Petracca hair line fracture - Triple M

[inCOGnito]

Bit different though, Dusty came in lacking both matchplay and aerobic fitness/ strength.

Petracca will still have all of that having played all year, will just likely be playing sore. I think I'd expect he could probably play to a better level than Dusty did. Sadly for us, Dusty needed a couple of weeks lead up, which unfortunately we couldn't give him.

Yeah its always a tough call. Dusty coming in doesn't just change only him. It changes the teams preparation around match ups, probably their mid/def half strategy to combat what he's capable of 'if' he manages to resemble anything of his past form. Its a hindsight call though - easy to sit in the stands and say 'oh yeah I wouldn't have picked him'. Put yourself in a coaches position and say you've got Dusty Martin available for selection in a knockout final, where you can play him forward nearly all night as your '3rd' forward, and you don't pick him, especially with his past history on that ground and against that team. End of career, soft tissue injury. I say you roll the dice.

Petracca's situation is so different with what could happen, but if he's there putting his hand up fit to play, cleared by the docs. Its a damn hard decision to leave him out as well. I guess having subs also changes how teams plan. Roll it, and if he comes up lame, sub him out.

 

[Duskfire]

Its not even for me if the injury will get worst necessarily, if it impacts performance don't play him. Melbourne had quite a bit of depth and while they have no one of Petraccas calibre, do they have someone who can match him at 80%? Probably. Hardwick would probably change his mind about playing Martin if he could go back.

Its tricky but playing injured players more often than not is not good.

 

[Rusty Brookes]

I know they're in very different stages of their careers but Trent Croad went into the 2008 Grand Final with a hairline fracture in his foot. It ended up snapping in two and he never played again.

 

[The Casey Cat]

Its not even for me if the injury will get worst necessarily, if it impacts performance don't play him. Melbourne had quite a bit of depth and while they have no one of Petraccas calibre, do they have someone who can match him at 80%? Probably. Hardwick would probably change his mind about playing Martin if he could go back.

Its tricky but playing injured players more often than not is not good.

Especially in finals when they are a midfielder.

 

[Ando727]

I know they're in very different stages of their careers but Trent Croad went into the 2008 Grand Final with a hairline fracture in his foot. It ended up snapping in two and he never played again.

Yep, I have to agree. I'm leaning towards the idea of not playing him. It just doesn't sound right. He'll be sore as hell from the fracture and the corky, so he won't train much. He'll be underdone. Even putting his well-being aside, I'd say he might be a liability to the team.

 

[tropicaltiger]

pretty simple for fagan.....tag tracca with neale. win win....neale is expected to be heavilly tagged, so it becomes a 2 v 1 with neale still good enough to get plenty of his own ball and a spare hard runner runner like mcluggage/rayne can get off the chain.