rjay

...and they persisted with playing him in the wrong position at Casey stunting his development.

One of them could have been though, the one were he toe poked the ball. He didn't want to put his head down and get his body anywhere near or in line with it. I understand why, but as a footballer in any division let alone AFL it's one where you would put your body on the line. Is it asking too much these days? I don't know 'Red', I know at the time I made a comment and a few seconds later so did Hodge.

Sure did 'Red'...he's very outside. ...but I wonder if we can say this anymore with the focus on concussion. The game is going to have to make some very big decisions going forward.

At some stage the game will become non contact, probably not in my lifetime. Otherwise it will go the way of the Gladiators. Things change, nothing stays the same.

We are totally in agreement on this...if a player puts himself at risk like this they need to get at least a 4 week suspension to have a good think.

Let's hope Ross goes all out defence...

I guess my question is...has he done anything in his career to show he's capable of doing the heavy lifting?

I haven't taken any notice of the Hawks over the last few years but didn't see O'Meara as an inside extractor in the past. Maybe he's put this into his game to make up for what injury has taken away???

Was just thinking the same before I read this thread 'old dee'...

...and here I thought either 'Stuie' or 'Lord Nev' were back. It's only Tom Morris.

That's great news 'BDA', looking forward to the mens season to start then more to come after that. Let's hope it's "Back to Back" for the girls.

We all know that Oliver is the best player in the game...Robbo still hasn't figured it out.

...but we were & are not a team in development. Lyon & Clarkson are often portrayed as not being development coaches. This is shortsighted & unfair...they built their teams, developed a game style & were hunting flags, they had their team & it was hard to get into. We were shooting for a flag & you don't win those from the bottom half of the 8. Unfortunately we didn't have the luxury to rest our top players, we were fighting for our spot all the way. Again you listed a bunch of players who could have come in but how about making the changes. Which key players do we rest & who replaces them? Would Tomo come in for Lever? post knee reco he just hasn't had the agility to play that type of role. J Smith was injured as usual & Turner was unfortunate in his debut game to cop a bad injury that was confidence sapping. McVee couldn't get a kick in a stampede in 2022 but another year at Casey & a good preseason now it looks like we might have a player. Bedford & Chandler weren't coming in for key players, they might give ANB or Spargo a break, hardly keys. JVR wasn't ready, we might have had no choice if Max didn't come up as our tall options were limited. Maj retiring put a big hole in the tall options bucket.

It's easy to name the players struggling with injury. Now name the players you would replace them with and tell me how they would make us better?

No, you can't get off that easily. So many are blaming Goodwin & the FD when I believe they had no realistic options. If you are going to blame the FD as you did then tell us what changes you would have made? ...and why they would have made us better. Not just say as others have, bring in fresh legs. We could have brought in Chandler or Bedford but neither would have changed our fortunes, that would be fiddling around the edges. At the end of the day, you can't replace champions, that's why they're champions...

Dunstan, a player that the Saints moved on despite those votes. He had played 5 games for us, no votes and wasn't able to reach anything like that 12 vote form. He's purely a break glass player... Weid, been tried enough. Making changes would not have helped and may have made us worse.

How could we, we were fighting for a place in the top 4. Again, name the changes you would have made and tell me why they would have made us better?

One of the modern myths in football...

What a lot of people don't seem to understand. This is depth 101... - Depth only covers your bottom 6 players - Depth will never cover champions - You do play champions when they are injured because in most cases they will give you more than what your depth can - All clubs play injured players - When the amount of (%) injuries mount up in your top10 players you are stuffed Last years GF (and you will find stories in all GF's) gives us some great case studies. The Swans played Reid, it was a gamble that failed...they played him as they had no one else that could do what he could. For them to win it was crucial for Reid to play his role which in part freed up Buddy to do his magic. It wasn't a great bet on past history, a very long odds gamble that didn't pay off. Geelong played Hawkins, going into the finals series with a foot injury that has since been operated on. This bet payed off as they won the whole thing, Hawkins was instrumental in setting up the game and taking away the Swans belief...it might put an early end to his career yet but they gambled and won. They also had no one that could do what Hawkins can do.

Name them...there was no one at Casey that would have made a difference that's why they went with what they had

Unfortunately if there were 5 or 6 guys in the same position we didn't have the dice to roll.

I guess we're more concerned about what they have now, not what's coming through. Just hoping they finish in the bottom half of the ladder. Not likely but it would be nice.

He's never been that sort of player though, in his prime a smooth mover never a bash and crash player.

Was it Jimmy "ya know" Barnes???

Joy erupting as each day is another day closer to Pickett re-signing...