Nasher

Yes.

Good article. The change in Oliver's style has been well documented on here, so it's great to see some outside recognition, backed up by some statistical evidence. It's not often you see a step-change in a player like this within a season, but it looks as if it has dawned on Oliver that there's more in the party bag than clean collect/handball in traffic. It will be interesting to see if it's still going to be as noticeable against stronger teams. It's really hard to get a good sense of where things are at when our last two results have been floggings of terrible teams.

I guess the counter-argument is that overplaying a key position when they’re not ready is also counterproductive and can also compromise their long term playing future. In the case of Weideman, this season is the only one where I think there is a legitimate argument where he wasn’t playing when he should have been. In 2018 he was rightfully behind TMac and Hogan, and came in to play a role in finals when Hogan was out. 2019 was a writeoff with poor form and multiple injuries. So maybe he should be on 40 games instead of 37. Big deal. He’s in now and I can’t see him going out again.

He has changed his identity. By ignoring that change and calling him by a name he has asked not to be called, something untoward is implied.

I think he played in defence as a junior too. Feels like a bit of a waste to me though. But I suppose less of a waste than never getting back to AFL footy.

I think they were both bottom age, but not under-age per se. The only under-age recruit I can recall us taking was Hogan.

I had a fair bit of trouble warming to Dunn as a player. The faux tough guy antics he put on in the front half of his career drove me nuts. He showed loyalty through a tough era at the MFC though, when plenty of his mates walked, and overall has gone on to have a solid career. Best of luck to him.

I wonder what Jason Taylor would think of this analysis? What you have said sounds right to me, but all these attributes and shortcomings would have been known as an 18 year old, but we took him anyway, and with a non-trivial pick (late 20s).

He’s been great since returning to the side after the break I reckon. Has looked like the player he was when he first came to the club.

I think the improvement in spread has come from Oliver participating in it more as much as Brayshaw’s return to form. That’s an aspect to Oliver’s game that has noticeably changed in the last few weeks. I think you’re underselling Viney’s capacity in that regard too, he’s definitely capable of breaking away from a contest when required. To me I think the Petracca-Oliver-Viney midfield is stronger than Petracca-Oliver-Brayshaw, but the conundrum is that Brayshaw can’t play anywhere else. Can Viney? If Viney could play as a half forward in the role Jones is currently playing, even though it takes our midfield down a peg, the team may still be better off.

For those who want Harmes as a tagger, which of Oliver, Petracca, Brayshaw (and then Viney) are you moving out to accomodate this? He’s too far down the pecking order to spend much time in the guts now. That’s why Goodwin is exploring alternative roles. I don’t mind the wing suggestion. But irrespective of position, he looks horribly out of form at present.

Occam’s Razor says they’re just crap umpires. There were a few where ridiculous calls went our way too, the non-free against Fritsch (I think) in the goal square from the Petracca goal is one example.

Fair enough. Probably guilty of a bit of confirmation bias myself.

Langdon did a number of good kicks. The shocking kick thing is massively overplayed and is nothing but confirmation bias. He kicks at full pace, which is pacier than everyone else’s version of full pace. There will be the odd shank.

Jackson was awesome. McDonald did his job but goes for Gawn next week. Spargo quiet but popped up a couple of times in the last when we ran away.

How good is dishing out beltings in the last quarter? I could get used to it. This one should have been even bigger than it was.

Two games in a row where he’s played through with a broken face. Tough as.

Is already being in Adelaide a prerequisite to playing? If he’s in the Qld hub, surely he can just fly in.

I had a bit of a wtf moment when someone linked an old clip that included Jordie in it - he and Clarrie are dead ringers in terms of body shape. I said it at the time that the club were taking the p when they gave Oliver #13. I always had a bit of a soft spot for Jordie. Wasn’t much good at AFL level but always had a crack, in an era of footy when we had quite a few players who didn’t.

They’re predictable by design: so the players know how to set up. Sit down and watch a neutral game and focus on kickouts, and I think you’ll see all the teams only have one or two variations on their kickins. We do actually seem to have a couple of plays in the book: May long to Gawn on a flank, May long to Gawn in the middle, and a Salem driven short kick navigation out. Kicking it to Gawn seems like a pretty high percentage play I think. Last time we had a player who wasn’t predictable with kickins, we had Gawn saying in the media afterwards, “he forgot to tell us he was going long”, it lost us the game and the next time said player took to the field again, it was in a Collingwood jumper.

Out: Jetta In: Rivers

It’s not just that he tackles though, it’s that his tackles prize the ball loose so much more than other players (as distinct from a tackle that causes a ball-up). I can’t name another player in our side I could say that about. The next best flankers such as ANB certainly can’t say that, and aren’t going to be so much better with the ball to justify the loss of that attribute.

Lots of theories around why Goodwin and Burgess didn’t mention the injury when given the opportunity, but isn’t the simplest and most likely explanation just that they didn’t know about it at the time of the reports? it seems like the type of injury that a player could probably attempt to conceal and not alert the club staff until a few days later when it didn’t seem to be getting better?

Beat me to the punch, I just came to post this. Great question from Gibson, who obviously reads Demonland (hi Ben) and great explanation from Goodwin about the need for calm and clarity in the box. It’s these types of answers from the coach that convinces me Goodwin is a high quality leader. Stuffs me why supporters would prefer a coach who loses his cool and cracks in high pressure situations.

Confirmed out for two weeks after cheekbone surgery. Bastards in the MFC social media team headlined it as “surgery for vandenBerg” and my mind immediately went to the foot.