Player Watch #1: Nick Vlastuin

[Goldust]

hes the third best mid

He's not even the sixth best.
A half-fit Prestia at the start of the season was providing more in the midfield than Vlastuin.
Lambert has established himself in there, Caddy will get more time in there with Townsend in the side (and once we get another key forward next season) and Miles is a better midfielder than Vlastuin, ditto for Grigg, who spends time there.
Vlastuin is best suited at HB and it would be a gross error putting him back there. His form in the last few weeks has more than proven that his position should not have been tampered with. He could barely get his hands on the ball as a midfielder.

 

[cannot]

He's not even the sixth best.
A half-fit Prestia at the start of the season was providing more in the midfield than Vlastuin.
Lambert has established himself in there, Caddy will get more time in there with Townsend in the side (and once we get another key forward next season) and Miles is a better midfielder than Vlastuin, ditto for Grigg, who spends time there.
Vlastuin is best suited at HB and it would be a gross error putting him back there. His form in the last few weeks has more than proven that his position should not have been tampered with. He could barely get his hands on the ball as a midfielder.

your talking rubbish

 

[Goldust]

your talking rubbish

Go back and look at Vlastuin's midfield games and start to the season.
Average at best.
He returned after injury and slotted back into a half back role and has been elite.
It's not even a contest matey ..... he would not be displaying this type of form as a mid and it was proven through the first half of the year.
Even the coaching panel have conceded this, hence he'll be a feature in our backline in finals.
The whole Vlas to the midfield was a push that Dimma finally saw through.

 

[TigerTime88]

He is a gun half back in the Corey Enright mould.....no point trying to turn him into something his not.

 

[Rayzorwire]

Vlastuin is an elite decision maker, reads the flight of the ball better than nearly anyone else and has extreme composure, plus is extremely courageous. I'd say he can play there better than most mids.

Bottom line is he's gonna be better in the centre than most mids. But yes, completely agree that there's plenty of mids unsuited to the role Floss is playing.

Yeah cos he carved it up in the midfield
He's one of the best half backs in the league and there he will stay.
You need strength across all lines and he didn't cut it as a midfielder, nor do we need him to be one.

We have no games where he was fully match fit and played there as a full-time mid to be able to make anything resembling that kind of statement. It's akin to all the wise football brains who were pronouncing that the likes of Rance and Astbury would never 'cut it', based on a sample of their first 50 games.

The fact that he was earmarked for midfield time this year makes it self-evident that he was competing well enough against our other mids to be ranked alongside them. He was underdone at the beginning of the year and it's really only the last quarter of the season where he's had enough match fitness to show what he can do.

Which is the only tiny chunk of his career where we can say that. If he'd been rotated through midfield it's highly likely he'd have been equally impressive or even better in a bigger role. For this finals campaign I'm happy where he is in defence and most importantly, on the field.

Longer term, he's far too good at the contest and far too good a ball user for us to not be wanting him at as many contests as possible and having ball in hand as often as possible.

 

[Goldust]

He is a gun half back in the Corey Enright mould.....no point trying to turn him into something his not.

Thank you.
What's frightening is people still believe or want to believe that he is a gun midfielder.
Akin to Riewoldt kicking eight next week and thinking we should turn him into a defender bacuse he would be good there.
You don't move match-winners from where they lay their best - and that includes Vlas.
Geez, if we can't get wins with a midfield of Martin, Cotchin, Prestia, Lambert, Graham, BEllis, Grigg and a combo of Rioli (who will get there) and a likely first-round pick, God help us.

 

[prodigy]

Leave him in the backline.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[tunksy]

Vlastuin is an elite decision maker, reads the flight of the ball better than nearly anyone else and has extreme composure, plus is extremely courageous. I'd say he can play there better than most mids. Remember when Bucks tried Pendles at half back, when Dimma tried Dusty? It's not an easy role.

do we say its hodge like?

 

[Danog]

Don't mind him playing a couple of minutes per quarter in the guts to give mids a chop out, but he should be a 90/10 def/mid.

 

[blaisee]

Flossy has been in borderline AA form the last 6 weeks.

Clearly his best position.

 

[cannot]

do we say its hodge like?

hodge was pretty good one the ball too

like floss

 

[tropicaltiger]

vlossy is too good for your standards half back flanker... hope hes our hodgey.

mids/smids- we will have up to a dozen mids next year the way the game is moving and its a mouth waterering prospect.

defensive mids rotating thru half back
vlossy, mackintosh, ellis boys x 2, houli, short

run with mids rotating on opposition stars
grigg, lambert, prestia, graham, miles

goal kicking mids resting forward
dusty, cotch, edwards, rioli, caddy.... thro in towna, Lloyd and Lennon if they can keep improving.

going back a few year but these 3 brownlow dudes- hardie, wangers and akka all played many early years down back learning the caper before kicking regular big bags and running amok thru all parts of the groud. just sayin vlossy has that look about him too.

 

[Bobby Sands]

vlossy is too good for your standards half back flanker... hope hes our hodgey.

mids/smids- we will have up to a dozen mids next year the way the game is moving and its a mouth waterering prospect.

defensive mids rotating thru half back
vlossy, mackintosh, ellis boys x 2, houli, short

run with mids rotating on opposition stars
grigg, lambert, prestia, graham, miles

goal kicking mids resting forward
dusty, cotch, edwards, rioli, caddy.... thro in towna, Lloyd and Lennon if they can keep improving.

going back a few year but these 3 brownlow dudes- hardie, wangers and akka all played many early years down back learning the caper before kicking regular big bags and running amok thru all parts of the groud. just sayin vlossy has that look about him too.

Three Brownlows?

 

[HumanMeatball]

He's not even the sixth best.
A half-fit Prestia at the start of the season was providing more in the midfield than Vlastuin.
Lambert has established himself in there, Caddy will get more time in there with Townsend in the side (and once we get another key forward next season) and Miles is a better midfielder than Vlastuin, ditto for Grigg, who spends time there.
Vlastuin is best suited at HB and it would be a gross error putting him back there. His form in the last few weeks has more than proven that his position should not have been tampered with. He could barely get his hands on the ball as a midfielder.

He is best suited at half back but there is no doubt training as a midfielder has made him a better player. Should continue training as a midfielder pre season regardless of where he plays.

 

[juss]

The harsh reality is he is below average - average as a midfielder. He simply doesnt win enough ball there.

Hes an above average - very good half back flanker.
Lets just accept that and move on with a player who can take his game to the next level - when settled in defence.

 

[Rayzorwire]

He played a learning bit-role in the middle for the first 7 games of the season. Apart from that his midfield minutes wouldn't reach triple figures.

I mean really, it's a ridiculously small sample of games to be basing sweeping judgements upon. We were always going to have to be patient while he built his tank, but he's approaching 100 games and on the verge of reaching that minimum fitness base to play an on ball role.

The coaching staff earmarked him for midfield time because he's a contested beast who was clearly stacking up well against our best inside mids last pre-season. Combine his ball use and it's a no brainer that he ends up there.

Next preseason we'll be hearing how much he's dominating during intra-club contests and as Hardwick has stated, he'll play in the centre next year.

 

[Brick Loosener]

 

[Capitano_Cotch]

B.O.G

 

[Toadvine]

FLOSS-TO-WIN!

 

[Blinky_bill]

Epic tonight

 

[Maroo]

I repeat what I said in the gameday thread.

I want Nick Vlastuin to put a baby in me.

 

[SSSSSS]

Hodge like.

 

[TigersMP4]

He's our 2nd best defender imo.

 

[RichoLedio]

Made for September

 

[DrMike]

Fantastic performance