Definitely green/green/green - quite a few empty seats - hope it fills a bit

I just can't deal with watching a guy called Jordair Jett play ;)

Got on Melb by 11 + at TAB NZ at $4.20.

Thought that was good value.


If any team is going to get complacent /take their foot off the pedal its Melb though.

Won't matter too much if Townsville continue to miss open shots, play D like they've never seen an onball screen, and give up offensive rebounds...

Going to be interesting to see Goulding's numbers this year. Melbourne are good enough that they don't really need him playing hero ball and firing from NBA range each possession.

Schensa? Really? The errors with not being able to say names properly is bugging me. But Rucker is a great color commentator

Melbourne by 5

Rucker is a gem. Great colour commentary.

Don't think the Crocs will miss Blanchfield as much as first thought.

Steindl will fill that hole nicely I reckon.

But who fills Steindls hole?

Serious question:

Is Jett's hair allowed?

Sure longish hair is fine but his hair is down to his belly button!

Teams look like they're playing a pick up game.

Yeah it does have the NBA no structure feel about it. Looked like the Crocs were about to get blown out big time but they did a good job to get back in there. Would help if either of their imports was in shape.

My humble reflections:

-Derek Rucker- best commentator so far, well researched, sounds like he is enjoying it and sounds professional.
-It's pronounced Shensha not Shensa- to the other commentator
-Hakim Warrick, as expected, dominating!
-Tville crowd- about 500, looks terrible!
-Jett cannot shoot but can do a few nice things.

Good game so far Townsville are scrapping hard. Crowd is sad to see though.

Enjoying the contest, but what did Schensler do wrong early in the third to get an offensive foul of Machook Machook?

Loving the commentary too...

Best commentary pairing so far by a long way. Rucker is impressive, speaking of impressive, Todd Blanchfield ey?

Ha, great banter...

'Are you saying Americans inflate their height?'

'They shrink coming over on the plane!'

Great stuff :)

Rucker is fantastic. Genuinely excited to commentate.

Loved when Blanchfield hit that three.."and Blanchfield's like ima just bank in this 26 footer three".

Okay, one thing has to change, that green, has to gooooo!

I suspect you're right, he might be a good 4th or 5th option but never more. Still, he's very handy in that role.

Derek rucker is sooo good to listen too! Its the cowboys team mvp type dinner tonight so was always going to be very hard t attract a crowd. Horrible planning. Great to see the swamp again though.

Wonder if Cowboys had more people at the airport after their grand final win than there are currently in the stadium in Townsville. Wonder if they should have tapped into that win.....

IE give free tickets to the Cowboys club/team and congratulate them at half time. Cross promote the NRL in the NBL up there

Production still bland but saw a few small changes.

Production is fine.... what could you ask for besides a closer game. Not enough every game is easily accessible now everyone is Steven Spilberg. Carrick will look to dunk every single play.... every single one. Going to be a great season once teams start to really gel.

Production is fine? Do you watch nba? College? Euro league? Production is half aassed and unimaginative

It is still very bland, but this deal wasn't done that long ago and there isn't a pool of game footage to use yet. If it still looks like this in a month or so that's a worry, but give them time.

Yeah, I think the production is OK. Obviously they are still feeling their way, but Rucker was a real find. Given it's season #1, it will likely take a few weeks for everyone involved to find their feet.

There's plenty of Blitz footage, and Fox did a bunch of interviews with players and coaches over that weekend.

Majok continues to impress....great stock of rookie big men this year. Kay, Majok, Hodgson.

This isn't the NBA, its a league trying to find its feet and some finances in the process which will lean towards better tv style features. Its More than adequate for now, glass half full, seen 3 games all in very good quality n 3 straights nights. Too much nit picking for me here.

I don't think Blitz footage is really worth the trouble. Give them time to slot their own produced footage into the coverage. It does need to improve given the deal is reviewed after year one, but it's not going to happen overnight.

As long as there's improvement by the time it hits the main FoxSports channels I think the NBL should be happy their money is being well spent.

Good production and imagination will make all the difference. They need to find ways to make people care about the team's and players. This is how you get new viewers in.

Majok and Sobey are ineligible for ROY.

Have they stated criteria for this year?

Blanchfield was awesome tonight 29 and 8, with 7 of 9 threes, some of those threes were tough too over pressure. If he keeps his form up he will make a strong case for replacing Goulding or Newley in the boomers team.

Have they stated criteria for this year?

https://twitter.com/guyneville/status/651557989409665024

Agree with others - Rucker is a great fit on the commentary team. Top notch along with Heal. CJ on the other hand ....

Townsville crowd looked dismal, Cairns only looked marginally better though. To be honest, 6:30pm tips on weeknights will kill QLD crowds, it has always failed. Would hope that future consideration be given to this to allow for 7:30 starts, or at least 7.

Hey my hair is as long as Jordair Jetts

No one has said anything to me.

Gets in my way sometimes though lol

"Mr bEn Taipans had 4.5k."

We did? Could have fooled me... and the ticket collectors.

Melbourne have a lot of home games now because Hisense will be unavailable towards the end of the season due to the Australian Open.

It's on the NBL website. Try looking.

Previous post was in reply to the Anon asking for tonight's match report.

Apparently it's not on the NBL website, it's on something that simply looks identical to the NBL website: http://nbl.fspdev.com/featured-news/r1-report-blanchfield-returns-to-townsville-downs-crocs/

http://nbl.fspdev.com/


That's odd.

The NBL tweeted the link. I didn't notice that it wasn't the NBL website because it looks exactly like the NBL website.

It wasn't exactly a remarkable assumption. In any event, the match report is also accessibly from the NBL's Twitter and Facebook pages, so it still wasn't hard to find.

All these negative posts are getting a bit old.
Sure the broadcasts aren't comparable to the nba yet but it is a big step from last year right.
At the end of the day we are getting to see every game live and in HD. That is what I'm interested in, I couldn't really care about seeing footage from other games or the blitz.
It is kind of refreshing not having to sit through the segments like the afl where they over analyse every possession and have 6 commentators all trying to make outlandish comments to get themselves noticed. And at least we aren't having to put up with listening to Dermott Brereton.
As with most sports, it is very simple to be an armchair coach/critic without knowing all the facts. Venue availability might be one reason that teams now have extended home or away schedules.
I know this is a lot to ask for, but maybe if we all got on here and built a list of constructive suggestions/opinions on the Nbl then the right people may take notice and try to implement some of these ideas.
Ie league assistance to lower teams.
I think the league could help a Townsville by assisting and potentially having an allowance for them to get higher quality imports. If they could attract an Ennis and Childress level pair then it would really help their position with fans etc and would make for a better league overall.
I think there was a similar program in place in the AFL where the league paid some of the salary for the big name players at GWS and Gold Coast.
Just a thought...

Unfortunately, the every game live part of the deal is only for one year, with a review at the end of it. If the coverage is simple, there is no reason for casuals to get hooked on it, and there probably aren't enough NBL fans watching to keep the same level of coverage.

So over the course of the season the coverage needs to add elements that help keep casual viewers watching. It doesn't need to be like the NBA, it has a big audience already and other ways of getting their message out around the world, it needs to be innovative and consistently show the best bits of the NBL throughout broadcasts, and tell the tale of the season to give people a reason to tune into the next game.

We have to give them time, but there has to be improvements on how the NBL's money is being spent or next year there's a reasonable chance we won't be seeing every game live.

Feel for Townsville losing Blanchfield - obviously couldn't compete financially.

Yes you whinging Anons calm down. Cairns crowd was 3750 as published,not hard to find. Now last night looked like only around 1500,which is super disappointing for the Crocs.

I'm sorry but the crocs are done... It's sad but how long can you keep propping up a sinking ship. I think they need to "relocate" the team to a new market.

I thought the crowds in Adelaide and Cairns were pretty good for midweek, if that's the standard for Weds and Thurs this season I think the league would be ok with that.

Townsville are a real worry, but hopefully things turn around for them. It's tough trying to win fans back when you don't have a great team.

Agreed Paul, and hard to put a winning team on the floor when there's no money. No playoffs the last 3 seasons and highly likely to be 4 this year.

It all went downhill for Townsville with past management when they got rid of Rillie and Homicide and the club today is paying the price for mistakes made 4 - 5 seasons ago.

They had an excuse when they were playing out of an RSL; they don't have an excuse now.

If they don't start showing up (atleast for weekend games, and last night was a Friday) then, they should be kicked out of the league. Crap franchises will bring the league down.

Haven't seen this game cos the replay hasn't been put up on the app...

But based on the highlights- Blanchfield was left open a lot early in the game, and then starting shooting the lights out of it later on, once he'd had the chance to get his eye in.

United and Illawarra both have so many shooters this season and both have a legit inside target too- so we will see them both nail plenty of 3's.

With Goulding and Holt so tough to stop in one on one's, and Warrick roaming the baselines- all requiring defensive help- I expect Blanchfield to find himself open very often this season. It's encouraging that he can clearly shoot the ball very well.

Oh and I also *love* that Holt looks keen to push the ball up the floor at every opportunity.

If nothing else, this team should be very exciting to watch this season.

Goulding with 11 assists last night, that tells a story of the approach of this team.

Totally agree.

I was worried about that, when it became apparent watching the Blitz that Holt loves taking a shot. You need a balance on a team where there are shot takers and there are pass first guys who are happy only taking a few shots a game. If this team can find a nice balance where everyone buys in and they're all happy to make the extra pass then they could be very dangerous. But that's a big *if*- it was my first question mark on this team, and remains an open question because, let's face it, it's early days and they just played a team who might struggle to win more than 6 or 7 games.

My second question mark was interior D. And that's something that's harder to tell from watching the highlights. I note Conklin got some buckets on the inside and the D on those was poorer on some of those plays than I would've hoped. I'll be watching Majok closely tomorrow to see how he goes against Ogilvy.

It's exciting times for Melbourne fans, because if those two question marks can be resolved or adequately overcome then this team could be something special.

It already looks apparent that there's more flat out scoring ability on this team than any Melbourne NBL club has had this millennium- I can't think of any other with 5 guys who could go off for 25 on nay given night.

And another thing worth watching tomorrow will be how well Kickert and Warrick go in getting a hand on the outside shots of Forman and Ellis.

Some of the contenders- Illawarra and Cairns specifically- have 4 men who can nail the 3. Warrick and Kickert will need to show they can defend on the perimeter.