Our Midfeild

[CUG81]

If the club can have a great midfield (mix of in and unders, good players running forward as well as back)..and hav a settled consistent defence, i think it will go a long way to helping our new forward line work.

Let's face it, henderson, setanta and waite/kruz altogether probably wouldnt kick as many as fev would in a year...so having a strong midfield who can help suport them and bag 10 between them all per game wont do us any harm.

 

[ESKIE]

Oh I'm so hurt by you. Seems like halfwits like you can't come up with a reasonable discussion but only resort to shit like this. What a loser you are.

BF is not the place to be if you are a little sensitive

I think our midfield is gong to be awesome, I can't wait to see it happen next year, holding and developing good stock

 

[ESKIE]

sorry dramoth didnt know u owned bigfooty where only ur opinion counts,but having said that,i reckon you'll see what i mean by about round 11 or 12 where niggling injuries to key backs and forwards start kicking in, its a long season and believe me u will be crying like a baby for more kp's.mate we just recruited brock mclean ffs and we take another 3 mids are u kiding? we are a laughing stock just read todays hun we got a c-,believe me if we don't make finals next year it's goodbye rats and hughes, amen. here's hopin' as i said before those two REALLY REALLY make me sick

 

[WeninRome]

I am still amazed with all this negative chat regarding our drafting.

a) we are underestimating the following talls with which we have.

Waite
Bower
Henderson
Hampson
Kreuz
Warnock
sentanta
Jamison
Austin

by my liking that is almost half of our 22...

The game today has developed into a midfielders game. Drafting players based on their height was sub naughties phenomenom..

would the likes of Madden, Big Nick, Burton and co get a run these days?

Sure they would have been great tap ruckman but would have been punished around the ground.

Who were the last ten premiers?

Cats, Hawks, eagles, swans, Power, lions.

Which of these sides had great KPF.

Hawks, Swans and the lions (to a certian extent)

Cats midfield is unstopable and destroyed a st kilda team relying on two pillars in the forward line.

Eagles had the worst forward line of all time.

power had treders but relied on the dash of the midfield and the run out of defence.

Consider the physique of players who succeed at our game.

there would be 5 midfield built players to every 1 gun tall forward or back.

Roo, Carey, Pav, Brown and co are match winners but they don't grow on trees.....in 5 years time will there be a player from this years draft to match these guys? i doubt it but who knows.

The idea of picking a tall based on our "apparent" needs is floored. If WH had selected 3 talls in this draft just because of height, would people here be satisfied? despite their ability...

can someone please name me the players who were avaliable at our pick who are talls who are rated better than what we selected?

1st pick - kane lucas, a player many thought would fall in the top 8. If butcher was available i am sure the blues would have picked him up. Carlton didn't pick Talia because Lucas was rated 5 picks higher in most people eyes than Talia. And Black? he went at 25.

2nd - Davies - i have seen this kid play and i think that he is better than Lucas...he is harder than just about anyone else we have at our club and will play most games this year. Were there better talls available at this pick? We may have picked Vardy if we had a chance.

For 12 months WH has copt crap for not selecting Rich...Davies is the same sort of player, except twice the height.

He played CHB for Tasmania, doesnt this qualify him as a KP?

3rd pick - Kerr- subjective pick which WH described as picking due his natural ability and skill...was there a better tall available at this pick?

Goose, but apparently he failed a medical during the week.

As far as I can see it our MC and recruiters can't win.

During the 90's we recycled players and made stupid trades, thus ultimately leading us into a black whole for 10 years.

Following this the club has stated they will not draft in anyone over the age of 24....youth policy.

With this in mind, we have assembled the following players in the drafts.

Livingstone
sporn
wiggins
fisher
simpson
murphey
gibbs
walker
grigg
bower
kreuz

judd + mclean + henderson were all sub 10 draft picks in their own right.

what does this mean. Midfield built players tend to be the better footballers...funny that. Champion KP's don't grow on trees...if there was one available in any of these drafts we would have taken them...

which we did with Livingstone, Kruez and bower.

So instead of all the cinics in here thinking they know what is best....how about we have trust in those who are paid to do it.

If anyone watches more football tapes than WH and the MC in here then i would be very surprised. Lets leave the professionals do their jobs...and hey if they are wrong, time will tell, but so far i would like to think they are doing a fairly good job.

 

[son of dominator]

what does all this mean for Ellard. He won the Ants B&F, was looking like he might break into the team this year, then we recruit Mclean and Lucas (nothing wrong with those decisions). He must be thinking right now that he's gonna play his guts out in the Ants again, get no AFL games and then get delisted.
I feel sorry for the guy, I can't see how he can break into the team unless we get a number of injuries to our mids

 

[WeninRome]

what does all this mean for Ellard. He won the Ants B&F, was looking like he might break into the team this year, then we recruit Mclean and Lucas (nothing wrong with those decisions). He must be thinking right now that he's gonna play his guts out in the Ants again, get no AFL games and then get delisted.
I feel sorry for the guy, I can't see how he can break into the team unless we get a number of injuries to our mids

I don't think Ellard is good enough to break into our midfield, given the quality of it now. However, I see no reason why he can't come in as another tagger and either take the opositions dangerous small forward or a heath shaw type in the foward line.

This would allow AJ to concentrate on locking down the best opposition mid.

 

[ptrsks]

what does all this mean for Ellard. He won the Ants B&F, was looking like he might break into the team this year, then we recruit Mclean and Lucas (nothing wrong with those decisions). He must be thinking right now that he's gonna play his guts out in the Ants again, get no AFL games and then get delisted.
I feel sorry for the guy, I can't see how he can break into the team unless we get a number of injuries to our mids

Yep, spot on,

Ellard has really done everything he can do to try and break into the firsts. I dont think he will be able to get into the squad, no madder how hard he works with the acquisition of Mclean and Lucas.

I think its the same with Grigg, i doubt he will cement get a spot in the team. Grigg i think will end up being in the same situation as Ryan Jackson, who was playing well, broke his hand, and couldnt get back in the team.

 

[gbatman]

We have looked for more grunt in our midfield and that will make a world of difference. Our midfield was over rated last year and was not that good. Now it s "that good" and I expect big things.

 

[Blue and Silver]

I think that if we are attempting to justify the further expansion of midfield talent then we must think about the two most recent premiership midfields:

Hawthorn 2008:

Shane Crawford
Xavier Ellis
Luke Hodge (mostly playing the quarterback role however)
Jordan Lewis
Sam Mitchell
Micheal Osbourne (in bursts)
Cyril Rioli (in bursts)
Brad Sewell
Clinton Young

For the most part only a few of these players played consistently in the middle but you can see how deep their midfield ran


Geelong:
Gary Abblett
Jimmy Bartel
Joel Corey
Joel Selwood
James Kelly
Cameron Ling
Corey Enright
Paul Chapman
David Wojcinski
Travis Varcoe (in bursts)

Another example of deep rotations of midfielders

Now Carlton's midfield this year was basically:

Chris Judd
Bryce Gibbs
Marc Murphy
Kade Simpson
Andrew Walker
Aaron Joseph
Andrew Carrazzo
Heath Scotland
Nick Stevens
Eddie Betts
Richard Hadley

With Stevens gone and Scotland, Carrazzo and Hadley all under pressure from Grigg and Robinson this unit should change significantly.

I would think that our side should accomadate approximatly 10 midfielders who rotate though the centre and the flanks and off the interchange.

Clearly the core members of our midfield in the future shold be:

Judd
Murphy
Gibbs
Lucas
Simpson
Yarran
Robinson
Mclean

with players like Grigg, Russell and the older players in Carrazzo and Scotland pushing.

In effect Premiership teams have recently had a deep midfield, ours with the new acquisitions is approaching this and should be complimented by some part-time influences.

Of course midfields alone do not win premierships, you need a sturdy defence and a serviceable and efficent forwardline

 

[Blueboys7]

We have looked for more grunt in our midfield and that will make a world of difference. Our midfield was over rated last year and was not that good. Now it s "that good" and I expect big things.

I was going to say the same thing, our midfield lack depth and a more balanced defensive/attacking mind set. Especially when one of Judd/Gibbs/Murphy were out of the centre, but with the inclusion of Mclean, Lucas and the development of our mids we should soon see the benefits.

 

[BlueYoss]

If anyone watches more football tapes than WH and the MC in here then i would be very surprised. Lets leave the professionals do their jobs...and hey if they are wrong, time will tell, but so far i would like to think they are doing a fairly good job.

TheGeneral...and possibly Bluebear.

 

[Weiterbot23]

I
2nd - Davies - i have seen this kid play and i think that he is better than Lucas...he is harder than just about anyone else we have at our club and will play most games this year. Were there better talls available at this pick? We may have picked Vardy if we had a chance.

This is good news

I hope your right about him

 

[Scared Scotland]

We have good midfield but i dont know why we got Kane Lucas over Aaron Black

 

[Salaryman]

thegeneral...and possibly bluebear.

:d:d qft

 

[TOPBLUE_25]

We have good midfield but i dont know why we got Kane Lucas over Aaron Black

Because our recruiters think he is a better footballer.

 

[Jock]

Yes our midfield was very over rated. Fab 4 yes but after that fell away pretty quickly.
When Simpson is spending regular stints in the midfield like last year we aren't that strong - Good player don't get me wrong but is an outside player and should be mostly on wings and flanks. The replacement of Mc Lean for Steven's is going to change the whole dynamics of our midfield.
Our midfield will be stronger by around 20% next year - If our mids can conjure up another 20 goals and follow Murphs lead we can bridge the Fevola goals gap along with a shared effort from our forwards.

This is the most I've looked forward to a season in 10 yrs. I'm really looking forward to the second half of the year in particular when our systems and new players have gelled.

 

[WeninRome]

We have good midfield but i dont know why we got Kane Lucas over Aaron Black

because he is rated 15 picks higher.

15 other professional recruiting managers say so too

 

[BlueJet]

We have good midfield but i dont know why we got Kane Lucas over Aaron Black

It's more than likely because he's a far riskier proposition, by all accounts didn't show that much until towards the end of the season, so that plus he hasn't been playing football for that long and the fact he isn't that tall (192cms) probably means he was dubbed as too risky.
People need to have more faith in our recruiting staff, especially given that the majority of us have seen very little or none of these kids play.

 

[inyourcool]

Yes our midfield was very over rated. Fab 4 yes but after that fell away pretty quickly.
When Simpson is spending regular stints in the midfield like last year we aren't that strong - Good player don't get me wrong but is an outside player and should be mostly on wings and flanks. The replacement of Mc Lean for Steven's is going to change the whole dynamics of our midfield.
Our midfield will be stronger by around 20% next year - If our mids can conjure up another 20 goals and follow Murphs lead we can bridge the Fevola goals gap along with a shared effort from our forwards.

Spot on. Brock will have a significant impact on the dynamics of the midfield group and give it a tough edge. I was a massive Stevo fan but he had run his race a little and the team simply didn't need his input as much as previously.
I also believe that if Hadley can be rotated through there we will be much tougher and stronger around contests

 

[gino]

Although I agree with you for most of it, I can't agree with hoping for us to miss the finals. That would be devastating and every supporter should want his team to win no matter how much you're pissed of with recruiting managers and coaches.

Although I may have taken this the wrong way... did you mean you would like to see them gone if we don't make the finals?

are u kidding ofcourse i want to make finals , i meant i hope theyre gone if we miss.

 

[djw1952]

sorry dramoth didnt know u owned bigfooty where only ur opinion counts,but having said that,i reckon you'll see what i mean by about round 11 or 12 where niggling injuries to key backs and forwards start kicking in, its a long season and believe me u will be crying like a baby for more kp's.mate we just recruited brock mclean ffs and we take another 3 mids are u kiding? we are a laughing stock just read todays hun we got a c-,believe me if we don't make finals next year it's goodbye rats and hughes, amen. here's hopin' as i said before those two REALLY REALLY make me sick

i agree with your point about the kpp, and i think that wh is overrated in that it`s easier to pick mids than it is key backs and forwards. even if hendo is the goods we need a ff for the future. a 192cm kid would be good in the pre-season or rookie drafts. if the blues make fisher a mature-age rookie we can still get a pick in the pre-season .presuming wh would take a kpp that is, and "risk" his reputation ??????? also waite is more of a link man than a stay at home chb.

 

[40yearBLUE]

A few posters have mentioned that the game has changed and that a deep midfield is the way to win flags now. First let me say that I could not agree more. But it is not new. We started the trend to a fleet of smaller running players with the "mosquito fleet" of the early 80's.

Back to now. Last year some spoke of our Fab 4. Premature and inaccurate. Whilst Judd, Gibbs, Murph are the cream but we need 8 mids to be competitive. Our mids were over rotated due to a lack of quality depth and as a result we got ran over quite a lot and also exposed going the other way due again to fatigued players not being able to keep up the pressure. Adding McLean and Lucas to that list we are still a couple of gun mids short, but we now have 5 silky skilled elite runners and ball winners that will stretch nearly every other mid squad in the comp with the probable exception of an in form Cats team.

We still have Hadley though he struggled a little last year, maybe he can bounce back, perhaps Yarran with a full pre-season can add silk on a permanent basis to our hf line and through the middle, and Betts has already had some success running through the middle, and many a back pocket has graduated to midfielder so AJ may get let off the leash too and a more confident JR could also run through the middle. Jury is still out on Grigga, and Carrots seems to be given jobs these days and Simpson seems more suited to a hb link player down a wing.

One other thing, gut running takes about 4 pre seasons to get the fitness up for. Gibbs and Murph are just getting there. Lucas will add another quality mid to the rotation but it will take him a year or 2 to get to the fitness level required to run games and seasons out, that wont stop him making an impact almost immediately as Gibbs and Murph both did but his consistency may not be there for a while.

All in all our mid squad is getting very close to ready to take us up a notch. Well done Ratts, Hughes and Icke. Good work.