STARTING 22 FOR 2023 - TOUGH DECISIONS TO BE MADE

[fargothegreat]

Here's my team for Thursday night:

B: Grimes Balta Miller
HB: Rioli Vlastuin Baker
C: Clarke Hopper McIntosh
HF: Mansell Bolton M.Rioli
F: Riewoldt Lynch Martin
R: Nankervis Taranto Prestia
IC: Ryan Broad Cotchin Cumberland
SUB: Dow

I've left out all of the blokes with recent injuries (Short, Pickett, Sonsie, Graham, Ross) aside from Prestia who just has a sore tit. Not interested in taking half-fit players in. Let them build fitness in the VFL.

Might be a little light on for mids, but I think Bolton and Dusty do their best work when they're getting more involved rotating through the middle, and I've got Cotch playing as a permanent mid and Dow as sub to hopefully come in fresh later in the match.

I'd love to see us go in with Miller and Ryan, but I suspect it will be Young and Soldo in those spots when the team comes out.

 

[Area51]

Critter needs to play. If he can beat his opponent as easily as in that practice match teams are going have to put someone decent on him and maybe more than one which will help stretch the defence and give everyone else better opportunities. Particularly if it's dry.

 

[tora tora tora]

I haven't written him off, he would be in my best 22 but playing third tall using his footy smarts to get his goals, much like he did last season.

I wrote him off as a CHF in 2021, when we spent half the games unable to get the ball past the centre line due to having nobody able to compete in the air up the ground. Jack tried but he could no longer launch himself into packs like he used to and can no longer compete against two players like CHF's have to. For some reason that year, Lynch was stationed inside 50 for most of the year. Jack was epic in that regard in 2017-18 but Lynch and getting older means he plays a different role.

Hence Balta was used as a CHF early in the season, when that stopped working Lynch came good and was immense. Jack can still occasionally get up the the wing to help out but was used primarily deep and got most of his goals on the lead or when one on one where he is still hard to beat. His 1%ers were the highest of his career last season, his contested marking 1/3 of Lynch's, which shows he is still working hard but in a different way.

You need 3 talls. I hope Miller remains up fwd. To work his way into the Lynch, Riewoldt system. But has only played a handful of games. I hope they leave him KPF and bring in young. Jeez what happened to bigoa? Debuted last year. Looked ok.
Ryan also has good traits as a KPP. I'd get games into him as priority over Soldo.
I'd like to see if Miller/Ryan can be the JR replacement before we bring a player in.

 

[Moppey]

I would be interested to see

I would be interested in see Cotchin stats based on minutes in the midfield Considering how much time he spent in the midfield his stats would be better than most but that doesn’t mean he was the best midfielder

Rubbish he was easily our second or third best mid last year and it was one of his better seasons for awhile.
Don't have the midfield minutes but Cotchins time on ground minutes is less than a lot of the mids. Prestia is the lowest but his tog is affected by being subbed off 4 times.
The two areas we were critcised in Clearances and contested ball only Prestia averaged more than Cotchin. Without those two it would have been a lot worse than it was a total disaster for us in those areas.

Given we name up to 11 mids every week including wingers and ruckman. Who is a better option than Cotchin. Who has actually outperformed him.
If Cothchin plays to the same level he did last year he will deserve his spot and will add great depth with interchanges.

Last year Prestia, Bolton and Cotchin were our best mids and then there was day light. We got Taranto and Hopper to help those three not replace em.

Imo the list of mids we have ranked in order based on performance last year.
Will put Taranto and Hopper at the top we got them for a reason even though both had injury concerns last year especially Hopper.

Taranto, Hopper, Prestia, Cotchin, Bolton, Baker, Graham, Ross, Short. The tiger boys all played 19 plus games with the exception of Ross with 15.
Then of course Martin and Sonsie who only played a 9 AND 7 games each. Tylar is not at Cotchins level yet and won't be asked to play the type of mid role Cotchin does. It seems Dusty is being played almost exclusively as a fwd.
Imo atm you are taking Cotchin as a mid in front of 5 or 6 of those players, he is comfortably in the team as a mid. It's up to others to show they have gone past him.

 

[Grrr]

Rubbish he was easily our second or third best mid last year and it was one of his better seasons for awhile.
Don't have the midfield minutes but Cotchins time on ground minutes is less than a lot of the mids. Prestia is the lowest but his tog is affected by being subbed off 4 times.
The two areas we were critcised in Clearances and contested ball only Prestia averaged more than Cotchin. Without those two it would have been a lot worse than it was a total disaster for us in those areas.

Given we name up to 11 mids every week including wingers and ruckman. Who is a better option than Cotchin. Who has actually outperformed him.
If Cothchin plays to the same level he did last year he will deserve his spot and will add great depth with interchanges.

Last year Prestia, Bolton and Cotchin were our best mids and then there was day light. We got Taranto and Hopper to help those three not replace em.

Imo the list of mids we have ranked in order based on performance last year.
Will put Taranto and Hopper at the top we got them for a reason even though both had injury concerns last year especially Hopper.

Taranto, Hopper, Prestia, Cotchin, Bolton, Baker, Graham, Ross, Short. The tiger boys all played 19 plus games with the exception of Ross with 15.
Then of course Martin and Sonsie who only played a 9 AND 7 games each. Tylar is not at Cotchins level yet and won't be asked to play the type of mid role Cotchin does. It seems Dusty is being played almost exclusively as a fwd.
Imo atm you are taking Cotchin as a mid in front of 5 or 6 of those players, he is comfortably in the team as a mid. It's up to others to show they have gone past him.

I agree and think Cotchin will benefit from having a stronger midfield around him, but I still think he will play forward at times which might also be good at. Time will tell.

 

[tropicaltiger]

no-brainer for mine we have five footballers playing the four positions and the spare one on the pine-

macca, pickett, vloss, short and dan (5) all play as wingers/half back for the year as mainstays.....

do the sums, 80 minutes match time, each of hard-running plus the spare of those mentioned getting a 5 minute breather each quarter on the pine. and rotate, rinse and repeat...most back flankers/wingers usually run at 77-84% match time as a rule...

broad and ralphy stepping in as well with obvious issues as injury/form and sub tweaks. not leaving blokes like graham, ross, sonz or clarke out either but they can do similar with the part time mid/hf/run with duties.

Baker is a gem and he is The Jewel in our Crown he can play anywhere the situation arises

this leaves 3 or 4 pure backs, 3 or 4 pure mids and 3 or 4 gun forwards to do their stuff.

Sammo, soldo, miller, young, mansell and co ready willing and able when their chance comes.