Adam The God

I trust Tim Lamb, but I guess we'll see.

I like the idea of recruiting in waves. As much as he's a nufty, David King mentioned on FIRST CRACK this week that the industry thinking is you draft an elite core and bring them through together. This has certainly been our model. The older core is May, Gawn, Brown, McDonald, Jones, Hibberd, Melksham and Jetta. We've traded in four of them and home grown the other four. Ideally, you start with 8-10 solid older guys, but due to our recruiting and development in the 2007-2012 period, we've had to rely on slowly building that older core. Ironically, that allowed us to pick up high end draft capital to continue building that elite core. Starting in 2012-2017, we drafted the next core. This was the core that we had to get right, but for many years the club talked about bringing through an elite group of guys together and then adding to it. That elite core is now Viney, Salem, Petracca, Brayshaw, Oliver, Langdon (at the end of '19) and Lever (at the end of '17). Throw in support players like Harmes, ANB and Fritsch (who some might argue could fit in the elite category), and you've got your middle core, driven by elite talent, that needs to get somewhere between 23-27 before they peak together. We're now seeing this. Then, because you don't want to drop off a cliff when that middle core retires, you carefully build a younger core that can play support roles for the meantime, but have enough upside to potentially be as good. Eventually, they'll take over from the middle core, and you target the 2018-2023 recruitment periods to build this core. That core now looks like Petty, Spargo, Sparrow, Jordon, Jackson, Pickett, Rivers, Bowey, Laurie and who knows whether Hore, Turner, Rosman and Declase will make it, but if they do, you've built some nice depth across the ground. You then add an elite midfield talent like Cerra to that mix in 2021 and work out HTF you'll get an elite KPF onto your list before Brown and McDonald come to the end. The internal thinking I'm sure is that as your two older cores propel the team up the ladder, you then start to become a destination club if you're serious, and this makes filling those holes in the younger core easier. So Cerra now views Melbourne as the minor premier and at the very least, a prelim finalist. Maybe he can be wooed? And Ben King starts to think Melbourne is in a better window than his brother's team. Maybe he can be wooed next year? So not only does this strategy rely on good planning from the outset, smart and excellent recruiting, and an ability to be creative at the trade table, but it relies on you becoming a destination club on field to offset the lack of trade/draft capital you'll increasingly not have at your disposal. Geelong have shown this and with perhaps a more dynamic game plan, they might have done more damage at the pointy end over the last decade. Where we might differ slightly from a club like Geelong is that we're targeting players for our younger core (18-23), rather than targeting players in that middle core or older core. Geelong have done this because obviously FAs require only salary cap and not draft capital, so must be in FA age range to land them, but I think we've been ahead of the game for a few years now when it comes to pick trading and getting good deals done for the right players. I reckon our long term planning may well look to continue 'topping up' the emerging core, rather than the older core. As elite young talent is shipped off interstate, I'm sure we're tracking the talent we really rate up on the Gold Coast, at GWS and anywhere else across the country. We can then target guys in the 21-25 age bracket to extend our list's longevity. The next 2-3 off seasons will be fascinating.

I'd be going Hunt ahead of Hibbo. Hunt's height isn't an issue. He's not bad above his head and with four Geelong talls likely, having Bowey, Rivers, Salem and Hunt rebounding with our mids, we could sling shot hard against Geelong's talls. Not only am I concerned Hibbo might be done, he doesn't have the leg speed Hunt does. Hunt has also shown repeatedly he's willing to take the game on even when the rest of his team mates aren't.

Yep, I reckon he's coming.

How was this framed? Because saying his "main priority" is us is quite a big statement to just throw out there...

You're on hundreds of thousands of dollars if you're Neale. Being a recent parent myself, being in lockdown the way we are, it's effectively the same thing as being interstate. It's not ideal, but it's manageable and my business is certainly not doing as well as Lachie Neale's deal would be doing for their young family. I reckon the Lions need to stand firm...

For all he's done since, Steven May also turned up in terrible nick and spent most of his first season injured with us. Lever's knee injury was an accident in his first season. May, however, was, by all reports, out of shape.

Good old Eddy Lingers Langdon, ay? ❤

Is this our banner in absentia? It should be. Maybe work in a rhyme about accuracy too. 😉

I reckon the main way Geelong win this if we turn up to play our way, is through clearance dominance and shutting down the effectiveness of our clearances. So basically out Melbourning us. Clearance dominance allows them to move the footy quickly via the likes of Dangerfield, Guthrie and co, but unless they're centre stoppage clearances, we should be able to deal with this, unless they really maul us at around the ground stoppages and get so many repeat entries that our defence eventually buckles. And yes, they'll likely be looking for a low scoring grind. Yes, I've been avoiding my Geelong supporting uncle on the phone. Serious family division possible here haha.

The FD clearly wants more midfield class. Cerra is a different player than Harmes, Viney and even Brayshaw. His ball use would work nicely in tandem with Oliver, Viney, Harmes, Petracca etc. I'd say it's also about building our young core (Jackson, Jordon, Sparrow, Spargo, Kozzy) to complement our mid career core (Oliver, Petracca, Harmes, Lever, Langdon, Brayshaw, Salem, ANB).

Most complete I'd think, but despite not having a genuine ruckman, Bulldogs is still deeper for mine. Essendon wouldn't be far away either. I'd very surprised if Luke doesn't bite the bullet this off season and go after a ruckman with more left in him than Stef Martin.

Thanks mate. Interesting we were still looking at inside mids then. I still believe we lack another clean bull. They don't have to be an A++er like Oliver, but if Oliver goes down, I think our midfield will too. He's been incredibly durable, but I hope we continue targeting the right inside mids.

If that were the case, how do you explain our negative differential? As the team who finishes top of the ladder, who plays a manic contested game style, you'd think we'd have to get to the ball first too, wouldn't you? The occasional game ruined due to umpiring, sure, it's a game adjudicated by humans, where there are many grey areas in the rules. But the Bulldogs differential is so out of whack with the rest of the competition, it needs a conversation. And because there currently isn't one, umpires may not be aware of it. Bring their attention to it and we might get a little more evenness in the free kick counts.

Thanks mate. What's Smith's ball use like and his pace? Would he have added a different dimension to our midfield?

His old man was a beautiful, fluid kick of the footy too.

I don't understand. So at 6 20ish during the sport segment, 7 West Media reported that there was an MFC injury sustained during training, but haven't named the player? What?

Unlikely, there's vision of him on the Insta from a few hours ago.

Is it a recovery from injury? Like a Jayden Hunt?

Sure, except he was the one banging on about Bontempelli's footy IQ. If you watch the replay, Bontempelli's the culprit in 3 of the first 4 Lions goals last night. No mention of this. Montagna implied that he's such a smart footballer that he placed himself defensive side of the stoppage after quarter time. Well, I'd be surprised if Luke hadn't asked him to be more accountable, because IMV Bontempelli is a defensive liability at times. I'd be angling most of my attacks through his man. I think that's what Fagan had identified as well. Bontempelli is probably the best player in the comp on the outside, but he's even been shaky at that this finals series. In fact, I'd even go as far as saying Bontempelli exemplifies the Bulldogs midfield. Brilliant, really damaging on the outside, but very little two way running.

The weather may reduce the amount of switching in this game. I think if it's wet, the difference between their ball use and our ball use draws us much closer together than would otherwise be the case. We saw in the wet against the Bulldogs, I believe, it was a significant advantage to the Bulldogs. It also takes away our intercept game, but conversely, if they go in with the same tall forward set up, we may be able to rebound quite heavily with inclement conditions.

Yep, spot on RE Montagna cutting him off. They lost that first quarter against us too. It was 2.3 to 2.1. So pretty rich to say "do you take the first half versus the second half". He's king of the muppets alright.

@Ethan Tremblay @McQueen @Pennant St Dee @Chook in Perth any of you in these pictures? 😀

So just caught up on FIRST CRACK from last night. David King is a deadset nufty. He talked about Geelong's tall forwardline and how it would trouble us, yet didn't talk about who Geelong played and their injury list. Staggering really.

Maybe. My Geelong supporting half of the family likes to tell me they have a bit of support over there from Polly Farmer days and they seemed to pack the stadium the other night. I know half the crowd were Freo or West Coast players, but still. :P