Recent Posts
A matter that is sure to raise some eyebrows, and tempers in the next year or two is the issue of draft picks being quarantined for the newly-developed clubs in Western Sydney and the Gold Coast. As a matter of fact, it seems to have raised the ire of many clubs obviously seeing their fate affected by these new teams entering the competition as they're experiencing a lull, and taking away their right, as a poor team, to have access to the best young players in the country.
Surely there has to be a better way.
As always, there is.
In school you learn many skills. You learn to count, though really, you should know this before you are thrust upon your poor teachers. But at school, you learn to count by twos. How easy is that. Count by twos, AFL, and watch every existing club entering a rebuilding stage breathe a sigh of relief.
Allow your new clubs to come into the competition, but instead of adopting the overly-simplistic attitude of attempting to make them competitive immediately by giving them the world of young talent on a platter, at least have them work for it. Instead of picks 1-6, stagger the picks. Count by twos, and offer opportunity to those other clubs... you know, the ones who have been around a hundred years or so, the chance to climb the ladder as well.
So the Gold Coast Prejacs enter the competition (Does this name intimate their season will be over before it begins?) and they are given not picks 1-6, but six picks in the first eleven. Sound OK?
Gold Coast gets picks 1,3,5,7,9 and 11. If they cannot draft well with those picks, then really, they have no business being in the competition. This gives them a tremendous start without overly disadvantaging the clubs who really need a leg-up at the time.
All it takes is a little basic maths. Sadly, it seems that those in charge don't have the capacity to master this intricate skill. One pick at a time for the AFL. Counting by twos is a little too hard.
Some have speculated that Matthew Knights got the Essendon coaching job based on an overly-enthusiastic interpretation of where the Bombers' list was at. While others thought they were some years away from making a significant impact on the top eight, or a tilt at a premiership, Knights saw more, and relayed these thoughts to the hierarchy at Windy Hill.
They liked what they were hearing.
However, those words are ringing hollow at the moment. Losing your best, most consistent forward to injury, and a club legend in Lucas and Hird respectively certainly didn't aid Knights' quest to turn the team around, but he knew Hird was leaving when he took the job on. The Lucas blow was unfortunate, but a part of footy.
Essendon now finds itself in a precarious position. They have a good crop of youngsters and some solid veterans, but there is a huge gap in between. Their middle tier of leadership is virtually non-existant. After Lloyd, McPhee, Fletcher and Michael, where are their leaders? Guys like Stanton, Monfries and Dyson hardly compel teammates to raise their game. A guy like Alwyn Davey does, but he has a hard road back from injury. The only others left who do show any signs of leadership are David Hille, who drifts in and out of games too often, and Adam Ramanauskas, who, sadly, isn't the same player he once was.
The Bombers are up the proverbial creek and the paddle is slipping from their grips.
So where to now for the Bombers? Their fans are feverish, and are not accustomed to sustained periods devoid of success, but it is a reality they may be forced to deal with. Like it or not, Matthew Lloyd is nowhere near the player he was a few years back. They cannot rely on him to take games by the scruff of the neck, and he doesn't get the ball delivered to him in a way that would allow him to anyway. Fletcher and Michael are entering the twilight of their careers, though both are still very handy. They ran into a Port Adelaide team yesterday who needed to solidify their position and reclaim some of its swagger. The Bombers were just what Port needed - a team unsure of itself, and one that Port could re-establish itself over.
They did that quite easily, and one has to wonder whether Matthew Knights' assessment of the Essendon list might have been just a little too optimistic.
You could see it in the eyes of John Worsfold at half time in the game against Carlton. His team had just produced one of the worst, most undisciplined quarters of football in their recent history - perhaps in their entire history - and he knew it. It was as close as you'll get to seeing Worsfold throwing his hands up in the air in frustration.
As he trudged across the ground, the bumbling, stumbling stooge-like Ricky Olarenshaw managed to catch up with him for what surely would've been another series of mixed metaphorical questions, but Worsfold's honesty made the situation clear. He placed the onus on his charges, the disappointment evident in his tone. They'd let him down in a big way.
To their credit, the team responded in the third quarter, and the Eagles got into the position to challenge. They played a quarter and a half of inspired footy, and almost pulled the comeback off. Now though, at 1-6, the season is on the brink, if not shot.
With the season looking like a horse on its way to the glue factory, the Eagles will be faced with some tough decisions in the coming weeks. Guys like Michael Braun and Chad Fletcher are there purely for their leadership abilities - of which they showed little tonight. They are in the twilight iof their careers, and with an eye for the future, their involvement in games for the next few weeks would be on a "need to be" basis. If there are other options, the Eagles will just about have to try them.
Mark Nicoski looks as though he is completely lost at times. He is showing nothing to justify the Eagles' belief in him through his injury-plagued seasons of 06 and 07.
The news isn't all bad, though. The team did show a lot of heart tonight, and they do have a lot of key players missing, namely Kerr, Priddis, LeCras, Staker, Hansen and Hunter, but every team has injuries, and every team is forced to cover them - to develop depth. They also have a young CHF who will sit the rest of the season with a knee reconstruction. Mark my words - Mitchell Brown will be a star.
No team can really recover from losing two players the calibre of Judd and Cousins, and the Eagles must face this fact. If they do manage to rally and sneak into the finals, I am sure I'll have this post pointed out to me. I'm happy to be proven wrong, but as it stands, and as it stood as John Worsfold spoke at half time, the Eagles lost the plot tonight, and admitted defeat. They handed the game to a determined and committed Carlton team in the second quarter, and despite the efforts of Josh Kennedy and Dean Cox, were unable to wrest it back.
The eyes in the West should now turn to 2009, and a renewed push into the finals.
I may come across as chauvinistic, and really, it's something I'll happily wear, but thank the good Lord that Sam Newman is not leaving the Footy Show.
I can understand why the AFL would want to protect those it is catering its game to - they have been worrying about what mothers think and whether or not they'll let their little boys play this nasty, rough, savage game for years now. But the core of the game is still the territory of men. We play the game, we talk about the game, we love the bloody game. We don't use it as a platform to attempt to change the world. We just want to see good footy, have a good time watching it, and enjoy the entire AFL experience, warts and all. It is almost the premise of the Footy Show. It is a good opportunity to have a laugh, a very blokey kind of laugh. Is it sexist? Yep. Is it racy? At times. Is it meant to be taken seriously? Of course not
[ Click here to read more ]
I am not a Sydney supporter, and I have the utmost respect for the way the club goes about it on the field. They are relentless and are only very, very rarely soundly beaten. They fight, tooth and nail to give themselves every chance of winning, and over the past few years have garnered the kind of reputation and never-say-die attitude that any club would be proud to call their own.
That is what makes the most recent Sydney debacle all the more disappointing. With 19 men on the ground, Sydney was able to claw back to kick a point and level the scores against a North Melbourne team who, really, should've shut the gate on the Swans. The only problem is, it is hard to man-up and be accountable when the opposition team has an extra player on the field. It may have only been for thirty seconds, but it was in the dying minutes, and the player whom he was supposed to replace got a disposal in that time, leading to the Sydney point, the scores becoming locked and the game ending in a draw
[ Click here to read more ]
Welcome to what will hopefully be the first of many blogs I post on this site revolving around the sport we love - Aussie Rules.
Is our game getting too soft, more skillful, over-policed, too complicated, too much like basketball or soccer? All these questions and more shall be answered, or at least addressed, in this blog right here
[ Click here to read more ]
|
|
Recent Comments
I've not commented on anything yet :(
|
Add Comments
Comments (1)
Read More