Watching a little bit of Fox this arvo. Flashback to R10 96. Cats V the “Bears”.
It was the game at the Cattery that we were behind most of the day and were over 3goals down at ¾ time but with some motivation from Ayres and some top play in the middle we were 3 up with 5 minutes left. We then proceeded to blow it and the game was drawn.
Boy, its great watch , just to remind oneself of those not so distant champs. Gee’s the man could do the stuff, couldn’t he. When the ball hit his hands on the lead, it was like Velcro on a tennis ball, it just stuck. Budda and Couchy were playing too and Billy Brownless still had enough in the tank to play at CHF although I’m sure he would have preferred it in goal square.
Yes, we still had some great names in our side and they were playing against a young but talented ,no name of Brisbane. Voss, Lappin, Ackermanis, White, Clark Keating, Leppitch and Chris Scott. The Cats kicked poorly and should won the game but as we now know the bears had some real talent there. Green yes, but real talent.
So when I look at our side today and compare us to them then and I say we our side is not that far off them. GAJ, Jimmy and Kelly could just as well Voss, Scott and Lappin. Probably the biggest difference between the 96 Bears and the 01 Lions was the Power their forwardline had. Lynch and Brown gave them the type of forward power that pushed Leppitch to the backline. It gave the ability to break other sides and maximize the on balers. With a little luck and reward for the patience that we have already displayed, a couple of our young forwards can give us some of this forwardline power, however, one area of concern is ruck.
Looking at the game they had a young Clark Keating showing the potential that would serve them well finals time in the years to come. Our ruckmen are middle aged and the don’t really match the age of our core group terribly well considering the wear and tear that they seem to take. Their bodies are giving loud messages that they shouldn’t be relied upon.. Blake is young and may well develop into the guy but to me its essential that we start trowelling the sea for big fish to fill our future needs.
Considering the lag time of around three years we must start looking for keepers this year. Its not considered that there is an abundance of “obviously” quality super talls this year but really, what does this mean? In three years time an unimpressive kid might be a really good solid ruck. At a minimum, we should start by picking two rookie ruckmen, it will give us a bit of a backup, if worst comes to worst, and it will give them a couple of years to show something and we can always do a “John West” with the fish not up to it. The cost doing nothing will be that we will be boxed into a corner. Next year, year after, some time down the track we will have to do another trade for a big guy like we did for Ottens and we all know how much it hurts to do tough deals like that
It was the game at the Cattery that we were behind most of the day and were over 3goals down at ¾ time but with some motivation from Ayres and some top play in the middle we were 3 up with 5 minutes left. We then proceeded to blow it and the game was drawn.
Boy, its great watch , just to remind oneself of those not so distant champs. Gee’s the man could do the stuff, couldn’t he. When the ball hit his hands on the lead, it was like Velcro on a tennis ball, it just stuck. Budda and Couchy were playing too and Billy Brownless still had enough in the tank to play at CHF although I’m sure he would have preferred it in goal square.
Yes, we still had some great names in our side and they were playing against a young but talented ,no name of Brisbane. Voss, Lappin, Ackermanis, White, Clark Keating, Leppitch and Chris Scott. The Cats kicked poorly and should won the game but as we now know the bears had some real talent there. Green yes, but real talent.
So when I look at our side today and compare us to them then and I say we our side is not that far off them. GAJ, Jimmy and Kelly could just as well Voss, Scott and Lappin. Probably the biggest difference between the 96 Bears and the 01 Lions was the Power their forwardline had. Lynch and Brown gave them the type of forward power that pushed Leppitch to the backline. It gave the ability to break other sides and maximize the on balers. With a little luck and reward for the patience that we have already displayed, a couple of our young forwards can give us some of this forwardline power, however, one area of concern is ruck.
Looking at the game they had a young Clark Keating showing the potential that would serve them well finals time in the years to come. Our ruckmen are middle aged and the don’t really match the age of our core group terribly well considering the wear and tear that they seem to take. Their bodies are giving loud messages that they shouldn’t be relied upon.. Blake is young and may well develop into the guy but to me its essential that we start trowelling the sea for big fish to fill our future needs.
Considering the lag time of around three years we must start looking for keepers this year. Its not considered that there is an abundance of “obviously” quality super talls this year but really, what does this mean? In three years time an unimpressive kid might be a really good solid ruck. At a minimum, we should start by picking two rookie ruckmen, it will give us a bit of a backup, if worst comes to worst, and it will give them a couple of years to show something and we can always do a “John West” with the fish not up to it. The cost doing nothing will be that we will be boxed into a corner. Next year, year after, some time down the track we will have to do another trade for a big guy like we did for Ottens and we all know how much it hurts to do tough deals like that
