If the kids are good enough they are good enough.
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AFLW 2024 - Round 10 - Chat, game threads, injury lists, team lineups and more.
Confirmed Jackson Macrae: To Saints p/of 4-way trade: B. Smith (WB) & pick 45 to Geel / pick 38 to Carl / Macrae (WB) to StK / pick 17 & Kennedy (Carl) to WB
- Thread starter BEEG
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Nope
I think we will try to take as many picks into the top 30 of the draft as possible
- Sep 12, 2013
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theres one thing im looking forward to with macrae,thats those left foot bullets from the 50 or flank that singe the chest of his forwards,saw it with dogs before they stopped playing him and bont went from 18 possies and 3 goals superstar to a 30 plus and 3 goal megastar
i want to see Max King licking his lips and moving his ass to those passes,if macrae is doing his thing in red white and black and King is still looking like a defeatist sook,then we should,well i will leave it there or i might upset 50% of the saints board
putting it simply,if nothing else macrae is my max king barometer
given Crouch has slowed to "never running again", Steele is going to obliterate his shoulders without support, Jones could disappear off the face of the earth again and the rest aren't "inside" (2 out of 3 ain't bad) - we unironically need one and Macrae is a good match to help while the kids are being developed
- Sep 14, 2010
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Great fit. Deal will be done with little issue. Plenty of good faith here from both sides.
GetDimmaBack
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- Mar 30, 2008
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Jacko has never had a serious injury, either. Will provide reliability as well as leadership.
Good get by the Saints - all the best, Jack.
- Oct 2, 2010
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You can only have so many 21 and under mids in 1 team. I dont think having him as the 2nd mid behind Steele hurts any young kids development.
It is Dow and Hunter Clark who this would impact but thats not necessarily a bad thing.
Snuffaluphagus
Brownlow Medallist
- Sep 10, 2015
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I suppose given what he'll cost, it's not a move that hurts anyway, more question if there's much to gain but maybe I didn't realise the midfield situation was as bad as it is.
- Oct 2, 2010
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With Crouch and Ross finished, our midfield situation is dire. Marshall was basically playing as a mid most weeks since it was our only way of winning the ball.
Macrae's inclusion should be huge to take some pressure off Steele.
Given how we went with a putrid midfield for the first half of the year (with Crouch, Clark and Dow all unavailable pretty much that whole time- and they would presumably have been 3 of our preferred main 4) and then just a serviceable one in the second half- resulting in 11 wins, and 6 losses by 10 points or less (including 5 to teams who made finals)- it will be interesting to see how we go next year, with Macrae added to said midfield, and Phillipou potentially ready to explode in there (if his end to the season is anything to go by).
Steele, Macrae, Phillipou, Clark, Dow, Windhager would be light years better than what we had in there in the first half of the year, and potentially a lot better than what we had in there for most of the 2nd half as well (when we were top 6 on the form ladder from R12).
Lack of speed in there a concern though (outside of Dow and Windy).
Steele, Macrae, Phillipou, Clark, Dow, Windhager would be light years better than what we had in there in the first half of the year, and potentially a lot better than what we had in there for most of the 2nd half as well (when we were top 6 on the form ladder from R12).
Lack of speed in there a concern though (outside of Dow and Windy).
I think we will see Wilson used a bit more inside over the next couple of years too which will add some speed.
- Oct 2, 2010
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Another bonus will be being able to keep Sinclair at half back. We are much more damaging with him there.
Speed could be a worry but we might rotate Henry through the middle as well to get someone else with some speed round the ball.
Sinclair and maybe even Wangmil other potential options. And eventually Garcia.
I hope we’re backing up the truck next year for Finn Callaghan. Enormous unit with speed and a piercing left foot and grew up in our area. Isn’t getting the midfield minutes that he ought to be.
Back off buster, he’s ours!Callaghan was a dogs supporter growing up
Oh yeah, it is.
There are glimpses of potential: Windhager's shutdown jobs before injury, Phillipou's form after returning from him demoting himself to the twos (better in the centre than HF imo), some early-season Henry performances (could go either way between centre and HF).
But otherwise, we spent most of the year getting absolutely pantsed in the midfield which was only being papered over by Marshall picking up stats by taking the ball out of the ruck to dump clearances himself and our elite HB line and good/great backline overall fixing things after we lose a clearance. Mids our worst line by far this year.
Not sure every Saints fan will agree or place as much importance on him, but I honestly think our mid structure completely broke down when Crouch broke down. Outside fans will laugh at being reliant on Brad Crouch, but his inside work in the last two years was quietly elite - averaged over 27 touches a game (more than Sinclair avg. this year), just on 12 cont. possessions a game, decent tackle and clearance numbers, played every game in 23 and only 1 game this year. Yeah some games were accumulation, but others were BOG performances. Without that to support Steele and feed the outside we honestly looked lost. Add Steele seemingly not being 100% all year and we were absolutely dismal in a number of key games.
Macrae as a Crouch replacement is exactly what we need, and even if Crouch somehow gets the Rey Mysterio stem cell treatment and bounces back better than Jesus, Macrae is still an upgrade over Seb Ross and lets us develop Mattaes, Wilson, Windy, Garcia, hopefully get Dow on the right track and maybe even get Mitchito into a more central position.
Snuffaluphagus
Brownlow Medallist
- Sep 10, 2015
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I blame The Boss for hiding the issues as well as he has. For all his faults, few can get as much out of nothing as he can.
Absolutely, another polarising figure but last year's run was comical proof of this - 6th with a team cobbled together in a cave with a box of scraps. An injury list miles long. A dude picked up SPP after two training sessions becoming a cult hero. it was a joke
Edit: anyway to get back on track and avoid deletion, I reckon this gets done easy and is a win-win
- Mar 19, 2020
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Even when playing the kids they still had Dow/Clark potatoing it up in there. With Ross/Crouch gone too, its quite a few cleared of the deck to just chuck 4 younger players into.
I think the Dogs are happy to get his money off the books. I would have thought one third would be enough to be honest.
Freeing up $2million over 3 years for a guy that was being largely pushed out- or at best played way out of position- is nothing to sneeze at.
You already have a bunch of guys on big coin and Darcy will cost a bomb to re-sign, and then you’ll want money left over to target guys from other clubs.
There’s no way you’d want Macrae on your books on that sort of coin.
Fair enough, time will tell.
I won’t be losing sleep if it costs two 3rd round picks but I can’t see it being any more than that.
I’d be very surprised though if the Dogs were not happy about getting his salary off the books. He’s eating up big money whilst being on the fringe of the best 22.
