Midfield rotations

[DanA]

We seem to be using a lot more players through the midfield this year. Last year it seemed Selwood & Ablett were at the vast majority of center bounces with Ling and Bartel the next most used.

This year seems a lot more evenly spread in particular guys like Corey, Kelly, Menzel, Duncan, Varcoe, Stokes, Chapman, Johnson, Wojak & even Christenson are getting a fairly significant amount of time in the middle.

I really like it as I think it's helping us on a couple of fronts.
1) It allows us to run out games better
2) We seem to play at a higher intensity
3) It's getting good experience into the young players which will soften the fall when it comes
Perhaps this is something taken from Scott's days at Freo where they threw a lot of untried players into the middle with some really positive results.

One wonders how big an advantage it will prove to be come finals time when our key players having spent less time in the middle and are hopefully less fatigued/injured

 

[Hood007]

Good post.
I like it.
The more options we have, the less predictable we are...

 

[pinion]

wouldn't have thought it would be any more than during the last 5 years.

 

[Selective Retention]

I think the rotation through the middle has definitely increased. I reckon we got slaughtered early against Hawthorn because we didn't have any of the A guys in there. From memory it was Taylor Hunt tagging Burgoyne, Chapman, and I think Kelly. Certainly a big test to see if it holds up against Collingwood's mids. I'd personally like to see one of Selwood/Bartel attacking side, one of Kelly/Corey defensive side and rotate the third. We don't want to leave it too weak at anytime.

 

[DanA]

wouldn't have thought it would be any more than during the last 5 years.

It is more. I heard Neald (assitant coach at Collingwood) directly make reference to it. He said the major change he saw between Geelong 2010 7 2011 was the number of players running through the midfield which he saw as a major change in philosophy and said we've gone from using the least rotations to the most. He used Varcoe as an example saying he played just three center bounces in the middle for the entire season last year and has averaged that a game this season. He also said Ablett (despite resting forward) along with Selwood played the vast majority of game time at center bounces but that it was now Selwood as the only one anywhere near the amount last year and that we've replaced Ablett's role not with a specialist midfielder but by rotating more players.