There is often different opionions about who should be in the centre square and who are our best clearance players.

These are from pro stats from the 2010 season

Moloney 5.2 per game

Gysberts 3.7

Sylvia 3.3

Scully 3.0

Davey 2.8

Mckenzie 2.6

Jones 2.5

Trengove 2.3

Jetta 1.5

James McDonald's numbers were unavailable but I imagine he would have been next best after Moloney. Gysberts numbers are impressive considering he played 2 and half games, and despite his propensity to kick long to no-one, Moloney is a critical player for us. In defence of Nathan Jones he was playing a tagging role more often in 2010, however he has always been a player who gets first hands on the ball in a clearance situation but cannot break free and clear the ball by hand or foot. This is a critical stat for him and for me his continued spot in the team requires that he improve in this area. Round 1 will be the perfect opportunity.

Here are some of Collingwood's numbers from 2010

Swan 6.7 per game

Ball 4.2

Pendlebury 3.9

Wellingham 3.7

Beams 2.3

Didak 2.1

Despite Collingwoods superior tactical Zone and awesome tackling pressure last year, they were also able to legitimately win their own ball. It seems that until our numbers get significantly better we will remain middle tier. It is unfortunate that Scully, Trengove, Mckenzie and Gysberts are not fit and firing as we won't get good comparative data against last year for while, regardless it will be interesting to see how these numbers look at the end of the season for the Dees, and whether we see a direct correlation between improved clearances and more numbers in the wins column.

Syndey are considered a team that likes clearances yet we smashed them last season. They have vowed revenge this week and it will be interesting to see how the dees stand up in the middle of the ground. This is why Scully is a big loss because he hardly played in the centre last year and was bound to be a big improver in this aea of the game.

Just wondering if anyone had any thoughts.

I would have posted the syndey stats however my computer was being lame and slow, maybe someone else can find the figures.

Cheers.

Edited March 25, 201114 yr by Bhima

Another good post.

In defence of Nathan Jones he was playing a tagging role more often in 2010, however he has always been a player who gets first hands on the ball in a clearance situation but cannot break free and clear the ball by hand or foot. This is a critical stat for him and for me his continued spot in the team requires that he improve in this area. Round 1 will be the perfect opportunity.

Are you sure? There's two separate stats - 1st possessions and clearances - they're correlated but they're not the same thing.

At first glance I think that the success of Collingwood has been capitalising on turnovers than getting the ball first themselves.