AFLW 2018 AFLW Top 50 Players Countdown

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I don't think I like the idea of a top 50 when AFLW consisted of about 200 players last season. Not a very exclusive club. And an honest fully-rounded critique of players, rather than simply praising their strengths would provide more clarity and meaning to the rankings.

Mo Hope dropped 45 places simply because she "struggled with injury"? But if she's not injured now, there must be something more to her game that the author doesn't rate, so why not say it.
 
Nov 28, 2011
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Interesting that only 1 Adelaide player 21-50

You'd imagine Phillips / Randell / Marinoff / Perkins in top 20 but it probably points to how the Crows relied and were lucky to have such a good top 4 players
 

TheShrewdDude

Debutant
Jun 20, 2017
59
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Fremantle
I don't think I like the idea of a top 50 when AFLW consisted of about 200 players last season. Not a very exclusive club. And an honest fully-rounded critique of players, rather than simply praising their strengths would provide more clarity and meaning to the rankings.

Mo Hope dropped 45 places simply because she "struggled with injury"? But if she's not injured now, there must be something more to her game that the author doesn't rate, so why not say it.
She dominates at club football against the weaker sides, but really struggled at the higher level, mainly due to her poor workrate imo. Saw 3 of her games live and her opponents by the end of games were running off of her at will.

Injured or not, her ranking in the top 50 at all is flattering.
 
She dominates at club football against the weaker sides, but really struggled at the higher level, mainly due to her poor workrate imo. Saw 3 of her games live and her opponents by the end of games were running off of her at will.

Injured or not, her ranking in the top 50 at all is flattering.
She did kick a bag in the last of the Bulldogs v Melbourne exhibition games. Those matches were taken seriously and featured the best players going around, but there obviously wasn't the same level of defensive structures put in place to stop a forward like what she experienced in AFLW.
 

Pykie

Cancelled
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Sep 17, 2006
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She dominates at club football against the weaker sides, but really struggled at the higher level, mainly due to her poor workrate imo. Saw 3 of her games live and her opponents by the end of games were running off of her at will.

Injured or not, her ranking in the top 50 at all is flattering.

You look at Phillips you see professional athlete, you can see the link between the current AFL and the AFLW

You look at Hope you see a local league full forward from the 80's.

Parks herself in the square and expects it on a silver platter, barely runs out of the 50 for the entire game. Doesn't chase and is completely unfit compared to the rest of the side.

The game is going to evolve in the next 30 years, looking back at players like Hope etc will probably elude to how bad the standard was in it's infancy.
 
Plus what you have to consider what the combination of part-time time, but professional resources, meant for team tactics. A couple of hours per week in the pre-season and you can't really experiment with innovative ball movement systems. But they had access to greater strength and conditioning before, and got a lot fitter, so it was a lot easier to flood and play loose players in defence than it was before.

Brisbane, probably the best team all season who were unfortunate not to win the grand final, played 6 in defence for the entire season, where most teams would play 5-6-5 and only flood one back to protect a lead or against the wind.
 

Soups

Premium Platinum
Jul 16, 2006
17,645
29,040
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You look at Phillips you see professional athlete, you can see the link between the current AFL and the AFLW

You look at Hope you see a local league full forward from the 80's.

Parks herself in the square and expects it on a silver platter, barely runs out of the 50 for the entire game. Doesn't chase and is completely unfit compared to the rest of the side.

The game is going to evolve in the next 30 years, looking back at players like Hope etc will probably elude to how bad the standard was in it's infancy.
Will be interesting to see how she goes this year. She has lost a lot of weight and looks like she’s in a lot better shape. I think she was obviously told things had to change as she was a marquee signing.
 

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Nov 7, 2017
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Hope is a confidence player, much like Travis Cloke was, if something went wrong in the space between her waking up and her getting her first disposal she won't have a good game, put on top of this that she's a fairly peripheral figure within the Collingwood squad it's fairly obvious that it's not going to work out. I imagine she'll be traded at the end of the season if she doesn't drastically improve
 

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