It was quite the pleasant morning today out at Max Basheer Reserve. The two hour training session began at its scheduled time of 9.30 am as the players arrived, footballs in hand, ready for the their warm up.
While there was still no sign of Graham Johncock, a familiar face made reappearance early on in the morning. Andrew McLeod, with his right knee still in a brace, was having a word with some trainers before presumably hoping on a bike for an hour or so.
- An agility drill, kick to kick and some goal kicking on the run from 25 metres out followed the normal stretching warm up. It should be worth noting that Porplzyia was involved in these warm up drills.
- The restricted group for today consisted of Cook, Moran, Burton, Dangerfield and Porplyzia. All five spent considerable time running laps amongst other things, with Young joining in with Dangerfield and Porplyzia mainly just sticking to running.
- The pace began to kick up a notch for the first main task of the day. The main group split up into smaller groups of six or seven, where one was handed an orange shirt to be the defender. The ball would be brought into play by a trainer and then passed around with a number of handballs to evade the defender before it was cleared of the area. So in other words, it was like affecting a clearance at a ball up situation.
Griffin was in the group closest to me and I think it’s fair to say he struggles a bit when it comes to trying to stop someone in a close situation. He's too big; he's got his arms and legs all over the place. But it’s fair to say he looked a lot more comfortable when he wasn't wearing an orange top!
- While the next drill involved the main group working the ball down one side of the oval with a handful or orange defenders in the way, the new recruits had some quick kicking practice with Peter Jonas. Today it was only Davis, McKernan, Sloane and Lee as Young was off with Dangerfield. They were working over about 20 metres and Davis and McKernan probably did the best. Lee was a bit off target a couple of times. At one point Jonas even commented on McKernan's good kicking and I must say myself, on Thursday I thought he was skinner but he must've beefed up over the weekend
He's got quite big shoulders and thighs!
Back with the main group and I was impressed to see Hentschel take a strong diving mark in the rather dry conditions. As a whole group they were moving the ball swiftly and smoothly through the centre. They then spread out to use the whole ground and I heard Gallman giving directions, Kite was rebounding well out of the fifty and Martin was also moving well. Maric and Cook spent some time together working out of one of the vacant goal sqaures just practicing making leads and the like with each other.
Our mystery Melbourne man was there again today I believe, unless that was Mr Irish.... He is quite tall, about 10 or so cm taller than Thompson. Speed doesn't seem to be his greatest attribute but he was able to hang around the top of the pack when they went for a jog as a break from the drill. It resumed again afterwards but only for a few more times.
- The closing drill of the session was as close to a game as I've seen this pre season. Orange was pegged against the blue tops, with the attacking orange bringing the ball in from behind the goals. The ball didn't make it all the way down to the orange goal that often, but when it did blue took possession and began their attack.
There didn't appear to be many structured match ups although I reckon McKernan was the full forward for orange with Bock placed on him. Lee was also an orange forward and I think Young may have been one too.
- Some highlights were Sellar's great run down of Martin from behind. He just latched his fingertips onto the back of Martin's top and was able to pull him down to the ground. Sellar was on the end of a lot of praise from his team mates.
McKernan finally got his hands on the ball by marking close to the boundary line on the forward flank. His long kick was indecisive though and found the orange players severely outnumbered by opponents. Bock was in his ear afterwards though, giving him a few pointers. He made up for it afterwards though, by taking a strong mark on the lead in front of Bock and being crashed into by an oncoming player. He quickly got to his feet and found Symes who had snuck down into the pocket.
Again, Kite was somewhat of a stand out in defence for blue. His attacking movement out of defence is almost Mattneresque besides the monumental stuff up at the end.
Otten showed poise and skill through the middle of the ground and was also heard to be passing on directions down the ground.
- Finally, players broke off to work individually or in groups. Armstrong, Shirley and Otten were working together on getting a handball away when being closely covered by an opponent and Jacky was having a chat with Neil Craig for a few minutes in the centre of the ground.
Walker, Sellar, Griffin, Tippett (still with some work to do), Hentschel (who was doing very well), van Berlo, Gill, Vince, Stevens and Jacky were having shots at goal. Funnily enough though Tippett seemed to kick just about everyone from when he gathered the ball off the ground and had a snap at goal, but he was missing the set shots at tight angles.
McKernan, Sloane, Davis and Lee ran a number of laps to finish off the session. Mackay was leading the way for a couple of laps before he retired to the rooms for the morning. Sloane was coping the best, then Davis was a few metres behind him, Lee was a greater distance behind Davis and McKernan was lagging at the back. A couple of times a trainer came over and had a word in his ear to ensure he would keep going. So while he may be in good shape, he could find himself in the SANFL for a while building up his endurance levels.
While there was still no sign of Graham Johncock, a familiar face made reappearance early on in the morning. Andrew McLeod, with his right knee still in a brace, was having a word with some trainers before presumably hoping on a bike for an hour or so.
- An agility drill, kick to kick and some goal kicking on the run from 25 metres out followed the normal stretching warm up. It should be worth noting that Porplzyia was involved in these warm up drills.
- The restricted group for today consisted of Cook, Moran, Burton, Dangerfield and Porplyzia. All five spent considerable time running laps amongst other things, with Young joining in with Dangerfield and Porplyzia mainly just sticking to running.
- The pace began to kick up a notch for the first main task of the day. The main group split up into smaller groups of six or seven, where one was handed an orange shirt to be the defender. The ball would be brought into play by a trainer and then passed around with a number of handballs to evade the defender before it was cleared of the area. So in other words, it was like affecting a clearance at a ball up situation.
Griffin was in the group closest to me and I think it’s fair to say he struggles a bit when it comes to trying to stop someone in a close situation. He's too big; he's got his arms and legs all over the place. But it’s fair to say he looked a lot more comfortable when he wasn't wearing an orange top!
- While the next drill involved the main group working the ball down one side of the oval with a handful or orange defenders in the way, the new recruits had some quick kicking practice with Peter Jonas. Today it was only Davis, McKernan, Sloane and Lee as Young was off with Dangerfield. They were working over about 20 metres and Davis and McKernan probably did the best. Lee was a bit off target a couple of times. At one point Jonas even commented on McKernan's good kicking and I must say myself, on Thursday I thought he was skinner but he must've beefed up over the weekend
He's got quite big shoulders and thighs! Back with the main group and I was impressed to see Hentschel take a strong diving mark in the rather dry conditions. As a whole group they were moving the ball swiftly and smoothly through the centre. They then spread out to use the whole ground and I heard Gallman giving directions, Kite was rebounding well out of the fifty and Martin was also moving well. Maric and Cook spent some time together working out of one of the vacant goal sqaures just practicing making leads and the like with each other.
Our mystery Melbourne man was there again today I believe, unless that was Mr Irish.... He is quite tall, about 10 or so cm taller than Thompson. Speed doesn't seem to be his greatest attribute but he was able to hang around the top of the pack when they went for a jog as a break from the drill. It resumed again afterwards but only for a few more times.
- The closing drill of the session was as close to a game as I've seen this pre season. Orange was pegged against the blue tops, with the attacking orange bringing the ball in from behind the goals. The ball didn't make it all the way down to the orange goal that often, but when it did blue took possession and began their attack.
There didn't appear to be many structured match ups although I reckon McKernan was the full forward for orange with Bock placed on him. Lee was also an orange forward and I think Young may have been one too.
- Some highlights were Sellar's great run down of Martin from behind. He just latched his fingertips onto the back of Martin's top and was able to pull him down to the ground. Sellar was on the end of a lot of praise from his team mates.
McKernan finally got his hands on the ball by marking close to the boundary line on the forward flank. His long kick was indecisive though and found the orange players severely outnumbered by opponents. Bock was in his ear afterwards though, giving him a few pointers. He made up for it afterwards though, by taking a strong mark on the lead in front of Bock and being crashed into by an oncoming player. He quickly got to his feet and found Symes who had snuck down into the pocket.
Again, Kite was somewhat of a stand out in defence for blue. His attacking movement out of defence is almost Mattneresque besides the monumental stuff up at the end.
Otten showed poise and skill through the middle of the ground and was also heard to be passing on directions down the ground.
- Finally, players broke off to work individually or in groups. Armstrong, Shirley and Otten were working together on getting a handball away when being closely covered by an opponent and Jacky was having a chat with Neil Craig for a few minutes in the centre of the ground.
Walker, Sellar, Griffin, Tippett (still with some work to do), Hentschel (who was doing very well), van Berlo, Gill, Vince, Stevens and Jacky were having shots at goal. Funnily enough though Tippett seemed to kick just about everyone from when he gathered the ball off the ground and had a snap at goal, but he was missing the set shots at tight angles.
McKernan, Sloane, Davis and Lee ran a number of laps to finish off the session. Mackay was leading the way for a couple of laps before he retired to the rooms for the morning. Sloane was coping the best, then Davis was a few metres behind him, Lee was a greater distance behind Davis and McKernan was lagging at the back. A couple of times a trainer came over and had a word in his ear to ensure he would keep going. So while he may be in good shape, he could find himself in the SANFL for a while building up his endurance levels.
