Review Positives and Negatives

[WCEswift]

Duggan has an AFL ready body

He is a shorter version of slenderman. not near AFL ready body just a huge set off balls as he dives in there

 

[JADED]

This end to end play topped off by a ripper goal to Shep hasn't seen much love (from what I've read since the game)

 

[2006_Eagles]

He is a shorter version of slenderman. not near AFL ready body just a huge set off balls as he dives in there

Thoes guns doe

 

[avishka5]

Black had silky skills and was a slightly more impactful Pendlebury.

Duggan has an AFL ready body, the skills aren't there yet. One thing is very good at already is tackling, he showed that against Pies a few weeks ago when he had about 7 hugs.

disagree about skills. he was fantastic last year but this year he has 0 confidence and looks rushed most times. He lacks size to play on ball but has enough strength to win the ball inside of packs on a lot of the time i think a big preseason is enough for him for him to have an impact on ball next season. He is someone who is strong for his size. Its a bit like sheed a few seasons ago. He lacked size but was still able to compete against bigger bodies at times.

 

[2006_Eagles]

disagree about skills. he was fantastic last year but this year he has 0 confidence and looks rushed most times. He lacks size to play on ball but has enough strength to win the ball inside of packs on a lot of the time i think a big preseason is enough for him for him to have an impact on ball next season. He is someone who is strong for his size. Its a bit like sheed a few seasons ago. He lacked size but was still able to compete against bigger bodies at times.

I'll agree that his skills last year were good for a first year player. Haven't been impressed this year doe.

Some of his kicking made Scott Selwood look like Sam Mitchell

 

[avishka5]

I'll agree that his skills last year were good for a first year player. Haven't been impressed this year doe.

Some of his kicking made Scott Selwood look like Sam Mitchell

yeah its to do with form confidence. Bit like gaff. Gaff is usually a very good kick but this season has been off. Its got worse after the hit.

 

[Moose1414]

Has he developed much? Last I heard he was not going too well in the 2's

Haven't been watching the games but he's been named amongst the best last 2 weeks and I think is top 5 for possessions for the year, kicked 0 goals 4 points in a 6 goal game on the weekend which so would be an almost seamless replacement for Le Cras for set shots.

 

[Moose1414]

Even though Liam is underweight he throws him self into contests and wins the footy he also tackles hard (i have seen him thrown ruckmen to the ground with ease and dispose of big guys). Thats a very positive sign as not many kids with a light frame do that. He only needs put on 5-3kgs in the off season to have a much greater impact around the ball( it was the same case with sheed 2 seasons back as well).

Duggans not really a work horse, he has a a very good balanced game. He goes and wins his own ball but inflicts damage on the outside. He is a bit like shuey but not as explosive in that sense. Most good side have very good balanced mids and its an area we lack as shuey and maybe sheed have a balanced game. We have basically no midfield depth and you want to get rid of a talented mid for another cream on top of the cake type. a big reason why duggan was recruited was for his toughness and leadership and we really lack in both area's at the moment. I agree we need a clever small but we can give up less for a guy like liam ryan and even willie rioli.


Mutimer is still behind cole and partington. Cole by a long shot but parto has had more of an impact than him. Pace is not everything. Our issue with pace is not as bad as it used to be a few years back. shuey,wellingham, cripps, shepperd, duggan and jetta all posses leg speed. yes we can add a bit more but we need more inside grunt more than anything. I hope Mutimer has a big season next year and puts pressure on a few but i still think he will be behind cole and partington next year.

Not a lot I disagree with again, except maybe that we don't have midfield depth.

Midfield depth is all we have really, what we don't really have is elite midfield talent [or enough of it anyway]

I don't see Duggan stepping into the breach next year and emerging as one of the comps premier midfielders, which is basically what we need someone to do.

The game is now less about midfield depth across the board as the midfield firepower of your best 1-3 players and I see him continuing to be fringe into his 3rd and probably 4th years.

I don't have an issue with the time it takes kids to develop I just don't see any evidence Duggan is a superstar who's going to win us matches over the next 2 years [if ever] and would bet on him looking to move home once his current contract is up.

With Priddis, Shuey, Gaff, Redden, Yeo, Sheed all likely to get more opportunity on the ball and Masten and Wellingham also squeezing into best 22 Duggan would have to suddenly explode onto the scene in a way that is not at all predicted and I just don't see him doing it. Happy to be wrong but would be more happy to bet against it happening and dangle him as trade bait, I remain one of the few who actually believes its possible for win win trades to happen in AFL.

 

[avishka5]

Not a lot I disagree with again, except maybe that we don't have midfield depth.

Midfield depth is all we have really, what we don't really have is elite midfield talent [or enough of it anyway]

I don't see Duggan stepping into the breach next year and emerging as one of the comps premier midfielders, which is basically what we need someone to do.

The game is now less about midfield depth across the board as the midfield firepower of your best 1-3 players and I see him continuing to be fringe into his 3rd and probably 4th years.

I don't have an issue with the time it takes kids to develop I just don't see any evidence Duggan is a superstar who's going to win us matches over the next 2 years [if ever] and would bet on him looking to move home once his current contract is up.

With Priddis, Shuey, Gaff, Redden, Yeo, Sheed all likely to get more opportunity on the ball and Masten and Wellingham also squeezing into best 22 Duggan would have to suddenly explode onto the scene in a way that is not at all predicted and I just don't see him doing it. Happy to be wrong but would be more happy to bet against it happening and dangle him as trade bait, I remain one of the few who actually believes its possible for win win trades to happen in AFL.

Yeas i agree but our top tier mids last year were good enough to get us into a granny.

By midfield depth its really the the second tier and third teir mids that we lack. last season our second tier mids were good.

Like i have mentioned before we lack players who are good enough to win their own ball and are exceptional on the outside. Sheed last season was a revelation and he was fantastic. In some games he was awesome inside the contest and in others he carved sides on the outside with his silky left foot. . If Duggan is able to have a good preseason, he will make it into the b22. Simmo is a big fan and he is highly rated internally by both players and coaches. He doesn't need to have a huge season to have a massive impact. He's the type of player for us that could average 20-17 disposals and have a massive impact. His ball use and poise is elite (when in form) and can carves sides up. I would rather him than jetta on wing.

i would really like to see him go back into defence for a bit. To get a bit more ball and find confidence in himself. He played mostly in defence as a junior and he did so well there.

I am only ok with trading him, if he is part of a deal to bring in a good midfielder

 

[QS]

Ryan Burton debuted for the Hawks last weekend. They could have stuck with Tim O'Brien / Jonathon O'Rourke.

I assume blooding new players is all a part of their plan for continued success.

Not sure a comparison to Hawf is apt in the circumstances...

 

[wce4premiership]

This end to end play topped off by a ripper goal to Shep hasn't seen much love (from what I've read since the game)

Every disposal and decision in that play was executed perfectly. So good!

As for Duggan's pace, he is not as fast as Wellingham, Cripps, Shuey or Shephard. He'd be middle of the road, more similar to Masten & Nelson at the moment.

 

[Agent93]

Not sure a comparison to Hawf is apt in the circumstances...

Probably not, and I don't even know how well he went. It was just a very recent example of a good side bringing in a largely untried player late in the season.

Without hunting down the teams of the last few years, I imagine good sides like Geelong, Hawthorn, Sydney and Collingwood (when they were good) have done it more than you'd expect, either to cover injury or give certain players a rest.

 

[kranky al]

yeah its to do with form confidence. Bit like gaff. Gaff is usually a very good kick but this season has been off. Its got worse after the hit.

Have we got that bell-end with the tennis balls back again?

Our skills havnt been good for a long time but last year we improved a lot - this year even our good kicks...

 

[SpaceClef]

Probably not, and I don't even know how well he went. It was just a very recent example of a good side bringing in a largely untried player late in the season.

Without hunting down the teams of the last few years, I imagine good sides like Geelong, Hawthorn, Sydney and Collingwood (when they were good) have done it more than you'd expect, either to cover injury or give certain players a rest.

I think you'd find that the sides above us on the ladder, with the exception of Adelaide, have debuted and blooded far more players than WCE have over the past year. As soon as we're in ""premiership mode"", we seem to shy away from it completely.

One debutant doesn't throw the entire side out, unless the structures/coaching is flaky, which I suspect ours is. People will refer to the Collingwood game as being evidence of why you don't debut players, but we were always going to lose that with the mindset we brought.

I argued months ago that Lecca should have been dropped for a week or two in favour of a youngster. It shouldn't matter that we don't have any superstar kids racking up numbers week in the WAFL. You can't expect to sustain the development of your side if you take that approach - you end up in Freo's 2016 situation if you do that.

It'll bite us in the ass if we get anything resembling a normal injury list next year and older guys like Le Cras, Priddis, Butler and even Kennedy start to deteriorate quickly.

 

[SpaceClef]

Haven't been watching the games but he's been named amongst the best last 2 weeks and I think is top 5 for possessions for the year, kicked 0 goals 4 points in a 6 goal game on the weekend which so would be an almost seamless replacement for Le Cras for set shots.

Averaging 19 disposals, 5 marks, 2.2 tackles and 1.8 scoring shots over his past five weeks. If he tidied up his goalkicking, that would be a ridiculously good return for a 19 year old who is still working out his role as a roaming half forward

 

[kranky al]

I think you'd find that the sides above us on the ladder, with the exception of Adelaide, have debuted and blooded far more players than WCE have over the past year. As soon as we're in premiership mode, we seem to shy away from it completely.

One debutant doesn't throw the entire side out, unless the structures/coaching is flaky, which I suspect ours is. People will refer to the Collingwood game as being evidence of why you don't debut players, but we were always going to lose that with the mindset we brought.

I argued months ago that Lecca should have been dropped for a week or two in favour of a youngster. It shouldn't matter that we don't have any superstar kids racking up numbers week in the WAFL. You can't expect to sustain the development of your side if you take that approach - you end up in Freo's 2016 situation if you do that.

It'll bite us in the ass if we get anything resembling a normal injury list next year and older guys like Le Cras, Priddis, Butler and even Kennedy start to deteriorate quickly.

I agree wholeheartedly with all you say - except a whole box of inverted commas need to surround premiership mode.

 

[Agent93]

You can't expect to sustain the development of your side if you take that approach - you end up in Freo's 2016 situation if you do that.

Freo's 2016 is the gold standard of falling away quickly due to no player development, overtaking St Kilda's drop after 2010 grand finallist to 16th in 2013 (common thread anyone?).

Going a bit off topic here, but due to location Victorian clubs often have the option of topping up with experienced players that suit their positional needs rather than fighting over scraps of who wants to come to Perth. Freo have been in contention from 2012, and from that period until the start of this season they've picked up:

Danyle Pearce - average outside mid who has benefitted from Morabito not getting on the park.
Colin Sylvia - Pea-heart from Melbourne who played 6 games.
Scott Gumbleton - yeah. Like he was ever going to be a key forward solution.
Harley Bennell - Left GC under a injury / scandal cloud and is yet to play for the club

Whereas the COLA and the Vics have taken:

Brian Lake - fills missing key defensive spot in Hawthorn's backline
Josh Caddy - promising young mid
Lance Franklin - superstar key forward to replace aging key forward (Goodes), or retired key foward (Bradshaw)
Ben McEvoy - replacement ruckman after David Hale struggled as full-time ruck once Max Bailey was injured.
James Frawley - Shores up questions in backline after Lake is struggling for pace.
Kurt Tippett - ruck forward replacement after Mumford left.
Rhys Stanley / Mitch Clark - mobile ruck options (admittedly with some baggage) after losing Mumford and West, and the retirement of McIntosh. Clark hasn't worked out obviously.
Patrick Dangerfield - superstar mid to boost aging team, and lack of young replacements

It seems Freo takes what is available (which happens to be average mid/HFFs) whereas the Geelong / Sydney / Hawthorn mob get what they want. Fair to say that Freo's recruiting sucks, but over the same period we added Morton, Wellingham, Cripps, Ellis, Yeo, Redden and Jetta outside of the draft and none of those have really done much to bolster our weak midfield.

I guess the point is that because the Vics and Sydney can top up postionally with experience players it becomes easier for them than use to blood young players to see if they work out (it's also easier for them to trade out the ones that don't (Jed Anderson -> pick 15).

Negative: Stunner is suspend for a ******* long time for a strike no-one saw and a tackle where the player chose not to protect himself, which means we have a forced change and need either
a) bring in a crab,
b) reward a player for being average in the seconds, and / or
c) bring in a relatively untried young player
against the current 1st placed side on the ladder.

 

[Agent93]

Averaging 19 disposals, 5 marks, 2.2 tackles and 1.8 scoring shots over his past five weeks. If he tidied up his goalkicking, that would be a ridiculously good return for a 19 year old who is still working out his role as a roaming half forward

Kind of an issue for us, as we don't have the midfield accumulator types that bring those guys into the game. If Lamb turns into Stringer in 2 year's time I'd be pretty happy.

 

[squashface]

Kind of an issue for us, as we don't have the midfield accumulator types that bring those guys into the game. If Lamb turns into Stringer in 2 year's time I'd be pretty happy.

I won't be because it won't be with us

 

[SpaceClef]

Kind of an issue for us, as we don't have the midfield accumulator types that bring those guys into the game. If Lamb turns into Stringer in 2 year's time I'd be pretty happy.

Make it happen Simmo.

I agree wholeheartedly with all you say - except a whole box of inverted commas need to surround premiership mode.

Fixed

 

[Moose1414]

Averaging 19 disposals, 5 marks, 2.2 tackles and 1.8 scoring shots over his past five weeks. If he tidied up his goalkicking, that would be a ridiculously good return for a 19 year old who is still working out his role as a roaming half forward

Pretty decent effort from a bloke who must know by now it doesn't matter what he does there's no spot for him in the seniors. I'm going to be so pissed off if [when] we lose him, criminal waste of development not dropping Le Crap for Lamb at any stage during the season. I'm just preying for an injury to force Simpsons hand and bring him in for finals because we need more firepower if we want to kick a winning score against defences that know how to shut Kennedy down.

 

[Moose1414]

I am only ok with trading him, if he is part of a deal to bring in a good midfielder

Kind of what I am trying to get at, for me there are only ever about 5 players on a list who should be untouchable and it would be ridiculous to consider Duggan one of them just because he might turn into a good player in 5 years when we desperately need a solution in our midfield today.

Untouchables would be Nic, Gov, Barrass, Kennedy, Sheuy to me. Hawks traded the best player in the comp and won 3 Premierships on the back of it yet a slow to mature pick 11 is untouchable, I don't think so.[they offloaded Kennedy to Sydney too in the same era, if Duggan ever reaches his level it would be astounding] When it comes to trade talk there is just no perspective on this board.

Our spine is great, the age profile of our best players is great. We need to fix the midfield with someone around the same age as these blokes not wait for kids under 20 to grow into their roles, by the time Duggan is significant Kennedy will be retired, Nic will be pushing 30 and this current team could possibly of blown its chance at Premiership glory. Duggan is just one of a dozen or more players we should have a flexible attitude about losing in an effort to be the best team possible in 2017. The fact he's still under 20 and we've pumped 25 games into him during 2 years in which we are contending for premiers gives him significant value in a market where we don't have a lot of currency. We are within striking distance of greatness and need to be bold with list management and have a no regrets attitude for recruiting for the moment, * the future the time is now.

 

[DanWCE]

I'm just preying for an injury

What an absolute flog thing to say. You're a *in dropkick.

 

[Moose1414]

What an absolute flog thing to say. You're a ****in dropkick.

Without injuries we wouldn't of made the GF last year. I've got no problem with personal attacks so cheers for that, the fact is injuries to established players who are selected regardless of form is sometimes [if fact quite commonly] the only path to team rejuvenation and discovery of new structures which often work better than what came before. Happens to every side. Happens every season. Realistically its a sound thing to hope for and I don't think there are many fans out there who don't secretly wish that one player in the team they can't stand maybe does a hammy once in a while

Without Michael Gardiner doing a knee Dean Cox might not of happened. Without McKenzie and Brown doing their knee's Gov wouldn't be one of the best defenders in the game. Without Nic missing time this season the midfield doesn't learn how to get by without him. Without opportunity to hold down the number 1 ruck spot Lycett's development is slower. Injuries equal opportunity in AFL, and on balance they are a key component to growth and improvement.

Our forward line is one dimensional and easily shut down by the best teams because its the same structure week in and week out. I see this as a liability, opposition coaches see it as a gift. Le Cras going down injured could be an event that transforms the side- you never know. What we know for certain is he'll never be dropped so what else is there to hope for for those who think there's a need to develop plans b and c for kicking a winning score?

All too often coaches aren't willing to make changes unless their hand is forced, its human nature but its to their detriment. Dropping blokes who aren't performing is a coaches toughest job and clearly something Simpson has struggled with this season, I'm not going to lose any sleep over hoping a bit of bad luck for certain individuals makes his job a little easier. I just want the best side possible out there.

 

[DanWCE]

Yeah Im not even reading that..