DeeSpencer

Victoria 1. Gawn 2. Oliver 3-4: Viney, Harmes Petracca, Fritsch, Salem, T Mc All Stars May injured I would assume we rule him out. 1. Jetta 2-4: Lockhart, ANB, Vanders, Wagner’s, Petty? I don’t think we have anyone end up playing for the All Stars.

Blind Freddy can tell you the air is awful and people should avoid exercise outdoors if it’s purely recreational. But the Essendon saga showed doctors get overruled when competitive edge is at stake and the tennis today showed dollars and schedules can overwhelm logic. The AFL medicos have probably done some research before the China games. Makes a lot of sense to send out a warning before a club takes an unnecessary risk.

A sports medico in Australia could probably go 30 years without having to worry about air quality impacting training, and even then they aren’t respiratory physicians, they’re unlikely to know safe limits. Wise from the AFL to take the initiative.

If tomirrow is anything like today I’d be looking for an indoor facility to do skills training and then hit the bikes for some fitness. Unless the perennially windy Casey fields is still getting some southerly winds and has better conditions?

Fair enough, I don't follow soccer. From the NBA there's plenty of cases of teams not disclosing info. The Nets right now are in a big circus with Kyrie Irving. https://www.amny.com/editorial/atkinson-clears-up-kyrie-irving-injury-confusion-nets-waiting-game-continues/ The NFL maintains a pretty strict protocol for who is missing practice and could miss games but teams break it all the time. Usually if they get investigated and found guilty the punishment doesn't bother them. https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2870513-bills-reporting-of-jerry-hughes-wrist-injury-being-investigated-by-nfl

Which big international sports? Does soccer do it? Because certainly the NBA and NFL have stronger policies but teams don't obey them at all. It's also preseason. Not games. Most international sports don't have such long preseasons and I doubt they have stringent policies on reporting in preseason.

About as convincing as the leadership he sold us for 3 years.

More like 3/4 than full seasons and the Suns weren’t known for preparing their players well. Im concerned by how much lighter they’ve got him and how much training he was doing pre Christmas. After last year I would’ve limited him to only about 3/4’s of the work load in preseason. Instead it sounds like we’ve pushed him too hard before Christmas and now have to back right off.

Fair enough but if it’s just one day of doing different stuff and not even missing sessions then it doesn’t require an update. Good for injury prevention as well, using different muscles and training how to fall and roll.

Did they not give us a recent update on Spargo, Hannan, Jones and Tomlinson? They’re doing plenty and heading towards the main group. Gus has done almost all the trainings, if he’s sitting out one drill there’s nothing to see there. Might be as much as getting him extra reps on his strength which is reading ruck taps and clearance work. Doubt there’s much to say about KK and Bennell. The one to be nervous about is May. We’ll all have to touch wood there

2018 caps the Roos plan as far as I'm concerned. We went from worst team since Fitzroy bad to a prelim final appearance. Our young players looked good. We had useful role players and we had experience in the side. Between 2013 and 2020 we've had important players in Vince, Lewis, Cross, Tyson, Bugg, Garlett and many others come and go. Howe emerge and leave. Watts finally fulfil his talent then regress and be traded. Hogan sent away. The utter failure of Toumpas. Plus the decline of Jones and possibly Hibberd. To build a full contending side whilst also replacing those guys would've been a monumental task. Most teams going for the full rebuild strip back to nothing very early so they can spend years building without losing older guys out the other side. It was the 3rd go around of rebuilding since 2007 and needed immediate action to remedy the list. Dreams of a Clarkson 2005-2008, Geelong under Bomber or a GWS style leap were long odds to happen, the baseline talent on the list and number of high and mid round drafts picks just weren't enough. And yes the coaching change was part of the rebuild but that alone shows it was a highly unusual situation. Just my opinion but as long as the culture and overall smarts of the club has changed and as long as our high draft picks like Oliver, Petracca, Salem, Lever kick on then combined with 2018 that's enough from the rebuild. I see your point of view that 2013-2020 should be one rebuild that ends in contention and therefore success. Just isn't how I see it.

Not sure attributing a time frame to post Roos is all that meaningful. The guy doesn't believe in rebuilds. He came in to build us up and that was achieved. I actually think last year was a lot about adapting to losing a lot of players that Roos bought in to help achieve improvement from basket case to legitimate side. In conjunction with injuries we really struggled to cover the decline or loss of guys who steadied us - Vince, Tyson, Jones, Lewis (post Roos but similar philosophy), Garlett, Hibberd even Jetta and someone like Bugg. Obviously there was a rebuild aspect as well around the time Roos was here (pre/post/during). The core group of top draft picks in Viney, Salem, Petracca, Brayshaw, Oliver, Weid and the Lever trade are meant to be the backbone of our side for a decade and that was looking likely in 2018. Gawn, McDonald, Jetta and maybe Harmes the other guys who were even part of the Roos era and still important today. Things will be looking bad if the majority of those guys aren't doing what we expect this upcoming season so I guess that's the legacy of the Roos rebuild. Along with hopefully more professionalism, grit and unity etc. But a lot of the teams success this year will be based on players we've added post Roos. Some trade ins to continue the build but also draft picks in the years since.

I think there’s times you have to move on from both coaching game plans and players who might help short term but aren’t going to get it done. In terms of players, older players are the simplest targets but also guys who don’t have the skills, or the two way efforts or the physicality. And it might be moving guys back to Casey to develop a skill or moving positions to use other parts of their games. Similarly conserving and developing your best players in other roles has to be a factor. Oliver forward. Petracca half back. Gawn CHB. All things I’d like to see if we’re just a middle of the road side, rather than playing them all max minutes to get to 12 wins. I look at what Bevo has done at the Dogs post flag whilst they’ve had a mini rebuild and he’s moved a lot of magnets and tried a lot of different plans. It’s probably caused short term pain whilst they’ve restocked with talent but they’re well placed to contend now.

Win the flag or get in the best possible position to win the flag in 2021-onwards. Finals is a realistic aim and winning now isn’t a handicap on winning later, in fact it’s the oppsite. But I am weary of the trap of the later Daniher years, selling out to make finals and never contending.

The 3 most common deep forward targets that I noticed were T Mc, Melksham and Fritsch. They are also our 3 most dangerous one on one forwards. If Jackson gets a game at this stage I can't imagine he'd be any kind of target. He looks best when allowed to move around in space. Whilst the main group was doing match sim he did ruck training with Preuss, Gawn and Bradtke and held his own.

3/4 ground match sim now. Mids deliberately mixing handballs and throwing the ball at each other’s feet under pressure to similate a stoppage. Then break in to match sim. Vanders, Fritsch, Nibbler involved

Next one: Weid on the flank, handballs up to Chandler who’s surveying options and RUN DOWN by Bedford.

Max gets the short kick in the corridor and goes long to Melk who nicely bodies Oscar out of the way on this one. Next one up. Chandler crumbs back to Vanders in the wing spot, in to Dunkley, out to Weid who hits Jackson on a nice lead.

Hitting the fat side flanker - has been Melksham and Fritsch - seems to be the aim of the kicking half ground match sim

No

At the other end it’s 4 on 3 running the ball from the backline

Rivers laces 40m pass to Sparrow who kicks long to set up the drill. Wagner centers, Kossie plays on, shakes the man on the mark, puts the handball in front of Viney who sets it up to T Mc. (Who spills the contested mark over Rivers). Match sim. 10 on 8. Bibs moving it out. Blues moving it back in.

Small group drills designed to kick to forwards one on one now. The kicking is gross. LJ on a lead is nicer.

No KK, no Bennell, no Neita and as far as I can see so far no Joel Smith. May walked back to AAMI as training started. A rather rusty kick to kick to start with in blustery conditions. Kossie P struggling to hit a target so far.