Shut your rucking face, Uncle Rucka...

[Mr Eagle]

Question: Can the current Eagles side play up to its potential without necessarily having Michael Gardiner in the ruck, or do we need Gardy permanently contesting the bounce in order to avoid getting killed in the middle?

Your thoughts, please.

 

[Voice of Reason]

Rucking hell

Good question, Mr Eagle. I'm not sure of the answer and it does depend on form, match-ups, how we're going etc.

Generally, unless the ruck tap goes to one of those little blokes who runs away with the ball, disposes of it accurately into the forward line and we then make the most of our opportunities in the forward line, it makes no odds. You could have a cross between Inspector Gadget and a giraffe in there, but it's got to be won by our rover/midfield. How they all work together is the issue (hello, centre square coach, hello!!!).

A bit before half time against Geelong (when I still harboured thoughts we could win), I said "let's bring Cox on, put Gardiner as a marking CHF and leave Willo to make a FF contest". "But if we then get killed in the centre, obviously we'll have to think again." Then we got killed in the centre, Phil Matera went down, we started to lose in almost every position and the rest is history.

Gardy's our No. 1 ruckman now. No question. But Cox is potentially very good and will need some game time to develop. So we need to manage it so that in the short term we win games (make the most of Gardy), but for the longer term we give Cox as much experience as we sensibly can. I'm a big fan of using both of them in the 22 and sometimes on the oval at the same time.

When they are on the oval at the same time, we should also discourage the two players from handpassing to each other!

 

[jod23]

No i dont think so. I dont think many teams play to there potential when there number 1 ruckman isnt playing in the ruck. I like Cox and i think he will be great once he get more experience and playing time but right now we need Gardy to play as much as he can in the ruck.

 

[iceman]

Originally posted by jod23
No i dont think so. I dont think many teams play to there potential when there number 1 ruckman isnt playing in the ruck. I like Cox and i think he will be great once he get more experience and playing time but right now we need Gardy to play as much as he can in the ruck.

i totally agree to that..

theres no doubt that when Cox goes into the ruck, we start to lose in the midfield.

im not saying that its totally Cox's fault as with experience he will no doubt become better, but i think that without Gardiner we'd be stuffed