Lynden Dunn hit list

[davey_magik]

- Hayes
- Swan
- Foley
- Goodes

Any others we can add?

Can people please respect the job this lad is doing, he's shutting down no.1 midfielders day in day out now.

 

[Tommyneu]

He's definitely been flying under the radar of us supporters. Looking at that list of scalps it's hard not to be impressed...

 

[w00dy]

he's played on those 4 players, but did he beat them?

thinking back, i'd say he at least broke even or beat each one of those opponents...

started to hurt adam goodes the other way a bit too on sunday... this week, simon black or luke power?

 

[davey_magik]

he's played on those 4 players, but did he beat them?

thinking back, i'd say he at least broke even or beat each one of those opponents...

started to hurt adam goodes the other way a bit too on sunday... this week, simon black or luke power?

All had under 20 touches when Dunn was on them (Not sure about Hayes' numbers but I'm pretty sure he had under 20, the rest definitely did).

 

[The Dr]

He is doing a really good job that's for sure. Interesting thing is, wasn't he recruited as a slightly-undersized key forward? I remember a couple of years ago when he came in, he started in the forward line and we got pretty excited about it.
Has the club decided he's better suited to a midfield role I wonder?

 

[w00dy]

Has the club decided he's better suited to a midfield role I wonder?

they certainly have... he's got a big engine, so he can run with these players... he was never a bad forward, but i guess they just saw the potential for him to become a ling type tagger... ling was also drafted as a forward, but became a tagger...

 

[McLean_4_Captain]

he's played on those 4 players, but did he beat them?

thinking back, i'd say he at least broke even or beat each one of those opponents...

started to hurt adam goodes the other way a bit too on sunday... this week, simon black or luke power?

I see what you're saying and quite a few people on here have been critical of Dunn not getting enough of the ball himself, which he started to show a bit of on Sunday.

This is not so much aimed at you, but more the people saying he's not doing enough, the guys he is playing on are usually in the top 5 most important players on the ground for their club, but Dunn's not for us. So if he halves their impact but has little himself, i still see it as a win.

He's only just started tagging, so he'll get better. There's a good interview with him on the MFC website. Dunn admits that he is concentrating on locking down the player and that he knows that he needs to work on having more of an impact himself. http://melbournefc.com.au/tabid/7415/Default.aspx?newsid=62073

If you compare the players season average, bearing in mind last year Dunn averaged 12.9 disposals
- Hayes averages 23 disposals (SC-65), Dunn kept him to 20, had 9 himself and kicked a goal.
- Swan ave. 24.5 dsp (SC-76), Dunn kept him to 18, had 11 and 1 goal.
- Foley ave. 22.7 dsp (SC-79), Dunn kept him to 16, had 7 and 6 tackles.
- Goodes ave. 19.5 dsp (SC-90), Dunn Kept him to 12, had 10 and kicked an awesome behind.

The SC is supercoach pts, which gives you a rough idea of their effectiveness, Hayes lowest for the season, Swan 2nd lowest, Foley 5th lowest, Goodes 2nd lowest. Based on that i'd say that he beat all, with Foley the one you might call only breaking even.

I rate Dunn, but he's never really done enough as a forward for us, so it's good to see him fitting into the side really well. The positives from this year need to be the development of younger players, so while Dunn is in his 3rd season, he's only played 30 games and only a handful of them as a tagger. He's not going to beat or break-even with everyone, but he's improving, which is all we can hope for this year

 

[eliasd82]

thats a good point.

 

[saj_21]

Hopefully turn into a chad cornes type on baller who can also fill in a key position in a couple years time.

 

[davey_magik]

People also forget he's still only 21 this year (Along with Bate and Newton in the 2004 draft they were all drafted as bottom age players).

I think Mark Riley initiated this last year against the Bulldogs when Dunn went to Cross IIRC. Dunn ran a 15+ beep test in the draft camp which shows he has a massive engine and his skills aren't that bad either.

He has plenty of room for improvement and in my opinion is coming along very nicely as a player. As he says in the interview he also has the potential to eventually push forward on his opponent and kick goals.

 

[McLean_4_Captain]

Hopefully turn into a chad cornes type on baller who can also fill in a key position in a couple years time.

Wouldn't be unhappy with a Ling/Cornes hybrid.

But "The Lynden" doesn't have the same ring to it

 

[Bartram_Class]

Needs to learn to get a bit of it himself too.

We don't want just another Godfrey, if he can get 15 a week too, he'll be doing a great job. The Kirks, Sewells and Rawlings of our world all can do it, no reason Dunn can't.

 

[JuveRule]

I think Mark Riley initiated this last year against the Bulldogs when Dunn went to Cross IIRC. Dunn ran a 15+ beep test in the draft camp which shows he has a massive engine and his skills aren't that bad either.

It was actually Daniher's plan, I remember reading an article very early last year in which he said that he was increasing Dunn's versatility so that he could play all over the ground - first evidence of this was against Port when we lost by a kick, he ran with Chad Cornes for the second half of the game and actually did pretty well.

As the article said, his primary objective is just to shut down his man, with him actually getting possessions being fairly unimportant. For this year I think that's fine but he does need to build upon his offensive game as a tagger. Luckily he has those natural instincts having played as a forward until now, so it's not a case of him having to learn them from scratch, just re-discovering them. Can't wait to see how he progresses.