I like these appointments, whilst some have said we needed some outside influences, my thoughts were that we needed at least 1 ex-crow in the coaching box, last year we had none, they were all outsiders as such.
The Matty Clarke appointment I love, I would rate him second only to Shaun Rehn in terms of ruck coaches, Benny Hart I also like, he is pretty much straight out of the game, had a little bit of experience last year, knows the players well from a different perspective too and would be really approachable from a players point of view, same with Clarke.
My only problem is we are not really addressing our biggest problem at all and that is the forward line, our midfield, whilst down on last year, still wasn't awful, our forward line was and has been for a long time. The only time its really looked good is when the midfield has been at its absolute best and we can't rely on that.
We don't have any star players up forward and to me it seems like Craig is trying to nullify the strengths of our forwards, Welsh is one of the best forwards in the league in terms of leading out of the goalsquare, yet we play him across half-forward, we croud our forwards up around CHF and get them to run back, but when the kicks are not absolutely perfect they get chopped off by the opposition.
We have the resources why not go and find the best forward coach in the AFL and pay him a lot of money to fix our forward line, just say do what you want, we want it fixed. In our premiership years we had guns galore up forward, in Modra, Jarman, Vardy, Robran, Bond etc. we don't have those quality players anymore, so we need a good set up or at least someone who can develop forwards well. D Jarman couldn't, I'm not sure who could, but someone should be found. Our defence has been the best in the league over the past 3 years, and next year will make it 3 different defensive coaches in 4 years, but only 1 forward coach, doesn't really make sense.