Teams 2025 Rate My Pre-Season Team

[A Bit Dusty]

Just a heads up kents if you didn't know you can copy & paste you team in one go clicking on this.

 

[ArdentEagle]

Its the small things

Hey...I'm not Luke Slayers!

 

[dabombers]

Parish a no for me at the moment.

How many Bombers do you have in your side at the moment??

 

[dabombers]

Mcgrath HB
Durham yes
Martin could play there but hasn't so far
Caldwell rotating from HF
Perkins meh
Hobbs meh, not a huge fan
Tsatas no skills just ticker, but will crack in eventually i am sure

Mcgrath HB
Top 3 in time trials and Bombers have 3 extra HB players in Saad, Archie Roberts and Jaxon Prior to go along with Redman. 3 talls down back and 3 runners.
Durham yes

Martin could play there but hasn't so far
Martin should play there one of the Bombers most dynamic players.

Caldwell rotating from HF
he is more willing to do the dirty grunt work than others, look up his increase in centre bounce attendances last 2 seasons. No longer a HF that was 3 seasons ago.

Perkins meh
His core strength and tackling skills have improved with age and he is a smart player.

Hobbs meh, not a huge fan
Still young and needs to get some time in the rotation there for the future, better sooner than too late when we need it. Same goes for below.
Tsatas no skills just ticker, but will crack in eventually i am sure


here is the one point you are right with.
Parish is 27, cant play anywhere else.
So what do you do with a one dimensional player who is holding back the development of the rest of the side. Either he learns to play wing, HB/HF and takes the drop off in midfield time or he gets a nice bright coloured vest.

 

[FAILTOSUCCEED]

Mcgrath HB
Top 3 in time trials and Bombers have 3 extra HB players in Saad, Archie Roberts and Jaxon Prior to go along with Redman. 3 talls down back and 3 runners.
Durham yes
Martin could play there but hasn't so far
Martin should play there one of the Bombers most dynamic players.
Caldwell rotating from HF
he is more willing to do the dirty grunt work than others, look up his increase in centre bounce attendances last 2 seasons. No longer a HF that was 3 seasons ago.
Perkins meh
His core strength and tackling skills have improved with age and he is a smart player.
Hobbs meh, not a huge fan
Still young and needs to get some time in the rotation there for the future, better sooner than too late when we need it. Same goes for below.
Tsatas no skills just ticker, but will crack in eventually i am sure
here is the one point you are right with.
Parish is 27, cant play anywhere else.

So what do you do with a one dimensional player who is holding back the development of the rest of the side. Either he learns to play wing, HB/HF and takes the drop off in midfield time or he gets a nice bright coloured vest.

Im over this, Parish is dropped. You win.

 

[dabombers]

Im over this, Parish is dropped. You win.

It wasn’t a competition to win or lose.
Just sharing thoughts and knowledge.

I am tempted drop Oliver from side for similar reasons, if Batman (Petracca is injured) what is Robin going to do, just tag him out of the game and leave all the heavy lifting to Viney.
Or he could just Pig it up and get 35+ touches per game.
Who knows.

My best tip for a player to bounce back into top 10 Mids is Dawson.
Hopefully he has changed footy boot sponsorship as last years boots were like he was playing a game in Roman Sandles.

 

[FAILTOSUCCEED]

It wasn’t a competition to win or lose.
Just sharing thoughts and knowledge.

OK

 

[aidanstaff]

First attempt.
The Flex role is doing my head in - do I take a gamble on a player who I think could score big, or just tuck away a known premo? I have SPP there currently, but it will change 100 times in the coming weeks.

View attachment 2199785

I have gone with a third ruck in the flex

 

[South of the Yarra]

How many Bombers do you have in your side at the moment??

2 at the moment

 

[Deliverance]

We are getting off the point here.

I wrote the list of players who could and maybe should be ahead of Parish in the Midfield.

For the future of the Bombers the younger guys need time in there as a priority, not giving them Half Back/Fwd or Wing roles.

My order of starting midfielders at Easendon goes

1. Merret

2. Durham

3. McGrath

4. Caldwell (tagger)

5. Martin

6. Perkins/Hobbs/Tsatas (equal pegging)

7. Parish

8. Shiel

9. Settergoat. (To tag against the monsters like Bont and Cripps)

Just my list for the future of the team.

Had noticed chatter on the Ess board that Parish may not be as important in the midfield any more

 

[dabombers]

Had noticed chatter on the Ess board that Parish may not be as important in the midfield any more

What will the essendon board and coaching staff be planning??

Do the Bombers have a side with talent to win games, yep, are they in a premiership window, maybe not.

Teams ahead of them easily are:
Lions, Swans, Cats, Port.

I think the Bombers are planning for 1-2 years ahead already.
Thats why last year they cleaned out the troublesome guys.
Get rid of the bad culture and create a good one.

Back to Parish his injuries are leg or calf, soft tissue based. Not good for a runner. Also questions on attitude especially towards rehab work came up last year. And the effort he put in to getting fit again. He is on a good paycheck so maybe he just thinks he is FIGJAM.

Find a young guy from an interstate club out of contract, pack in a few draft picks or players and spend the season chasing a homesick player.

Harley Reid !!!!!

 

[A Bit Dusty]

 

[A Bit Dusty]

Here we go this should be my starting team. $100 ITB
Every year I never finish my defence so I will finish it from the start this year.
Dusty 2.0 is tearing it up at training and is a lock at M4 (will also be a POD because no one is picking him)

 

[Northernsoul74]

Here we go this should be my starting team. $100 ITB
Every year I never finish my defence so I will finish it from the start this year.
Dusty 2.0 is tearing it up at training and is a lock at M4 (will also be a POD because no one is picking him)


View attachment 2202833

 

[stevebbb]

View attachment 2202738

So Freo recruited Bolton as a small forward Schultz/Walters replacement. There goes that idea of starting him expecting midfield time.

Bye Shai.

 

[Rustymagoo]

the result of my latest fiddle with it has 28K left over.

 

[stevebbb]

Parish is one of those players that the fanbase hate, but he's one of the first picked every week by the coaches.

If he gets through the preseason unscathed, I'm locking him in. He could easily start the year of strongly, go bang, bang, bang and be $650k in couple of months.

 

[dabombers]

Here we go this should be my starting team. $100 ITB
Every year I never finish my defence so I will finish it from the start this year.
Dusty 2.0 is tearing it up at training and is a lock at M4 (will also be a POD because no one is picking him)


View attachment 2202833

I have exactly the same thought as you regarding going close to a completed Defence to start the season.

I have chucked a D/M rookie in the flex spot to start season with and will shift the highest scoring Bench Rookie there from Mid or Defence as the season goes, also helps starting more early bye players.

I would suggest A Bit Dusty to downgrade ACL Kiddy and invest it into Flex but thats just what I would do, you do you.

Here is todays version 5026, if Ryan is hurt come start of season he would be only change down back.
Can’t decide between Lalor and Draper as 1st rookie off bench, can’t wait for preseason to rip team apart and start again from scratch.

 

[dabombers]

Parish is one of those players that the fanbase hate, but he's one of the first picked every week by the coaches.

If he gets through the preseason unscathed, I'm locking him in. He could easily start the year of strongly, go bang, bang, bang and be $650k in couple of months.

I can’t argue with you on your points here.

What would you do with him once he reaches $650k keeper or sideways trade him?

 

[stevebbb]

I can’t argue with you on your points here.

What would you do with him once he reaches $650k keeper or sideways trade him?

I suppose if you're picking him you gotta have some faith that his body will hold up. He's still a young fella at 27.5 yo.

Rd4 is too early to trade him out. Rd16 might be too late. But if he's played every match until rd16, then something must be going right.

But history says he'll cop a soft tissue injury at some point, so let's say Parish is $650k in rd9 and he's just scored 80 pts and copped a corkie or a niggle, and Daicos is $550k after a slow start, has bottomed out and scored back to back 130s, you have to consider that trade for a profit of $100k. It's a difficult trade to make, but those are the sort of power moves that propel teams.

Just he's too cheap to ignore for me. History says he's a 108-114 average player, I'll pay $480k for that. The flipside is that history says he'll cop an injury, but that's why we have a heap of trades and trade boosts and now flex.

 

[dabombers]

Trying a No Bont and No Flanders team now as an experiment.

Guys that last season that have an early game injury affected game I am having a look into.
Scrolling through the guys who in 2023 were Top 6-8 in their lines.
And dropped a sub 30pt game that ruined their season average's.

One name comes to mind is Tom Stewart who dumped a 33 in Rd 24..
Thats 100k saving on Flanders.

Seeing how many I can find.

 

[ArdentEagle]

Here we go this should be my starting team. $100 ITB
Every year I never finish my defence so I will finish it from the start this year.
Dusty 2.0 is tearing it up at training and is a lock at M4 (will also be a POD because no one is picking him)


View attachment 2202833

I actually really like this...

 

[Nelso]

Have not seen Young in many teams.

Another preseason training as a mid and I expect him to go to another level. I am hoping that his TOG will increase further.

Elite left foot leg and loves a tackle and has shown that he can kick goals.

 

[Makeshift Park]

The only North players I’m considering locks from the outset are Xerri and Daniels.

The preseason track reports on Sheezel, Kerch and Parker are truly making me wonder tho.



Bring on the preseason games I say.