- Banned
- #26
While I understand you attend very few games, surely you aren't suggesting that McKinley was actually starting games at high half forward or out on a flank???
McKinley started the vast majority of the games he played close to the goalsquare ... surely you noticed that?
Are you actually suggesting that the Eagles were lining him up out on a flank to allow Lecca to start at FF??? Well, lets be honest, you are .... which makes any actual informed debate impossible ...
McKinley is not suffering because of LeCras because they play different roles. The issue for McKinley is that he often attracts a running half back type as his opponent (regardless of where he starts) BECAUSE they can run off him AND because he can't exploit them in the air because of his relative dwarfism .... his innate goal and positioning sense is his strength - as I said he is a natural forward - the jury remains out on whether he will become a long term player - and this has nothing to do with Lecca .. at all ... clear enough??
And just in case it isn't, I have consistently argued that McKinley is simply a lead and mark FF - thats what he is but he is undersized in that role and needs to add strings to his bow to survive long term... its interesting that he rarely enters the FF debate (i.e. who should be our FF this year) and yet when debating our forward line carrying too many "talls", McKinley is often quoted as one of the marking "talls"... He is a player with talent who may yet make it but your assertion that he was played out of position or away from the FF area last year belies both a lack of understanding of our forward structure and a lack of attendance at games - how many were you at?
There was, no doubt, occasions when he was further up the ground but in modern forward lines that happens to all players - but efforts to see him become a better defensive player who could hold a running defender were not overly promising and rarely lasted long.
