AFL Player # 7: Indefatigable Zach Merrett (c) - 5 time Crichton Medallist! 🏅🏅🏅🏅🏅

[Beerfish]

Contract Status: Unrestricted Free Agent 2027
My Boy Draft 2024: Pick 10, I Remember Bluey

 

[Milanista28]

We could get some of those early picks they got good idea

Yeah and hopefully we draft someone like Zach Merrett

 

[DERO]

Yeah and hopefully we draft someone like Zach Merrett

If anyone could do it it is Dodoro!

 

[Jobe_zaka]

I agree with half time hero, in that merrett is copping unfair criticism. He is a star, and easily our best midfielder. The contributions from his fellow midfielders fall well short and he is forced to make risky kicks under significant pressure. I followed his draft closely and his one attribute that stood out was his long accurate kicking. I dont believe you lose this in one or two seasons.

I think that its more to do with the defensive structure and lack of space created by other mids. Sam Mitchel was one of the best kicks from the midfield I have ever seen, and he won his own ball yes, but he had Sewell, Lewis, Sheil, Burgeone and hodge on occasion winning that ball or creating space for him to use the ball well. We cannot expect merret to pinpoint passes while we play this defensive minded lacksluster strategy. He was hitting them all over when we played an aggressive minded strategy and conceded a lot of points. In short we need a fully fit Heppel in the midfield ( who I think for structure is our most important mid) to even have a chance of creating the space required for Zachs skill set to be used to its potential.

 

[Yoda_]

I agree with half time hero, in that merrett is copping unfair criticism. He is a star, and easily our best midfielder. The contributions from his fellow midfielders fall well short and he is forced to make risky kicks under significant pressure. I followed his draft closely and his one attribute that stood out was his long accurate kicking. I dont believe you lose this in one or two seasons.

I think that its more to do with the defensive structure and lack of space created by other mids. Sam Mitchel was one of the best kicks from the midfield I have ever seen, and he won his own ball yes, but he had Sewell, Lewis, Sheil, Burgeone and hodge on occasion winning that ball or creating space for him to use the ball well. We cannot expect merret to pinpoint passes while we play this defensive minded lacksluster strategy. He was hitting them all over when we played an aggressive minded strategy and conceded a lot of points. In short we need a fully fit Heppel in the midfield ( who I think for structure is our most important mid) to even have a chance of creating the space required for Zachs skill set to be used to its potential.

I was about to come in and say something very similar.

For all the criticism levelled at Zac, he is still clearly doing all the right things and the coaches see the same (6th in the coaches votes).

He sits in the top 10 for some key stats for an outside leaning midfielder. On top of this and the big plus for me in 2020 is his balance between kicking and handballing. Not since 2017 has he had a better % of kicks to handballs. It reflects on his attacking outut going forward (3rd in total I50's, 7th in metres gained, 19th in score involvements per game).

Feel the move to the wing is his place, allows us to use his attributes, now just to finish his good work off inside 50.

 

[The Prosecutor]

If we can get two first-rounders for him, take it.

 

[MarkJohnson#1]

If we can get two first-rounders for him, take it.

Genuine star. Why on earth would you want to shop him around for a couple of first round picks in a draft that will essentially be a lottery..?

Also, why did he lose his spot in the leadership group again? Seems to have put a huge dent in his confidence...

 

[Schnitzengruben]

Genuine star. Why on earth would you want to shop him around for a couple of first round picks in a draft that will essentially be a lottery..?

I've said it before but if you trade Merrett for two firsts, Dodo will use them to draft one kid that will be a bust and the other will be Merrett's size but not as good. I don't see a possible, realistic scenario where we come out of that situation better than what we went into it. Merrett still has upside to his game and is still quite young. One of the few untradeable's for mine.

 

[Albertross]

Please trade, hopefully for a high draft pick. Let him try for success somewhere else. His defensive efforts are shite.

 

[Halftimehero]

Please trade, hopefully for a high draft pick. Let him try for success somewhere else. His defensive efforts are sh*te.

Just a lazy 9 tackles yesterday.....

 

[brain taylor]

can't trade him, he's arguably our best player and he's young enough that he could still be around by the time we get our shit together

 

[mike14]

Just a lazy 9 tackles yesterday.....

Not relating all this to Merrett, but there's a difference between defensive efforts (chasing, running hard back to full space or get to a contest) and laying a tackle where the other bloke might have been standing near you at a stoppage.

For most of this year Merrett has been very good at the latter and poor at the former.

 

[Halftimehero]

Not relating all this to Merrett, but there's a difference between defensive efforts (chasing, running hard back to full space or get to a contest) and laying a tackle where the other bloke might have been standing near you at a stoppage.

For most of this year Merrett has been very good at the latter and poor at the former.

What do you want though? If his role is to be an outside midfielder then he’s obviously going to have the mindset of running forward and backing in his team mates to win the ball and distribute it to him, makes it hard when they turn it over all the time and he’s caught out of position.
If you look at his possession heat map from yesterday more than half of his disposals are back of centre and 8 of them in the defensive 50 so it kinda discredits that he’s not working back hard enough anyway.


His tackling around the contests is a massive part of defensive play, it slows the opposition down with their ball movement at the very least and allows the team extra time to set up defensivemy behind the ball or it can cause a turnover.

9 tackles yesterday was massive, to put it into context, the next best for the whole match was 4 and Essendons total was 43, he’s had more than 20% of them on his own.

 

[ant555]

I was about to come in and say something very similar.

For all the criticism levelled at Zac, he is still clearly doing all the right things and the coaches see the same (6th in the coaches votes).

He sits in the top 10 for some key stats for an outside leaning midfielder. On top of this and the big plus for me in 2020 is his balance between kicking and handballing. Not since 2017 has he had a better % of kicks to handballs. It reflects on his attacking outut going forward (3rd in total I50's, 7th in metres gained, 19th in score involvements per game).

Feel the move to the wing is his place, allows us to use his attributes, now just to finish his good work off inside 50.

Wing is his place but his kicking has gone backwards and it is not always the under pressure stuff. Apart from defense the issue I have is that he is in our best 3 players but in other sides he would not be in their best 3 midfielders. Our best is not at a level of the better sides. You can be high up in coaches votes and get Brownlow votes if you are one of the better players in a side that has generally won just over half its games. He is a good player but he has flaws that do not help us if he is our best player.

 

[ant555]

What do you want though? If his role is to be an outside midfielder then he’s obviously going to have the mindset of running forward and backing in his team mates to win the ball and distribute it to him, makes it hard when they turn it over all the time and he’s caught out of position.
If you look at his possession heat map from yesterday more than half of his disposals are back of centre and 8 of them in the defensive 50 so it kinda discredits that he’s not working back hard enough anyway.


His tackling around the contests is a massive part of defensive play, it slows the opposition down with their ball movement at the very least and allows the team extra time to set up defensivemy behind the ball or it can cause a turnover.

9 tackles yesterday was massive, to put it into context, the next best for the whole match was 4 and Essendons total was 43, he’s has more than 20% of them on his own.

What do you want ? fill his spot in the zone and stop ball watching so when it comes back the other way there is not a wave coming down the ground.
Making tackles is good and I will not bag anyone for making 9 of them but it is only half the story. There are two defensive set ups. Zone or man on man. He does neither. It is great he is putting effort into the pressure around the contest but he should be given he is a player around the contest. Now he must work out his zone stuff as that train wreck that was the second quarter was simply because none of the midfield group bothered to defend the zone with any brains or effort.

 

[mike14]

What do you want though? If his role is to be an outside midfielder then he’s obviously going to have the mindset of running forward and backing in his team mates to win the ball and distribute it to him, makes it hard when they turn it over all the time and he’s caught out of position.
If you look at his possession heat map from yesterday more than half of his disposals are back of centre and 8 of them in the defensive 50 so it kinda discredits that he’s not working back hard enough anyway.


His tackling around the contests is a massive part of defensive play, it slows the opposition down with their ball movement at the very least and allows the team extra time to set up defensivemy behind the ball or it can cause a turnover.

9 tackles yesterday was massive, to put it into context, the next best for the whole match was 4 and Essendons total was 43, he’s has more than 20% of them on his own.

What do I want? A team commitment to doing the hard yards to push back into defence so that we don't keep seeing the easy tranistion play opposition sides have been able to get away with all year. Merrett's not the worst of us, but our team defense is shithouse and he's part of that.

His tackling for the most part is excellent and great part of his game. It also wasn't in question.

 

[CBombers17]

What do you want ? fill his spot in the zone and stop ball watching so when it comes back the other way there is not a wave coming down the ground.
Making tackles is good and I will not bag anyone for making 9 of them but it is only half the story. There are two defensive set ups. Zone or man on man. He does neither. It is great he is putting effort into the pressure around the contest but he should be given he is a player around the contest. Now he must work out his zone stuff as that train wreck that was the second quarter was simply because none of the midfield group bothered to defend the zone with any brains or effort.

There was some damning vision of this in the second. I will be surprised if it's not highlighted during the week. It wasn't just Merrett though. There were a few if them there, including Shiel, jogging along with the ruckman. White flag stuff.

 

[Halftimehero]

What do I want? A team commitment to doing the hard yards to push back into defence so that we don't keep seeing the easy tranistion play opposition sides have been able to get away with all year. Merrett's not the worst of us, but our team defense is shithouse and he's part of that.

His tackling for the most part is excellent and great part of his game. It also wasn't in question.

How much of this is attributed to his team mates turning the ball over though? He can’t be both, if we want him to be the attacking wingman with aggressive ball movement then he needs to be proactive in running forward.

How many of the other top ball winners and users in other teams do you think work back in defence like you are suggesting he should?

Like I said anyway, if you check his heat map just from yesterday’s match then he quite clearly does work back, our midfield is terrible but Zach Merrett is the absolute least of the worries.

 

[mike14]

How much of this is attributed to his team mates turning the ball over though? He can’t be both, if we want him to be the attacking wingman with aggressive ball movement then he needs to be proactive in running forward.

How many of the other top ball winners and users in other teams do you think work back in defence like you are suggesting he should?

Like I said anyway, if you check his heat map just from yesterday’s match then he quite clearly does work back, our midfield is terrible but Zach Merrett is the absolute least of the worries.

I don't understand why he can't be both, but we seem to interpret the game and what certain aspects of it mean very differently. So I'll just say that I agree Merrett is waaaay down the list of club issues and leave it at that.

 

[Halftimehero]

I don't understand why he can't be both, but we seem to interpret the game and what certain aspects of it mean very differently. So I'll just say that I agree Merrett is waaaay down the list of club issues and leave it at that.

You cant be both as consistently as what you are suggesting he should be as the game is not that easy to play, we generally end up with two scenarios where either no one works back and the defensive gets sliced open, or they all work back and we can’t clear it because we have no field position which create repeat entries. You need to be able to back your team mates at times to cause turn over so you can the attack the other way.

 

[DERO]

I’ll play devil’s advocate for a bit.

Ants aside, do any of you who are suggesting we trade Merrett know anything about this year’s draft? Midfielders in particular I guess.

How would trading Merrett fit in with your overall list management strategy? Are we rebuilding? Who else are we trading? Is there enough depth in this draft to go ham?

 

[Halftimehero]

I’ll play devil’s advocate for a bit.

Ants aside, do any of you who are suggesting we trade Merrett know anything about this year’s draft? Midfielders in particular I guess.

How would trading Merrett fit in with your overall list management strategy? Are we rebuilding? Who else are we trading? Is there enough depth in this draft to go ham?

If you are trading Merrett you may as well trade or delist everyone else over 25 with the excepting of Hurley and maybe Stringer, because you’ve obviously conceded and going for a full rebuild.

 

[ant555]

There was some damning vision of this in the second. I will be surprised if it's not highlighted during the week. It wasn't just Merrett though. There were a few if them there, including Shiel, jogging along with the ruckman. White flag stuff.

Agree. Sheil was horrible and even Snelling was just jogging around at one point. The whole midfield group where horrible .

 

[ant555]

I’ll play devil’s advocate for a bit.

Ants aside, do any of you who are suggesting we trade Merrett know anything about this year’s draft? Midfielders in particular I guess.

How would trading Merrett fit in with your overall list management strategy? Are we rebuilding? Who else are we trading? Is there enough depth in this draft to go ham?

I am only in the trade me camp if it is top end picks. Dylan Sheil like first round picks.
I will say your point of asking about where we are going is valid. You would only be doing it if you rare going to start a proper rebuild.
Unless he wants to go I doubt we trade him.

 

[84859300]

he's arguably our best player

Best players are usually your captain - thi sguy can't get into the leadership group of 15

There has to be a reason

 

[ant555]

How much of this is attributed to his team mates turning the ball over though? He can’t be both, if we want him to be the attacking wingman with aggressive ball movement then he needs to be proactive in running forward.

How many of the other top ball winners and users in other teams do you think work back in defense like you are suggesting he should?

Like I said anyway, if you check his heat map just from yesterday’s match then he quite clearly does work back, our midfield is terrible but Zach Merrett is the absolute least of the worries.

After half time he was good. The issue is we do not always get good and secondly working back can be an easy way to get cheap kicks.
Zack Merrett may not be one of the biggest problems but he is one of the problems. He is a senior player who for whatever reason is part of one of our biggest issues. You want good players who work back in defense and around the ground. Dangerfield. Pendlebury (does now but never used to). One who doesnt really work back and defend is Martin but he goes forward and kicks big goals when needed. Fyfe is similar. Tends to go forward rather than hard defend but then Fye can be relied on to take a big contested mark through the middle of the ground.

No one can defend turnovers in the middle of the ground but he can be both. You can get into the zone and play your part. Pendlebury is a prime example of a leader who never defended to now doing all that stuff.