Alan Didak - Where To From Here?

[Timmy from Thomastown]

Pull the other one Timmy...

He's coming back from an awful injury and quite frankly I am happy he is sneaking under the radar. Not our most important player at the moment by any stretch, avoiding contact, (good for him we don't need him going in hard obviously) so he is getting run in his legs, whilst that injury continues to heal.

I think it will be the last month before finals that we will see him to really hit his straps again. He is afterall a superstar!

Fair enough... I should have said "for the time being". I didnt word my post too well. It was meant to be a positive comment meaning that we have enough depth to cover for him.

I dont think he's going to return to top form any time soon and I think we can afford to carry him in the meantime. Its not as if he is playing terribly, he's still putting in and doing his job. It might not be until next year until he's back to his best. Preseasons are so important these days and if you miss one its hard to come back.

 

[shawthing09]

It's an interesting issue.

I think there are two separate issues considered.

1stly Didak and his form itself. He is no where near his best and on form alone would be on the fringe / verge of being dropped. As other have mentioned a lot of that has to do with the lack of pre-season but a) Is that a good enough excuse and B) Is the best thing for him right now to be playing?

It was interesting hearing Roosy talk about players who miss a pre-season and not knowing exactly how to manage them. One of the key issues would be that if you are playing much more time would be spent on the recovery during the week making it hard to do the intensive fitness work required.

Obviously with Dids what you want is him in best form come finals time, but what is the best way to do that?

The second thing to consider is the strength of the team and the "mental" edge. It is very hard to claim "everyone is picked on their performance" when you are clearly carrying Didak. If clearly the best thing was for him to be playing then you wouldn't care but I am not sure it is.

It maybe a little unprecedented but maybe we should look at, with the bye this week "resting" him for the Geelong game and giving him a couple weeks to focus on the fitness type stuff and then bring him back through the VFL. It could work on a couple of levels. Firstly he is not being dropped so much as missing for fitness issues, secondly it reduces his actual workload and gives a Maccaffer / McCarthy or other sometime to keep up to pace. Thirdly it maintains the philosophy that all players have the same expectations.

 

[PieNSauce]

I reckon the idea of resting Dids has some merit but might just as well be counter-productive. The intensity of VFL is not really going to be conducive to finding form although it just migh spike his confidence but the big worry from a team perspective is what we would lose without him. Regardless of form, Dids demands a classy running tagger because opposition teams know all too well that all he needs is a few minutes off the leash and he can hurt them big time on the scoreboard. Against Geelong we're going to need every weapon in our asrenal and we all of their play-makers to be accountable. IMO the best way of doing that is to keep Dids in the side and make them chase him. If they decide to drop off him they know they might pay in spades.

 

[shawthing09]

I'd say if we rested him it would require a couple of weeks without any real match practice to be worthwhile. Which is obviously a risk but as others have mentioned, given that he missed a pre-season there is no guarantee that he will make that up this year if he is playing in the 1's.

 

[Quicky]

The other thing to consider is that perhaps it isn't a fitness issue at all rather his injury still bothering him. A torn pec is a pretty serious injury and could well be playing up on Dids. You often hear of conditioning staff playing players through these sort of injuries as there isn't really anything to be gained from resting the player (i'm not sure if this would be true of Dids injury). Thats just conjecture but a possibility I thought i'd throw out there.

I'm happy to rectify the blue balls... You know for the sake of the team...

So much for your loyalty to Taz!!

 

[Frugan]

hes looked old and slow for the past 2 years. all our other stars have left him in the dust. at his age his best days are gone will just give us a cameo now and then but id prefer a ball winner

 

[Football God]

Calm down OP, no pre-season.

Plus he had surgery on his shoulder he played with for a month, so yeh give it time guyz.

 

[Shellz]

The other thing to consider is that perhaps it isn't a fitness issue at all rather his injury still bothering him. A torn pec is a pretty serious injury and could well be playing up on Dids. You often hear of conditioning staff playing players through these sort of injuries as there isn't really anything to be gained from resting the player (i'm not sure if this would be true of Dids injury). Thats just conjecture but a possibility I thought i'd throw out there.



So much for your loyalty to Taz!!

lol!!! Taz would understand... it's for the team guys!!!!!!

 

[Jonno_]

I cannot believe people are giving this issue serious thought. He is a star player, who has had a limited pre-season and is not playing that well by his standards. If the club operated on the knee-jerk and collective 7 day memory of the majority of this board, Leigh Brown and Sidebottom would not have been around to win us the game yesterday.

Some people have really short memories. It's almost surprising that there isn't the same thread on Dane Swan given he has been down the last two weeks...

 

[Ed D]

He hasn't been playing well to his standards but I still think he's been playing alright football. I think he just needs to keep playing in the seniors to get match fit again. If it gets to the point where his body is exhausted or he's fit but not playing well, then sure, drop him then.