Training 2021/22 Preseason Thread Lessssf*ngo

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Sphynx

Norm Smith Medallist
Jul 10, 2011
9,907
31,864
AFL Club
North Melbourne
Alright, it was a fairly intensive session and I'll preface it by saying it wasn't really a scratch match, just a full ground, full contact drill, was very powder puff at stages. The second one was at a noticeably lower intensity, as they had already done around 2hrs of training by that point. The full ground drill was just kicking a ball randomly into the middle and each team had to get a mark in an end zone from the goal line extending 20m out from goal.

No Zurhaar, Goldstein, Walker, McKay out there today.

All the new draftee's are fairly impressive, even Archer who has a bit about him. He's probably the most limited athletically on the entire list, but he has some decent footy IQ and intercepted the ball more than a couple of times throughout the day. Bergman showed quite a bit more in the contested stuff than I thought he would, he's going to go well in the VFL imo.

Paul Cutis will 100% play AFL football this year.

Rehab group for the start consisted of Hayden, JHF, Ziebell, Bonar, WiPhi, Corr, Spicer at stages, pretty much all these guys ended up playing in the full ground drill apart from Bonar and Spicer.

JHF - Ran laps and did rehab and entered the fray in the second scratchie. It's my 5th time viewing him and he's very quiet in training, but steps it up in the game situations. He seems to be very much in the Cunnington-style of trainer, in that he does what he needs do, goes at half rat power for most of the ball work etc, to the point I was questioning whether he was "that quick" or "that powerful" at stages during these sessions. As soon as the ball is thrown in the middle for match sim though, he turned into a different animal. He is absolutely rapid when he needs to be and just like the videos with the blonde hair going everywhere, he looks like a bit of a maniac at full tilt going for a contested ball. As I said, he read a handball receive very early off Paul Curtis at half forward and turned right through the gears, left the entire ground standing still and drilled Larkey on a lead. His skills were excellent in every contested situation and showed a lot of poise. I think people still need to temper their expectations a little bit, he's in no way an endurance animal yet, but his burst impact is going to be incredible on some games this year imo.

Goater - Played the seagul role across half back and slotted straight into it. Knew when to peel off at the right time to get the cheap possessions and flew for an intercept at one stage that got chopped off by Greenwood coming back with the flight. I think he's going to be a lot closer than people think to a Rnd 1 position. He looks a better player than LMAC at the same age IMO and he placed in the RS in the same role. I think if you are being honest, he's every bit as good as someone like Perez also. If he plays this year, I see him easily replicating the Lmac/Rivers/Witherden style HBF this year of 17+ disposals a game in that role. He used his pace and agility to get separation on the wing at one point, he just puts meters on a tackling with absolute ease in these situations. For every possession he had, he went at 100% DE also.

Powell/Phillips - Just going about their business quietly this pre-season. They are definitely going to get that 10-15% improvement this year, looking forward to seeing them in legit game situations in the pre-season games. Both are just really solid players already. Both ahead of LDU and Simpkin at the same stages of their careers imo.

CCJ - As I said, he's a bit unco, he dropped a few marks I thought he would have gobbled. He's still agile, he's still a good kick for his size, but he goes about it like an agile ruckman rather than a tall forward if that makes sense. I think he's an improvement on Xerri, but very much looks like a 4th/5th year ruckman with minimal experience himself. absolutely buried Perez in a tackle in the first minute of the first scratchie.

Stepho - As said, he looks a level above at times and it's crazy to think he's a bit of an afterthought of the side at the moment. What a luxury this guy is going to be to enable us to just shift him into the middle or half forward when we want. Close to the best out there today.

Greenwood - Again, like Stephenson, was just everywhere at stages of the first scratchie, he's not mobile, he's not fast, but he's a brute. In the contact tacking drills he was just rag dolling through tacklers at stages. He's going to be really important to us this year and an unbelievable recruit for absolutely nothing.

Corr - Was good and still has the dash we saw in the limited viewing last year, to say we need him to stay fit to cover off Robbie is a huge understatememt

Chom - He's such a competitive animal and hates getting spoiled or tackled even in match sim. He's flying, looks super fit and I expect him to be right in the mix for Rnd 1. He was cooked by the second match sim but had put in a lot of effort in the 2hrs prior.

Happy for some questions.
 
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Alright, it was a fairly intensive session and I'll preface it by saying it wasn't really a scratch match, just a full ground, full contact drill, was very powder puff at stages. The second one was at a noticeably lower intensity, as they had already done around 2hrs of training by that point. The full ground drill was just kicking a ball randomly into the middle and each team had to get a mark in an end zone from the goal line extending 20m out from goal.

No Zurhaar, Goldstein, McKay out there today.

All the new draftee's are fairly impressive, even Archer who has a bit about him. He's probably the most limited athletically on the entire list, but he has some decent footy IQ and intercepted the ball more than a couple of times throughout the day. Bergman showed quite a bit more in the contested stuff than I thought he would, he's going to go well in the VFL imo.

Paul Cutis will 100% play AFL football this year.

Rehab group for the start consisted of Hayden, JHF, Ziebell, Bonar, WiPhi, Corr, Spicer at stages, pretty much all these guys ended up playing in the full ground drill apart from Bonar and Spicer.

JHF - Ran laps and did rehab and entered the fray in the second scratchie. It's my 5th time viewing him and he's very quiet in training, but steps it up in the game situations. He seems to be very much in the Cunnington-style of trainer, in that he does what he needs do, goes at half rat power for most of the ball work etc, to the point I was questioning whether he was "that quick" or "that powerful" at stages during these sessions. As soon as the ball is thrown in the middle for match sim though, he turned into a different animal. He is absolutely rapid when he needs to be and just like the videos with the blonde hair going everywhere, he looks like a bit of a maniac at full tilt going for a contested ball. As I said, he read a handball receive very early off Paul Curtis at half forward and turned right through the gears, left the entire ground standing still and drilled Larkey on a lead. His skills were excellent in every contested situation and showed a lot of poise. I think people still need to temper their expectations a little bit, he's in no way an endurance animal yet, but his burst impact is going to be incredible on some games this year imo.

Goater - Played the seagul role across half back and slotted straight into it. Knew when to peel off at the right time to get the cheap possessions and flew for an intercept at one stage that got chopped off by Greenwood coming back with the flight. I think he's going to be a lot closer than people think to a Rnd 1 position. He looks a better player than LMAC at the same age IMO and he placed in the RS in the same role. I think if you are being honest, he's ever bit as good as someone like Perez also. If he plays this year, I see him easily replicating the Lmac/Rivers/Witherden style HBF this year of 17+ disposals a game in that role. He used his pace and agility to get separation on the wing at one point, he just puts meters on a tackling with absolute ease in these situations. For every possession he had, he went at 100% DE also.

Powell/Phillips - Just going about their business quietly this pre-season. They are definitely going to get that 10-15% improvement this year, looking forward to seeing them in legit game situations in the pre-season games. Both are just really solid players already. Both ahead of LDU and Simpkin at the same stages of their careers imo.

CCJ - As I said, he's a bit unco, he dropped a few marks I thought he would have gobbled. He's still agile, he's still a good kick for his size, but he goes about it like an agile ruckman rather than a tall forward if that makes sense. I think he's an improvement on Xerri, but very much looks like a 4th/5th year ruckman with minimal experience himself. absolutely buried Perez in a tackle in the first minute of the first scratchie.

Stepho - As said, he looks a level above at times and it's crazy to think he's a bit of a side thought with the group at the moment. What a luxury this guy is going to be to enable us to just shift him into the middle or half forward when we want. Close to the best out there today.

Greenwood - Again, like Stephenson, was just everywhere at stages of the first scratchie, he's not mobile, he's not fast, but he's a brute. In the contact tacking drills he was just rag dolling through tacklers at stages. He's going to be really important to us this year and an unbelievable recruit for absolutely nothing.

Happy for some questions.
Very good reports from you & co
 
Alright, it was a fairly intensive session and I'll preface it by saying it wasn't really a scratch match, just a full ground, full contact drill, was very powder puff at stages. The second one was at a noticeably lower intensity, as they had already done around 2hrs of training by that point. The full ground drill was just kicking a ball randomly into the middle and each team had to get a mark in an end zone from the goal line extending 20m out from goal.

No Zurhaar, Goldstein, McKay out there today.

All the new draftee's are fairly impressive, even Archer who has a bit about him. He's probably the most limited athletically on the entire list, but he has some decent footy IQ and intercepted the ball more than a couple of times throughout the day. Bergman showed quite a bit more in the contested stuff than I thought he would, he's going to go well in the VFL imo.

Paul Cutis will 100% play AFL football this year.

Rehab group for the start consisted of Hayden, JHF, Ziebell, Bonar, WiPhi, Corr, Spicer at stages, pretty much all these guys ended up playing in the full ground drill apart from Bonar and Spicer.

JHF - Ran laps and did rehab and entered the fray in the second scratchie. It's my 5th time viewing him and he's very quiet in training, but steps it up in the game situations. He seems to be very much in the Cunnington-style of trainer, in that he does what he needs do, goes at half rat power for most of the ball work etc, to the point I was questioning whether he was "that quick" or "that powerful" at stages during these sessions. As soon as the ball is thrown in the middle for match sim though, he turned into a different animal. He is absolutely rapid when he needs to be and just like the videos with the blonde hair going everywhere, he looks like a bit of a maniac at full tilt going for a contested ball. As I said, he read a handball receive very early off Paul Curtis at half forward and turned right through the gears, left the entire ground standing still and drilled Larkey on a lead. His skills were excellent in every contested situation and showed a lot of poise. I think people still need to temper their expectations a little bit, he's in no way an endurance animal yet, but his burst impact is going to be incredible on some games this year imo.

Goater - Played the seagul role across half back and slotted straight into it. Knew when to peel off at the right time to get the cheap possessions and flew for an intercept at one stage that got chopped off by Greenwood coming back with the flight. I think he's going to be a lot closer than people think to a Rnd 1 position. He looks a better player than LMAC at the same age IMO and he placed in the RS in the same role. I think if you are being honest, he's every bit as good as someone like Perez also. If he plays this year, I see him easily replicating the Lmac/Rivers/Witherden style HBF this year of 17+ disposals a game in that role. He used his pace and agility to get separation on the wing at one point, he just puts meters on a tackling with absolute ease in these situations. For every possession he had, he went at 100% DE also.

Powell/Phillips - Just going about their business quietly this pre-season. They are definitely going to get that 10-15% improvement this year, looking forward to seeing them in legit game situations in the pre-season games. Both are just really solid players already. Both ahead of LDU and Simpkin at the same stages of their careers imo.

CCJ - As I said, he's a bit unco, he dropped a few marks I thought he would have gobbled. He's still agile, he's still a good kick for his size, but he goes about it like an agile ruckman rather than a tall forward if that makes sense. I think he's an improvement on Xerri, but very much looks like a 4th/5th year ruckman with minimal experience himself. absolutely buried Perez in a tackle in the first minute of the first scratchie.

Stepho - As said, he looks a level above at times and it's crazy to think he's a bit of a side thought with the group at the moment. What a luxury this guy is going to be to enable us to just shift him into the middle or half forward when we want. Close to the best out there today.

Greenwood - Again, like Stephenson, was just everywhere at stages of the first scratchie, he's not mobile, he's not fast, but he's a brute. In the contact tacking drills he was just rag dolling through tacklers at stages. He's going to be really important to us this year and an unbelievable recruit for absolutely nothing.

Corr - Was good and still has the dash we saw in the limited viewing last year, to say we need him to stay fit to cover off Robbie is a huge understatememt

Chom - He's such a competitive animal and hates getting spoiled or tackled even in match sim. He's flying, looks super fit and I expect him to be right in the mix for Rnd 1.

Happy for some questions.
Was Atu training to day ?
 

Sphynx

Norm Smith Medallist
Jul 10, 2011
9,907
31,864
AFL Club
North Melbourne
Also, cooper looked better than I was expecting

Yep, he looked better than viewing on the other day. Still say he looks a bit like Kieran Harper, minus the explosive pace.

He's certainly got decent footy IQ, got quite a bit of the ball in the match sim.

It's going to be interesting to see how he performs in the Nab League.

To do 20+ days full-time of an AFL pre-season is an unbelievable head start on kids his age.
 
May 20, 2009
16,143
37,401
coburg
AFL Club
North Melbourne
Alright, it was a fairly intensive session and I'll preface it by saying it wasn't really a scratch match, just a full ground, full contact drill, was very powder puff at stages. The second one was at a noticeably lower intensity, as they had already done around 2hrs of training by that point. The full ground drill was just kicking a ball randomly into the middle and each team had to get a mark in an end zone from the goal line extending 20m out from goal.

No Zurhaar, Goldstein, McKay out there today.

All the new draftee's are fairly impressive, even Archer who has a bit about him. He's probably the most limited athletically on the entire list, but he has some decent footy IQ and intercepted the ball more than a couple of times throughout the day. Bergman showed quite a bit more in the contested stuff than I thought he would, he's going to go well in the VFL imo.

Paul Cutis will 100% play AFL football this year.

Rehab group for the start consisted of Hayden, JHF, Ziebell, Bonar, WiPhi, Corr, Spicer at stages, pretty much all these guys ended up playing in the full ground drill apart from Bonar and Spicer.

JHF - Ran laps and did rehab and entered the fray in the second scratchie. It's my 5th time viewing him and he's very quiet in training, but steps it up in the game situations. He seems to be very much in the Cunnington-style of trainer, in that he does what he needs do, goes at half rat power for most of the ball work etc, to the point I was questioning whether he was "that quick" or "that powerful" at stages during these sessions. As soon as the ball is thrown in the middle for match sim though, he turned into a different animal. He is absolutely rapid when he needs to be and just like the videos with the blonde hair going everywhere, he looks like a bit of a maniac at full tilt going for a contested ball. As I said, he read a handball receive very early off Paul Curtis at half forward and turned right through the gears, left the entire ground standing still and drilled Larkey on a lead. His skills were excellent in every contested situation and showed a lot of poise. I think people still need to temper their expectations a little bit, he's in no way an endurance animal yet, but his burst impact is going to be incredible on some games this year imo.

Goater - Played the seagul role across half back and slotted straight into it. Knew when to peel off at the right time to get the cheap possessions and flew for an intercept at one stage that got chopped off by Greenwood coming back with the flight. I think he's going to be a lot closer than people think to a Rnd 1 position. He looks a better player than LMAC at the same age IMO and he placed in the RS in the same role. I think if you are being honest, he's every bit as good as someone like Perez also. If he plays this year, I see him easily replicating the Lmac/Rivers/Witherden style HBF this year of 17+ disposals a game in that role. He used his pace and agility to get separation on the wing at one point, he just puts meters on a tackling with absolute ease in these situations. For every possession he had, he went at 100% DE also.

Powell/Phillips - Just going about their business quietly this pre-season. They are definitely going to get that 10-15% improvement this year, looking forward to seeing them in legit game situations in the pre-season games. Both are just really solid players already. Both ahead of LDU and Simpkin at the same stages of their careers imo.

CCJ - As I said, he's a bit unco, he dropped a few marks I thought he would have gobbled. He's still agile, he's still a good kick for his size, but he goes about it like an agile ruckman rather than a tall forward if that makes sense. I think he's an improvement on Xerri, but very much looks like a 4th/5th year ruckman with minimal experience himself. absolutely buried Perez in a tackle in the first minute of the first scratchie.

Stepho - As said, he looks a level above at times and it's crazy to think he's a bit of an afterthought of the side at the moment. What a luxury this guy is going to be to enable us to just shift him into the middle or half forward when we want. Close to the best out there today.

Greenwood - Again, like Stephenson, was just everywhere at stages of the first scratchie, he's not mobile, he's not fast, but he's a brute. In the contact tacking drills he was just rag dolling through tacklers at stages. He's going to be really important to us this year and an unbelievable recruit for absolutely nothing.

Corr - Was good and still has the dash we saw in the limited viewing last year, to say we need him to stay fit to cover off Robbie is a huge understatememt

Chom - He's such a competitive animal and hates getting spoiled or tackled even in match sim. He's flying, looks super fit and I expect him to be right in the mix for Rnd 1. He was cooked by the second match sim but had put in a lot of effort in the 2hrs prior.

Happy for some questions.
Was McGuiness training?
 

Psicosis

Brownlow Medallist
May 7, 2012
13,165
58,685
Bird Rock
AFL Club
North Melbourne
Yep, he looked better than viewing on the other day. Still say he looks a bit like Kieran Harper, minus the explosive pace.

He's certainly got decent footy IQ, got quite a bit of the ball in the match sim.

It's going to be interesting to see how he performs in the Nab League.

To do 20+ days full-time of an AFL pre-season is an unbelievable head start on kids his age.

I thought the same from what I've seen. I was surprised, considering some of the previous reports on him (before the preseason).

Interesting if he can work his way into late first/early second calculations (fully understand he isn't there yet), considering we traded our future second.
 

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The Horne Dog - probably lacking the burst and athletic boss mode. Like trying to break tackles unsuccessfully or not being able to burn off a pursuer. Thought that seems logica given the recent covid issue. Then he did the second match sim, playing high half forward and had 3 lovely inside 50’s to Larkey. All up I think he’s playing forward for most of the year. May need to build into the season.

We should be playing him as a forward in his first year. Let him build an AFL tank. Use his pace, tackling, goal sense and overhead ability there.

Plenty of time for him to graduate into the midfield.
 

Sphynx

Norm Smith Medallist
Jul 10, 2011
9,907
31,864
AFL Club
North Melbourne
Was McGuiness training?

Yep, he was out there, he was OK.

He's more like a tall flanker than a KPP at this stage and it's a bit suicidal of the club to be going into the season with him as the 4th KPD option on the list tbh.

I kind of want him to be thrown a hard task in the pre-season games to see where he's at and what we've got. Like pickup a Tom McDonald type in the Melbourne pre-season game for a half.
 

roos_tt29

All Australian
Oct 6, 2015
729
1,644
AFL Club
North Melbourne
How did hall train? Think he will be as good this year?

I’d like to comment on this.

Heard a lot of negative stuff on here about shanked kicks, which he is liable to do, but you have to accept that with some of the kicks he can pull off.

Today I thought his kicking was pretty solid overall, but I like how if he misses a tough one, he doesn’t shy away from trying it again. Great mentality.

As expected, a lot of play ran through him in drills - especially the transitional drills. A lot of chat from him as well as a senior player.

Honestly cannot fault him looks like he’ll pick up from where he left off last year.


On iPhone using BigFooty.com mobile app
 

Sphynx

Norm Smith Medallist
Jul 10, 2011
9,907
31,864
AFL Club
North Melbourne
How did hall train? Think he will be as good this year?

He's a lock, as is Lmac as well and JZ for obvious reasons.

The real question will be who slots into that last half back role.

I almost have Goater in front, but then there's Perez, Young, Bonar, Hayden all vying for 1 spot. Then Bergman and Archer as others further down the pecking order.

Goater has completely market corrected poor old Lachie Young, very much "anything you do, I can do better" to the point I'd be surprised if he's with us next year.
 
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Shinboner1

Norm Smith Medallist
Aug 13, 2020
8,899
16,813
AFL Club
North Melbourne
does anyone know if Hore was out there?
Yeah he was there. Photo taken from a video I can't upload because it's too big lol
Screenshot_20220121-134203_Gallery.jpg
 
I thought I saw him at the very start of the session but then didn't see much of him, unsure if he was taking Larkey on the last line at times? Was hard to tell tbh.
Probably an indication what we see him as. An undersized kpd if he’s taking Larkey.
 

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