Team Mgmt. 2025 Back Line *Benny Hill theme plays*

[Yoda_]

Do we have 1 killer in our backline that loves that contest and loves contact. Bunch of soft introverts.

this belongs on the overall make up of our list


not one tough man, someone who will stick up for his mates at every opportunity. Bunch of soft cocktails private school boys for sure

 

[Skipper_]

this belongs on the overall make up of our list


not one tough man, someone who will stick up for his mates at every opportunity. Bunch of soft cocktails private school boys for sure

Have we even had one on the entire list since Goddard?

 

[Yoda_]

Have we even had one on the entire list since Goddard?

probably not


as much as I hate him, wouldn't you love a Brayden Maynard?

 

[andleanback]

this belongs on the overall make up of our list


not one tough man, someone who will stick up for his mates at every opportunity. Bunch of soft cocktails private school boys for sure

Soft meek footballers, redman picks and chooses when he cares. No one willing to fight life and death every contest.

 

[Yoda_]

Soft meek footballers, redman picks and chooses when he cares. No one willing to fight life and death every contest.

this has been a gripe of mine for a decade... we haves little fight and k*n! on our list. Its embarrassing when someone gets buried and we meekly surrender as if to say, "please don't do it again" when you just know a Melbourne or Collingwood would be all in saying "do it again and we'll bury your head next time you try"

 

[Schnitzengruben]

Well done Ben Jacobs, you've got this back line absolutely humming.

Chuck the heater on, put the feet up and order some uber eats; you've earned it mate.

 

[Skipper_]

Is this our worst backline in recent memory?

Obviously it has a lot to do with what is happening up the field, but the 2016 top up side’s highest conceded score was 151.

The Crows surpassed that by 10 today.

 

[TheFrenchCut]

My philosophy on backlines is simple. If you aren't a key defender, you have to be a good decision maker and user of the ball.

The way we take McKay and surround him with even more chaotic operators is infuriating. I hated the Shiel to half back idea initially, was willing to give it a chance after seeing some of his pre-season, but they can't stick with it now*.

McGrath, Shiel, McKay, Prior all running around in that back half is just pure white hot nightmare fuel.

Redman isn't the player we hoped but seeing him get stuck defending Tex at times so McGrath and Shiel can headless chook it just cannot be how we want to set up.

 

[bombadeer]

This thread is going to take a beating in 2025.

It was poor last week, but coughing up 161 points…

Looking very disorganised.

 

[Jobe Watson]

Week 2 of the "Let's play Shiel in the backline because he's been overtaken in the midfield and we don't want to pay him big money to play VFL" experiment and it's going about as well as you'd expect.

Prior, he's a shithack too. McGrath sucks. Good thing we let D'Ambrossio go for nothing, can't have a guy who can actually kick the ball in our defence.

 

[Agronomus]

Our HB line in the VFL sounds like something to work with
Clarke Hayes Z.Johnson
No need to rush them into this shitshow. Suck it up princesses

 

[eth-dog]

probably not


as much as I hate him, wouldn't you love a Brayden Maynard?

Nope. Faux tough guy

 

[Yoda_]

Nope. Faux tough guy

puts his head over it, will at least (pretend) to stand up for his team mates..

who on our list will rush to his team mates defence?

 

[eth-dog]

puts his head over it, will at least (pretend) to stand up for his team mates..

who on our list will rush to his team mates defence?

He only stands up when it's someone smaller than him. Exactly the shit you're criticising us for doing

 

[Yoda_]

He only stands up when it's someone smaller than him. Exactly the shit you're criticising us for doing

no one stands up when a team mate goes down

 

[jdstorm]

no one stands up when a team mate goes down

Feels like this team doesn’t like each other very much

 

[Zach Package]

Hiding to nothing on a day like that, why be an Essendon defender?

And why invest lots of money and draft picks in blokes that are essentially just witches hats due to what's happening up the ground.

Bringing a pairing knife to a machete fight.

 

[div12ressie]

Do we continue letting out backline get manhandled with no lube for the rest of the year or do we patch it up and put martin back, shiel back in the midfield and even potentially try Merrett down back to give him a rest for when Parish comes back

 

[Old Campaigner]

Hiding to nothing on a day like that, why be an Essendon defender?

And why invest lots of money and draft picks in blokes that are essentially just witches hats due to what's happening up the ground.

Because at some stage we’re going to want good defenders?

 

[jdstorm]

Do we continue letting out backline get manhandled with no lube for the rest of the year or do we patch it up and put martin back, shiel back in the midfield and even potentially try Merrett down back to give him a rest for when Parish comes back

No patchups. Hang tough and work it out or find a new club

That goes for all parts of the ground

 

[Skipper_]

Do we continue letting out backline get manhandled with no lube for the rest of the year or do we patch it up and put martin back, shiel back in the midfield and even potentially try Merrett down back to give him a rest for when Parish comes back

Ah yes let’s return renowned lockdown defender Nic Martin to the backline to shore it up.

That should fix 10+ years of defensive woe. Heck it went so well last year!

 

[Call Me Cake]

I can't shitcan the entire backline because of one game, and I can't blame the backline entirely as our entire defensive efforts across the ground to start the year has been poor. You can't just have your backline mop up all entries, it's a domino effect and some of the loss prevention has to start in the middle of the ground through contested marking/stoppages and locking the ball in the F50 to give the defenders a chance to regroup.

Was critical of the Shiel experiment from the start because I felt like we got rid of Hepp for a reason, only to replace him with someone older and fumblier.

 

[nipst@r]

Hayes, Jones, laverde, Johnson, Lual.

A few options in the backline still.

So far we have just swapped heppel for shiel and prior for kelly.

Give them another week and likely make some changes and more options post bye.

 

[Yoda_]

Do we continue letting out backline get manhandled with no lube for the rest of the year or do we patch it up and put martin back, shiel back in the midfield and even potentially try Merrett down back to give him a rest for when Parish comes back

Im hopeful that another impressive week from any of those youngsters at the lower level and our match committee has the guts to say "stuff it" and pick a Zak Johnson, Jayden Nguyen, Angus Clarke. Let a kid make the same mistakes as 32 year old Shiel.

 

[WABomber]

It's not ideal but Laverde should comeback in. Put Mcgrath into a lockdown role, Shiel back into the midfield rotation or drop him to the VFL. Need some structure there but I know it is hard when you have such a high line/press being played. Without someone at the back orchestrating the play it is just a shit show. Ridley is a massive in this week.