Preview AFL Round 23 - Collingwood vs Essendon - Changes and Prematch Discussion

[Temploar]

Blairy's groin is fine spoke to him at training said it's just a bit of soreness being squashed by the misses last night D: !

In all honesty i too hope it's AOK, need a fit team for finals!

 

[dook]

We can't do that to Jolly in this game though, ideally I would have played Wood and let Jolly rest forward a lot this week, because if Jolly runs himself into the ground this week, and misses the finals it's all over, we have no backup.

Agree. I said similar a few days ago. I would have rested Jolly actually.

Paine for Dawes last game of the year is...well...let's hope it works. No VFL to play for Dawes to find form and Paine is on debut.

 

[Temploar]

Agree. I said similar a few days ago. I would have rested Jolly actually.

Paine for Dawes last game of the year is...well...let's hope it works. No VFL to play for Dawes to find form, and Paine is on debut.

Paine has played AFL This year.

 

[dook]

Paine has played AFL This year.

you're right. Corrected what I wrote. Thanks.

 

[Pera]

Yeah, I wonder who second rucks. I don't really want Jolly to be battered and bruised for what could be a knock out finals series. Paine is surely too small to play that role, and can't see Reid or Brown in the ruck.

May very well be Cloke who plays that roll.

 

[entourage]

Looking forward to seeing what Paine can do. Worried though, if he doesn't step up and we turn to Dawes his confidence will be absolutely shot if it wasn't already. Would've rather dropper Cloke to be honest, but I guess that'd draw too much attention to him and his contract again.

 

[noideaatall]

devastated. knee jerk reaction. this team will not win us a gf. Dawes will get nothing out of being dropped. Jolly will get run into the ground this week, even worse if we do it the following week. Seems selection committee hasn't changed their habits of the past decade: ask a ruckman to do the impossible then cry injuries when the ruckman isn't fit for the finals. stinks of panic.

 

[Temploar]

Yeah, I wonder who second rucks. I don't really want Jolly to be battered and bruised for what could be a knock out finals series. Paine is surely too small to play that role, and can't see Reid or Brown in the ruck.

May very well be Cloke who plays that roll.

In AFL LIVE Cloke always plays second ruck if you have wood out of the team. So maybe

 

[Adz]

you're right.

Refresh my memory - how did he go?

 

[Baltimore Jack]

devastated. knee jerk reaction. this team will not win us a gf. Dawes will get nothing out of being dropped. Jolly will get run into the ground this week, even worse if we do it the following week. Seems selection committee hasn't changed their habits of the past decade: ask a ruckman to do the impossible then cry injuries when the ruckman isn't fit for the finals. stinks of panic.

That's the stuff

 

[dook]

Refresh my memory - how did he go?

I'm the guy that got that wrong. I don't know. Living in the USA now I don't get to see or hear all the games.

 

[HFF]

This is worrying regarding the second ruck issue.

Jolly cannot do it alone. If he breaks down, this will be he biggest selection blunder of all time.

We can't throw Cloke in the ruck because thoroughbreds are too rare to do that.

Paine is still a kid so it wouldnt do any good to use him as ruck.

This would have been an issue at the end of last season and the club did not seek to address it. We are now paying the price for poor list management.

 

[Cory]

If Jolly gets injured after playing 100% of the game I will firmly put the blame on the coaching panel.

 

[Bay Pie]

One of he best games I recall Pebbles playing was the 2002 GF. He was awesome as the 2nd ruck. He'd go into the centre bounce, then just go forward dominating as there were mismatches galore.

I recall the Lions doco on that game and Leigh Matthews tearing his hair out telling Leppitsch what Rocca was doing.

It could be the unexpected edge that tips Travis' year and sparks us through the finals.

 

[mattys123]

It could be the unexpected edge that tips Travis' year and sparks us through the finals.

It's worth a crack, heck, if we breaks down his price goes down and we keep him anyway.

We need to change something if we are to compete against any of the other top sides in the competition, last week showed that, so maybe using Cloke as the second ruck might just fire us up.

 

[Shade]

FINALLY !! THANK YOU NATHAN AND THE SELECTORS FOR SEEING THE ERROR OF YOUR WAYS

Christopher Dud dawes finally dropped.

 

[noideaatall]

One of he best games I recall Pebbles playing was the 2002 GF. He was awesome as the 2nd ruck. He'd go into the centre bounce, then just go forward dominating as there were mismatches galore.

I recall the Lions doco on that game and Leigh Matthews tearing his hair out telling Leppitsch what Rocca was doing.

It could be the unexpected edge that tips Travis' year and sparks us through the finals.

wasn't pebbles first go inthe ruck as i recall. I've never seen travis contest a centre bounce. these changes might have been reasonable a month ago but now they look like a last throw of the dice.

pretty much the whole team was s'house over the last couple of weeks, I can't see individuals making the difference. but say Essendon rolls over (on par with their recent form) and we have a 'great game': do we carry this team with one ruck into the finals? If they were willing to take this risk now, why didn't they do it weeks ago? For the first time this year I have to seriously wonder what the powers that be are thinking down at pieland.

 

[loki04]

Refresh my memory - how did he go?

kicked 2 goals off limited opportunities iirc.

His last 2 VFL games he kicked 5 and 3 was injured for 2 games in between for a team who struggle to get the ball inside 50.

 

[Dazza62]

Guys who really cares about a second ruck when we have no obvious replacements - we are not blessed like WCE - but hopefully next year with Ceglar/Witts we will be fine.. Dawes was crap as second ruck. Put anyone in there for the 5 - 10 minutes a quarter break Jolly needs. I said that Goldsack is the obvious second ruck for the small amount of time he will be required a few months ago. He will be perfect and gives us better ground support - also he has not given us enough up forward either. This could be the master move we required - to get us up & about. Really looking forward to this game to see how it works.

 

[eddiebankbalance]

That Travis Cloke has NO excuse to play poorly. And this game is on TV in the red centre, so excited

 

[blaze036]

jolly wont do 100% of the ruckwork, thats impossible.

Cloke shouldnt be dropped, his still EASILY in our best 22 in current form.

Dawes might gain a lot from being dropped, keeping him in the team wasnt helping so maybe a week off with help things.. hell it cant make thing worse.

Paine has a chance to stand up and force his way into the team.. great lad hope he does well.

I like elliot given another chance, far more skilled than sinclair and seedsmen and i think he is better suited to finals football.

Great to have krak and the skipper back, huge morale boost.

Now all we need is to crush the bombers and here we come grand final

 

[Kirby]

I don't have a problem with Cloke second rucking at all (Roughy does for the Hawks and is about equal on ability with Cloke-- but we have no Buddy) but it seems to me that if they do this that there is a fair chance that we know that he is gone at the end of the year.

 

[migz]

I reckon jolly rucking on his own isn't all that bad. I'd expect a fwd like cloke to assist in the fwd line, in the back line surely one of the back men will assist. And I'm guessing we will have a lot of third man up... Maxwell and goldy to take those duty's I'm guessing.. could help us clear a lot of the congestion.

It looks like bucks is taking a massive risk here on the eve of finals. It either makes us or breaks us...

 

[dansa]

Jolly should be rested not playing sole ruck.
Hope the club knows what they are doing.

 

[sr36]

Assumedly one of Cloke, Brown or Reid will be second ruck. I'd favour Cloke. I reckon that he's really suited to the role.