The Road Ahead

[ONE EYE]

As passionate as I am about my team I dont think they showed anything yesterday. The last quarter comeback just showed how much they had left in the tank after an insipid first three quarters.

After saying all that, all our injuries were unsettling.

As long as we see the boys showing endeavour and playing with passion we are happy. Even if we lose.

I believe Judgey did the right thing with our recruits. They are stop gaps until the youngsters develop. It is the nature of the draft. We just need to bide our time and hold up the fabric of our Great Club.

You just cant go out and recruit ready made Champions or expect them to develop over night. We have some outstanding youngsters and in many respects are miles in front of the Dockers who every sees as not far from taking the next step.

Hows this for yougsters:

Gardiner, Morrison, Fletcher, Cousins, Braun, Collica, Glass, Munro, Embley, Kerr, Williams, Jones, Wirra, Cox

Add that to mid twenties players - Banfield, Phil Matera,

And the kids - Buszan, Gaspar, Humm, McDougall

Maybe I am in La La land. But it wont take much to build this into a finals side over the next three years.

We have got some great service out of Siera, Prior, Merenda. We knew they were injury prone (I think this is Priors second knee reconstruction). You cant say Judgey recruited a bunch of Duds.

But we still cant have a list of injury prone players. And if we play the Kids before they are physically ready you wont get longevity out of them. paul Haselbys aldready got back problems which can be a real killer in our sport.

Sorry for being such a bore. But stick with it guys. Stick by Judgey and watch the plan unfold. Next year we will have early draft picks and unless we do the stupid thing like Freo did in giving the Earth away for Peter Bell (Super Player but they needed a tall) it will all work out.

I say build it and they will come.

Next year will be worse than this year. Especially if the younger guys keep getting injured. Milli and Tommy Kemp will retire. Perhaps even Roo. So if dont recruit well over the next two year we are screwed.

Go You Great Club! Go Eagles!

 

[daddy_4_eyes]

You are absolutely right, this year is all about development and rebuilding. All eagles supporters know this and don't expect a win every week. What we do expect is the players to play with some passion, not go out there just because they have to.

It isn't our youngsters that are failing us, we can only expect that much from Kerr and Cox, its the players that have been at the club 2-3yrs that are letting us down. Chambers, Wooden(can't even break into the team), Antonovich, Munro, Harding, Carroll, etc.

Cousins, Morrison and Gardiner play their freakin arses off every week only to see their team get humiliated. Roo, Milli, Jako, Tommy and Banners put their ageing bodies on the line every week. Cox, Kerr, Williams, Fletcher, Wirrpunda work their butts off. But of those 13 mentioned above 3 will likely retire by years end, one(Jako) is losing his touch, 2 are first year players and one(wirra) is being played in the wrong position. That leaves 6, how can six players win games for a team?

KJ has basically two options, keep playing half-fit players with the ignorant idea that the team can make the finals, or start planning for the future. His contract expires next year, and a 2-5 start to next season will not be handled as leniently as this year, and going by this boards posts he will be crucified if that happens.

 

[ah_19]

i agree
id prefer to see more youngsters making their debut and playing, like munro and haynes,
and on a side note collica sure has been a great pickup
if he could learn to run just a bit faster he would be awesome

 

[WA]

I'm the first to admit that I'm not a huge Judge fan, but I really don't think he truly believes/believed that we were ever going to make the finals this year. I think this year has always been about rebuilding.

I totally agree that we, as fans, expect plenty of losses this season, and to be honest at least the same for 2002 & to hopefully a lesser degree 2003, but we still expect to see the players (all of them!) giving it their best - this has been far from the case so far.

Most WC fans want the younger guys given a run & 'moulded' for the next couple of seasons, so we have to accept the losses AND Judges win/loss stats....