Player Watch Welcome to Hawthorn : Jai “Duke” Newcombe - 2022 AFLCA Best Young Player, extends to 2026!

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Jai will be a monster after a preseason next year. These games are valuable experience for a kid that has largely come into the AFL off the back of a half a dozen games. Huge scope for improvement. This KID needs games
 

burner1

Premiership Player
Nov 3, 2005
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Needs a big preseason to gain some speed/agility. Was fine on the scg but looked lost on the bigger ground. Hard to justify keeping spot after 6 touches irrespective of how team went when there’s a batch of guys at BH who also need experience. Hes got his taste, now has some things to work on - and plenty of games left to give him another shot in a month etc.
 

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Slick

Club Legend
Oct 5, 2004
1,267
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Berwick
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The game passed him by a little bit yesterday. He couldn't really get near it. It's a great learning experience for him and I've no doubt Sam Mitchell will sit down and analyse the vision with him (ala the Worpel video from 2020).
 

CHUBBSS

Premiership Player
Apr 6, 2010
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He looked completely lost out their on the weekend, the pace of the game will be a great learning experience, if he plays every game leading into pre season we will see some big jumps in development.
 
Jun 11, 2013
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Worps had games like this in his first season. Went back to BH, dominated, and when he came back into the side got 30 touches vs Carlton and soon after won that 1v1 vs Hurley to win the game against the scum.

A bit more work to do getting involved in games (didn't have much of it in his debut either), but I'm confident he can do it, and it may not even be by next season.
 

Dipper

Norm Smith Medallist
Oct 28, 2000
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Even though it wasn't his day, that chase on Hind who he wasn't never going to catch spoke volumes of Dukes perseverance and competitiveness. Massive effort for a second gamer with 2 weeks of AFL standard training.
Yeah he's not going to not make it due to lack of effort, I get the same vibe from Callow.

And the pair of them doing it the hard way should be a good counter point to any high draftees we have, who possibly always had it easy to some degree.

On moto g(7) using BigFooty.com mobile app
 
Sep 13, 2020
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Even though it wasn't his day, that chase on Hind who he wasn't never going to catch spoke volumes of Dukes perseverance and competitiveness. Massive effort for a second gamer with 2 weeks of AFL standard training.
Its exactly what we want to be seeing from our players even if they arent having a great day .
He was always a chance to have a downer second one up .

Keep getting games into him , another decent pre season and I think we see a real spike next season from him .
 

Burtman

Club Legend
Oct 7, 2016
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Seemed to spend a lot of time in the forwardline. Just like worpel did when he first started. Can’t fathom how a guy can play like he did last week, then gets pushed into a forward pocket so we can shoehorn shiels back into the middle, only to watch us get absolutely destroyed in the midfield the whole game. Don’t play inside mids as small forwards, his tackling pressure is best used around the contest. Not chasing whippets like hind out of the forwardline.
 

CHUBBSS

Premiership Player
Apr 6, 2010
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Seemed to spend a lot of time in the forwardline. Just like worpel did when he first started. Can’t fathom how a guy can play like he did last week, then gets pushed into a forward pocket so we can shoehorn shiels back into the middle, only to watch us get absolutely destroyed in the midfield the whole game. Don’t play inside mids as small forwards, his tackling pressure is best used around the contest. Not chasing whippets like hind out of the forwardline.
Well theres a few reasons but you have to squint, I am deep into the clarko is foxing conspiracy but, so don't come down my rabbit hole...
 

Davo-27

Norm Smith Medallist
Sep 9, 2006
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Seemed to spend a lot of time in the forwardline. Just like worpel did when he first started. Can’t fathom how a guy can play like he did last week, then gets pushed into a forward pocket so we can shoehorn shiels back into the middle, only to watch us get absolutely destroyed in the midfield the whole game. Don’t play inside mids as small forwards, his tackling pressure is best used around the contest. Not chasing whippets like hind out of the forwardline.
Shiels is a Clarko favourite, doesnt matter what he does, he will get looked after by Clarko, as long as he is there and plays well one game every 2 months, Worpel and Newcombe will have to do their time in forward pocket purgatory.
 

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Well theres a few reasons but you have to squint, I am deep into the clarko is foxing conspiracy but, so don't come down my rabbit hole...
“So you’re telling me that we had a mid lay 14 tackles last week, but we refused to stand him next to the one guy who kept breaking tackles out of the middle this week”.


 

CHUBBSS

Premiership Player
Apr 6, 2010
4,870
11,817
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“So you’re telling me that we had a mid lay 14 tackles last week, but we refused to stand him next to the one guy who kept breaking tackles out of the middle this week”.



One of the reasons I am quite upbeat about the list and the rabbit hole deepend at the saints game. But maybe I’m an idiot haha
 
Aug 9, 2017
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Penguin
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Tasmania
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Was quiet again early but you could see him work his way in to the game, i think it is a confidence thing at this stage. He just needs to inject himself in to the game because most of the time he does good things happen.

Am a big big fan.
 

daniel23

Club Legend
Mar 19, 2006
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Thought he was very good yesterday . It's easy to forget his age and inexperience looking at him, but the fact he missed a big development year last year and now come into an afl environment 3 weeks ago and has played well in 2/3 games is massive for him and the club.

I can't see him being a 25+ possession mid but ill take 15-20 high impact possessions over that especially when you include the work he does odd the ball blocking and tackling.
 

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