Oppo Camp Non-Essendon Thread XI

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Jun 13, 2007
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Martin is a bloody good player, but would come at a huge expense and he is NOT the kind of player I want at Essendon; flies in the face of everything we've put together these last few years. A seriously bad influence.
Which makes his "bring home my dad" sob story all the more odd.

Obviously he / manager will be shopping him around again with the only knock clubs having is his off field issues. in what universe does that piece reassure potential buyers? to me he just talked down his price.
 
Sep 12, 2003
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Is their best 28 really that good?

I know I take the piss frequently, or speak in hyperbolic terms, but that side is seriously void of a lot of talent.

Ignoring the fact that it's youth stocks would have to be damn near the worst in the league, and just concentrating on its best 22 plus spares, what do they really have?

Quality? Sure, they've got some. Let's start with the obvious quality - it's forward line. Roughead, assuming he plays near his best, is a great key forward. Something that many clubs have. Behind him as tall? Vickery?? Look, I'm not saying a complete turnaround isn't possible, but the bloke is a bloody spud. Has a peak return of 36 goals in a season, and his bad games are utterly putrid. He is the very literal example of a 'less than average' AFL player.

Gunston is a great lead up forward. Don't dispute that at all. Just quality. Sicily looks like he'll be a long term option.

Rioli and Breust are both very good small forwards. Puopolo isn't in the same class, but is still a very good player. Overall, I would suggest that the Hawks still have among the top handful of forward lines in the game.

From there is where the holes are.

It's midfield is wafer thin. So seriously brittle that it almost literally can't afford to lose a single player out of it's starting midfield before it starts to become woefully outmatched by opponents.

Don't get me wrong, I would absolutely have swapped T. Mitchell and O'Meara for S. Mitchell and J. Lewis solely due to the age difference - but to suggest that change could actually make Hawthorn's midfield better in 2017 is stark raving mad.

Hodge is done. I'm sorry, he is. He might throw up the occasional game that is commensurate with his talent and career - but he is finished as a top line player. Burgoyne is class stacked on top of class, but he is NOT a midfield general, he is a player who cuts up sides already having to deal with what was an impressive Hawks midfield. And he's 34.

Smith? Birchall? Both are good players, make no mistake. But EVERY. SINGLE. TEAM. has players of their ilk running around in the middle. They do not (quite rightfully) strike fear in to the hearts of any opponents.

This midfield was already, demonstrably, the worst contested side in the AFL.

If you are an opposition midfield, if the sound of playing Hawthorn doesn't sound like a dinner bell ringing you need to take a serious look at yourself.

Defensively, they were better only than North for finalists in 2016. How does this get better? Where does the improvement come from?

It's not flag capable. It's very best side may not even be finals capable. And the list decisions they've made will make recovery from this condition hard in the next few years.

This is so going to * with Hawks fans heads yet again on their board.
 

BrunoV

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Is their best 28 really that good?

I know I take the piss frequently, or speak in hyperbolic terms, but that side is seriously void of a lot of talent.

Ignoring the fact that it's youth stocks would have to be damn near the worst in the league, and just concentrating on its best 22 plus spares, what do they really have?

Quality? Sure, they've got some. Let's start with the obvious quality - it's forward line. Roughead, assuming he plays near his best, is a great key forward. Something that many clubs have. Behind him as tall? Vickery?? Look, I'm not saying a complete turnaround isn't possible, but the bloke is a bloody spud. Has a peak return of 36 goals in a season, and his bad games are utterly putrid. He is the very literal example of a 'less than average' AFL player.

Gunston is a great lead up forward. Don't dispute that at all. Just quality. Sicily looks like he'll be a long term option.

Rioli and Breust are both very good small forwards. Puopolo isn't in the same class, but is still a very good player. Overall, I would suggest that the Hawks still have among the top handful of forward lines in the game.

From there is where the holes are.

It's midfield is wafer thin. So seriously brittle that it almost literally can't afford to lose a single player out of it's starting midfield before it starts to become woefully outmatched by opponents.

Don't get me wrong, I would absolutely have swapped T. Mitchell and O'Meara for S. Mitchell and J. Lewis solely due to the age difference - but to suggest that change could actually make Hawthorn's midfield better in 2017 is stark raving mad.

Hodge is done. I'm sorry, he is. He might throw up the occasional game that is commensurate with his talent and career - but he is finished as a top line player. Burgoyne is class stacked on top of class, but he is NOT a midfield general, he is a player who cuts up sides already having to deal with what was an impressive Hawks midfield. And he's 34.

Smith? Birchall? Both are good players, make no mistake. But EVERY. SINGLE. TEAM. has players of their ilk running around in the middle. They do not (quite rightfully) strike fear in to the hearts of any opponents.

This midfield was already, demonstrably, the worst contested side in the AFL.

If you are an opposition midfield, if the sound of playing Hawthorn doesn't sound like a dinner bell ringing you need to take a serious look at yourself.

Defensively, they were better only than North for finalists in 2016. How does this get better? Where does the improvement come from?

It's not flag capable. It's very best side may not even be finals capable. And the list decisions they've made will make recovery from this condition hard in the next few years.



Putting a few minor points of difference aside, I don't disagree with most of this. The only caveat is that nothing has really changed for the Hawks. No decent team should ever have feared their midfield (even at Hawthorn's very best) and yet they beat up a midfield as good as Sydney, repeatedly. They're now a more powerful inside midfield group.

Hawthorn's best asset has always been an unbelievable system and discipline to pull it off under pressure. That's where the misconception about their depth has come from. They've never really had depth (we all saw how average Simpkin was last year, for example). As long as they're not playing players who are not AFL standard it's too hard to write them off because of the quality they have.

It's replacing Hodge, Burgoyne and Gibson in the next year or two that will destroy them. Their only hope is being able to convince quality free agents to sign on but I expect that the system will break down because there will be a threshold number of players with experience playing together that are required to make it effective.
 
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Apr 1, 2008
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This actually really irritates me.

The bounce has never been about a fair contest. The whole point of having it around the ground is that it clears congestion by forcing players to stay further back in case it goes haywire.
Eh, that's a benefit, but I'm not sure you'll find any clear intent so far as the development of these rules go, given the bounce predates the problem of modern congestion by a century and a half or so. You also need to weigh it against being able to stage a throw-up more quickly than a bounce, limiting the capacity for players to reach said contest.
 
Eh, that's a benefit, but I'm not sure you'll find any clear intent so far as the development of these rules go, given the bounce predates the problem of modern congestion by a century and a half or so. You also need to weigh it against being able to stage a throw-up more quickly than a bounce, limiting the capacity for players to reach said contest.

I didn't need to find it, someone else did it for me:

https://www.bigfooty.com/forum/threads/history-of-centre-bounce-remove-the-second-circle.173110/
 
Sep 12, 2003
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Port Adelaide.

The one word that come to mind is 'lazy'.

On-field, off-field, just a lazy, lazy club.

You want proof? Take Wingard, Hartlett and Wines.

Talented? Sure, all three are - not quite as much as Port fans want to believe, but talented nonetheless.

But would you ever see a bigger collection of me, me, me players in a single club?

It's not a player issue though (not really). You have a Chairman that arsed up the Chinese deal so badly that the AFL had to step in and take the reins.

It's an infection that seeps down through the entirety of the club. From the senior coach, who stubbornly refuses to try and adapt when it's clear that the status quo simply won't work - to it's fans that are as gullible as any in the league.

It'll be back to tarps soon enough - it's fans don't have the stomach for real hardship.

And that's fine by me to be honest, for a bigger (or should I say smaller) minnow club you will never see.

Mate, you're talking about an AFL club that was built upon deceit & created upon the death of another.

Classy foundations are classy.
 

BrunoV

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http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-22/afl-considers-changing-bounce-has-no-benefit/8291964



The do it at most 30 times per game ffs.

The randomness is a good thing.



Good riddance to bad rubbish. I've got no time for the bounce which has only been held on to to this point because of the view that it's a unique and identifiable characteristic of the game. Doubt that anyone will be longing for the good ol' days when the umps used to bounce the ball (and it would often end up as a clearance for one side).
 
Good riddance to bad rubbish. I've got no time for the bounce which has only been held on to to this point because of the view that it's a unique and identifiable characteristic of the game. Doubt that anyone will be longing for the good ol' days when the umps used to bounce the ball (and it would often end up as a clearance for one side).

hi
 
None of that speaks to the original intent.

What else could the intent possibly be other than that? We all know that football was a mad scramble in the early days, and the bounce was introduced later. Was it mere coincidence that the bounce also meant that one on one contests over it would occur regardless of where it bounced?
 
Apr 1, 2008
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What else could the intent possibly be other than that? We all know that football was a mad scramble in the early days, and the bounce was introduced later. Was it mere coincidence that the bounce also meant that one on one contests over it would occur regardless of where it bounced?
It might well be.
 
Apr 7, 2010
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bounce should clearly go. perhaps the changes that have taken place shouldn't've taken place, but they did, and it's not changing back, so if the bounce as it now currently stands is having a negative impact on the quality of the umpires on the field (through injures caused by the stress of bouncing and through promotion through the ranks) it should pretty clearly be totally removed.

I would still like a bounce at the start of each quarter, though. only a few umpires would have to do that.

If we lose in Round 1 you will be banned from ever talking about Hawthorn again.

who do you think you are, the Icelandic president?

Having said that, this thread doesn't need to be a running commentary on whatever is being said on the Hawthorn board, please.

No thread on any board in this whole forum should used as a place to discuss things being said in other threads on other boards...
 
who do you think you are, the Icelandic president?
In that case I prefer to think of it as a mercy giver.



No thread on any board in this whole forum should used as a place to discuss things being said in other threads on other boards...
Oh ho ho.
 
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