NAB 4 Vs Kangaroos @ Craigieburn

[Glasgow Hawk]

Rioli will be right for round 1.. right?

I don't know!!, But Lake will be won't he??

 

[Hodginator]

If Lake doesn't make round 1, it would bring me great joy to see Spangher stand up and ease some of the pressure in the backline and rip the Cats a new one.

 

[WWSD]

If Lake doesn't make round 1, it would bring me great joy to see Spangher stand up and ease some of the pressure in the backline and rip the Cats a new one.

Or we could play Spangher up forward along with Buddy and Gunston, while Roughead play's full back replacing Lake. Thoughts?

 

[Hodge is God]

I don't know!!, But Lake will be won't he??

We've got like two weeks until our first game.

They'll be right, I think.

 

[Hodginator]

Or we could play Spangher up forward along with Buddy and Gunston, while Roughead play's full back replacing Lake. Thoughts?

Yes, I thought of that after I made that post. Not a terrible idea. Spangher looks comfortable up forward and putting him up forward in place of Roughy still leaves the Cats with the same accountability as it would with Roughy there.

 

[cryptor]

FB: Guerra ... Gibson ... Stratton

HB: Burgoyne ... Schoenmakers ... Birchall

C: Savage ... Mitchell ... Smith

HF: Gunston ... Franklin ... Lewis

FF: Breust ... Roughead ... Hill

Foll: Hale ... Sewell ... Shiels

Bench: Simpkin ... Grimley ... Anderson

Subs: Puopolo ... Cheney ... Ellis ... Spangher ... Bailey ... Duryea


Who exactly starts on the bench or is a sub is the tricky part to pick. The starting 18 on field I'm fairly confident is the best we have from that list with perhaps only Savage swapped with one of Simpkin or Anderson on the bench.

 

[MrFujiMoto]

Evvvvaaaannnnnssssssss... where are Rioli and Lake??? Have you put them somewhere safe in the Ricoh centre and can't remember where you put them???

Edit: Good signs for both Hill and Anderson. To be named in a squad that strong would be great for their confidence, especially Anderson. Well done Jed.

 

[Collins-Langford-Ayres]

Very good squad.

Understand that if Cyril badly rolled his ankle, they'd be erring on the side of ensuring it is completely fixed, otherwise he'll have to carry it through the entire season.

Lake out with a "tight calf" for 3 weeks? Geez, how soft are these Western Bulldogs blokes?

 

[Madhawknut]

Yeah, what is Madhawknut talking about???? Mark Evans said he had calf tightmess and would be right to go in a wee.... wait.. what...

So what's up with Lake?

 

[tommyk72]

Pleased with Grimley still being in. Definitely an indication of how far ahead of lowden he is now. Not even sharing the praccys.

 

[hawka4eva]

Im pretty concerned about Lake, he will probably have the big Hawkins gig round 1 with half a game in February under his belt. The club may play Schoey on Hawkins now & shift Lake over to Pods. If he even gets up.
Cyril is different as i feel he will just come in & be his normal self in round 1. He'll be ok. Lake as a 31 year old is more of a concern for mine.

 

[Baz_hawk]

If Lake has actually torn his calf then he'd be looking at 4-6 weeks tops. should be right to go round 1. That being said, I suspect the club has followed up on his tightness complaint and probably found a slight tear so are managing him to be fit for round 1. Not worth risking him if there's even a chance he could do a full blown tear

 

[spudmaster]

So what's up with Lake?

His water level!

 

[savagelunchbox]

His water level!

EFA

 

[eldorado]

Nice work from Spud and Lunchbox

 

[spudmaster]

EFA

Haha, touche

 

[Agent Smith]

Im pretty concerned about Lake, he will probably have the big Hawkins gig round 1 with half a game in February under his belt. The club may play Schoey on Hawkins now & shift Lake over to Pods. If he even gets up.

Even more of a concern is the backline hasn't had much of a chance to gel together under proper match conditions. I guess they'll have to learn each others idiosyncrasies on the run.

I've always liked that word 'idiosyncrasies'... so rarely have an opportunity to use it in a sentence.

 

[Deleted member 98541]

Our boards tipping we'll give that dark day in Launnie a run for its money, "Buddy's 13 could end up 20". It's the weakest squad I've seen on paper, the coach is going Full Experimentation in this one. Strange because had we got up against Geelong we probably would've gone best 22 to try take out the NAB.

"The AFL has given us the option not to play at all. We've chosen to play because we want to get some game-time and expose some young players against a very good Hawthorn side.

"This game will absolutely be about giving young guys an opportunity, giving guys who are pushing and on the cusp of our Round 1 side a chance to impress, but that's our priority; it's not to field about our best side, or a dress rehearsal for Round 1.

"The priority is to get some game-time into select players, but also to give the guys on the fringe a chance."

No injuries, that's all.

 

[Ram-Man]

If only it were Jennifer.

 

[Steven Tyler]

Most teams go experimental during Nab cup, look at us all through this series
Results are not important, including this match
Just because we have a strong squad doesn't mean we go full throttle
Roles were reversed for us last week v Tigers, they had a near full strength team and we had around 10 players out
They beat us after the siren by a point!
Match fitness and getting bumped around is all coaches are after in practise matches

 

[PenAndPaper]

Or we could play Spangher up forward along with Buddy and Gunston, while Roughead play's full back replacing Lake. Thoughts?

No, we don't need Rughie down back. He is way too useful a forward. We simply just need to play him permanent forward this year with Buddy and Gunston doing some work up the ground. We need to start making other teams change their side to try and cope with ours and stop changing ours to try and cope with theirs

 

[Collins-Langford-Ayres]

Pleased with Grimley still being in. Definitely an indication of how far ahead of lowden he is now. Not even sharing the praccys.

Am not sure that's the inference that should be made from the team selection.

From what I can tell, Lowden's getting full games at BH, Grimley is getting cameos in the NAB Cup. I'd suggest Lowden is being groomed to be ready for Round 1 if he is needed.

Just my two cents though.

 

[Spursfan]

No, we don't need Rughie down back. He is way too useful a forward. We simply just need to play him permanent forward this year with Buddy and Gunston doing some work up the ground. We need to start making other teams change their side to try and cope with ours and stop changing ours to try and cope with theirs

Agree whole heartedly, in fact I'd want to see buddy and rough playing a combination of FF/CHF together. I've seen Buddy kick 5 plenty of times and some people say he's had a bad game , 2 or 3 times a year an oppostion forward kicks a bag (?? 4 or 5goals) and people want to completely reshuffle the whole side.

 

[tommyk72]

Fai

Am not sure that's the inference that should be made from the team selection.

From what I can tell, Lowden's getting full games at BH, Grimley is getting cameos in the NAB Cup. I'd suggest Lowden is being groomed to be ready for Round 1 if he is needed.

Just my two cents though.

Fair call. I haven't seen any games on tv or otherwise this pre-season. Just seems like Grimley has had a couple of games with good impact, whereas Lowden has been shotdown for a sub-par effort in the 2's. My take from the feedback i've heard is that neither will play round 1, or probably any games outside of bottom 4 clubs (barring injury). And the first one to get an opportunity to play in those circumstances will be Grimley. But that's only my speculation!

 

[BlackByrd]

Am not sure that's the inference that should be made from the team selection.



From what I can tell, Lowden's getting full games at BH, Grimley is getting cameos in the NAB Cup. I'd suggest Lowden is being groomed to be ready for Round 1 if he is needed.

Just my two cents though.

I'd be surprised if we saw either of them before Round 8 given our opposition in the early stages of the season (not to mention the quality of ruckman we're up against).That being said, I believe Grimley has jumped ahead of Lowden at this stage of the season. Has looked good in his NAB cup games so far and taken his opportunity well. However round 8 is a fair way away, and both players (plus Bailey & Ceglar) are all competing against one another for Hale's position. Hopefully we'll see them all play some quality football down at Box Hill so the coaches will have a dilemma on their hands!