First 22 in 2023

[martinson]

Berry & McCluggage would be my starting wings, with Fletcher the bench wing rotation.

It’s a double edged sword. Inexperienced players make more mistakes, but you need to play them at the highest level for them to gain the appropriate level of experience.

I’ve been one of Dev’s biggest supporters on here, but what let’s him down, is his kicking, particularly when he plays inside midfield, where he tends to throw the ball on his boot exactly the same as Matho.

I noticed that particularly with Dev the last 2 weeks. He's very quick with his hands and has good awareness but it takes him too long to get his boot to the ball when he wants to kick and then when he does it lacks penetration.

He seems a smart hard at it player with talent and good skills inside the contest but just doesn't have the polish ,run or piercing kicking skills to really hurt the opposition.

If we were able to give him a season or two as an inside mid he'd be a capable fourth or fifth stringer and he's not far off being a regular senior player but where we are at the moment we're probably looking for better.

 

[buttermuffs]

Divisions wouldn't work in our environment - the similar concept option that would work would be some kind of rotating conference system with the top teams in each merged for the final series.

Has been done to death on many a thread on the main board.

Funnily enough two 12 team divisions makes 24 teams at which you could just have a 23 game season playing every team once anyway. Completely eliminates double ups which makes the fixture a lot fairer than it is now. The current model is relatively well intentioned but has its very obvious flaws.


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[M Malice]

Funnily enough two 12 team divisions makes 24 teams at which you could just have a 23 game season playing every team once anyway. Completely eliminates double ups which makes the fixture a lot fairer than it is now. The current model is relatively well intentioned but has its very obvious flaws.


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You would have to play a 24 game season to accommodate for 2 clashes in the Showdown, The Derby, Qclash, The Bridge and the big Melbourne club rivalries.

 

[Tom14]

What I find interesting is that Fletcher came in and I think most people would agree, given his effort and output in his first two games he is most likely to be in nearly everyone's 22 as the first wing rotation. Fletcher was lucky enough that his (I am assuming this) preferred position was one in which is probably our weakest. On the current trajectory I would expect Fletcher to do what Payne has done and cement his spot in the first 18 towards the end of the season and into the next. I was calling for Payne to be playing ahead of Gardiner who was clearly not the player he once was. Payne could have potentially reached the level he is at now earlier in his career. If Dev is given more opportunity does he become a lock in our first 18-22? When given the chance, I think his defensive game and hunger speaks for itself in a team that sometimes lacks it. Does playing Dev in that role give Dunks more opportunity to hunt the ball? I don't know but it's definitely a question.

But what I wonder is, are we missing some chances like Fletch (who I admit has more to prove) and Payne because we don't like to rotate the team? As said above me, there is some players who will play better at the elite level than in the ressies, there is also players who's output won't change between ressies and AFL. IE same disposals etc in both leagues. We have probably lost a couple of players that could maybe add more than just depth over the years. That doesn't mean the calls we made at the time were wrong, I just would hate to let the next Ashcroft, Clugg or Payne go because we can't get them game time to evaluate them properly.

Fletcher was the 12th overall pick though, and given his delayed start to pre-season due to the back injury he probably couldn't really have played any earlier. Early draft picks will always get opportunities, whereas later picks or academy types usually take a while. Keays and Dev were early second round picks with some deficiencies in their game which limited opportunity.

There's good arguments for more rotation across the board and using the whole squad, but I'm not too concerned on missing out on stars because they can't get game time.

Keays was let go but in my view wouldn't have had a consistent spot in the team until this year as Linc was always going to be ahead of him.

 

[buttermuffs]

You would have to play a 24 game season to accommodate for 2 clashes in the Showdown, The Derby, Qclash, The Bridge and the big Melbourne club rivalries.

Nah I think just one a season would be fine and I think doing that makes it somewhat worse than it is now. Like Freo would have a massive advantage for a couple years always having an extra game against WC to get an easy win and boost percentage. That would be a chance no other team gets compared to five teams now.

Same applies for us and GC to an extent. They are certainly much better now but if you were choosing a team to play twice in a season in the last decade I would think GC and Carlton are the only two you’d pick.


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[p4p1]

Berry & McCluggage would be my starting wings, with Fletcher the bench wing rotation.

It’s a double edged sword. Inexperienced players make more mistakes, but you need to play them at the highest level for them to gain the appropriate level of experience.

I’ve been one of Dev’s biggest supporters on here, but what let’s him down, is his kicking, particularly when he plays inside midfield, where he tends to throw the ball on his boot exactly the same as Matho.

I haven't watched any reserves games but is that something that could be fixed by more games and getting used to the level/speed of AFL or is it consistent through his VFL form as well?