winty
Moderator
- Staff
- #1
With all the plaudits that the likes of Stephen Wells and Chris Scott get (and rightly so), I think the guys at the club who don't receive the plaudits they deserve are those guys who are in charge of player development at the club.
It is one thing attracting the right players to the club, but it is another thing entirely to get them to such a stage that they not only can make it at AFL level, but look like they belong there. This is where we excel as a club IMO.
You look at teams like Melbourne and Carlton who have more than a handful of top 10 draft picks running around, but without the right development they aren't getting everything out of them (just look at Jack Watts!). We may not have been blessed with such lofty picks over the years, but those players we have drafted have been nurtured the right way, and play like they belong at the level. We had 10 players playing last night who weren't on our list back in 2008, only one of which we traded for (Caddy). By comparison, Hawthorn had 14, but of those, they traded for 6 of them (Burgoyne, Gibson, Gunston, Hale, Lake and Simpkin). Simply put, we're willing to put time into our youngsters and are reaping the rewards.
I'm sure having our own VFL side helps, and receiving guidance from guys like Matthew Knights, Troy Selwood and Dom Gleeson helps at that level, as well as the likes of Max Rooke and Paul Hood. It's not hard to see why more and more Victorian clubs are looking at creating their own stand alone VFL side, like Collingwood and Essendon, or trying to gain more control over their VFL affiliate, like Carlton. They've seen our success, and are trying to replicate it.
They say in these times of equalisation with the draft and salary cap that teams should only have a limited period of time at the top of the tree (usually 5 or 6 years). We're currently making a mockery of those predictions despite losing a raft of senior players to retirement over the last 18 months to 2 years, and most of this is due to our player development.
Kudos to Paul Hood, Max Rooke, Matthew Knights and co. You guys are a huge part of the reason we're still up at the pointy end of the ladder after 7 years, and it doesn't look like we'll be dropping down the ladder anytime soon, if the exploits of the young guys last night are any indication.
It is one thing attracting the right players to the club, but it is another thing entirely to get them to such a stage that they not only can make it at AFL level, but look like they belong there. This is where we excel as a club IMO.
You look at teams like Melbourne and Carlton who have more than a handful of top 10 draft picks running around, but without the right development they aren't getting everything out of them (just look at Jack Watts!). We may not have been blessed with such lofty picks over the years, but those players we have drafted have been nurtured the right way, and play like they belong at the level. We had 10 players playing last night who weren't on our list back in 2008, only one of which we traded for (Caddy). By comparison, Hawthorn had 14, but of those, they traded for 6 of them (Burgoyne, Gibson, Gunston, Hale, Lake and Simpkin). Simply put, we're willing to put time into our youngsters and are reaping the rewards.
I'm sure having our own VFL side helps, and receiving guidance from guys like Matthew Knights, Troy Selwood and Dom Gleeson helps at that level, as well as the likes of Max Rooke and Paul Hood. It's not hard to see why more and more Victorian clubs are looking at creating their own stand alone VFL side, like Collingwood and Essendon, or trying to gain more control over their VFL affiliate, like Carlton. They've seen our success, and are trying to replicate it.
They say in these times of equalisation with the draft and salary cap that teams should only have a limited period of time at the top of the tree (usually 5 or 6 years). We're currently making a mockery of those predictions despite losing a raft of senior players to retirement over the last 18 months to 2 years, and most of this is due to our player development.
Kudos to Paul Hood, Max Rooke, Matthew Knights and co. You guys are a huge part of the reason we're still up at the pointy end of the ladder after 7 years, and it doesn't look like we'll be dropping down the ladder anytime soon, if the exploits of the young guys last night are any indication.
