Early Selections

[theGav56]

It was interesting to go through the recruiting process again, but I am surprised at the grief that some supporters give the club over selections like Mourish last year (and again this year). Any player recruited is a gamble let alone ones taken in the latter rounds.

Where we have suffered is from the failure of our early selections of the past few years to progress into genuine contenders, pushing for selection. At best they have become depth players. I am talkng particularly of;

Polak; Did nothing to elevate his status in the team beyond depth player despite the club having vacancies at CHB, CHF or FF. Took the easy route to become spare man for Richmond.

Dunn; in a team that lacks in the mid-field we badly need a midfielder selected early to become a good regular player. Dunn of course has had ongoing injury selections so including him here is a little harsh.

Murphy; at the moment he is not a best 22 player and seems like he may be on a last chance this year, or he will be traded/delisted. Very disappoining result at this stage especially given that we have had a vacancy at Full Forward for several years, and that he has failed to grasp it.

Drum; If Drum is to live up to his potential and selection in the draft, then he should be displacing Thornton in the backline, or finding a place on our forward line. We have also advertised the "tall midfielder" position for several years, but he has not succesfully filled the role. Too early to call on Drum, but I had expected that he would be more than a fringe/depth player at this stage of his career.

Collard; I am very disappointed in the way the Collard selection has panned out. Local knowledge should have given the club all the information they required about his suitability for our list, but instead he has been a wasted selection.

In my mind it is reasonable to expect that all of those players should be best 22 for us next season, yet at this stage, non of them will. I think it is the greatest failing the club has, and it is impacting us now, as well as for the next 5 years. Collectively they would provide a substantial proportion of the spine of the team if they had lived up to the expectation of their selection.

 

[FootyEater]

It was interesting to go through the recruiting process again, but I am surprised at the grief that some supporters give the club over selections like Mourish last year (and again this year). Any player recruited is a gamble let alone ones taken in the latter rounds.

Where we have suffered is from the failure of our early selections of the past few years to progress into genuine contenders, pushing for selection. At best they have become depth players. I am talkng particularly of;

Polak; Did nothing to elevate his status in the team beyond depth player despite the club having vacancies at CHB, CHF or FF. Took the easy route to become spare man for Richmond.

Dunn; in a team that lacks in the mid-field we badly need a midfielder selected early to become a good regular player. Dunn of course has had ongoing injury selections so including him here is a little harsh.

Murphy; at the moment he is not a best 22 player and seems like he may be on a last chance this year, or he will be traded/delisted. Very disappoining result at this stage especially given that we have had a vacancy at Full Forward for several years, and that he has failed to grasp it.

Drum; If Drum is to live up to his potential and selection in the draft, then he should be displacing Thornton in the backline, or finding a place on our forward line. We have also advertised the "tall midfielder" position for several years, but he has not succesfully filled the role. Too early to call on Drum, but I had expected that he would be more than a fringe/depth player at this stage of his career.

Collard; I am very disappointed in the way the Collard selection has panned out. Local knowledge should have given the club all the information they required about his suitability for our list, but instead he has been a wasted selection.

In my mind it is reasonable to expect that all of those players should be best 22 for us next season, yet at this stage, non of them will. I think it is the greatest failing the club has, and it is impacting us now, as well as for the next 5 years. Collectively they would provide a substantial proportion of the spine of the team if they had lived up to the expectation of their selection.

gav i agree with you, in that we definetly could have used those picks better, but what about the good young players that HAVE gone on to be important members of the team. mundy, johnson, peak, crowley, schammer, foster, while these guys generally were not earlly selections, you can not discount them as being good young players coming through the ranks, so as bad as we have been with early selections, we have been equally good with later selections and rookie list players

 

[theGav56]

gav i agree with you, in that we definetly could have used those picks better, but what about the good young players that HAVE gone on to be important members of the team. mundy, johnson, peak, crowley, schammer, foster, while these guys generally were not earlly selections, you can not discount them as being good young players coming through the ranks, so as bad as we have been with early selections, we have been equally good with later selections and rookie list players

Those are all reasonable players, but not a star amongst them, though Johnson is continually improving. They have lived up to what they would be expected to achieve.

 

[Frigate]

Those are all reasonable players, but not a star amongst them, though Johnson is continually improving. They have lived up to what they would be expected to achieve.

Would have to disagree. I think Mundy and Johnson are in that star bracket and would get selected in any team in the AFL. I don't think anyone could expect much more from them, apart from Johnson not getting rubbed out for a quarter of a season for nothing! Schammer missed practically a whole season last year and Peake most of it too.

There is no doubt in my mind that we have made some bad decisions in the past but you have to take that with the good. We have poached players J Carr, McPharlin, Farmer, Headland (underachieved overall but coming good in the past couple of years), Soloman and Tarrant who would all feature in the starting lineup. At what cost? Well if the younger guys don't come through at one point we will fall down the ladder and have to rebuild, but perhaps this is inevitable anyways, and aslong as we win a flag, everyone is a winner!

 

[dominguez]

Thats nonsense Frigate, Mundy and Johnson are far from stars. Johnson has had one good season. Mundy needs to improve his game if he is to be a regular in 08. Peake, Schammer, Mark Johnson, Bradley, Palmer, Farmer, O'Brien and Sandi either missed a lot of footy or weren't on our list last year and will be pushing for selection in 08. Unaccountable half backs are the easiest to drop if they have a couple of poor games.

 

[anti.]

the word 'star' is bandied around too lightly.

those are all good young players but none of them are stars.

 

[dominguez]

On the players you mentioned Gav- I think Polak and Murphy were poorly coached by Connolly. The fact that Murphy wasn't traded suggests that Harvey is confident that he'll improve. Collard looks to be a poor selection at this stage. Dunn has been disappointing but looked a good selection at the time. You're a bit harsh on Drum, he has been on our list for 2 seasons and we have a couple of established players who already fill his role. Its crazy to expect him to play midfield, we didn't expect Pav to fill in when Sandi went down because we know its not his natural position.

 

[estibador]

the word 'star' is bandied around too lightly.

We've only got three genuine stars at this stage I reckon. Pav, Belly and the Wiz.

 

[paccraig]

I can't understand the obsession with peter Bell

Ok, he puts in more than just about anyone on his day. But he appears to have an ego you couldn't jump over. At 1Q and 3Q time when we are not travelling well; see him totally ignore the coach/ walk off the huddle/ no interest.

Mundy & Johnson are B graders + easily have the talent and drive (mundy was a query in that dept. mid season, but rapidly improved). Mundy is in our top 5 players in my opinion (ahead of LMcPharlin, Tarrant,Grover..) ,and a much more important player than Peter Bell to this club going forward.

 

[estibador]

...and a much more important player than Peter Bell to this club going forward.

Most of our players probably are, considering Belly is unlikely to play on past this season.

There have been times that I've been annoyed with Bell but it must be incredibly frustrating for such an ultra professional competitor to be surrounded by some of the lazy teammates he's got.

Sometimes I feel sorry for the guys like Belly, Pav, Grover, Dodd and Hayden who bust their asses every week only to be let down by some of their teammates who only show up to play when they feel like it. Hopefully Harves is the man to beat that attitude out of our team.

 

[estibador]

And I agree that Mundy might be in our top 5 players for pure talent, but there's no way he's a top 5 player in terms of output.

 

[FootyEater]

stars- Pavlich, Josh Carr, Bell, Farmer, Hasleby(when fit, not in the last two years)
the rest are either good contributors or average.

bell should be the last player we ever bag out, he has never given anything less than 100%. a true champion of the club

 

[theGav56]

If those players are stars, they are the dim, twinkling kind. I am refering to bright beacons in the gloom of a football game we are losing, but whose light leads the way to a swarming victory. Pavlich is a star, the others can star, but aren't stars. Bell is a star on the wane.

The post however is refering to our early selections, which is where you can expect stars to come from more regularly than where we found Michael Johnson. Those selections have been disappointing.

Blaming Connolly for Polak and Murphy lets players off the hook. Polak was given every opportunity to prove himself a capable player, and chose instead to go to a club where his selection was an automatic thing. Is Johnson's succes one of Connolly's credits? Pavlich's? Sandiland's?

 

[The Night Shift]

We've only got three genuine stars at this stage I reckon. Pav, Belly and the Wiz.

I think you could include Tazz in there - even though e gained his fame from Collingwood.

 

[FootyEater]

If those players are stars, they are the dim, twinkling kind. I am refering to bright beacons in the gloom of a football game we are losing, but whose light leads the way to a swarming victory. Pavlich is a star, the others can star, but aren't stars. Bell is a star on the wane.

The post however is refering to our early selections, which is where you can expect stars to come from more regularly than where we found Michael Johnson. Those selections have been disappointing.

Blaming Connolly for Polak and Murphy lets players off the hook. Polak was given every opportunity to prove himself a capable player, and chose instead to go to a club where his selection was an automatic thing. Is Johnson's succes one of Connolly's credits? Pavlich's? Sandiland's?

and rhys palmer being a star is all harvey's doing. come on... i dont usually mind semantics but this conversation is frustrating me

 

[Underdog]

I can't understand the obsession with peter Bell

Ok, he puts in more than just about anyone on his day. But he appears to have an ego you couldn't jump over. At 1Q and 3Q time when we are not travelling well; see him totally ignore the coach/ walk off the huddle/ no interest.

I reckon Bell has been phenomenal for the Purples and they are very fortunate he has agreed to stay on another season. He is always reliable and still plays bloody good football

 

[pistol17]

I reckon Bell has been phenomenal for the Purples and they are very fortunate he has agreed to stay on another season. He is always reliable and still plays bloody good football

Cant believe im agreeing with a coaster but yea bell has been and still is a great player for us. No one can say he doesnt put the team first or put himself on the line for the club.

 

[Warrior 89]

Murphy; at the moment he is not a best 22 player and seems like he may be on a last chance this year, or he will be traded/delisted. Very disappoining result at this stage especially given that we have had a vacancy at Full Forward for several years, and that he has failed to grasp it.

Very harsh call on Murphy. I think 90% of the reason he has not secured a spot in our forward line is because of poor coaching and a scrappy midfield that lacks vision and skill.

Hawthorn for example have a star like Franklin in their forward line, but they still play and get good value out of Tim Boyle who is no better than Murphy. The difference is that you can see that the team has been instructed to look for various options in the forward line (that also includes Roughead) not just bombing it to Franklin all the time like we do to Pav. In the few games Murphy played last year he was the 4th option in our forward line which is a hopeless situation to be in for a leading forward.

From memory most of Murphy's goals in 06 came from Farmer assists and Farmer is one of the few players we have who has the vision to kick it to the best available option and the skill to execute it. Too many of our defensive midfielders - the Carrs, Mcmanus and now Mark Johnson just don't have that ability.

I hope with a new coaching staff, Murphy becomes more of a target in our forward line which will allow Pav more freedom to play up the ground. But for Murphy's sake (he is one of my favourite Dockers) I sometimes wonder if it would of been best for him to be traded to the Bulldogs playing alongside Brad Johnson and feeding off their skillful midfielders. We could of got Farren Ray in return with maybe us giving up a 3rd round pick as well and I think both teams would of been better off.

 

[theGav56]

Very harsh call on Murphy. I think 90% of the reason he has not secured a spot in our forward line is because of poor coaching and a scrappy midfield that lacks vision and skill......


.......In the few games Murphy played last year he was the 4th option in our forward line which is a hopeless situation to be in for a leading forward.

Given that Harvey coached the forwards last season, which was probably Murphy's most disappointing, then it is not looking good for him in the future then.

I've heard thiese arguments before, yet last year when MacPharlin went into the forward line because we badly needed a third tall up there who would lead and mark the ball, he had a field day, dispelling the idea that 1) we don't need a third tall as well as 2) the midfield are instructed to kick it to Pavlich and Tarrant only.

The reality is that Murphy has failed to even become our third best option, and would be rated in a bunch of other options including Campbell, Drum, and Bradley. Add into that list of possibles are backmen with versatility including MacPharlin, Johnson, Mundy and Thornton. Murphy needs to stamp himself on the game or he will be shopped around.