Our Midfield

[Meteoric Rise]

I think what clubs look for today in their development list is different to even 10 years ago. Whereas a guy like Anthony Miles could get a kick, he was a fairly limited "see ball, get ball" mid. If you want one of those, go and pluck a guy like Anthony Dawson from the VFL. He'll go head to head with Tom Mitchell and then you'll understand why one wins a Brownlow medal and the other can't get on a list.

There are 18 players on the field at any given time and a guy needs to be able to play to his strengths and have the game plan cover his weaknesses. That's how flags are won. There is no point drafting (particularly in the first two rounds) for "solid" players. Every club is looking for X-factor. We'll continue to develop a player like RCD until we're certain we've seen his ceiling. If he doesn't have a role at AFL level then he'll be shown the door.

I still have hope, but will try and watch a lot more VFL footy this year so I can form my own opinion.

Very good post. He needs to develop an AFL game. He has clearly had a weakness in defensive aspects and is currently working on those in the VFL rather than trying to “dominate” the lower level. This is all as it should be. Fingers corssed he gets there because we have seen he has some decent weapons.

 

[Drunken Wookie]

Very good post. He needs to develop an AFL game. He has clearly had a weakness in defensive aspects and is currently working on those in the VFL rather than trying to “dominate” the lower level. This is all as it should be. Fingers corssed he gets there because we have seen he has some decent weapons.

I guess my question is why are we focusing on a mids defensive side when he hasn't yet shown he has an offensive side. Defensive discipline can be taught to pretty much any midfielder at any stage of development. Winning contests and regularly finding the pill should be our primary concern with Riley at this stage. Unless he's earmarked to be Graham's understudy, which would be concerning in itself.

 

["The Roar Is Back"]

Martin played round 1 after being drafted and looked like an AFL player from day one. He always spent spells in midfield but at the start his only weakness was his tank. Took a couple of seasons to build his tank to play more midfield.

There were plenty of doubts about the defensive side of his game .
Naish atm is classic example of a player thriving without a high emphasis on defence . Not saying he has got the balance right but he certainly has alot more confidence .

 

[Bird Man]

its a miracle some times we can move the ball through our midfield at times

 

[Daka]

Proof we have the worst midfield in the competition hands down completely toweled up by a rebuilding Crows outfit.

 

[jetbhag]

Proof we have the worst midfield in the competition hands down completely toweled up by a rebuilding Crows outfit.

So true, torched by Ben keys, Sloane and a few other no names

 

[Bojangles17]

So true, torched by Ben keys, Sloane and a few other no names

Staggering but not surprising that we could play so well v WB class midfield and lower our colours tonight , shai and pres so prominent last week both had little impact , Pickett very quiet . Cotch worked hard jack G tries hard neither really hurt the oppo , we really gotta turn some players over in this area ,,,,NOW , sonz , rcd, banks in coming weeks

 

[DustinsGuns]

Bolton is our closest thing to an A grade mid unless Prestia is firing. The fact that Cotchin was our best mid for most of the game really is an indictment on players like Graham who have been around the traps long enough now to have taken the next step.

 

[GastevsBeard]

I'll donate both my balls, and scrotum if you call in within the first 15 mins for Green

 

[mauricerioli]

Won the clearances and had 10 more inside 50`s, I`d be blaming our forward line more than our midfield today.

 

[Muddiemoose]

Won the clearances and had 10 more inside 50`s, I`d be blaming our forward line more than our midfield today.

We are looking alright at centre bounces but we are still getting smashed at stoppages, leaking goals at d50 stoppages and teams seem to kill us when transitioning through the corridor

Don’t think having Kmac out helped tonight
He does a ton of work on that far side wing

 

[Bojangles17]

Won the clearances and had 10 more inside 50`s, I`d be blaming our forward line more than our midfield today.

We need another look at how we go i50 , this daisy chain approach out wide is too slow and favours the flooding defence , guaranteed when ball hits deck our smalls are nowhere near it , later in game baker bobbed up ,,,we need more ,

 

[Noidnadroj]

Proof we have the worst midfield in the competition hands down completely toweled up by a rebuilding Crows outfit.

10 more inside-50’s and won the clearances. The problem is we’ve got multiple problems to fix:

1. Let teams waltz through our supposed ‘press’.

2. Give away free kicks and 50’s … all … the … time . And we know the maggots need zero excuse to blow their whistle against us.

3. Backline can’t defend as a group - not having a settled backline for over 12-months due to injury is killing us I believe.

4. Inconsistent form of the entire team - to go well you need lots of players having ‘career’ years. We’ve probably got Rioli, Broad (both average today) and Bolton playing their best career footy - it’s nowhere near enough. We’ve got lots of other players 23-30yo who have no reason not to be playing their best footy or close to it in 2022 but are nowhere near it.

5. Injuries. Have had nothing even remotely close to our best team on the park since Round 3 2021 when Prestia got injured. We’ve had at least 3 of our best dozen players out every week almost without exception from that game on (some weeks 5+ missing). We are no longer good enough to cover those outs.

6. Umpires. It’s not whingeing, it’s fact. How the same team can have a group of players supposedly more prone to giving away frees for 6+ years is just not possible. I don’t think the umpires are cheats ….I just believe that for whatever strange reason they look as hard as they can to penalise us and turn a blind eye when it’s the other way. So we get very few 50-50 calls and get loads against us. So overall umpires may not get criticised as they’re not getting many 90-10 calls wrong ….. they just err against us in most 50-50’s which adds up to making it much harder to win each week.




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[Tomnat Tigers]

10 more inside-50’s and won the clearances. The problem is we’ve got multiple problems to fix:

1. Let teams waltz through our supposed ‘press’.

2. Give away free kicks and 50’s … all … the … time . And we know the maggots need zero excuse to blow their whistle against us.

3. Backline can’t defend as a group - not having a settled backline for over 12-months due to injury is killing us I believe.

4. Inconsistent form of the entire team - to go well you need lots of players having ‘career’ years. We’ve probably got Rioli, Broad (both average today) and Bolton playing their best career footy - it’s nowhere near enough. We’ve got lots of other players 23-30yo who have no reason not to be playing their best footy or close to it in 2022 but are nowhere near it.

5. Injuries. Have had nothing even remotely close to our best team on the park since Round 3 2021 when Prestia got injured. We’ve had at least 3 of our best dozen players out every week almost without exception from that game on (some weeks 5+ missing). We are no longer good enough to cover those outs.

6. Umpires. It’s not whingeing, it’s fact. How the same team can have a group of players supposedly more prone to giving away frees for 6+ years is just not possible. I don’t think the umpires are cheats ….I just believe that for whatever strange reason they look as hard as they can to penalise us and turn a blind eye when it’s the other way. So we get very few 50-50 calls and get loads against us. So overall umpires may not get criticised as they’re not getting many 90-10 calls wrong ….. they just err against us in most 50-50’s which adds up to making it much harder to win each week.




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Another thing with the massive discrepancy we experience most weeks with free kicks for/against is with the new rules our taxing playing style is harder to maintain once we give away a free kick. We can be perfectly set up behind the ball with lost of pressure on the ball only for a 50/50 decision to go against us and all of a sudden we are out of position and can't defend against it.

 

[59Stanley]

Our mids aren’t clean and panic dispose of the ball massive problems

 

[tigerfan1961]

Our mids aren’t clean and panic dispose of the ball massive problems

But problems that are not insurmountable

 

["The Roar Is Back"]

If not willing to play mids who have been within our system for a few years , Why we didn’t go hard for brodie is bemusing to say the least .

 

[Rioli2Rioli]

If not willing to play mids who have been within our system for a few years , Why we didn’t go hard for brodie is bemusing to say the least .

Brodie had 2 years to run on a $500k contract , He had shown nothing in his games for GC to warrant that type of money with the contracts we have in place

 

[Simche]

Brodie had 2 years to run on a $500k contract , He had shown nothing in his games for GC to warrant that type of money with the contracts we have in place

Agree generally but we used to take a few chances on blokes like Brodie but we've sort of gone off trying to take blokes off other sides like we did in the Grigg/Houli pre-2017 period and seem to be a bit obsessed with picking the Parkers, Lamberts and Picketts out of the VFL/WAFL (Lambert is a fantastic get btw and I'm not suggesting otherwise).

I think guys like Lyons, Keays, Lipinski etc. prove that there are blokes who might not get the opportunity at their club to play the position they play best and are shuffled to the flanks and in and out of the side accordingly, but are terrific footballers when they get the chance. Parish was probably six months and an injury free Dylan Shiel away from being shopped around also. Think our recruiting has to get a bit better at finding these guys in addition to hoping our draft picks come good.

 

[Rioli2Rioli]

Agree generally but we used to take a few chances on blokes like Brodie but we've sort of gone off trying to take blokes off other sides like we did in the Grigg/Houli pre-2017 period and seem to be a bit obsessed with picking the Parkers, Lamberts and Picketts out of the VFL/WAFL (Lambert is a fantastic get btw and I'm not suggesting otherwise).

I think guys like Lyons, Keays, Lipinski etc. prove that there are blokes who might not get the opportunity at their club to play the position they play best and are shuffled to the flanks and in and out of the side accordingly, but are terrific footballers when they get the chance. Parish was probably six months and an injury free Dylan Shiel away from being shopped around also. Think our recruiting has to get a bit better at finding these guys in addition to hoping our draft picks come good.

I dont think we deliberately avoid this but more that we have cap constraints that inhibit us with looking at these options
Im sure things will change in the next 2 years with so many players coming of the list that are on big $$$ like Cotchin , Edwards , Riewoldt , Caddy which is close to $2 mil then we have 2 years of Dusty to go so thats over $3 mil available post 2024.

Lynch contract is the one that is going to bite for a while with 3 more years to run at big money being backended

 

[Meteoric Rise]

Agree generally but we used to take a few chances on blokes like Brodie but we've sort of gone off trying to take blokes off other sides like we did in the Grigg/Houli pre-2017 period and seem to be a bit obsessed with picking the Parkers, Lamberts and Picketts out of the VFL/WAFL (Lambert is a fantastic get btw and I'm not suggesting otherwise).

I think guys like Lyons, Keays, Lipinski etc. prove that there are blokes who might not get the opportunity at their club to play the position they play best and are shuffled to the flanks and in and out of the side accordingly, but are terrific footballers when they get the chance. Parish was probably six months and an injury free Dylan Shiel away from being shopped around also. Think our recruiting has to get a bit better at finding these guys in addition to hoping our draft picks come good.

The cautionary tale for all these types of players is someone like Matt Priddis. Priddis was a plodder in that he wasn’t the most dynamic player or punishing ball user, but he was a good footballer, who even won the 2014 Brownlow Medal. He was a lot better than those type of players you list.

Priddis was a permanent fixture from exactly 2007 to 2017, so had a good long 11 year career essentially, bar the 2 games he played early 2006 as a 21 year old. He played in 240 AFL games.

Why do I raise Priddis? Because his career is amazingly and perfectly bookended by Eagles Premierships in 2006 and 2018 - when he was not in the team.

When he did play in a Grand Final in 2015, Priddis had an ok game, especially his 7 tackles and 16 contested possessions were commendable, but 25 touches with zero goals or goal assists and 2 intercept possessions was never going to cut it against Hodge, Mitchell, Lewis & co.

When Priddis was gone from the Eagles midfield it functioned better in the bigger games. Before he arrived the midfield functioned better in the bigger games. When he played they got beaten in the bigger games. Of course it wasn’t all his fault, but his career is the absolute ceiling for the guys you are listing. And this is why Richmond is not chasing these type of players. The club wants to win flags or build teams that can win flags. Little flaws like weak disposal, lack of footspeed, weak contest, lack of endurance, these type of things can be brutally exposed at times in big games after being unexposed in all other matches.

If we need a player like that to protect promising young mids from being exposed too early, maybe ok, but otherwise, stick with what we have even if it means losing more games.

 

[Simche]

The cautionary tale for all these types of players is someone like Matt Priddis. Priddis was a plodder in that he wasn’t the most dynamic player or punishing ball user, but he was a good footballer, who even won the 2014 Brownlow Medal. He was a lot better than those type of players you list.

Priddis was a permanent fixture from exactly 2007 to 2017, so had a good long 11 year career essentially, bar the 2 games he played early 2006 as a 21 year old. He played in 240 AFL games.

Why do I raise Priddis? Because his career is amazingly and perfectly bookended by Eagles Premierships in 2006 and 2018 - when he was not in the team.

When he did play in a Grand Final in 2015, Priddis had an ok game, especially his 7 tackles and 16 contested possessions were commendable, but 25 touches with zero goals or goal assists and 2 intercept possessions was never going to cut it against Hodge, Mitchell, Lewis & co.

When Priddis was gone from the Eagles midfield it functioned better in the bigger games. Before he arrived the midfield functioned better in the bigger games. When he played they got beaten in the bigger games. Of course it wasn’t all his fault, but his career is the absolute ceiling for the guys you are listing. And this is why Richmond is not chasing these type of players. The club wants to win flags or build teams that can win flags. Little flaws like weak disposal, lack of footspeed, weak contest, lack of endurance, these type of things can be brutally exposed at times in big games after being unexposed in all other matches.

If we need a player like that to protect promising young mids from being exposed too early, maybe ok, but otherwise, stick with what we have even if it means losing more games.

Not quite sure how we got from Keays and Lyons to Priddis. Irrespective of that, I don't agree that what we've got is better than a Matt Priddis. If he was out there at the moment we might not be getting smashed in the midfield most weeks.

I also don't think you can pin the success of the entire team on one bloke. Priddis played his role and excelled, but he played in a predominantly rebuilding West Coast era to begin with and then a pretty successful side that happened to run into a Hawthorn team that will go down with the best ever. They even took a game off the Hawks in the finals from memory, so nothing particularly to have a go at there.

Their midfield 'functioned better' before he got there because it was made up of Cousins, Kerr and Judd. Two went off the rails and the other traded himself to Carlton after forming arguably one of the greatest midfields ever.

Priddis went in 2017 and for the years before then had still played with Yeo, Shuey, Gaff, Sheed et al. and they'd made a Grand Final. Those blokes are still going and hit their peak in 2019 (and arguably wouldn't have won that year if not for a certain American and a bout of gastro), but don't think that's any patch on Priddis. Was an unfairly maligned player given that he filled a role that was not particularly glamorous and always fell below the category of truly elite players.

 

[docko911]

Impossible to judge our midfield until all our midfielders are playing together. Our best game of the year was when we only had two missing, don’t think it was a coincidence.

Round 1 - no Lambert, no McIntosh, a quarter from Prestia
Round 2 - no Lambert, Martin, Prestia
Round 3 - no Lambert, Martin, Prestia
Round 4 - no Lambert, Martin
Round 5 - no Lambert, Martin, McIntosh

 

[DoItForCaptBlood]

Impossible to judge our midfield until all our midfielders are playing together. Our best game of the year was when we only had two missing, don’t think it was a coincidence.

Round 1 - no Lambert, no McIntosh, a quarter from Prestia
Round 2 - no Lambert, Martin, Prestia
Round 3 - no Lambert, Martin, Prestia
Round 4 - no Lambert, Martin
Round 5 - no Lambert, Martin, McIntosh

It's a good point. We are focussed a lot on our ageing players with the losses so far, but we will 'hopefully' see Cotch, Martin, Prestia, Lambo and Bolton as the main onballers, and Macca and Pickett on the wings soon (all game!!). Then we can see if they are still able to dominate a game. If we get a run of games with them all there - we'll get answers to how good the midfield is.

 

[tony__montana]

If not willing to play mids who have been within our system for a few years , Why we didn’t go hard for brodie is bemusing to say the least .

yep and he was on our radar a few years ago