Opinion WHERE WILL THE IMPROVEMENT COME FROM?

I thought Crouch was pretty good for his 1st year at the club and will be better again next year


He was pretty even but dropped away late. At the Crows he had some really dominant games and he's probably more consistent but less brilliant than he was in the past. If he can get better it will make a massive difference. Jones too, we need him to stay on the park, he's the most dynamic mid in the side.
 
I thought Crouch was pretty good for his 1st year at the club and will be better again next year
I thought so too. He had a really odd role late in the season, which looked like he got pushed to make way for Dunstan. Get him back around the ball with Zones and Steele.
 
Jun 17, 2018
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That's tough, JB is talented beyond what most players get given, he's compared to Bont who has the drive and self confidence to react before thinking. Billings looks like the type that would think before acting, plenty of players who become champions are too dumb to have a neurotic mental state that hinders performance.

I see JB as a guy that in real life would be a great guy but doesn't have the psychotic competitiveness and lack of self awareness to be a star. If he gets a good start to a game he tends to have his belief build to a point where he can play like a champion but the cracks open up if he misses a set shot or pulls out of a tackle.

My mate who was a rower said the guys that make it to the top have a mental state where competitiveness is almost pathological. Riewoldt gives that vibe. Lenny too but Sir Lenny had the ability to switch off when he wasn't on field, he was a proper white line fever player.

Wayne Carey, DeGoey etc seem like they operate on instinct on field, we seem to have chased players who had the nice factor which seems to have excluded the dumb arse knuckle draggers but also lost a generation of dominant dumb fu**s.

That's fair I suppose. My comments are purely on Billings as a player, not an individual. I'll never know him as an individual, so I can only rant my opinion of him as a player...and I don't rate him as a player. To be fair to him though I've always found the comparisons to Bont to be irrelevant. Billings has never played the game like Bont, and never will...they are different in almost every way, with the only thing linking them being their draft positions.
I look at him in much the same way as guys like Sinc's, a bloke who has literally pulled himself up and done the hard work to get where he is, with the result being that he has surpassed Billings, a guy that has the clear talent and attributes to succeed....but doesn't, and now looks like he won't.
I just don't think he cares that much about it. He's made a good career for himself at a club that was going nowhere when we needed him to come good, and he'll coast to 200 games and disappear into a good job afterwards in some middling profession that he'll be paid way too much for...he'll have an easy life of little to no worries, with no real struggles, other than hating Mondays.
Good on him...can't begrudge a guy who rides his luck, and gets good breaks.
His footy though will be a legacy of unrealised potential and talent...within a team that had no real identity throughout much of his tenure.
I watch him play and ask myself: "Who is Jack Billings?"
I wonder if he's even ever asked himself that question.

Now, what did you get suspended for??
 
That's fair I suppose. My comments are purely on Billings as a player, not an individual. I'll never know him as an individual, so I can only rant my opinion of him as a player...and I don't rate him as a player. To be fair to him though I've always found the comparisons to Bont to be irrelevant. Billings has never played the game like Bont, and never will...they are different in almost every way, with the only thing linking them being their draft positions.
I look at him in much the same way as guys like Sinc's, a bloke who has literally pulled himself up and done the hard work to get where he is, with the result being that he has surpassed Billings, a guy that has the clear talent and attributes to succeed....but doesn't, and now looks like he won't.
I just don't think he cares that much about it. He's made a good career for himself at a club that was going nowhere when we needed him to come good, and he'll coast to 200 games and disappear into a good job afterwards in some middling profession that he'll be paid way too much for...he'll have an easy life of little to no worries, with no real struggles, other than hating Mondays.
Good on him...can't begrudge a guy who rides his luck, and gets good breaks.
His footy though will be a legacy of unrealised potential and talent...within a team that had no real identity throughout much of his tenure.
I watch him play and ask myself: "Who is Jack Billings?"
I wonder if he's even ever asked himself that question.

Now, what did you get suspended for??

Renegade behaviour.
 
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The main improvement to me will be having our core base fit and firing for more than half a season and the younger brigade making big improvements.

Core base - Marshall , Ryder , Jones , Clark , Gresham , Paton - most of these guys didn't even play half a season - you could add Hanerbery but he never plays too much anyway.

Younger brigade - Max King , Coffield , Higgins , Highmore , Battle , Connolly , Byrne , Sharman , Bytel --- I know some of these guys might not even be in the side some weeks but if King , Higgins and Highmore progress we should be heading in the right direction and you never know one of the others could well surprise us.

We have the side this year to really push any team , but they must have fewer injuries
Having Marshall only playing half a season with patchy form , Membery being not seen in some games and not to mention Hill , Butler and having Jones , Clark not playing most of the games.

We have genuine stars in the side and if they turn it on we will be the team to watch and hard to beat.
Steele
Marshall
King
Hill
Crouch

When you have guys like Ross , Hannerbery fighting for selection you know the squads pretty good.
 

ScrappyDo

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No it doesn't.

First off, our results and performances show we play better when Ryder is rucking. So your assessment that we don't take advantage of Ryder rucking is incorrect since our performances show otherwise.

Then you want Ryder to play less than 50% of the games because we dont take advantage of him and Marshall is the more effective ruck, yet come finals time you would want Ryder to be playing? Why would switching to who you have deemed the less effective ruck comes finals time be a good idea? Especially when you say its ideal for that ruck to play less than half the games. If Marshall is the superior ruck and we've used him as the main ruck for the majority of games, why would you change that comes finals time?
Ok fair enough, from your view it doesn't make sense.
In my view, since his quality of ruck craft is basically irreplaceable and his style is the opposite to Marshall, and l reiterate that we are terrible at roving to him irrespective of win/loss when he plays, and this being his last year, it's a big mistake to make him a linchpin of our formula.
Use him sparingly and make sure he's fit for finals. It makes perfect sense.
 

Saintbloke

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We will go nowhere if we rely on older players in the twilights of their careers, flashing in and out of games with a touch of what they used to have...when they can get on the field. The improvement will only come when some of the younger guys take a step up every season. If the younger brigade even improve by 10-20% this season then we will go up the ladder.
 
The main improvement to me will be having our core base fit and firing for more than half a season and the younger brigade making big improvements.

Core base - Marshall , Ryder , Jones , Clark , Gresham , Paton - most of these guys didn't even play half a season - you could add Hanerbery but he never plays too much anyway.

Younger brigade - Max King , Coffield , Higgins , Highmore , Battle , Connolly , Byrne , Sharman , Bytel --- I know some of these guys might not even be in the side some weeks but if King , Higgins and Highmore progress we should be heading in the right direction and you never know one of the others could well surprise us.

We have the side this year to really push any team , but they must have fewer injuries
Having Marshall only playing half a season with patchy form , Membery being not seen in some games and not to mention Hill , Butler and having Jones , Clark not playing most of the games.

We have genuine stars in the side and if they turn it on we will be the team to watch and hard to beat.
Steele
Marshall
King
Hill
Crouch

When you have guys like Ross , Hannerbery fighting for selection you know the squads pretty good.


Snags is one I think has really high level potential, he's the same age as Paton, Clark and Coffield, Gresham is still only 23 or something too by the way. Probably all still fit into the youth brigade although all are coming up to the point that we should know either way. All of them will be at least good players but the real lift comes around now but it can also mean that the plateau starts as well.
 
Ok fair enough, from your view it doesn't make sense.
In my view, since his quality of ruck craft is basically irreplaceable and his style is the opposite to Marshall, and l reiterate that we are terrible at roving to him irrespective of win/loss when he plays, and this being his last year, it's a big mistake to make him a linchpin of our formula.
Use him sparingly and make sure he's fit for finals. It makes perfect sense.


I actually think nature and time will probably do it for us regardless. I can see him getting time off to see his family again, maybe taking a few 2 week breaks when the fixture throws up a couple of games where the double ruck is less needed.
 

ScrappyDo

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I actually think nature and time will probably do it for us regardless. I can see him getting time off to see his family again, maybe taking a few 2 week breaks when the fixture throws up a couple of games where the double ruck is less needed.
There'll surely be an element of that. I think people forget how good Marshall has been as a sole ruck and perhaps also overrate his performance as CHF. Having Sharman now gives us another viable option with a future.
 
I’d like to see some new names in our top 6 players. Currently Steele, Marshall, Howard, ………. ???
Need to compare to Melbourne: Gawn, Petracca, Oliver, Brayshaw etc.
If King, Gresham, Clark or Higgins can push into our top 6 then we may have the class to compete with the best.


Sent from my iPad using BigFooty.com
 
TBH i think the answer is pretty straight forward:
- 70% fitness: just having the ability to run out 4 qtrs of footy and not die in red time, probably gets us to finals
- 20% skills development: just sharpening the skills mainly connection type skill i.e. kick mark.
- 10% attitude: we have been far too complacent as club, that's whole of club, for a long time. then we seem to be good at talking s**t then making excuses or re-writing history.
 
TBH i think the answer is pretty straight forward:
- 70% fitness: just having the ability to run out 4 qtrs of footy and not die in red time, probably gets us to finals
- 20% skills development: just sharpening the skills mainly connection type skill i.e. kick mark.
- 10% attitude: we have been far too complacent as club, that's whole of club, for a long time. then we seem to be good at talking sh*t then making excuses or re-writing history.


Just staying fit I think we sit around 6 to 12th. If we can get a big improvement who knows. I really feel like there is no dominant team right now so if we are going to make a play for top 4 now is the time. I think some of the s**t sides are underrated by some and there won't be many easy wins with sides like Collingwood and Carlton decimated by injury last year and sides like GC, North, Adelaide and GWS likely to get better.
 

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I actually think nature and time will probably do it for us regardless. I can see him getting time off to see his family again, maybe taking a few 2 week breaks when the fixture throws up a couple of games where the double ruck is less needed.
When Ryder plays it will be a bonus , however I feel Marshall if he can stay fit will be our main ruckman.
Ryder has not been able to get more than 12 games in the last 2 years and expecting him to be one of our focal points is not on in my view.
However every game he can play as I say will be a bonus.
Then again Port more or less wrote him off and he came to us and showed he still is a champion when right.
You can never write this big fella out.
 
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When Ryder plays it will be a bonus , however I feel Marshall if he can stay fit will be our main ruckman.
Ryder has not been able to get more than 12 games in the last 2 years and expecting him to be one of our focal points is not on in my view.
However every game he can play as I say will be a bonus.
Then again Port more or less wrote him off and he came to us and showed he still is a champion when right.
You can never write this big fella out.

Umm he played 14 in 2020, and we know there was personal leave involved during the whole Covid lockdown thing.
He might surprise.
 
Umm he played 14 in 2020, and we know there was personal leave involved during the whole Covid lockdown thing.
He might surprise.


He's one of the players that makes a huge difference when he plays but he's something like 34 next season. We really need him Gresham and Jones to stay fit for most games or to have others step up and fill the gaps that they make. All three have question marks unfortunately. You probably have to hope some others step up to fill the void rather than hope that you'll get 23 games each out of them.
 

Yabadoo22

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I think with the list we have, this year is going to be the year where we find out if our young players will take us to the top.

Clark- needs to come back the fittest he’s ever been, no more excuses. Has to command a spot in the midfield and start to dominate games.

coffield- looked to be a potential star in 2020. Also needs a big lift in fitness and confidence. No more getting dropped in and out of the side, time to own his spot.

Higgins- had a good debut year, but you guessed it, needs to get fitter to be able to give stints in the middle.

Gresham-injuries permitting

big years for battle, long, Byrnes, butler also
 
I think with the list we have, this year is going to be the year where we find out if our young players will take us to the top.

Clark- needs to come back the fittest he’s ever been, no more excuses. Has to command a spot in the midfield and start to dominate games.

coffield- looked to be a potential star in 2020. Also needs a big lift in fitness and confidence. No more getting dropped in and out of the side, time to own his spot.

Higgins- had a good debut year, but you guessed it, needs to get fitter to be able to give stints in the middle.

Gresham-injuries permitting

big years for battle, long, Byrnes, butler also


Butler finding a few more goals would be handy too.
 

MordySaint

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The improvement must first come from the Administration, Coaching and Selection panel.

Talking about individual players is a bit pointless until we have great leaders making the right decisions.

The improvement must come from Ratten, he must coach better and turn his boys into men.
 
The improvement must first come from the Administration, Coaching and Selection panel.

Talking about individual players is a bit pointless until we have great leaders making the right decisions.

The improvement must come from Ratten, he must coach better and turn his boys into men.


Ratts is in his final year and I hope that we don't rush to sign him yet. He's been a bit of a mixed bag, seeing finals again was amazing but there are times that his coaching looks ordinary. I think he's at least playing with an eye on the future and not for today unlike Richo who was always out on a ledge waiting for a shove so he coached for the day.
 
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