Training Official Essendon Preseason Thread

[ant555]

I seem to remember Dawson being talked up as a potential CHF at some point in his draft year.

They used him as a lead up forward a lot.

 

[faible]

In the world they are genuinely trying Redman through the midfield, he’s a decent size, good tank, aggressive, good long kick.

There’s some level of traits to work with there.

 

[Old Campaigner]

You need an actual midfielder's instinct to really succeed in the role. Not everyone has that (see: Archie Perkins).

It's probably an open question as to whether or not Redman has it.

 

[eth-dog]

You need an actual midfielder's instinct to really succeed in the role. Not everyone has that (see: Archie Perkins).

It's probably an open question as to whether or not Redman has it.

Whenever he played mid in the VFL early on he looked lost.

 

[weltschmerz]

Here for supercoach reasons - think Archie Roberts goes into the year best 22 and would he be playing off half back?

 

[eth-dog]

Here for supercoach reasons - think Archie Roberts goes into the year best 22 and would he be playing off half back?

Yes

 

[TheUnicorn]

A few posters from Blitz giving the run down on todays session.


JBaller92 said:

Got in at 10am, windy as per usual but a nice enough day for it.
Lads are back to training on the main oval, which has come up nice after resurfacing.
Caldwell some warm up’s with the boys, my God that man is always bronzed to within and inch of life. A true Adonis.
Began running laps.
Duzz leading as always, Clarke, Martin, Caddy trailing him closely on lap 1.
Lual mid pack which is a marked improvement.
Gerryn trailing a way last.
Clarke broke away from the group around lap two, Martin pushed to second, Menzie slid up to 3rd and Duzz seemingly hit the treadmill.
Parish, Wright and Reid did not partake, they ran a few warm ups through the centre square.
Next up was sort hit up to handball receive on the wing.
Very noticeable it was the 1st session back, skills were yuck and timing was off.
Hussein El Ackhar was training with the group. A real nugget, could definitely stand to shed afew kgs, hopefully they dial in on his fitness base this year.
Tsatas kicking looking really sharp in short stab drills. Parish was very scrappy by foot, although it is the 1st session I’ve seen Darcy participate in kicking this summer.
Martin fluffed a few regulation kicks.
Bryan was very clean, moving to nice spots as well.
Clarke moves well and runs better than most, his kicking seems a tad wayward and drops short of the target a lot. Odd as I remember it being fine in the SA champs games (Not unusual for our Clarke’s to find it well but kick poorly)
I chose to go and watch the small forward/defender drills as the team broke up.
Lual, Sheil and Merrett were doing drills as small fwds. Merrett has a real natural knack for forward moving patterns, his intensity really shows. I think he would be better utilised resting forward, we could use the pressure and clean skills.
Shiel and Merrett then threw bibs on and played as backs in a 4x4 in side the arc.
Kako moves totally different to all others in the forward half. He is like Zac 2.0 with his dynamic movement and intensity. (The afl really did us a solid here… nice change).
A set of 2v2 moved to each flank, they worked on winning the ball and moving from halfback and delivering to the other 2v2 on the flank down the wing.
Gresham and Andy vs Alwyn and Prior
Menzie and Lual v Saad and Roberts
Were the groups on the flanks.
Andy looked totally gassed. Roberts and Gresham were bouncy, both did well at lateral movement to buy them a a meter or so space
The next drill was a 1v1 in the pocket where the coach instructed to get the shot off almost instantly.
Andy actually got a few nice snaps in, as did Gresh and Roberts. Prior was probably the best performed defender in this.
I thought Gresham was probably our best performed small for the session. He didn’t miss often (contrast to kicking for goal in 24’).
Menzie was very vanilla and not much to say on him.
Lual pressured well, but he’s to slightly built to break tackles. He doesn’t seem likely imo.
Roberts looks good as an option, he was kicking goals from the wing in the VFL. He just made space and was very accurate.
Prior defended fairly well on smalls during the session, he may well be our new Jake Kelly.
After the main session and everyone walked off, 3 players hung back and spent maybe 10mins going through specific drills
Tsatas did kick to kick with what looked like Rath. He went through basic kicks and worked on stab passes. You could see them discussing mechanics and still tweaking tiny bits.
This work is showing up so far this summer, his kicking has honestly been good.
The other one who was getting drilled (and I mean drilled) was big Sammy.
The coaches ran him ragged! Cloke would body him up for a ball up, he would tap to another coach, they’d tap it in front of Sam.
He’d collect the ground ball and deliver to CHF where martin would recieve it. Sam would be gut running across the square to the opposite side for an outlet, where it felt Martin was instructed to kick to space and make Sam chase it.
They did this over and over till Sam was on jelly legs and fumbly. It was tiring to watch!
It was as expected today, scrappy, clunky at times, and big cobweb blow out. I’m a tas under the weather so todays report may feel flat (as I very well am). So apologies for it being a tad vague




daf said:

Quick overview per player
McGrath - Was on the other side of the field so I didn’t see much of him. Was running strong and got around Lual a couple of times. Didn’t see him miss targets
Draper - Majority of the mullet is gone sadly. He impressed today in the forward drills and the midfield 4 on 4s. He pushed Goldy out of the way a couple of times
Parish - Missed easy kicks which was disappointing but got his fair share of clearances
Langford - Was the best in the forward drills in front of us. High marks, pushing hard on the lead and was clean. Very classy/made it look easy
Tsatas - Thought he also had a good session. Clean with ball in dispute, quick handballs, kicking was fine.
Merrett - Didn’t notice him that much as he was on the other side. I’m sure he would have been perfect
Hobbs - Copped a knee to the head from El-Hawli and stayed down for about 20 seconds. SEH came to check on him a couple of times to apologise but he just was on the floor with his head down and hands on the back of his head. Got up and participated in the next drill with no issues, no medical attention etc. Worked hard in those drills
Shiel - Didn’t see him much/other side of field
Kako - Quick and clean. Kicking goals from the pocket for fun. Had a quick chat with his dad. Isaac has been a bomber fan his whole life and is loving it there. Club invited all the parents the day after the draft and have been very welcoming.
I think he’ll get picked for opening round.
Gresham - Didn’t to anything wrong
Setterfield - Didn’t see
Cox - Ran laps on both fields - didn’t participate in any of the drills
Ridley - Probably BOG for me today. Was amazing in the one on one drills. Hope he stays fit
Lav - Also played well in the one on one drills. Professional
Perkins - Trained with the forwards the whole session. Pushed hard on the lead with great kicking. Came back fit.
Goldy - Clearly the third in line from ruck performance. Came off with about 15 mins to go and did a lap or two at good pace.
Hayes - Didn’t do anything wrong whole session but didn’t stand out in any way. Matched up against Caddy/Jones in a couple of drills.
Gerreyn - TBH i wasn’t 100% sure who some of the new players were. If he was the player i think i was watching than his movement around the ground surprised me (in a good way). Quite agile, good kick and worked the whole session.
2MP - Didn’t participate in any physical drills. Did a bit of kicking to the leading players and missed 20-30% of kicks…
Roberts - Was pretty good. No noticeable mistakes in front of me. Best 22.
Durham - Slightly disappointing session IMO. Parish and Tsatas were better in the middle but overall good.
Jones - Good session - Jumping/marking at highest point, pushing hard on lead etc. Trained with forwards the whole session as well.
Bryan - IMO Draper was better today (and i want Bryan to be our first ruck) but was ok. Really hope he can take the step up.
Prior - Didn’t notice him/didn’t know who he was
Redman - OK session. Worked hard and was clean. Good kicking
Duursma - Don’t think he was in the main drills. Saw him running around with Hussein El Achkar at the end of the session. Maybe coming back from an injury.
Menzie - Scored a couple of nice goals from the pocket. Seeing Kako play makes me notice the deficiencies in Jye’s game. I think there is still a spot for him but needs to play at his best.
Caddy - Great session. Clearly best 22. Same frame as last year. There are some players who train at 80%. He doesn’t. Pushes hard in drills. Sprinted to try and kick a goal with a bouncing ball going to the line. Great hands.
Reid - Really happy with Reidy as well. Again, best 22 when fit.
McKay - didn’t see
Davey - Didn’t notice that much
Lual - I thought he had a good session. Kicking was nice, took a couple of hard kicks on that did come off. Nice/quick ball movement. He does have a light frame/needs to hit the gym a bit.
Guelfi - Didn’t see
Clarke - Trained with the defeners and played well. Wouldn’t be surprised if he gets a game in the first 5-10 rounds.
Martin - Was clean from what I saw. Still with the defenders.
Unwin - Didn’t know.
Visentini - If he was the player i think he was he was also good. Strong hands.
Johnson - Didn’t see
SEW - Clearly best 22… Was great
Nguyen - Didn’t get into any contest work. Didn’t see him train at all
ADW - Didn’t see/know.









CharlieDons

 

[jannissary]

A few posters from Blitz giving the run down on todays session.


JBaller92 said:

Got in at 10am, windy as per usual but a nice enough day for it.
Lads are back to training on the main oval, which has come up nice after resurfacing.
Caldwell some warm up’s with the boys, my God that man is always bronzed to within and inch of life. A true Adonis.
Began running laps.
Duzz leading as always, Clarke, Martin, Caddy trailing him closely on lap 1.
Lual mid pack which is a marked improvement.
Gerryn trailing a way last.
Clarke broke away from the group around lap two, Martin pushed to second, Menzie slid up to 3rd and Duzz seemingly hit the treadmill.
Parish, Wright and Reid did not partake, they ran a few warm ups through the centre square.
Next up was sort hit up to handball receive on the wing.
Very noticeable it was the 1st session back, skills were yuck and timing was off.
Hussein El Ackhar was training with the group. A real nugget, could definitely stand to shed afew kgs, hopefully they dial in on his fitness base this year.
Tsatas kicking looking really sharp in short stab drills. Parish was very scrappy by foot, although it is the 1st session I’ve seen Darcy participate in kicking this summer.
Martin fluffed a few regulation kicks.
Bryan was very clean, moving to nice spots as well.
Clarke moves well and runs better than most, his kicking seems a tad wayward and drops short of the target a lot. Odd as I remember it being fine in the SA champs games (Not unusual for our Clarke’s to find it well but kick poorly)
I chose to go and watch the small forward/defender drills as the team broke up.
Lual, Sheil and Merrett were doing drills as small fwds. Merrett has a real natural knack for forward moving patterns, his intensity really shows. I think he would be better utilised resting forward, we could use the pressure and clean skills.
Shiel and Merrett then threw bibs on and played as backs in a 4x4 in side the arc.
Kako moves totally different to all others in the forward half. He is like Zac 2.0 with his dynamic movement and intensity. (The afl really did us a solid here… nice change).
A set of 2v2 moved to each flank, they worked on winning the ball and moving from halfback and delivering to the other 2v2 on the flank down the wing.
Gresham and Andy vs Alwyn and Prior
Menzie and Lual v Saad and Roberts
Were the groups on the flanks.
Andy looked totally gassed. Roberts and Gresham were bouncy, both did well at lateral movement to buy them a a meter or so space
The next drill was a 1v1 in the pocket where the coach instructed to get the shot off almost instantly.
Andy actually got a few nice snaps in, as did Gresh and Roberts. Prior was probably the best performed defender in this.
I thought Gresham was probably our best performed small for the session. He didn’t miss often (contrast to kicking for goal in 24’).
Menzie was very vanilla and not much to say on him.
Lual pressured well, but he’s to slightly built to break tackles. He doesn’t seem likely imo.
Roberts looks good as an option, he was kicking goals from the wing in the VFL. He just made space and was very accurate.
Prior defended fairly well on smalls during the session, he may well be our new Jake Kelly.
After the main session and everyone walked off, 3 players hung back and spent maybe 10mins going through specific drills
Tsatas did kick to kick with what looked like Rath. He went through basic kicks and worked on stab passes. You could see them discussing mechanics and still tweaking tiny bits.
This work is showing up so far this summer, his kicking has honestly been good.
The other one who was getting drilled (and I mean drilled) was big Sammy.
The coaches ran him ragged! Cloke would body him up for a ball up, he would tap to another coach, they’d tap it in front of Sam.
He’d collect the ground ball and deliver to CHF where martin would recieve it. Sam would be gut running across the square to the opposite side for an outlet, where it felt Martin was instructed to kick to space and make Sam chase it.
They did this over and over till Sam was on jelly legs and fumbly. It was tiring to watch!
It was as expected today, scrappy, clunky at times, and big cobweb blow out. I’m a tas under the weather so todays report may feel flat (as I very well am). So apologies for it being a tad vague




daf said:

Quick overview per player
McGrath - Was on the other side of the field so I didn’t see much of him. Was running strong and got around Lual a couple of times. Didn’t see him miss targets
Draper - Majority of the mullet is gone sadly. He impressed today in the forward drills and the midfield 4 on 4s. He pushed Goldy out of the way a couple of times
Parish - Missed easy kicks which was disappointing but got his fair share of clearances
Langford - Was the best in the forward drills in front of us. High marks, pushing hard on the lead and was clean. Very classy/made it look easy
Tsatas - Thought he also had a good session. Clean with ball in dispute, quick handballs, kicking was fine.
Merrett - Didn’t notice him that much as he was on the other side. I’m sure he would have been perfect
Hobbs - Copped a knee to the head from El-Hawli and stayed down for about 20 seconds. SEH came to check on him a couple of times to apologise but he just was on the floor with his head down and hands on the back of his head. Got up and participated in the next drill with no issues, no medical attention etc. Worked hard in those drills
Shiel - Didn’t see him much/other side of field
Kako - Quick and clean. Kicking goals from the pocket for fun. Had a quick chat with his dad. Isaac has been a bomber fan his whole life and is loving it there. Club invited all the parents the day after the draft and have been very welcoming.
I think he’ll get picked for opening round.
Gresham - Didn’t to anything wrong
Setterfield - Didn’t see
Cox - Ran laps on both fields - didn’t participate in any of the drills
Ridley - Probably BOG for me today. Was amazing in the one on one drills. Hope he stays fit
Lav - Also played well in the one on one drills. Professional
Perkins - Trained with the forwards the whole session. Pushed hard on the lead with great kicking. Came back fit.
Goldy - Clearly the third in line from ruck performance. Came off with about 15 mins to go and did a lap or two at good pace.
Hayes - Didn’t do anything wrong whole session but didn’t stand out in any way. Matched up against Caddy/Jones in a couple of drills.
Gerreyn - TBH i wasn’t 100% sure who some of the new players were. If he was the player i think i was watching than his movement around the ground surprised me (in a good way). Quite agile, good kick and worked the whole session.
2MP - Didn’t participate in any physical drills. Did a bit of kicking to the leading players and missed 20-30% of kicks…
Roberts - Was pretty good. No noticeable mistakes in front of me. Best 22.
Durham - Slightly disappointing session IMO. Parish and Tsatas were better in the middle but overall good.
Jones - Good session - Jumping/marking at highest point, pushing hard on lead etc. Trained with forwards the whole session as well.
Bryan - IMO Draper was better today (and i want Bryan to be our first ruck) but was ok. Really hope he can take the step up.
Prior - Didn’t notice him/didn’t know who he was
Redman - OK session. Worked hard and was clean. Good kicking
Duursma - Don’t think he was in the main drills. Saw him running around with Hussein El Achkar at the end of the session. Maybe coming back from an injury.
Menzie - Scored a couple of nice goals from the pocket. Seeing Kako play makes me notice the deficiencies in Jye’s game. I think there is still a spot for him but needs to play at his best.
Caddy - Great session. Clearly best 22. Same frame as last year. There are some players who train at 80%. He doesn’t. Pushes hard in drills. Sprinted to try and kick a goal with a bouncing ball going to the line. Great hands.
Reid - Really happy with Reidy as well. Again, best 22 when fit.
McKay - didn’t see
Davey - Didn’t notice that much
Lual - I thought he had a good session. Kicking was nice, took a couple of hard kicks on that did come off. Nice/quick ball movement. He does have a light frame/needs to hit the gym a bit.
Guelfi - Didn’t see
Clarke - Trained with the defeners and played well. Wouldn’t be surprised if he gets a game in the first 5-10 rounds.
Martin - Was clean from what I saw. Still with the defenders.
Unwin - Didn’t know.
Visentini - If he was the player i think he was he was also good. Strong hands.
Johnson - Didn’t see
SEW - Clearly best 22… Was great
Nguyen - Didn’t get into any contest work. Didn’t see him train at all
ADW - Didn’t see/know.









CharlieDons
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good to hear that lij's hard work is paying off, even if it's slow.

 

[Kong]

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[TheUnicorn]

good to hear that lij's hard work is paying off, even if it's slow.

He looks to be terrific condition too

 

[MiguelM]

Tsatas looks impressive so far. He is my breakout tip for 2025.

Massive bonus if he could replace Merrett in the middle. I think Merrett could be so much more damaging away from the middle where he has been tagged easily in the past.