On paper our forward line looks very good. Some tall fwds, medium fwd gun in Membrey & a touch of class with Billings & Gresh. Maybe a manic small def fwd could be added or Long/Lonie improve out of sight.
Our mids looks quite strong but obviously lacking a bit of class & perhaps leadership (although Billy seems to get them going when he's on). Kelly & perhaps Sinc rotating mid/fwd adds class but probably need someone else on top imo.
Our defence is shaky. Carlisle the only bloke I truly trust. The rest look good half the time but generally we have some poor disposers & decision makers. White I reckon improves us straight away but another quality user down back is also needed.
The teams coming together just need to tinker in a few areas & fill some gaps.
I actually rate our defense a lot.
I think if we improve our midfield we improve our defense by extension cause they would be under less pressure. Roberton is at worst a B+ player. Webster takes the game on and is can cut through structures with his foot. He bites off more than he can chew but in our team you need his flair. I have progressively thought Brown has played worse throughout the year. Geary I rate as a bloke and a leader I guess but as a player we need to do better. I get he'd heart and soul but **** me he needs to do more than just half his contests. I thought he started the year well as well and got worse. Baz White has shown a lot imo, needs to bulk up a bit but at worse he's top 3 player in the AFL already. Savage I rate recently, not as a defender but as an attacking outlet that can deliver into the 50 ala a less floggy Suckling
Our mids are:
Steven, Stevens, Dunstan, Steele, Gresh, Sinclair, Ross, Acres and (Armo)potentially Freeman, Dmac and rotate Weller, Membrey and Bruce through.
That's not a
bad midfield but it's vanilla unless we can get Freeman and he becomes the player we'd hope he can.
In an ideal world we play 2 of Steele, Dunstan and Kobe. Have Steven as the receiver along with Sinc and have Acres following the pill around the ground and rest up forward.
Our midfield is very inside heavy and they aren't as dominant as the dogs/swans were last year that even without the outside run they can win most of the footy so they more than halve the contests.
Steele is a gun but to take the next step he needs to go beyond win the ball at the ground and handball away. I would like to see him kick it 6 times to ever handball. Without checking stats I'd reckon it 6-7 handballs out of every 10 possessions.
Dunstan is playing very well nowadays. Hope the penny has dropped, if he can kick a goal a game and have 25ish touches I reckon he'd be a very solid B grade player who has A+ games.
Koby isn't going to get better, he can improve his kicking I hope but he's a mature body.
Ross/Stuv love them both, carried our midfield these two years (Stuv slightly less this year). I'd like to see Steven outside more and drop some weight but I'd imagine his punctured lung ****** with his fitness the entire year.
Gresh has played ~40 games and I'd reckon we try him near the middle. He's evasive and has some flair which we lack. His disposal is very good (apart from set shots) and honestly our forward line could use some good delivery.
I wouldn't say desperately need some class but I don't really think skill wise our curernt group is going to get much better. Dunstan I trust to hit the target by foot 65% of the time, Steele and Acres around 70%. Ross and Steven around 75% etc.
I think the worst part of this year is that there is a good side but there are really major flaws as well. I'd really like us to play a less high octane gameplan where we rely less on our skills cause honestly we butcher the footy so ******* much and then everyone ******* drops their head. I appreciate we mostly tackle well and when we're on we look every bit as good as any other team but that's 4/5 games a year.
If we compare ourselves to Melbourne who we get paired with a lot. Moving beyond we were in grand finals when they were getting #1 draft picks in Scully etc.., the one thing I would say they have over us is a consistent midfield. I don't think they have any real stars in their either beyond what Oliver projects to be. They just have a very solid inside group that bomb it into their average to good forward structure. Another bonus they have is that Hogan after his shit year manages to play footy but Paddy..
Our main focus should be improving our midfield. If we're happy with our inside brigade then get class on the outside who can make an immediate difference to our best 22 and please get some better ******* ball users. If we don't get Kelly I wouldn't mind trading a first rounder for L Weller. Yes we wanted him a lot in the past hur durr but he uses it well and we can immediately use him as a rotation. I wouldn't mind trying some of our quicker players through the middle as well. Dmac can't kick to save his life this year but he's hard as nails and can at least bomb the footy as well as any of our other mids. I would like a bit more flexibility in who we play through the middle.
Without going back and shitting on Richo but a lot does depend on our gameplan. I agree he can't control that we're shit kicks but he can realise as a team we are pretty poor short passing team so he can make a gameplan wth would help mask that, perhaps that is asking for too much
tl'dr we suck atm but we shouldn't suck hopefully.