RussellEbertHandball
Flick pass expert
Unlike in soccer, aussie rules left footers don't tend to develop their right foot as they get away with not needing to use it in junior grades. In soccer where technical training is more important and kids start as young as 5 or 6 or even if they start at 10 and pay about $3,000 for coaching like the Coerver Coaching clinics named after Dutch coach Wiel Coerver, they have to master kicking with their right foot to progress.
It is better to play your left footers on the right hand side if they dont have a good right foot, as they are usually turning into the middle of the ground and get away with it. As a leftie I played on both sides, but the right hand side was more advantageous.
Watch Hawthorn play and as you are looking from the Hawks back pocket, they usually start from deep in the right hand side back pocket and move the ball to the left with a string of passes from left footers to other left footers and usually end up on the left hand side forward flank. Buddy was unusual that he seemed to be a better kick for goal on the left hand side of the ground, which is a tougher kick for a leftie, than from the right hand side of the ground. Those two great 40-50m goals he kicked against Essendon 6 or 8 years ago where he ran and bounced and left Cale Hooker in his wake, he was on the left hand boundary line and basic physics says they probably shouldnt have been goals. They would have been a lot easier kicks on the right hand boundary. But Buddy is a bit unusual in the way he moves the ball thru the air for a leftie.
The Hawks sometimes play 10, 11 or 12 lefties which is very unusual and its why you will see them do what I described above, at least once in most games. They have/ well had as Mitchell and Lewis have been left, plenty of lefties in the backlines and mid field so that's why its natural for them to move the ball that way from the right hand side to left across the field as they go forwards.
