Roast Player development

[TheGreatGrundy]

Think the age profile will drop significantly at the end of this year with the departures of a few players like Blair and Mayne, and potential retirements of others like the Sack and Varcoe.

And Lynden Dunn is hardly going to be an eternal presence in our defence.

 

[Saintly Viewed]

And Lynden Dunn is hardly going to be an eternal presence in our defence.

Technically, nobody is going to do anything eternally for us or anybody else.

 

[TheGreatGrundy]

Technically, nobody is going to do anything eternally for us or anybody else.

I was just adding him to the list. The bleeding obvious is evident enough without stating it.

 

[Saintly Viewed]

I was just adding him to the list. The bleeding obvious is evident enough without stating it.

For a brief moment I forgot.
Then the vicissitudes of life was remembered.

 

[Timmy from Thomastown]

Wasn't he stripped of a Best Young Player award at the Crows when he asked for a transfer? Would seem to suggest that he'd make it either way. Maybe the Crows deserve the development credit.

Or maybe hes a natural talent.

 

[Bard]

Or maybe hes a natural talent.

Maybe he doesn't even exist. He's just a figment of our imaginations.

 

[Timmy from Thomastown]

Maybe he doesn't even exist. He's just a figment of our imaginations.

Who?

 

[TheSierBear]

I find the timing of a player development roast thread an odd one in february. Player development has been disappointing, or maybe those players were pretenders, but its not like there's been any new data or evidence either way. It's a new year, for the vocal chicken littles on this board lets wait until we at the very least see a preseason game before we indulge in hubris.

 

[mike123]

I find the timing of a player development roast thread an odd one in february. Player development has been disappointing, or maybe those players were pretenders, but its not like there's been any new data or evidence either way. It's a new year, for the vocal chicken littles on this board lets wait until we at the very least see a preseason game before we indulge in hubris.

The timing is perfect!

It adds an important discussion to the board to help get through the off season.

 

[TheGreatGrundy]

The timing is perfect!

It adds an important discussion to the board to help get through the off season.

Better the chicken littles among us are active now rather than during the season proper. As you say, there is lots of time to kill and too little to talk about. A bit of idle speculation about player development will not cause the sky to fall.

 

[left at home]

Better the chicken littles among us are active now rather than during the season proper. As you say, there is lots of time to kill and too little to talk about. A bit of idle speculation about player development
will not cause the sky to fall.

Proper health discussion is good at any time, and as you say, this time is as good as any

 

[Carringbush2010]

Though to get to there the Club and the FD must do all they can to cajole and persuade and support and motivate and push... all those things.

But at the end it’s really simple, get the ball. Do good things with it.

While I agree it's a two way street between player and FD in reality it's not simple - it's the end game, there's so many variables like natural potential to realize and different persona's and how they gel / clash etc. just for starters.

You could argue that we do the "get the ball" well it's the "do good things with it" that lacks and on face value it looks like the potential of the list is far and away from where it should be because of development hence the "do good things with it" not happening or only glimpses of it.

And this is where I think the OP is a valid discussion and obviously uber critical to any teams success not just ours. Get that right which admittedly is not simple as I mentioned and we travel north in improvement and it's obvious the club has identified this and are addressing it.

 

[Carringbush2010]

I think for the most part from the posts I'v read so far (being Thursday) there are some very simplistic views and that's probably in part compounded by the lack of evidence to "gauge" our development.

On face value it is obvious that the club has identified the "development" as a flaw going by all the off field changes and newly created positions like Maxy's leadership role for example.

GC has mentioned that he fears our list talent is in the bottom half of the ladder and I'd agree but that is arguably because of the poor development.

There's so many variables in "development" that by that very nature it's hard to define exactly what it is let alone on how to improve it or the variance from list to list.

This is the issue facing all clubs and I'd argue more so us than other clubs apart from a list like GC such is my belief in the potential in this list we have - duly noted the list is unbalanced not as sensationally publicized as the media would have us believe though.

 

[Carringbush2010]

I too think that our development of players has been less than ideal for a number of years but I think the club has made efforts in the last 6-12 months to address this with the appointments of Gotch, Boyd, Maxwell and Hocking (even though that is not his official area). I hope we begin to reap the benefits of their expertise/skills sooner rather than later.

I just want to say something on the posts of sr36 which I believe are very astute and applicable to our club. I'm talking about the pressures on players to be continually self critical, inward looking, self analyzed to the point where many of them just lose confidence and can no longer perform to their best. I couldn't agree more and I think it's a symptom of the coach's mentality as it's something that worked for him and he has continuously tried to implement that on our players, but this has stifled many as it has destroyed their confidence.

This leads me to mention this. I received a call from a mate yesterday who had a conversation with one of our veteran players (won't name him but he's a premiership hero and still a key player for us ) who said that very late last season when our season was stuffed and we were out of contention that Buckley called in the players and essentially released the shackles. Some of the convoluted game plan was abandoned and they were encouraged to enjoy their football more and take it on.

This attitude has continued through our pre-season and according to our veteran the place has never been happier in his 10 years or so at the club. The whole attitude is more relaxed and there's a great vibe going on.

Let's hope that this is a step in the right direction and that it translates to better on field performance.

Even though not the whole answer and far far from it, this positivity will be cause for improvement, the 64K question is the quantity of improvement.