Will Young on Sunday

[Butts_JZZ30]

I thought I would start a topic about his involvement in the game on Sunday. I don't intend this to be an attack on him or a witch hunt. I don't understand why he was picked?

I can't remember a game where I have seen a player so out of his depth. I don't blame the player for this, he gave it a crack but he obviously was not AFL ready. He didn't seem to understand the game plan, he always ran to the wrong places, he blocked up space and made some critical errors.

What was his match up? He is a tall defender, who they persisted in playing on a faster crumbing forward. I think Craigy hung him out to dry, it can't have been easy for him. The match up was obvious to everyone as a failure.

This once again brings me to the point of why he was picked? I could understand if they had a specific player whom they intended him to play on. Surely in terms of a tall, McKernan, Davis, Henderson even Schmidt would be considered ahead of Young at this stage?

What do people think? I don't think Young would of gained much from the experience, and I'm sure we can all agree he isn't AFL ready.

 

[cmndstab]

I think the match-up, more than the player, was the issue here. As Vader pointed out in the gameday thread, our hands were tied somewhat since our other matchups were mostly working in defence, but the thing is he was picked to replace Van Berlo. Van Berlo was clearly suited for McGlynn, and Young clearly wasn't. It's hard to imagine a player on our senior list less suited for McGlynn than Young, to be honest.


Why he was selected, knowing that it would be his match-up? I've got no idea. You always hear about players getting a debut game and it helping them have a good preseason as they "now understand the speed of AFL" and all of that - I'm not convinced last Sunday taught Young a single worthwhile thing other than the fact that he is unable to play on speedy midfielder forwards.


Davis and McKernan probably didn't show as much as Young in the preseason, and Henderson is not yet promoted, but Schmidt is an interesting one. He showed enough in the preseason to warrant selection given our current injury situation, and would have been an infinitely more suitable matchup than Young for McGlynn. He's also a more versatile player and could have been swapped out for any other midfielder to take the role.


I usually try to give the club the benefit of the doubt, but it's a very difficult decision to support. I don't mind Young at all, I wouldn't be surprised if he has an AFL future, but to select him in a position that suited him so poorly was a waste of a spot in the 22, and served little purpose other than to spoil his debut.

 

[tinman]

It was the lad's first game so give him a break. He will now have an understanding of the work he needs to put in to become an AFL footballer.

Armstrong is in the same category, and the others you mentioned aren't really up for playing the role expected. Schmidt is a rookie and so can't be considered.

Davis would have serious trouble with a small forward match-up, and still has some way to go as well.

So the coaching staff are criticised for playing underdone players, and are also bagged for bringing guys in...it is a no win situation.

I'm not making excuses, this is just the reality of where we are at the minute. People have also criticised Burton and Porps coming in - and the alternative is???????

At least those guys have a game under their belt now and both are proven performers. This board has always criticised selectors for not bringing the new guys in, but when they do the expectations aren't realistic.

My biggest question at the moment is over some of the established players who are letting us down and if they are still up to it. That doesn't include Macca who has been good the last two weeks but there are some others who have been poor.

As we are light on they may be carrying injuries, which gets harder as you get older, in a strange way I hope they are.....cos then they have the prospect of improvement as my fear is a couple have gone.

The decision making of some senior players has been very poor and way below what we've been used to.

We are a short way into a long season, but we all want to see some improvement this week.

 

[Riggy1]

James Sellar, Now that was out of his depth against North Melbourne in 08, he (Young) did give his all which was promising, but the rest of this paragraph is wrong

he was in the right places but stuff ups elsewhere had him in the wrong defensive position
if the attacker actually did his job and tried to shut him down then it would of been an entirely different story.

It's just because Ben McGlynn was a squiib and hiding away from the contest he was all alone on the rebound. Young looked terribly out of position due to our shit midfield on the weekend as well as McGlynn being a lazy prick

he was picked because we needed the height in defence
Sydney dropped Seaby up forward at times, Seaby, Goodes, Bradshaw and White, if Young didn't play we needed to find someone else on the field to help out Bock, Rutten, Hentschel

we were covering our arse for when Seaby dropped forward. Young has the pace to cover smalls but the ineffective midfield put him in bad positioning all day.

McKernan had a poor pre-season, Young had a good one
Davis had a shit one
Henderson and Schmidt are rookie listed players
McKernan and Davis train up forward

we needed a defender

it was either Young who would of been fine all game if the midfield did their job
or Armstrong who would of been fine for 80% of the game if the midfield did their job

is it good for the experience? yes, Neil Craig would be saying that he did the right thing and not to worry about it because he tried to take risks on attack, but he didn't have options so it was others not doing their jobs as to why he looked inneffective, or the midfield broke down and he was out of position after he actually did his job

he knows what he did was right, and it'll be others that will get the full blast as to not helping the kid out

to be honest, he looked the worst out of him, Cook, Petrenko, Armstrong and Sloane over the first 2 rounds

but only Petrenko has actually done their role better

to their roles Petrenko > Young > Armstrong > Sloane > Cook
but how things have looked on TV it appears differently because of lack of help from their team mates.

it's like american football
Young (and the rest of the defence actually) is the quaterback, but the offensive line (midfield) wouldn't protect the defence, and the receivers (forwards) wouldn't present, leaving the defenders ****ed

 

[thed]

what i liked about young's game is he kept attacking the ball, he kept his head up, he tried to start run from the back. He looks like he has an excellent attitude and approach to the game.

I think he has a bright future, needs more games.

 

[Crow-mo]

I thought he wasn't bad

 

[Cap]

I've seen plenty of players look out of their depth however as I didn't see the game I can't comment it (damn it )

 

[lunacy]

what i liked about young's game is he kept attacking the ball, he kept his head up, he tried to start run from the back. He looks like he has an excellent attitude and approach to the game.

Unfortunately thats about the only good thing he did. He kept his head up and tried to stay positive.

Yes he is Young but some of the posts in this thread are more than puzzling. Pretty much everything he tried or was involved in turned to s**t. Being at the game behind the goals I had perfect view of how easily McGlynn gave him the slip. Not just because he was too quick, but Young would just get caught ball watching, while his direct opponent would just rub his hands together and slip into space. Young had no idea what was going on and he really looked like he had no idea where his opponent was most of the game. Surely its obvious that you need to keep an eye on your opponent's positioning at all times. At least when he kicked his first 3 goals.

When Young did get the ball, he tried to be attacking (which I applaud) but boy did he telegraph every handball. His possessions were continually cut off or turned over.

Disappointing debut and an unfortunate game to make his debut in. It was a tough match up for him but I can undersand why they selected him as we may have been a touch too short. Turns out we were too tall. But I think Sydney tried to exploit that. If we went Armstrong instead of Young, Sydney probably would have exploited that by going tall.

The easy option is to blame selection, but unfortunately if our players want to make it in th AFL they have to adapt to wherever they're played.

I havent given up on him, but it was disappointing.

 

[IddyBiddy]

I might be in the minority but i thought he was ok. Got plenty of the ball but yes he burnt it when he had it. The kid was three weeks without a game. I put him in the Burton category for than game - he saw a lot of the ball but suffered from not being game ready due to time off the park. I think if he was to get a game this week we'd get a better indication. He deserved his chance.

 

[spexau]

I think he's better than the game though and it didn't help that the gameplan fell down around him anyway so he was always caught in the middle of two players and looked worse for it.

Sellar was looking great before he did his hammy though, poor bastard.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

Difficult to see him get another crack at it with Stevens coming back in. Although maybe if the injuries continue to pile up he will get another opportunity later on.

What his game on Sunday showed was the gulf that exists between the SANFL and the AFL. He struggled with switching between zones and man-on-man defence, found it difficult when the opposition cleared out their forward line and then having to run back with the flight of the ball and also in the SANFL you stay on the same opponent for a period of time rather than chopping/changing every couple of minutes. Plus each time he had the ball he was under pressure.

The SANFL is great for seeing whether players attack the ball hard, whether they can win contested possessions, whether they can stick tackles etc. But it can only take them so far and cannot completely prepare them for AFL footy.

 

[betterthanu]

Nothing was going right but it says plenty that he kept getting his hands on the ball and didnt just go into his shell

 

[jackster83]

Why didn't we just keep Armstrong in the side?

 

[Vader]

A couple of comments regarding his selection..

Firstly, he wasn't in the original 22 selected last Thursday. He was one of the 3 emergencies. He only came into the side when VB dropped out after pulling up sore during the training session on Saturday.

Secondly, in situations like this clubs are only allowed to replace the injured player with someone from the emergency list - ours consisted of Griffin, Young and Armstrong. Schmidt never came into the equation, not because he's a rookie (we have 2 players on the LTI list, so elevating him is not an issue), but because he wasn't on the original emergency list. The only viable alternative was Armstrong and the selectors decided to give Young his debut, not having been entirely happy with Armstrong in R1.

Thirdly, he was selected ahead of Davis and McKernan because he performed better than they did during the MMC games. His selection was based on merit.

Also, many of the goals scored against him were as the direct result of turnovers between half-back and centre. Young was doing the right thing, running into attack while Adelaide were in possession, only to get caught out when someone inadvertently turned the ball over. It wasn't entirely his fault - and I can also see an argument that McGlynn was actually rewarded for being lazy and not running to defence when Adelaide went on the attack.

Young got stuck with McGlynn because he was the last man left standing when the music stopped. Rutten was busy minding Bradshaw, Bock had his hands full with Goodes, while Hentschel was doing a more than handy job of keeping Jesse White quiet. We went into the game with 4 tall defenders, against 3 tall forwards, Young lucked out. The situation would never have arisen if VB and/or Johncock were available - but they weren't and that's life!

 

[Riggy1]

Secondly, in situations like this clubs are only allowed to replace the injured player with someone from the emergency list - ours consisted of Griffin, Young and Armstrong. Schmidt never came into the equation, not because he's a rookie (we have 2 players on the LTI list, so elevating him is not an issue), but because he wasn't on the original emergency list. The only viable alternative was Armstrong and the selectors decided to give Young his debut, not having been entirely happy with Armstrong in R1.

that's not entirely true
You CAN bring someone straight in for a small fine
I know it is possible becuase it was brought up a few years ago when Richmond took an injured Richo to Subi (the week after he broke his cheekbone against us IIRC), not named in the 25 at all, but Richmond played him and took a small fine in the process

 

[Vader]

that's not entirely true
You CAN bring someone straight in for a small fine
I know it is possible becuase it was brought up a few years ago when Richmond took an injured Richo to Subi (the week after he broke his cheekbone against us IIRC), not named in the 25 at all, but Richmond played him and took a small fine in the process

This is true.. but most teams just opt to play an emergency rather than copping the fine.

The reality is that it was a choice between Young and Armstrong, with Young getting the nod on this occasion. Jaensch, Henderson & Schmidt never even came into the equation.

Maybe there's another thread to be had here, discussing where our rookies really are at...

 

[Hodgy]

The last couple of days have really confirmed to me how many people are more critical of players who have a red hot go and attack the footy but then make bad errors than of those that struggle to get in the game, are more passive but don't stuff up. Since Sunday I have heard so many people blame Will Young and Richard Douglas for our result, but Personally I think there were at least a dozen players who had more reason to be dissapointed with their games than those two. I have watched this for years where players who give everything but aren't consistently blessed with the talent to go with their endeavour are maligned and become the scapegoats for losses and conveniently ignored when the side wins. Liptak, Perrie, Burton, Mark Stevens spring to mind over the years as guys who can and have won us games but have constantly incured the wrath of supporters when they make errors. Recently Dogga, Shirley, Sellar and Douglas have been in the same boat but history shows that if you have the natural ability and work effort to find the footy in dangerous positions that player has a good chance of becoming very important to the team.

FWIW I put Will Young in this category and actually saw many more possitives than negatives in his game on Sunday. He runs, finds the footy, is athletic and is prepared to back himself and most importantly of all kept his head up and didn't sink into defensiveness. I would love to know how to retrieve some of the posts from 2 years ago after Sellar and Otten's first games as they were a lot worse than Young's and from memory received plenty of prophecies of never being good enough. I will reserve judgement until he has played 30 games but to me the early signs were promising.

 

[beartoo]

The last couple of days have really confirmed to me how many people are more critical of players who have a red hot go and attack the footy but then make bad errors than of those that struggle to get in the game, are more passive but don't stuff up.....

I agree with a lot of this post--especially the whipping-boy syndrome that exists on this board.
Young looks to me to have a big AFL future, but it was a puzzling performance. When an opposition player is in space as often as McGlynn was--and close to goal with no one within 20 metres on several occasions as the ball was coming in to the Sydney forward line--then you have to question if it's the instructions from the coaching staff or the player. Young did suffer a bit from 'rabbit in headlights' a few times, but the main problem was that he was in the wrong place to prevent his direct opponent doing damage.
Our backline problems weren't restricted to Young. At one time at the northern end--think it was second q, there were three Sydney players loitering around CHF without an opponent in cooee when they were in possession on the wing.
Gameplan, execution or player?

 

[Mismatched]

For mine, Young has all the tools to be a very good defender, but unfortunately doesn't have the experience or maturity at the moment to counteract AFL quality forwards. Its things like knowing how to outbody your opponent, where to position yourself, how to corall an opponent, or read which way he's going to turn, how to keep track of him whilst forming part of a zone. Things which Ben Rutten is an absolute master at and allow him to compete at this level despite not being particularly gifted athletically. Hopefully he spends a fair bit of time with Ben Rutten learning these things, because he has all the tools to be a great defender IMO, I liked what I saw, but he's probably a year or so off being properly ready, worth giving him a shot though.

 

[Bicks]

Why didn't we just keep Armstrong in the side?

I'll go out on a limb and predict Young will play a lot of games at AFL level, Armstrong will not.

I think the bloke we should be looking at here is our backline coach Ben Hart......and team selection.

Even though Will made a couple of clangers I was very happy with his endeavour, made every effort to get involved, looks like a real goer and considering he hadn't played in a CONTESTED match for 3 weeks of course he had to be a bit underdone. I'm predicting a real future for the lad at the AFC.

 

[KUNG FU]

Appalling thread.

Young made some very poor decisions by hand, but on the whole was very good, getting into the right spots and playing accountable football in a defence that was swamped at times. He was only on McGlynn as a stop gap and obviously it was a mismatch. For much of the game he was on Jesse White and did a solid job keeping him out of the game. Definitely had a superior pre-season compared with Davis and McKernan. His kick has excellent penetration, needs a bit more time to use it with confidence, but for the most part he is a meat and potatoes defender and I think for a second year player he filled that role very well. Obviously he was promoted prematurely due to injuries, but it was a good experience for him.

Armstrong is still a solid prospect, but when he was recruited Rendell (and others) stated he wouldn't play regular AFL for 3 years, so really he's ahead of schedule. He was forced to play far deeper and defensively than he would usually. His spot in the side shouldn't be a great priority this year imo, but I'm quietly confident about his prospects.

 

[Mego Red]

C'mon - he was TERRIBLE. Let's not mix words. It was a shocker.

But he has the physical tools to be a good key defender at the elite level, and the smarts will come with time. I think he's a good prospect who had a nightmarish first game.

 

[johnnypanther]

From what i saw, i think both Armstrong & Young have an AFL career ahead of them.

Armstrong got plenty of the ball, unfortunately he was a deer in the headlights and butchered heaps of them, which was unusual for him because one of his strengths is his disposal, but in the circumstances understandable.

Young, i was impressed with his run and willingness, even though he too was a deer in the headlights.

Nevertheless, it was their 1st game, and it didnt help that the whole team played so poorly too, but i think that they both have a good future.

 

[Crow-mo]

The last couple of days have really confirmed to me how many people are more critical of players who have a red hot go and attack the footy but then make bad errors than of those that struggle to get in the game, are more passive but don't stuff up. Since Sunday I have heard so many people blame Will Young and Richard Douglas for our result, but Personally I think there were at least a dozen players who had more reason to be dissapointed with their games than those two.

Agree.

 

[Crow-mo]

C'mon - he was TERRIBLE. Let's not mix words. It was a shocker.

But he has the physical tools to be a good key defender at the elite level, and the smarts will come with time. I think he's a good prospect who had a nightmarish first game.

I think he made a few blunders, but that he just didn't drop his head at all. he didn't go into his shell, he kept attacking the contest.

that's a great sign