Morrell does have a ridiculous idea that every player should never be paid. Clubs like Mitchell Park and Morrell will have to gett over this ridiculous notion if they want Io exist and prosper into the future. You can't just blame local clubs like CLG and Kenilworth and Southern clubs for rewarding players efforts with financial reward. A part of football life that 95% of players are rewarded financially now. To suggest that football or SAAFL football should be non paying is both ridiculous and nieve. Time for Mitchell Park to either dig ino their pockets or just accept that players will walk away for financial reasons. The days of playing for zero reward have been over for 20 years and is nothing new. It has nothing to do with who is a tue Mitchell Park player but a football reality I've been over this countless times and to be honest the discussion now bores me and probably many others. Suffice to say I would much rather struggle and get smashed but play with great life long friends, than play with a bunch of guys who are after a pay packet and/or aren't interested in contributing to the club outside of kicks, marks and handballs.
That is a personal preference and a cultural point of difference at Mitchell Park. Some people love it, and stay for the rest of their careers. Others don't dig it as much.
We are essentially a social football club, some people at the club would hate me saying that, but that's the reality. Of course we strive for success and we want to win, but ultimately, on field success is only one measurement of how well we're going. Gameday lasts for a couple of hours, the amount time I spend at the club is much, much more than that. Sport is the vehicle, but the real reason why I play, and I would suggest the great majority of other people at Mitchell Park play, is for the social component. Paying players would erode the social component.
Its a different outlook, and one that is sadly disappearing from modern football. But I wouldn't have it any other way.
If you all want to turn your clubs into mini corporations and slut yourselves to the next group of mercenaries, so be it, good luck with that, have fun in the lofty heights of what, Div 4? Div 3? Whoppdeedoo! We will still be down here, having a laugh, and kicking goals, albeit likely less than our opponents in 2014.
morell, you do not need to defend yourself and your great club re paying players. Yes, most clubs do it and the progressive one's who want to go up divisions all have footy spending budgets to get them there. The wonderful thing about MP is the mateship of people who play for the love of the club. If that leaves the club up and down from Div 6 to 7 and players coming and going then so be it. It is what it is at the den but unless attitudes change at the top then the club will struggle to stay alive. Yes zedman, I hope to come back this year and be an influence in some way. :)