- Sep 28, 2009
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Smith lost all his speed when he bulked up.
Roast WC Need to do Something About Their Recruiting.
- Thread starter Play by Numbers
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the weekend should be a jolt for a lot of teams.Richmond,Freo,Carlton all going with youth.Yes it is only one loss but there will be more.At the start of the season i had the Eagles 7-11 on the table.Every team winning premierships have a few superstars.Wheres ours??.Where are our excitement machines? Mcgovern? yes!! Who else?.NN was but hes out.Kennedy is a star but not a superstar.Jetta has the goods but i now think we will never get to see it.The Eagles internally were very confident this year and one loss probably wont have dented that very much.The question we must ask is whats the difference in this team from last year?NN out Mitchell in.Has that improved us that much?? I think not.Sheed in Sheed out.Jetta being persevered with for too long.A big influx of youth wont catapult us to the top instantly but we need new blood.francis Watson should be given a gig now!! Want an excitement machine? this kids got it in spades.Dont throw him into a lockdown defensive position,put him in the forward pocket or ar worst on a wing.Jackson Nelson should be playing midfield,hes got the moves; kicks beautifully and sells a mean dummy.Darling and Mckenzie should have been traded possibly Gaff as well.Old big bodied teams struggle in this new style of footy;the Dockers and North found that out the hard way.Priddis or Mitchell? Pick one; Hutchings or Reddan? Pick one.Can anyone make a case for us beating Geelong Sydney GWS Crows Woods or Melbourne away? Gold Coast,Port Hawks and Saints will also be a struggle.Teams started to shut down on Mitchell last year [ why did it take so long ] so with him shutdown we are back to Priddis/Shuey and weve been down that road many a time.And whilst im raving,our recruiting staff took Partington as our first pick.Whenever i watch him he racks up the stats but racks up a fair clanger count as well.
I see this as a long term problem, I suspect it is part of the club culture where its a boy club with not enough new blood or outside scrutiny.
How for example did Woodhouse get a job? This will not be resolved easily.
How for example did Woodhouse get a job? This will not be resolved easily.
Monocle
And the rebuild begins.
- Sep 18, 2003
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You see thats where you are being short sighted because this critique of our recruiting is a valid topic REGARDLESS of the loss.
There are several glaring faults and weaknesses that have be been commented on and to say thats just reactionary to a disappointing loss is just simply brushing over some alarming facts and trends.
You see that in my opinion is one of the Eagles Football Departments short comings.
Its a Mates Club and from the outside looking in not enough analysis and 360 assessment is done.
Nepotism and warm fuzzy central seems like "The Go ".
Its based on the false premise that if you win games all is honky dory in all facets of the Clubs Operations.
Thats the sort of mentality that takes care of the here and now without adequately planning for on going sustained success.
We turn our list over way too slowly and keep list cloggers on the list for way longer than we should and I am not just talking about now / today its been a problem for over a decade .
- Oct 8, 2007
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We won 9 of our last 10 games and lost our best impact player in Nicnat .Some fans seem to forget that . If Nic plays in the EF v Bulldogs we win ..
stream of consciousness at its finest...
No we havnt forgotten.What has been constantly stated even when NN was playing was that he papers over a lot of cracks.He is a one man army,but even with him we lost a GF so taking him out of the equation how can so many people be gung-ho??
- Oct 8, 2007
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- FLO-RIDA , PITBULL ,SEAN PAUL
We had 2 AA players and the Coleman medalist as well but I'm not against blooding young players which I will agree on that Simmo has been negligent on ..
Leaving or waiting for our drAftee to be superstars in WAFL is pointless if they are showing signs of being able to play certain roles than put them on Afl interchange bench and give them experience , by all means drop senior players to send a message ..I'm all for that guys like Masten ,Shepperd ,WellinghAm, Cripps ,Hill ,Lecras Darling and not necessarily the usual suspects in Hutchings,Sheed,Neilson or Jetta ..
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- Jun 11, 2013
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This is the problem that people who are saying its only after one loss dont seem to understand. They arent looking at whats been happening for the last 5 years or so. We have a very weak minded side with a lot of passengers, and have done so for a long time. The fact we rely on a ruckman to be a ruck, as well as a contested mid beast, and clearance machine shows how many people arent doing their jobs up to the required standard to win a premiership. Can anyone honestly say this side looks like it has the desire and hunger to win a Premiership in this current group? Coz to me they're living up to the Coast part of our name and have done for years.
- Sep 8, 2011
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If you play the same spuds, you get the same results. Sometimes development needs AFL game time at a position.
It isn't an over reaction to a loss to reflect that over the last several seasons we have lacked speed, size and class in our midfield, with many mids begin HBF's, or role players at best.
Good team, but not great sadly.
Good team, but not great sadly.
I don't think it's an over reaction either. A 'close away loss at the start of the year' is a positive way of glossing over what happened. It was a poor performance against an average side and the fact that we don't have many obvious replacements to come into the side for those poorly performing is an issue and is a reflection on our youth.
More than that though, the effect of a loss is bigger than what some people seem to be suggesting. If we went into this year thinking we are a premiership chance, there's probably five - six at an absolute maximum - losses that a team from Perth can afford across 22 games. Given our very tough fixture, dropping an early game to Richmond is unacceptable given the other danger games that await:
Port (A)
W. Bulldogs (H)
Essendon (A)
GWS (H)
Geelong (H)
W. Bulldogs (A)
Port (H)
Collingwood (A)
St Kilda (A)
GWS (A)
Adelaide (H)
We probably start at less than 50/50 in all of those based on what we've seen this year. On balance, we will probably win a few of those, but you can see surely that we don't have that much room to drop games outside of these fixtures.
Now if you don't consider us a top four threat (and nor do I at the moment) you should definitely be concerned that our list is clogged with underperforming experienced players and that other than a handful of exceptions, the younger guys available to be brought in are either no good or not ready.
More than that though, the effect of a loss is bigger than what some people seem to be suggesting. If we went into this year thinking we are a premiership chance, there's probably five - six at an absolute maximum - losses that a team from Perth can afford across 22 games. Given our very tough fixture, dropping an early game to Richmond is unacceptable given the other danger games that await:
Port (A)
W. Bulldogs (H)
Essendon (A)
GWS (H)
Geelong (H)
W. Bulldogs (A)
Port (H)
Collingwood (A)
St Kilda (A)
GWS (A)
Adelaide (H)
We probably start at less than 50/50 in all of those based on what we've seen this year. On balance, we will probably win a few of those, but you can see surely that we don't have that much room to drop games outside of these fixtures.
Now if you don't consider us a top four threat (and nor do I at the moment) you should definitely be concerned that our list is clogged with underperforming experienced players and that other than a handful of exceptions, the younger guys available to be brought in are either no good or not ready.
- Sep 8, 2011
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Hopefully those ten spots that were up for grabs pre-season are back on the market
I think given the state of the competition this year (aware it is only early), the only stand out team is Adelaide, the rest are very beatable. Therefore top 4 is certainly attainable.
- Jan 13, 2013
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To what end though? We're not winning the GF with this pedestrian midfield, and it's been the same for the last 5 or 6 years. None of the midfielders we've drafted have come on at all and whether it's the recruiting or the development or a combination of both something is going wrong. The midfield has been our biggest weakness since Kerr's last decent season and nothing we've done in the meantime has been able to address the issue.
A lot can change across the season. We made Adelaide look second rate at the end of last season and now they are the form team of the comp.
- Jan 13, 2013
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I just don't think our midfield is good enough and the players aren't mentally tough enough to win the big games.
I don't think who we've recruited is the main problem - it's the lack of development where we have fallen down. Not sure who the Development Manager is or has been over the last 2-3 years but something has gone wrong. Duggan is a prime example - promised so much when he first came to the Club and played quite well in his first year, but seems to have gone backwards since.
Not sure they've gone the hunger going yet - seem to be in cruise control. Hopefully that can be rectified otherwise the may pay for it by seasons end.
- Jan 13, 2013
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This is true, they just don't seem to be playing with any desire to take the game on, just going through the motions
A bit of leadership wouldn't go astray though. Shuey did try to drag us over the line with his endeavour, but where were the others?
Simmo was just on the radio and said that there wasn't anybody in the 2s knocking the door down to force any changes, although he did admit with the short break there would probably be a couple of changes for Thursday night. Also you mention Le Cras above, but I think he's been fairly consistent so far this year - he kicked 3.4 on Saturday which was more than anybody else kicked. Okay he could have got more goals had he kicked straight, but at least he was thereabouts.
- Jan 13, 2013
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Interesting considering Sheed seemed to have a pretty good game.
Monocle
And the rebuild begins.
- Sep 18, 2003
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Both very valid points and your assessments is spot on.
But it's also additional to who we recruit and our forward planning.
I will give you a couple of examples of where I am coming from.
We don't adequately forward plan and our list management is sub standard. IMO.
Kennedy is going to turn 30 this year and we all know that KPP particularly KPF take 4-5 years to develop and we only have Allen on our list that may be able to fill that role, so there is a shortfall of potential KPF's already on our list
. Kennedy isn't going to be running around for us in four years so to me thats a .Once Cox retired we needed to get a developing ruck man on our list ASAP
, we got Sinkers who was a good cheap option.Once we traded him in the ill fated Jetta trade we needed to take another young ruck man again
.I was pushing that we take Darcy Cameron as a rookie.
He has since had a very good 2016 in the WAFL as a KPF / Ruck Man...... Sydney swooped. Alas the
has bolted.We still didn't take a young ruck man even as a rookie at the last draft yet we re drafted Tunbridge ( who has more than enough chances ) so go figure.
We are hardly short of half backs , but we are desperately in need for another big bodied midfield extractor..... so we draft Tom Gorter and leave Bailey Banfield on the table.
We have kept the likes of Lucas , McGinnity, to but name a few, on our list way longer than we should have.
And don't get me started on another of my hobby horses.......We seem to go out of our way to recruit good citizens before we recruit good leaders and good footballers.
I have no doubt that the Cousin / Chick / Fletcher cluster F*** still to this day casts an ever present dark shadow over our recruiting.
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