Tasmania

[B.M]

Are we in talks with Tas at the moment wrt playing game there 2022 and beyond?

We really should never have left in the first place!!! One of the many dumb moves we made between 2005 - 2010

[The_Dud]

What was our record down there?

[Winmar7]

Agreed, hope we are! China is off, NZ didn't work, and Cairns can get stuffed... let's go to Tassie

Dreamtime in Tassie..?

[B.M]

What does our record have to do with it?!

That’s something the coaching and playing staff needed to deal with!!!

Instead of fixing the problem, we walked away?!

I remember GT saying at one stage (04) we are an anyone anywhere team
Then in 06 said we don’t necessarily like playing there and prefer Etihad!
Basically giving the players an out, very poor attitude towards Tas in the end GT.
In the end, we were a great indoor team during that period with a shocking record away from Etihad!!! And the problem was, finals are played outdoor!!!
Contrast that to Hawthorn (who embraced Tas) and look at their record down there.
He should have welcomed the opportunity to play outside in the elements and figured out why our record was so poor there (was it attitudinal or personnel?)
Remember we played teams who had to travel much further to play on a ground we should have been used to!

I’ll say it again
Short sighted dumb decision that has cost the club millions!!!
And never helped us win a flag by getting a few more cheap indoor victories!
It did appease some selfish Melbourne supporters who got to go to 16 games instead of 14
Even though Tassie supporters (of which there were many!) went from a few games to ZERO!!!

No person with a brain could argue it was a good decision to walk!
I was livid at the time and thought it was gutless and disrespectful

[skeptic]

I want in too

Am a huge fan of GT and that era but the decision to walk away from Tassie when we did is IMO one of the most disastrous ever.

Never mind the financial downturn and the fact that we went to NZ and China to make up the windfall...
I reckon our unwillingness to master the infamous Tassie conditions and get the prep right cost us in the 09 GF when we couldn’t buy a goal despite the plethora of shots we had on the back of our dominance.

Reckon we’d have won both 09-10 if we’d kept playing there

[B.M]

Fully agree skeptic

And instead of the thousands of budding Hawthorn fans getting to share the premiership cup glory in Tas

That could have been us, creating more prospective young members!!!!

The team was great from 03-11 but everything else about the club was almost terrible

Which is why we didn’t achieve what we should have

[shanegrambeau]

TBH

We didn’t win many games there.

We won’t.

How games do Geelong play there?

I like the idea except ...we will not go up the ladder.

The only caveat is that it might save us from playing in China or NZ.

The idea that we have to “toughen up” is nonsense.

The winners are toughening up too.

You don’t run uphill deliberately.

[B.M]

Why won’t we?

Both teams are subjected to the same conditions

Why are we not capable of beating any team on any ground

We CANNOT be a team that is tied to home ground advantage too strongly because the Finals are not played on our home ground!!!

If we are good enough it shouldn’t matter

[The_Dud]

Our record of course plays a part as it will be a home game, and selling home ground advantage can be costly.

I also agree though that you should be able to win anywhere in any conditions.

Funnily the only wins I can think of off the top of my head are a couple against Hawthorn.

Most importantly though, did we ever get to the bottom of whether there are kangaroos in Tassie???

[saynta]

I remember one win..against the hawks but plenty of losses...mainly against the Dockers. Don't remember us ever winning in Slowbart against the Roos either.

And I think the one win against the Hawks was their home game anyway.

Big no from me.

[supersaints2]

agree we never should have given up a potential “ fortress “ for a bit of short term pain
Myopic at best
However there are still a lot of older Saints supporters here in Tassie , but we are missing out on the youngsters to the Dawks and to a lesser extent Norf.....

[B.M]

So we a making a choice because we don’t win there?

How about actually winning

We are not selling a home ground advantage to play other teams on their home ground

It’s a NUETRAL venue!!!!

Which in fact should still be our HGA given other teams have to commute further to a more foreign venue to them!!!

We lost in China, NZ, Tasmania and have a terrible interstate record!!!

Maybe work on improving that record, and the only way to do that is by playing away. Reality is the MCG is an away venue for us, so if we can’t win away trying to win the thing is pointless!!!

[cwrcyn]

I was a fan of GT, but the biggest mistake he ever made was bullying the board into bailing out on the Tassie deal. Wedbe so much better of financially now if that deal hadn't been scuttled

[cwrcyn]

It's probably cost us at least $20 million

[cwrcyn]

It's probably cost us at least $20 million

[shanegrambeau]

So we a making a choice because we don’t win there?

How about actually winning

We are not selling a home ground advantage to play other teams on their home ground

It’s a NUETRAL venue!!!!

Which in fact should still be our HGA given other teams have to commute further to a more foreign venue to them!!!

We lost in China, NZ, Tasmania and have a terrible interstate record!!!

Maybe work on improving that record, and the only way to do that is by playing away. Reality is the MCG is an away venue for us, so if we can’t win away trying to win the thing is pointless!!!

All teams are working on that.
Why?
We know what should happen. (Neutral venue, win anywhere, bla bla)
We don’t know why it happens.
We do know what tends to happen. So do our competitors.

We tend to lose more often in scenario x and it’s a fact. And it is no surprise teams that have good fixtures are successful - Geelong etc. Richmond..

So we try to avoid more of scenario x.- cause we tend to lose.

But we are a pretty poor team financially and our job is to do precisely what the AFL wants for the time being. So we have no choice. Make some coin, play Tassie.

I am sure we will be between 4-8 premiership points worse off for it too. We are ‘taking one for the team’. Unfortunately, it’s not our team.

[skeptic]

The point is that by playing there more you turn it into a home ground... get used to the blustery home ground conditions and it becomes a huge advantage

The biggest ingredient to our failure is our willingness to abandon these challenges rather than overcome them.
Every big venture we’ve had... Tassie, NZ, China, Seaford... doesn’t work out right away so we run away

We were losing winnable games at Tassie... no rationale person IMO could argue that it didn’t point to a bigger issue that needed to be addressed

[shanegrambeau]

The point is that by playing there more you turn it into a home ground... get used to the blustery home ground conditions and it becomes a huge advantage

The biggest ingredient to our failure is our willingness to abandon these challenges rather than overcome them.
Every big venture we’ve had... Tassie, NZ, China, Seaford... doesn’t work out right away so we run away

We were losing winnable games at Tassie... no rationale person IMO could argue that it didn’t point to a bigger issue that needed to be addressed

The teams we will play will most likely be interstate teams like Fremantle, Port Adelaide, Gold Coast. For them it's just another interstate away game. Port still have their 14 games at Adelaide Oval safely in the bank. we, on the other hand, are having our home games/home ground advantage eaten into. Puts a lot at stake

Our opposition are already are ready for 'away' game, flight etc...It is what those interstate teams do every other week. In return they get their fortress at home thing.

I honestly think we'll be lighter off in the wins department for it, and I can see where Tommo was coming from in that aspect.

Still, better than China.

[Ghost Like]

B.M. has raised / regurgitated a very good point. Apologies to skeptic & cwrcyn, I was never a GT fan and retreating from Tassie because of his short sighted belief was only one reason. There are many others but B.M. started this in good faith, not as a GT thread.

I love Tassie, I love the people and I love watching football in both Hobart or Launie. Give me Tassie before Canberra any day & I've had houses in both.

It would be a fortress & a goldmine, a St Fort Knox.

[shanegrambeau]

B.M. has raised / regurgitated a very good point. Apologies to skeptic & cwrcyn, I was never a GT fan and retreating from Tassie because of his short sighted belief was only one reason. There are many others but B.M. started this in good faith, not as a GT thread.

I love Tassie, I love the people and I love watching football in both Hobart or Launie. Give me Tassie before Canberra any day & I've had houses in both.

It would be a fortress & a goldmine, a St Fort Knox.

I like the sentiment and to like Tassie too.
But this 'fortress thing'.

Why? Can you think of one reason we are going to win more games or why we didn't win games back then either?

Unless you are being clever...and I am missing the point..(quite possible unfortunately for me!)

[CQ SAINT]

Its all about the money honey. If we could heal this rift between the Tas government and the AFL with our emotional and historical ties to Tassie and guarantee $6m per annum by stealing Hawthorn and Norths thunder, why wouldnt we. Exclusive rights to an academy for a contracted period while Tassie builds on KPI's the AFL sets to obtain a license would be a huge money maker for us. There no better time than now.

[B.M]

We needed to learn to win there, not run away from it.

Hawthorn did, Kangaroos do!

A bit of it is mindset. If you don’t like playing away from home you aren’t a contender. Which is why we never won when it counted at the G.

We play 09/10 Grand Finals at Etihad, we would have been back to back premiers. But of course that’s never going to be the case!

Winning on the road in Tas might have helped us with our putrid interstate record?!

[Devilhead]

Sorry am I missing something here?

The Tassie government are withdrawing their funds because they want their own team ... not another team to come in which they can give money to ala North & Hawks

As for withdrawing from Tassie and losing that money well it is likely we only would have increased our spending anyway which would not have guaranteed more wins or more profit - every likelihood we would be in same position as we are today except deeper in the Tassie gun in having to relocate their permanently to survive ........ and losing our St Kilda identity in the process.

Sorry to all those that love Tassie but I for one love that we forging ahead in Melbourne where we belong

With a likely sustained period of relative success coming up and with a competent board in charge we can clear our debts soon enough

[stevie]

What was our record down there?

Hamill (knee) - 2 weeks

And a ‘draw’ v Freo