Whispering_Jack

Picked up in a trade for #43. That’s stumps after we pick up young Woey.

Tipped this 😀

The thing that's up in the air is whether there's a bid for Taj Woewodin, in the absence of which he could potentially be rookied. I suppose we wait and see.

Great vision of JVR including that clutch goal against SA. IMG_7793.MOV

Not half as unflattering as Van Rooyen’s arm girth which should now be the subject of much greater importance to Demon fans and which I’m sure the Club’s fitness people will attend to ASAP.

It might have escaped you that I was responding to Ivan’s comment in a discussion which involved Andrew. If you don’t like what I say then feel free to block me.

Fair enough. The point that you make about Van Rooyen not having played on someone like Weitering is precisely that which I’ve been making about Mac Andrew. He’s never come anywhere near to having been tested by a quality opponent and even more so. That’s not his fault of course and I’ve been saying all year that he needed testing at National Championships level and in the combines before being rated as highly as some of the draft watchers were doing with him. Historically, has anyone so raw and untried gone top 5? Perhaps Richard Lounder but that was a long time ago.

For most of the early part of last night’s first round of the draft, things were going as planned with the exception of some brief disruptions when a couple of the pick trades were announced. The surprises came later on in the evening with the early selection of players not widely expected to be in the top 20 - players like Leek Alleer (GWS Giants), Angus Sheldrick (Sydney) and Kai Lohmann (Brisbane Lions). A couple of others such as Darcy Wilmot (Brisbane Lions) and Tom Brown (Richmond) only entered the top 20 picture in the last fortnight. All this leaves us with an interesting array of players ready to be selected in the second round and beyond who have, for the most part of the journey, been considered as probable/possible first rounders. Here are the names that should be prominent early and there’s some quality there - Rhett Bazzo Sam Butler Judson Clarke Toby Conway Arlo Draper Josh Fahey (GWS Giants NGA) Josh Goater Blake Howes Matthew Johnson Mitch Knevitt Alastair Lord Connor Macdonald Jesse Motlop (Fremantle NGA) Cooper Murley Mitch Owens (St KIlda NGA) Matthew Roberts Tyler Sonsie Zac Taylor Corey Warner Jack Williams Marcus Windhagen (St KIlda NGA) That should well and truly cover Round Two of tonight’s draft and there are another eight more rounds to follow (albeit rounds 9 & 10 are allocated to the Western Bulldogs). I think Melbourne did well with its first selection and tonight we can expect at least two more although one of them might be father-son pick Taj Woewodin. The Demons’ next pick is currently scheduled at number 38 so you can safely wait until after 8.30pm before tuning it. The club also holds picks 42 and 50 so it should be a much earlier night than last year’s draft which was wrapped up at close to midnight when someone bearing a close resemblance to Jordan De Goey was sighted stepping out for an exciting evening ahead.

I think you’re being tough with our boy JVR, noting that he was diagnosed with glandular fever in May and that illness can knock you about even if you’re a fit young person. That makes his efforts both in the WAFL Colts and for the WA Under 19s even more admirable. I did watch him in those state games and he was impressive in both in defence and attack. Moreover, my understanding is that he was sent down back after already proving himself as a forward at Colts level and in earlier state games to test his capability in defence. He not only did that but also from memory was sent forward late in the game and kicked the winning goal. He’s gone a long way to proving his versatility and he’s lucky to be at Melbourne where there’s absolutely no pressure on him to hold a place in the senior straight away.

Best of luck to him and he will need it up there. He sounds very level headed when interviewed and he clearly wants to succeed in a place where it’s going to be difficult for him. That said, I don’t think he would have been a Demon under the old system where we could have matched the bid for him. I’m much happier with Van Rooyen who better suits our needs and, at this stage of the journey is far more developed for the game.

AFL NATIONAL DRAFT ORDER (after Day 1 of the National Draft) with Draft Points ROUND TWO 21. Fremantle 878 22. North Melbourne 845 23. Hawthorn 815 24. Geelong 785 25. Geelong 756 26. Hawthorn 729 27. Carlton 703 28. Richmond 677 29. Richmond 653 30. Richmond 629 31. West Coast 606 32. Sydney 584 33. Geelong 563 34. North Melbourne 542 35. Adelaide 522 36. West Coast 502 37. North Melbourne 483 38. Melbourne 465 ROUND THREE 39. Sydney 446 40. Brisbane Lions 429 41. Western Bulldogs 412 42. Melbourne 395 43. Geelong 378 44. Essendon 362 45. Collingwood 347 46. GWS Giants 331 47. GWS Giants 316 48. St Kilda 302 49. Essendon 287 50. Melbourne 273 51. Collingwood 259 ROUND FOUR 52. Hawthorn 246 53. Fremantle 233 54. St Kilda 220 55. Port Adelaide 207 56. Carlton 194 57. Hawthorn 182 58. St Kilda 170 59. St Kilda 158 60. West Coast 146 61. Fremantle 135 62. Sydney 123 63. GWS Giants 112 64. Western Bulldogs 101 65. North Melbourne 90 66. Port Adelaide 80 67. Port Adelaide 69 68. Adelaide 59 ROUND FIVE 69. North Melbourne 49 70. Adelaide 39 71. Hawthorn 29 72. Carlton 19 73. Collingwood 9 74. Richmond 75. Fremantle 76. St Kilda 77. West Coast 78. Sydney 79. Essendon 80. Port Adelaide ROUND SIX 81. Gold Coast 82. Adelaide 83. Essendon 84. Sydney ROUND SEVEN 85. Gold Coast 86. Essendon ROUND EIGHT 87. Collingwood 88. Geelong 89. Western Bulldogs ROUND NINE 90. Collingwood 91. Western Bulldogs ROUND TEN 92. Western Bulldogs

Well … well … well

Nailed it!

Blake Howes of the Sandringham Dragons is one of the players Melbourne and a few other clubs are keen on. He's 18 years of age, a 190cm, 79kg outside midfielder and wouldn't take long to fit into a regular spot, even in the premiership side.

I don't think the club is as interested in a KPP selection at that stage of the draft than I am. They're the ones with their jobs on the line so I'll leave it to them.

One of the results of the Covid19 pandemic is that it will take a while before the outcome of last year’s AFL National Draft can be judged. And if 2020 turned out to be an enigma for recruiters then tonight’s national draft is going to be just as difficult for AFL clubs even though we saw a little more football than we did last year. You might not appreciate this if you pick up today’s newspaper or look at on line sites given that nearly every draft expert is predicting an identical top five as follows:- 1. Jason Horne-Francis (South Adelaide, SA) 2. Sam Darcy (Oakleigh Chargers/Vic Metro) 3. Finn Callaghan (Sandringham Dragons/Vic Metro) 4. Nick Daicos (Oakleigh Chargers/Vic Metro) 5. Mac Andrew (Dandenong Stingrays/Vic Country) You can just about lock that in as my draft top 5 for tonight but if you think that this is the order from 1 to 5 of the best players available in this year’s draft pool, then you need to think again. The outcome above is a combination of the machinations of the AFL draft system and the fact that drafting has been compromised by Covid19. Writing in the Herald Sun’s on line section (no link available), former Hawthorn star and “recruiting guru” Gary Buckenara cautioned that the limited number of games and the inability in 2020 and 2021 of recruiters to travel and see players playing live was a major issue. Often clubs have had to rely on the use of video analysis and local part time staff and this is not ideal. Buckenara maintains that the best way to form an opinion about players is to view their games in person. “You cannot actually pick up everything about a player by analysing videos and stats and relying on these two forms of analysis is lazy recruiting”. My reading of much of the draft coverage of the past week confirms this about many of the leading experts in the field. The pen pictures that have been posted about certain players bear such a resemblance to each other that it couldn’t be coincidental. So please forgive me for joining the lazy sheep in posting my top five as above. You would be aware by now that, despite his potential as a future player, I wouldn’t place over-hyped Melbourne’s NGA player, Mac Andrew, in my top twenty “power rating” but spare a thought for GWS Academy player Josh Fahey who will probably have to wait until tomorrow night to be drafted without much fanfare by the Giants in the 20s. Fahey was his team’s only four quarter player for the Australian Academy when it was thrashed by 130 points by Geelong VFL and named its best player. Andrew was unsighted in that game for three quarters but put in a solid final term which catapulted him into top twenty draft rankings. Good luck to both of them in 2022 when they start the season as equals in their quests for long AFL careers. The way things look at the moment, I’ll be cheering Blake Howes from my NAB Boys League club, the Sandy Dragons because most of the draft pundits have already decreed this to be the case.

Van Rooyen has been one of my favourites since the start of the season and looks gettable by the club if you follow the draft experts most of who all seem to be singing from the same choir book on draft eve (the Herald Sun joined in the chorus today). The consensus is that he will be selected by Brisbane with the last selection in Round 1 tonight.

He’s dramatically downgraded Chesser right out of the park in his power rankings because he claimed he hadn’t seen enough of his output. Yet, he upgraded Mac Andrew to top 20 in his power rankings on the strength of one so so quarter for the Academy after earlier stating that the “team got pumped by 100+ points. I wouldn't read too much into anyone's performances”. He also incorrectly claimed back in early May that Andrew weighed nearly 80k (he’s still 74kg today). There’s lots more this year. Still, he’s entitled to his opinions but I wish he expressed them consistently. Here’s his latest power rankings - November's AFL Draft Power Rankings: No. 1 player locked in as bolters make their moves

This is Chris Doerre’s Phantom Draft Every club, every pick: ESPN's full AFL phantom draft You may call me a cynic but it does help your accuracy to be second, a day after Cal Twomey.

Mentioned elsewhere on Demonland is Cal Twomey’s Phantom Draft. Cal Twomey's 2021 Phantom AFL Draft: Top 30, late picks, club whispers Highlights for Melbourne are that he believes that the club will select Blake Howes of the Sandringham Dragons and, his “whispers” for the rest are - “A father-son is set to land at Melbourne for the first time since 2014 with Taj Woewodin nominated as a national pick, meaning if a bid doesn't come for the son of 2000 Brownlow medallist Shane then the Dees can automatically grab Woewodin with their last live selection. That appears the most likely outcome, with a bid not expected before Melbourne's third pick. Dandenong Stingrays forward/midfielder Judson Clarke could still be on the board at No.37 while the Dees have nominated Andy Moniz-Wakefield, an outside runner, through their Next Generation Academy and he could be a rookie shot. As could Anthony Caminiti, a 198cm forward who kicked five goals in his NAB League debut for the Northern Knights.”

Class of 2021: Father-son Taj Woewodin 'put to the sword

I think that if Melbourne goes for a midfielder or mid-sized player with its first selection at 17 then this Western Australian KPP might be worth a look with its second pick. Jack out of the box: Why athletic WA tall is open to a move east

Ha, ha … I beat him to it.

I came across the name Harry De Mattia a few years ago in the context of a discussion on young football prospects in the southern suburban region. He was described to me as an absolute gun footballer. I’m not sure if he’s made the choice of cricket over football yet but yesterday, at age 16 he made his debut in Premier District Cricket for the Melbourne seconds and scored an unbeaten ton. Say no more.