West Coast's focus on draft
12:39:32 PM Tue 21 October, 2003
Mic Cullen
afl.com.au
The Chinese ideogram for ‘crisis’ is a combination of two separate characters - one means danger and the other means opportunity.
For West Coast Eagles football manager Steve Woodhouse, that could be the perfect description as the club prepares for next month's National AFL Draft.
“Look, it’s exciting times – it’s pretty serious times and difficult times,” he told afl.com.au.
Coach John Worsfold said that while many clubs were compelled to contend with ‘unknowns’ during the trading period, drafting was a little more organised.
“With the draft, our focus is to take the best player available, regardless of position and regardless of where they’re from,” Worsfold told afl.com.au.
“We take into account where they’re from, we take into account their age – if a Victorian or interstate player is still doing year 11 now and will do year 12 next year, that’s a pretty big consideration to take in.”
“So there are factors that you look at with those players.”
West Coast chief execuitve Trevor Nisbett spent years as the club’s football manager, so not surprisingly, his opinions are pretty similar to Worsfold’s and Woodhouse’s.
“We hope to draft some good kids,” he told afl.com.au.
“Our main emphasis is to draft underneath and make sure that we continue to grow the footy club as we’ve done the last few years.”
Not much is said there, the footy department guru's just doing there job description by the book in saying we will draft the best player available at the time of our picks.
I wonder if that is true, or they will succumb to pressure to try and fill in some gaps in the KPP department (only problem with that being that players that low in the draft need developing and won't be straight into the side, also we have an influx of young talls lining up to take those positions by the scruff of the neck, so do we really need more? Because what we really need is a ready made kpp, not an up-and-comer, because we already have lots of those.)
I guess small players that can play down back will be the way the club is looking, thoughts?
12:39:32 PM Tue 21 October, 2003
Mic Cullen
afl.com.au
The Chinese ideogram for ‘crisis’ is a combination of two separate characters - one means danger and the other means opportunity.
For West Coast Eagles football manager Steve Woodhouse, that could be the perfect description as the club prepares for next month's National AFL Draft.
“Look, it’s exciting times – it’s pretty serious times and difficult times,” he told afl.com.au.
Coach John Worsfold said that while many clubs were compelled to contend with ‘unknowns’ during the trading period, drafting was a little more organised.
“With the draft, our focus is to take the best player available, regardless of position and regardless of where they’re from,” Worsfold told afl.com.au.
“We take into account where they’re from, we take into account their age – if a Victorian or interstate player is still doing year 11 now and will do year 12 next year, that’s a pretty big consideration to take in.”
“So there are factors that you look at with those players.”
West Coast chief execuitve Trevor Nisbett spent years as the club’s football manager, so not surprisingly, his opinions are pretty similar to Worsfold’s and Woodhouse’s.
“We hope to draft some good kids,” he told afl.com.au.
“Our main emphasis is to draft underneath and make sure that we continue to grow the footy club as we’ve done the last few years.”
Not much is said there, the footy department guru's just doing there job description by the book in saying we will draft the best player available at the time of our picks.
I wonder if that is true, or they will succumb to pressure to try and fill in some gaps in the KPP department (only problem with that being that players that low in the draft need developing and won't be straight into the side, also we have an influx of young talls lining up to take those positions by the scruff of the neck, so do we really need more? Because what we really need is a ready made kpp, not an up-and-comer, because we already have lots of those.)
I guess small players that can play down back will be the way the club is looking, thoughts?
