Axis of Bob

Maybe Nicholson will be a/the tagger, while Bail is released to a more general midfield role. Maybe.

Interestingly, Blease was part of the forward group at the end of training today. Although it may have been because he was too knackered to do anything except goalkicking after the running!

He's a small defender who is quick, skillful, but very light and not really one for AFL style contested football.

Pretty much because he was playing as an undersized ruckman in a TAC team, I would assume. Not many of them get drafted. He's also not the world's silkiest kick, but he's got a big tank and a good head on his shoulders.

Karl Pilkington is a genius.

Tarrant, Reid, Maxwell, O'Brien. Scarlett, Taylor, Lonergan, Mackie. The key is flexibility. Both Garland and Davis provide that flexibility to play tall and small (and Frawley) I don't think you can regularly play all 5 in the same backline, but 4 should be fine.

Oh, and Katich must be some sort of tool. It was interesting to hear the response from Clarke. He said all the right things, but he also mentioned the dressing room harmony being important. Don't need to read very far between the lines there.

I was watching the game. It was a game decided by the toss and the first 10 overs of Victoria's innings. Starc and Hazelwood bowled brilliantly early and Victoria was lucky to only be one down. The ball was swinging around and batting was tough going. The Victorian openers had to do their best to survive and we lost 4 early wickets before the pitch settled down. Once the pitch settled down it was a batting paradise. Hodge and Quiney did as they pleased on the postage stamp of a ground and a pitch that may as well have had lane markings. The NSW innings was just more of the same and bowling was near impossible. Hazelwood (especially) and Starc are very promising young bowlers. Starc has all the tools to be really good, but sprays it around at the moment. Hopefully with maturity he can get more consistency. Hazelwood will be a star. Giant of a kid, bowls mid-130s and hits the seam regularly. He is as close to Glenn McGrath as you could get. He'll be a regular national bowler if he stays fit. For the Vics it was only Herrick that looked to have any penetration, although he tends to spray it around a bit.

And it's now a different way people are going to have to start looking at football. Once you could judge a player's performance on disposals, but as the game becomes more and more focused on 'playing your role' supporters are going to have to look at a player's performance in the context of the role they are being asked to play in the team. For example, the easiest role in football is probably playing Full Back on Nathan Ablett. Why? Because your job at full back is to take your opponent out of the game, and taking him out of the game is very easy. But being an offensive half back on Clinton Jones i very difficult, because your role is to damage the opposition coming out of defence, so it is very difficult to perform your role when you have a good tagger on you. It may be more fun to win the ball a lot, but it doesn't make the role easy. It's just that the parameters for success are different.

Same. But I really like his intensity and hard running. I look forward to seeing how he develops.

Anyone with half a brain can win the ball there, but the key is being able to damage the opposition with the ball. If you're just a solid kick and that's it, then you aren't really any benefit to your side. The player needs to be offensively talented enough to damage the opposition. Davis, Yarran, Deledio, Mackie, Murphy/Gilbee, Hodge, Hurn etc. These are very offensively talented players and they are given the ball because they can take the ball through the press better than their team mates. They either have explosive pace or are damaging, heavy kicks. You could play Nathan Jones at half back and he'd get it 30 times a game. But you wouldn't. Blease is offensively talented, and that's why you'd play him at half back. It's plays to his strengths. Thinking the role is 'easy' depends on how you define success. I could play there and get the ball 10 times a game at AFL level. But it would be embarrassingly awful and the side would be pounded. But if Grimes plays there, gets it 20 times and makes a few clangers then everyone calls it a failure. Leon Davis does that in the Grand Final and he has 'vanished'. But Lonergan gets it 6 times in the GF and he's brilliant. How 'easy' the role is depends on how you measure success in each role.

Priorities depend on how you rate the players. I dare say that what Neeld deems to be important to our team is very different to what Bailey deemed to be important. As such, I would think that we are likely to see more big bodied players selected. And if we don't think that a player is capable of being a best 22 player then we won't draft them. If we were going to select a skinny, mid sized forward then Barry would have to think that the sun shone out out of their arse. If that was the case then I think it'd be unlikely they'd be around in the 30s.

Not necessarily. Ask Clinton Jones. Different role need different skills. The attacking HBF needs someone who can run and damage the opposition. The often get fed the ball, but they will only be fed the ball if they can damage the opposition. You could say that being a ruckman is easy because all you have to do is compete in ruck contests. Full backs only have to stop the opposition full forward. A forward pocket only has to apply defensive pressure. A wingman only has to get by himself. A full forward only has to compete in the air. Different roles suit different skills sets. Doesn't necessarily mean that it's easy. Being entrusted to kick the ball through an opposition press is far from easy.

His pace will be important, because it will allow him to play a role in our side. He's fairly strong too, which will help. I don't think he'll ever be anything more than a role player, though. But if we play a very specific, highly structured game style then we're going to need players like him to do the dirty work.

He may be a good player, but don't see how he'd fit into our team structurally. All the noise points towards Neeld wanting big bodies, and I don't see us picking a skinny medium forward when we already have Jurrah and Howe filling those positions very well. Surely our priorities lie elsewhere.

I saw him play Casey Reserves before he came back into the seniors mid year and he played on a wing. He kicked 3 goals, two of which involved him running 50 metres with the footy. When he came back into the seniors he played a much better defensive game. He's got the tricks to play AFL, but it's a matter of building up his fitness to the point where he can impact a whole game. At the moment he's having really good moment, patches and quarters of game. He'll have a patch of 10 minutes where he has 6 touches, 4 tackles and sets up a couple of goals. Then you'll barely see him for a quarter, before he has a similar patch of productivity. His productive periods also tend to be early in games, so there's a good chance that this will improve with better fitness. He's got the tricks, so it's up to him.

On top of that he was unbelievably skinny when he came to the club. He made Watts look like a hulking Adonis. He's coming along much faster than I'm sure most at the club thought he would.

I don't think O'Brien has great agility. He has a lot of pace, but you'll rarely see him go sideways. He's a straight line player who takes the ball and uses his power to burst away. That's how I see Davis playing. But he's more of a key position height.

He has a 2 year contract. And you obviously haven't seen him play.

He was recontracted for two years mid-season while he was still injured. It was much earlier than most of the recontractings. It was mentioned in an article on the official site.

He'd go pretty close.

He looks like a hulking behemoth compared with what he looked like when he first got to the club. He's getting there. I don't think he'll ever be the incredible hulk, but he won't always be a skinny kid.

Both. He has the strength and power and size to play KPP, but has the speed to play mid sized. He's the same size as Frawley. He offers a huge amount of flexibility, which is important because it allows you to maintain your structure in defence no matter who the opposition picks. Unfortunately he's at the 'undraftable' 192cm mark. Cook is at least an inch taller than both. He just needs time to fill out. Patience.

I think his skills and co-ordination are improving a great deal as he develops in size. It often happens with big men. Look at Cox and Sandilands. That said, Gawn is a freak. He has reasonably good co-ordination already at 19 years old and 208cm. That's amazing. Plus his incredible running ability for someone that size means that Spencer will probably always be behind him. I don't see that as a negative on Spencil, but just unlucky for him that we drafted a freak.

I don't think he has been underrated. I think he's where he should be ... as one of the 10 best cricketers this country has ever produced. I think Border was better, IMO, because he was a class above his team mates and faced some of the best bowling there has ever been. Ponting is better than Border. Gilchrist I think is over rated, but he did change the way the game is played. Miller I would love to have seen, and it's hard to argue with his selection. I believe that bowlers win matches once you get to the very top level. When the best teams play each other they can both bat well and deep - it's the bowlers that set them apart. With that in mind I'm happy with McGrath above Ponting. That said, the Don is still number 1. When you are twice as good as any batsman in history then I think you've earned it! Benaud I think might be a little high, but it's hard when I didn't see him play.