FIND out what’s being said about the club in the major daily newspapers on Saturday, May 7, 2011

Herald Sun

Bailey plays down significance of Crows clash above others
By Matt Windley

MELBOURNE coach Dean Bailey says he is unworried by growing speculation about his job. While the Demons remain in the eight, they have endured a week of scathing criticism after a 54-point loss to West Coast last week. The club has been equally savage on its own as a result of the Perth capitulation, last night confirming four changes to the side to play Adelaide at the MCG tomorrow. Matthew Bate, Matthew Warnock, Ricky Petterd and Addam Maric have come in for injured defender Jared Rivers and the omitted Cale Morton, Stefan Martin and Jamie Bennell. Bailey denied tomorrow's game was his side's most important of the year to date, but said he expected an improved performance. "I think every week we get tested on character. To put one game more than ahead of any other is wrong," he said.

The Age

Melbourne’s man for the job
By Caroline Wilson

THE superb and touching Jim Stynes documentary which aired last year on the Nine Network indicated that the big Irish ruckman had performed something of a medical miracle in overcoming an early and grim diagnosis in his cancer battle. At the risk of sounding glib, Stynes has been overcoming odds for as long as the AFL community has known him. Sport should never be overstated in the context of life, but once Stynes had achieved on the playing arena what some at Melbourne still rate as the greatest football story of all, he continued to perform minor miracles. The story of how Stynes saved the Melbourne Football Club is much more than a sporting saga. Demolishing more than $4 million worth of debt was something the AFL initially believed beyond even him, but it was uniting the disenfranchised Demons that remains his most remarkable legacy. And now the Melbourne president - declaring himself healthy enough, determined and identifying the threat of a new malaise within his beloved club - has stepped forward again to investigate, correct and unify. If anyone can do it, Stynes can, but there is plenty to be done and it is not simply coach Dean Bailey who is under pressure. In fact, Bailey's position is fairly simple. He will survive at the club should the team improve and the younger players show genuine signs of development. If not, he will be moved on. The bigger issue is the structure of the club's football operation and, by extension, the Demons' administration.

Demons must fight
By Garry Lyon

PRESSURE and AFL football go hand in hand. It's a constant companion for all involved in the game. No one is immune to it, but how it is received and handled can give you a telling insight into the make-up of an organisation or an individual. Six weeks into the season and a number of clubs have had to endure the scorching heat that goes with being under the game's spotlight. The Eagles and John Worsfold had it before a ball was even bounced. After a wooden spoon last year, anyone who suggested he wasn't a dead man walking was seen to be one out. Now, he leads the most improved football team in the competition. Neil Craig and the Adelaide Crows lost the ''unlosable'' game to Port Adelaide in round four and his tenure was questioned. The club held its nerve, the CEO guaranteed his position for this year and beyond, and they have since recovered with a fighting loss to Carlton and a win against St Kilda. Richmond, having been beaten by the Magpies by 71 points, had three losses and a draw after four rounds. Questions were being asked about their rate of improvement and the quality of their kids. Two wins in a row since, with Dustin Martin on the rampage, and all of a sudden Punt Road is a place of great optimism. North has been in the gun, Port Adelaide still is and St Kilda is being lined up. This week, it was the Melbourne's turn, and rightly so after a spiritless display in Perth nine days ago; no one would be surprised at the scrutiny. Proud competitors should welcome the pressure, for it provides an opportunity for redemption.

Judgment day Dees
By Martin Flanagan

JUDGMENT time has arrived for the Melbourne Football Club. The Dees got flogged in Perth. ''Woosher'' Worsfold's boys are back. They're ebullient and vigorous - like kids just let out of school. The surest guide to the Eagles' form is Daniel Kerr. Thought to be in the class of Chris Judd and Ben Cousins at West Coast's peak, he dropped from sight immediately they left. Well, he's feeling cheeky again. As for the Dees, what can you say? Early against West Coast, they were like the Tassie tiger - they weren't there. By the time they got it together, they were too far behind and West Coast finished them off with a couple of goals at the end. The result caused pandemonium back in Melbourne with Facebook petitions calling for the sacking of the coach. It's all in play for Dean Bailey now. About Bailey, I would say three things. One, I have never found him to be fake in any way and my impression is that he has the respect of the players. Two, Kevin Sheedy told me he (Bailey) is a good football thinker. Three, he is not an extrovert.

Bailey happy to have Stynes in key director's role
By Jon Pierik

MELBOURNE coach Dean Bailey says he has no problem with president Jim Stynes also taking on the key role of football director and is unconcerned about the heightened public scrutiny over his job. Bailey, out of contract at the end of the season, and the Demons have been under the spotlight internally and externally after a 54-point loss to the Eagles in Perth - a defeat that featured a goalless first term, only three inside-50s in that term and 48 clangers through the game. It has since been revealed Stynes and his deputy Don McLardy have in recent months taken a more hands-on role in the football department, with the pair sharing the role of football director held by Andrew Leoncelli until he quit last December. Stynes's move indicates he wants to closely analyse Bailey in a year in which expectations have risen at a club that has failed to play in the finals since 2006. Bailey, however, said he and club legend Stynes regularly discussed football matters, even when the latter was purely the president. ''The conversations Jimmy and I have had since he has been president have been about football. He [was] a fair player Jimmy, so he has got a fair view on things,'' Bailey said yesterday.

The Australian

Bailey's age-old predicament not what you'd believe
By Stephen Rielly

MELBOURNE coach Dean Bailey is under pressure, but not in the eye of a cyclonic storm. He is in the final year of his contract and the Demons have been spasmodic when they haven't been awful, as they were in Perth nine days ago. It is a timeless football scenario, a predicament Bailey addressed yesterday. "You're only ever judged on your previous performance and our last game against West Coast was really poor - it was really poor in whatever angle you want to look at," he said. Bailey is a phlegmatic character, a quality held against him by some, and just as well for him that he is. A coach more easily roused or distracted could be forgiven for suspecting, if not already believing, that he is doomed. He has supposedly had his football department taken from him in order to head off imminent crisis. If the team continues to play poorly, Bailey will go. Finals aren't expected of Melbourne this year but competitiveness is.