fair or illegal bump at the time). That being said, we have a special player in Parker....reminds me of a young Dane Swan (there I've said it with the comparison)...and exciting that Tom Mitchell is yet to hit the field (another Sam Mitchell ? but with a penetrating left foot). Our midfield for the future is looking very exciting!

In fairness to our players, they were focused on getting the ball. That should always come first.

[Doctor]

It's because we were entirely cast in the supporting character role in the story of the weekend. So nothing we did was ever really going to get much discussion

We might as well have run on wearing black capes, top hats and twirling our moustaches and tied the poor, innocent Giants players to the train tracks while the piano music played.

[Doctor]

For one of the only times in my life I was right behind Mike Sheahan as he gave to Gerard. I was absolutely disgusted that McDonalds hit was applauded and called "leadership" whilst ignoring that a young player on the brink of a massive year, who has put in an outstanding preseason, now had the start of his season derailed.
I love Horse.

Couldn't agree more. Mike Sheahan did a great job on this one. I do generally rate Healy as one of the better, and fairer, analysts around but he got this one wrong. He called Lewis Jetta "Leroy" later in the program too but he did have the decency to correct himself, so I can forgive that.

Great work from Horse.

[wolftone57]

We might as well have run on wearing black capes, top hats and twirling our moustaches and tied the poor, innocent Giants players to the train tracks while the piano music played.

Love the analogy and Sheedy could dress up as Chaplin

[goswannie14]

Just on your "hitman" comment Wolfy, do you suppose thats why Sheeds has gone for players like Brogan, Mcdonald, and to an extent Cornes and O'Hailpin ? So they can line a bloke up every now and then to give the Giants a reputation for not taking any crap from opposition and to make "statements" like the one against Parker ? Its not as though any of them will be too sorely missed if they have a 2-3 week break every now and then this year ( Possibly Cornes the exception, he showed he can still play) , and there all seasoned big bodies who would know how to put a hit on someone. Unlikely, but wouldnt put it past Sheeds...

Players who have nothing to lose like retired players coming back for a season will play the Sheedy way to the max. Cornes is a good clean player, tough but clean and I don't expect to see anything from him. Brogan on the other hand is quite the mongrel on his day and gets white line fever, if Sheeds gives him a rev like his offsider used to at Port anything could happen. I don't see O'Hailpin as that sort either even though he is tough. He is more famous for knocking one of his own team-mates out at Carlton if I am not mistaken. Probably the reason he didn't play a lot for them in the last few years. I think there are two players who are quite expendable, Brogan and McDonald, both had retired and are just there as experience and muscle for the young blokes.

In my time following footy (since the mid 1990s) the two clubs who have consistently wanted to show off their mongrel have been Essendon and Hawthorn - and especially Essendon in the Sheedy period. Watching those two teams play against each other became tedious because you could almost guarantee they'd find something to have a melee over during the game, and if there wasn't anything, they'd just have a melee anyway. Essendon haven't been quite as bad since Sheedy left, but the Hawks still carry on with it. They've even found a name for it now - "unsociable football".

Having seen Sheedy play, he was a dirty mongrel and he wants some of his players to be the same. I think Lou Richards nick named him "stink weed" because the way he play stunk.

[Untamed Snark]

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/afl/luke-parker-keen-to-take-to-field-against-dockers-despite-broken-jaw/story-e6frexwr-1226312946319

Not sure if anyone posted this.

[wolftone57]

Having seen Sheedy play, he was a dirty mongrel and he wants some of his players to be the same. I think Lou Richards nick named him "stink weed" because the way he play stunk.

I watched all the early footy from 1967 onward and Sheeds was playing for Richmond during a very good era for them so they got on telly a lot. In Broken Hill until 1968 when we moved to Adelaide there was only the ABC and they had VFL Footy on every saturday night. Sheeds was a mongrel of a player and some of the things he did on a footy field are specifically banned so they will never be repeated. He was not too big on the rules but he was a sneaky as a @@@@house rat.

[giant]

Think people are getting a tad carried away here. I've never seen anything in MacDonald's extensive career to suggest he's a thug, and the accusation that he's directly targetted one of our young guns seems based on fairly limited evidence. To me, it was the type of bump that we all would have applauded in the past but these days he didn't execute, call poor old Luke high, and now has to do the time.

There was plenty of niggle from the Giants off the ball, and they were clearly under instructions to get in the Swans' face (and the umps were apparently prepared to show a blind eye to it all), but it's still a long bow to draw to get to the accusations of some on here.