Nasher

Please elaborate, with verbatim quotes preferably (don't paraphrase, I want the opportunity to derive my own interpretation). I very much doubt it is the club's intention to turn Watts in to a ruckman; it seemed to me to be an on-the-fly tactic borne out of necessity, and that's absolutely fine with me.

The conditions, two injured players and two players doing not doing their share of the work might have been a contributing factor.

P_man was talking about Wines being sensational, not Toumpas. Thanks for the long winded rebuttal, though

Player, 2013 games, average % time on ground Drew Petrie, 16, 99.3 Ted Richards, 15, 98.7 Tom McDonald, 11, 98.3 In round 1, 11 players had 100% game time. Lee Spurr, Dustin Fletcher, Robbie Tarrant, Cale Hooker, Zac Dawson, Nathan Brown, Ted Richards, Lachie Henderson, Michael Jamison, Heath Grundy, Drew Petrie. As I asserted, mostly key defenders. In round 2 there were 3 players, one of whom was James Frawley. In round 3, 12. Source is AFL website. Doesn't sound rare at all to me, though I accept the explanation as to why Garland should probably have been rotated.

It's ground breaking to know that in 5 weeks we've suddenly turned from miles off the pace to middle of the road. It's an interesting point in light of the almost universally accepted wisdom that our midfield is third world.

?It was a serious question.

Despite what many people say, the statistics usually do tell the story.

It's fairly standard practice for key defenders to have 100% game time isn't it?

True, it sucks from that perspective.

Agreed again, was going to post the same Spencer for Gawn change in the changes thread when someone started it. I love Gawn, but the big fella is knackered. This is why I'm happy to carry some ruck redundancy on the list. I'm not worried about Garland, for the paradoxical reason that he's a solid and cemented senior member of the team. He's not going to miss crucial development or experience or confidence, so in the medium term, him being injured won't set us back any. If we were pushing for a flag, or he was a 40 game player I'd be shattered.

Totally agree mate. Sometimes the mood on this forum is so misaligned with my own that I wonder what I missed.

Agreed. Just wondering what to expect for next week. It'll be a bum if he has to miss more games when he finally seems to be tying it all together. Frustrating.

Injured? Spent very little time in the ruck when Gawn clearly needed more support. Watts rucked in the last quarter.

It was a shocker. I won't make any excuses, that was a disaster by any measure, young or not. That said, I agree that this was clearly an outlier. Even if he does turn out disappointing, he'll never be as poor as he was tonight. I won't judge ANY player on his absolute worst game, especially a 19 year old finding his way. That's just not a fair way to judge. He'll play for Casey next week, and he won't ever be that poor again. He's an emotional guy and was clearly gutted. We move on.

What are your grounds for claiming that? He had a lengthy time out, but for the latter half of the Shield season he was a regular feature. His form isn't much at the moment, but there's not much doubt about his fitness. I expect that within the next 12 months he'll be pressing for Test selection once again.

I thought the same thing about an MFC parallel. The results are similar too, gallant enough in defeat to give you some heart, followed up in the next match with a crushingly pathetic performance that makes you think there is just no hope. Jeez I'm tired of supporting rubbish sport teams.

Demonland members in thread scare on forum.

Considering Tapscott is a player with a lot of weaknesses, it's pretty funny that you're moaning about his one strength as if it's a weakness.

Mrs Roos, apparently

I'm a little scared to ask, but what the heck is a Snot Block?

I thought Davis got injured in the VFL.

The VFL is the place to 'look' at players.

...21, 23, 24, 22, 22. 23, 23, 25, 22 (and built like a brick outhouse, why's he in this group?), 23.The only one whose case I think you could argue as being close to complete development wise is Bail (and his problem is not size, it's just that he's no good), and maybe Grimes. The rest are still a long way off their peak size and shape, fitness and whatever other attributes you want to toss up. If you're really claiming that you're comparing them to other players in the same age group, I'd like to see you present some evidence to support your claim that our players aren't on a comparable trajectory. And I mean real evidence, not something dismissive like "I can see it with my eyes". Eyes can be deceived. Edit: Despite how it may come across, I'm not trying to argue that you're wrong about how our players' physical development is tracking relative to other clubs. You could be absolutely right. I'm also not saying with absolute certainty that it's purely because of age - reality is I don't know. I just want you to back up your claims, and explore this idea further.

There's three posts on topic, I think I'll just close it.

Is this a serious question? "Why aren't our 21 year olds the same size as those other clubs 27 year olds?"