Potential Midfield in 2014

[Mallee Bull 97]

I remember reading somewhere Roos stating that we need "defensive skilled (gut running) midfielders with a good turn of speed". I am assuming by good turn of speed he means quick off the mark. Does this narrow down the candidates?

If he can somehow get the speed back into the kid, that describes Trengove.

I really hope a full pre-season under Roos can get Jack back on track. He was my favorite player in 2011.

[Webber 10,150]

If he can somehow get the speed back into the kid, that describes Trengove.I really hope a full pre-season under Roos can get Jack back on track. He was my favorite player in 2011.

Jack's loss of pace is a mystery. A lot have suggested he's had an undisclosed osteitis pubis, which is a furphy. The answer is that his foot fracture early season really killed the top 30% of his running mojo. The foot is the 'springboard' from which speed comes, and it would have been playing catch-up all season. He was noticeably quicker in his last 4 or 5 games, and with a full preseason, JT will come back with a bounce. His best is yet to come, and I reckon he, Viney and Toumpas will complement each other beautifully.

In respect to Toumpas, he's obviously not at the level of Ollie Wines in respect to his physical maturity, but as he does mature, both his physical capacity and his confidence will grow. His disposal quality, evasive skills and decision making remind me most of Sam Mitchell in his early days as anybody in the AFL, and I'm as confident about his future elite status as about Jesse Hogan.

[monoccular 16,218]

Jack's loss of pace is a mystery. A lot have suggested he's had an undisclosed osteitis pubis, which is a furphy. The answer is that his foot fracture early season really killed the top 30% of his running mojo. The foot is the 'springboard' from which speed comes, and it would have been playing catch-up all season. He was noticeably quicker in his last 4 or 5 games, and with a full preseason, JT will come back with a bounce. His best is yet to come, and I reckon he, Viney and Toumpas will complement each other beautifully.

In respect to Toumpas, he's obviously not at the level of Ollie Wines in respect to his physical maturity, but as he does mature, both his physical capacity and his confidence will grow. His disposal quality, evasive skills and decision making remind me most of Sam Mitchell in his early days as anybody in the AFL, and I'm as confident about his future elite status as about Jesse Hogan.

Sure as hell hope the analogy between Toumpas and Mitchell turns out true - how mouth watering would that be.*

* and it may shut up all those soothsayers who are saying that we got JT vs Wines all wrong, because OW played well and played in finals, perhaps forgetting that JT didn't have a full preseason, played in a cr@p midfield, and surprise of all, played in a team that just missed out on the finals (had another nine teams been caught our injecting like the bummers we could have slipped into the top 8!)

Edited September 20, 2013 by monoccular

[Young Dee 1,303]

Excactly. We are obviously on the lookout for talent from other clubs, but we've also go to remember we've got a lot of young mids still to come through. Trengove, Viney, Toumpas, Barry, Kent, Taggert, Evans etc. all of these guys could benefit greatly and we may see marked improvement in them. And by the sounds of it Taylor Adams isn't interested in joining us (though we should definitely not give up) so we will need to see improvement from our current players as well as look for others.

Looking at that list I would say we have one player that looks like becoming a great midfielder (Viney).

Trengove (B grade - if Roos can fix his body)

Toumpas (hopefully B to A grade - bit of an unknown)

The rest Barry, Kent, Taggert and Evans are all long shots.

If we want to be a good team we will need to find some diamonds in the rough but if that's going to happen we need some really good mids to show them the way and ease the pressure of them.

Barry could be a small forward/Jetta type

Kent has the potential to be a good wingman/forward

Taggert - a solid bodied inside and outside midfielder

Evans - a hard running midfielder.

[TheoX 1,218]

I'd be happy if we got 2 or 3 of Hallahan, Michie, Schroeder, Miles and Weller. At least they're realistic targets. We would be able to do that with our first 2 picks intact.

Edited September 29, 2013 by TheoX

[samcantstandya 939]

I'd be happy if we got 2 or 3 of Hallahan, Michie, Schroeder, Miles and Weller. At least they're realistic targets. We would be able to do that with our first 2 picks intact

.[

I want to use 1&2 in the draft rather than recycle.

[TheoX 1,218]

I'd be happy if we got 2 or 3 of Hallahan, Michie, Schroeder, Miles and Weller. At least they're realistic targets. We would be able to do that with our first 2 picks intact

.[

I want to use 1&2 in the draft rather than recycle.

That's what I said: our first 2 picks intact as in, we still have them.