stevethemanjordan

Slightly exaggerating the truth there. Most* great teams and premiership winning teams have two key pillars playing in the FF/CHF positions. The 'pure' CHF tag and role from yesteryear may have changed, but there's many reasons for that. Teams like the dogs and the current Hawthorn team are anomalous to this rule simply because their back-half and midfields are so incredibly skillfull and strong. Their efficiency going inside 50 helps in that regard. They don't need to rely on big contested marking players forwards to win one-on-one contests like us. We suffer from having a weak and under-skilled backline and an under-skilled and one-dimensional midfield . Which is why our entries going forward can be so wayward and why we see opposition teams run it straight out. Roos has built our team similarly to that of Sydney and our game style due to this requires two big contested marking forwards. We can only hope that Weed and Hulett come on as quickly as possible so that Hogan can move to the CHF position which is the position best suited for his attributes.

Perhaps. But I assumed Tom would go to Taberner, I think that's what has happened that last few times. They rotate anyway as part of the zone at times so we'll see different matchups throughout the night, (which I also cringe at). But I'm always [censored] scared when there are players who only need a sniff early on to become dangerous for the entire night. Pav is one.

Yeh I could understand that given different opposition. But Pav is shot and is slower and less fit than even Dunn. So it's an even match in that sense but the advantage is that Pav won't be able to outbody and out smart someone like Dunn as easily as he would with O-Mac. Anyway, can't change anything now. But if Pav is allowed to work himself into the game simply because of a matchup, then it's going to be dangerous for us.

Happy with the ins and outs but I would still rather Dunn ahead of O-Mac for this game. Is the perfect size and matchup for Pavlich and the role given could have really been a simplified lockdown one that would suit Dunn's limitations. At his best as a defender, he has been very effective and I can't understand why he is still out of the side. We have been leaking goal simply because O-Mac and Frost are in the side and Tom takes it upon himself to do things he shouldn't simply because the support is not there. I don't understand it frankly. Dunn has been out of favour pretty much all year, and nobody knows why. Usually when ex-leaders and really experienced players are made to play ressies, they bounce back relatively quickly to play seniors again. Especially when there's an underdeveloped 20 year old who is hardly holding his own taking his position.. It's getting [censored] annoying. I know posters think we lost the game last week due to a 'lapse' in the third which might be true. But it wasn't because of the midfield. Watch all of those goals starting in the third and you'll see that we conceded those goals due to a lack of intensity, experience and smarts in the backline. We conceded easy goals from there when we didn't need to. Pavlich is far too strong, smart and experienced for either one of O-Mac or Frost.

A considerably undersized defence, which makes them even more impressive as a collective. Leo Barry was an AA full-back/defender in 04 and 05 Craig Bolton an AA in 06. Fair to say both of those blokes at the top of their game were elite defenders.

Or unless - heaven forbid - we remain winless for the second half of the season...

For those who think it's a two-horse race between us and Essendon in regards to both Hibberd and Hurley, I'd like to remind you that there are 16 other clubs in our competion, many of which would also be interested in both players. We have been the laughing stock of the AFL for near 10 years and we will be the only club that loses to the VFL team that is Essendon this year. To assume that we're a lay down misere to land either of them if they don't want t stay at Essendon like some of you are suggesting is nothing short of comical.

He's on today

I think it's all those responses I had from you re: the Garland situation last year.. But you're right, on second viewing I could have changed the tone. As for the second highlighted paragraph, I'm again baffled at your reasoning behind much of what you're saying. I question your understanding of list management and development and I'm certainly not trying to be condescending when I say that. It seems that for one, you are more one-eyed than I about individuals at our club and with that comes a bias when comparing our own players to players of opposition sides. The Garland situation is proof of that in my view. Something you just refused to see time and time again last year. And I think your second paragraph is further evidence to this 'one-eyed' view you seem to hold. Fundamentally, we disagree on the value of both Nathan Brown and Eric Mackenzie. Why is this? How is it that you refused to point out problem players at your own club last year like Colin Garland, yet you are more than happy to state that Brown and Mackenzie are both 'limited' and have 'reached their ceiling in terms of what they can provide going forward'? It's completely emotional bias. Here's a picture to paint. Due to two problem players that we have at our club in Colin Garland and Lynden Dunn, we are playing a 9 game, overawed 20 year-old in Oscar McDonald and an athlete-turned footballer in Sam Frost who has 33 games to his name. It is completely circumstantial that these two are holding down key posts in our backline and if Garland and Dunn weren't problem players, both O-Mac and Frost would be developing at Casey. Nathan Brown and Eric Mackenzie have 122 and 132 AFL games to their names respectively. Nathan Brown is a stay at home-full back and was nearly awarded a Norm-Smith medal for his job on Nick Riewoldt in the 2010 Grand Final and since then has battled with injuries. At his best, he is defensively just as good as Tom McDonald. Eric Mackenzie was short-listed for the AA side in 2013 and 14 as well as finishing second and first in West Coast's BnF those years. He did his ACL last year and if you were aware of any of that, you'd have pointed it out as a reason as to why he hasn't regained his spot ahead of the youngster Tom Barrass just yet. I have no idea what'll happen to Garland and Dunn at this stage but what I do know is that anyone within the AFL would have both Brown and Mackenzie over Garland Dunn. Bar some Melbourne supporters for obvious reasons. Why would having either one of Brown or Mackenzie help our list? A) Because they're both far better pure defenders with the same amount of experience but with runs on the board and aside from not possessing the many problems that Garland and Dunn possess, neither of them would be undersized full-backs. B) Because they'd provide so much more than either one of O-Mac and Frost and would allow those two to develop where they should be developing right now. At Casey. and C) They would simplify the role that T-Mac plays at present, would allow him to play only to his strengths and would help his football and confidence enormously. We will be targeting a mature key defender. It's not that I think we need the both of them at our club, but I suggested those two as the kinds of players that would without any fraction of a doubt, help our list. Injury would be the only deterrent in both of their cases and that is obviously something that the club will have to decide.

Agree it's the only thing that is holding him back although he was really smart with ball in hand on the weekend. I can't wait to see another pre-season from him and I reckon we'll see him moved to a far more dangerous position when we sort our defence out in the off-season. I'm almost certain he'll be tearing up the wings for us next year. He possesses such a unique blend of attributes. His contested work and contested marking for such a speedy player is extremely rare. Clearly a confidence player and the more game games he plays, the more his confidence will grown. Last weekend would have done wonders to this side of his game.

I'm sorry but these posts are just complete tripe. More often than not, the reason that players like T-Mac are berated by supporters so much is because they possess bad habits which are on display regularly. Supporters can tolerate certain players turning the ball over every now and again as Jones did on the weekend. Why do you think that is? Because 90% of the time, they're consistently good in their skill level, decision making and impact of the contest. Nobody can agree that T-Mac is consistently good in all facets of the game. He is not like Jones, consistently good in all facets of the game 90% of the time. In fact when it comes to disposing of the ball and decision making with ball in hand, he is a complete flip of the coin. How is it that you're in utter confusion as to why supporters pull their hair out when witnessing these kinds of errors? It's not that [censored] hard man. Tom McDonald tries his heart out and is super important to us at present because funnily enough, he is the most consistent out of all our KPB. Even if it's in only a couple of areas. But that is far more of a worry than anything else and says an awful lot about the state of our defence. We're lucky that we can address this. And we will. Tom McDonald would be a far better player with players who performed consistently well around him. Which is why we need two players who can take up the roles that Garland and Dunn have failed at taking up. However, he also needs to fix up a hugely problematic area of his game. Disposal and decision making.

Great post and it says an awful lot about emotional bias. Wiseblood is one of many. Not to say that Vardy will be anything like Gawn, but Gawn not so long ago was struggling for senior games simply because he hadn't had a clean run at it. If you look at his injury history, it'd be on par with Vardy's if not worse than. It's funny that posters completely ignore facts like that. As well as the Trengove one. I'll back the club to bring in players who they think will help us move forward and it's fairly [censored] obvious that we need to add to our Ruck division. The fact that Spencer has only been given a one year extension says as much. Vardy has shown enough early days that he can play the game well both as a resting forward and ruckman. There are a host of players out there that would compliment our list in many ways and like we have with our midfield, we must now address both our ruck division and backline. Depth and talent.

Hope he features on GF day this year.

Hunt wasn't at the combine so nobody has any idea of his 20 metre sprint time nor what time he'd run over 100. But he'd take it up to Dangerfield without a doubt. His pace is blistering over 50-100.

It's strange to me that you don't see Nathan Brown or Eric Mackenzie as players who would not only immediately boost our defence, but also provide relief for Tom McDonald and allow his brother Oscar to develop in the VFL like he should be right at this very moment. Both would be immediate upgrades to Frost and Oscar in our starting 22. There is absolutely no argument there. You talk about 'upgrades' as though we need to target an A-grader in Hurley or we leave the defence as is. It's an extremely short-sighted perspective and shows a complete lack of understanding of how lists are built. How do you think we've built up our midfield over the last few years? I'll say it again. There are key defenders out there aside from Hurley who would help us in ways that you clearly can't see.

These are my favourite parts to read when reading these kinds of posts.

You are assuming wrong. On both counts. McDonald has a place in the side. Obviously. It's shaky because there is little support with Frost and O-Mac also playing. But it's also shaky because Tom simply isn't improving his ball use. We cannot have all three play there next year if we're expecting to improve again. Tom McDonald has miles of work to do if he wants to be considered a reliable and consistent backman. We will land a KPD in the off-season. Because we have to.

I'm hoping that basic errors come under the heading of, 'coming to play for 120 minutes' in Roos' mind. Because they are what lost us the game. Basic errors that resulted in goals to Adelaide. At was an error ridden game. But we easily had the most. For example, the opening two goals to Adelaide were from Frost and O-Mac and their efforts. Not anything else. They had more tackles inside 50 also. Why? Because we lack composure and skill back there and we were constantly putting team-mates under pressure by missing targets or passing to players with heat on them. It's fairly obvious that their tackle count in that part of the ground was up. We have ourselves to blame for that. Frost running around like a headless chook hitting about 1 in every 4 kicks or handballs. Tom McDonald marking and spoiling well but then undoing all of his good work by kicking atrociously. O-Mac by possessing sub-standard intensity around the contest, playing slow-motion football and just generally making really basic errors.

As others have said and continue to say, Tom McDonald continues to be a liability with the ball in his hands. I can't understand why supporters think that taking a few intercept marks during the game correlates to a 'good game'. What the fark do you people watch? The footy club obviously see little alternative as they refuse to play Dunn or Garland. We have T-Mac, Frost and O-Mac holding down key posts. It's as shaky a defence you'll see from a side who are sitting 10th on the ladder. Yesterday was but a taste of what's to come in regards to high pressure games. Imagine if it were a final? I have little to no confidence that T-Mac won't turn it over when the ball is in his hands. Frost doesn't have a football brain and sorely lacks the basic and fundemental skills required to play the game regardless of his impressive 'athletic' capabilities. And Oscar McDonald is only getting games because the selection committee have little to no faith in two experienced and former 'leadership group' players in Garland and Dunn. Which says a huge amount about the both of them as players and is not spoken about enough on here. There were plenty of positives to take out of yesterday's game and I was proud of the way we played. But fark me we will continue to leak goals from our backline play if we don't bring in some quality KP defenders. Brown, McKenzie, Hurley. We need to land one. Hibberd as well. We need experience and competence back there. And we have little atm.

He is 28 so I'm not sure how much 'better' he'll be getting.

Anything to share on the matter as of recent GNF?

This is a religion known as Satyrism. It's where you place blind faith in every player on the list and imagine they'll be a best 22 player forever and a day at our club. A star even. Frost is extremely limited in his smarts and basic skills as an AFL player. That's already a huge hurdle to overcome at this level, regardless of his 'freakish' athletic gifts. And Oscar has shown just as many bad signs as good ones in my eyes. I'm stating it as it is. Every player has 'potential' and the ability to 'improve'. But they also have a timeline and with it, a limit. Anyway, forecasting these hypotheticals from where we are is hard to do. Mainly because we have little idea of who we've been speaking to behind closed doors, bar the odd murmuring. However, I'm sure if Tom McDonald surprised everyone by signing with Sydney, we would have a plan in place.

^ Lols. Perfect example. Imagine it in Stuie's accent. Amazeballs.

Stuie's posts are actually now quite entertaining. Simply imagine it's 'Stuie' from family guy every time you read one. It's great.

It's a case-by-case scenario and will depend on many factors. But what I will say is that as a back-line unit, we've been far too susceptible in our more recent past to this kind of play due to the bombardment of inside 50's against and also due to a lack of composure for most of our back-six. Ideally you'd like to have defenders who, like most well-rounded defenders, have poise and composure and whose first instinct might be to give off to a player with more space and time. Obviously not all scenarios will allow for that, but I think we all know it's a trait that is definitely lacking in our back-line and it seems to be something that we continually miss when recruiting defenders. Composure. I watch and marvel at players like Burgoyne, Birchell, Gibson and Hodge. Smart players who seem to be able to assess a number of options within a couple of seconds and give to to the best one. Be it a kick or a handball. We have too many defenders who refuse to give a creative and releasing handball to a player in a better position, simply because they don't have the same composure/awareness. Clayton Oliver is someone who clearly possesses spatial awareness and composure. Watch him gather the ball in heavily congested areas with huge pressure and he'll nearly always give off to someone in the most advantageous position for us at that contest. Mitchell is the king of it and is amazing to watch. There are times where these players will also just bang the ball on the boot. But as a back-line collective, the more composure defenders possess, the less likely you'll see rushed and thoughtless play.