The most disappointing part of the season so far...

[skeptic]

I genuinely believe we should be 6-0

We had two scrappy wins vs Bris and Coll.
We smashed the hapless Hawks today
A combination of poor kicking for goal and horrendous umpiring cost us wins vs Geel and WCE when we were the better team IMO
Melb... well they won fair and square but we still won 2 quarters of that match and made them look second rate for a while...

Well at least 5-1 then.

We're really close to being a genuine threat IMO... maybe a midfielder or two short.

I was thinking about where the change has come from and IMO what we've done really well the last few weeks compared to before has to do with team balance...
So far this season our structure has been all over the place with ideas that haven't worked
Bruce in the ruck
Too many small forwards
Hickey vs Longer
Too many ball pack midfielders not enough spread

In terms of backline, I think we've nailed it.

Geary, Brown, Webster
Roberton, Carlisle, Newnes

Really good back 6. Brown, Carlisle, Roberton are good in the air
Newnes and Geary play smaller
Webster, Newnes, Roberton give us run
Roberton and Carlisle drift down


I think the forward line works reasonably well too

Billings, Riewoldt, Weller
Gresh, Bruce, Membrey

Three marking targets that can all get off the leash and kick bags
Three players that have excellent pressure and goal smarts
Admittedly Weller is well down on his best though is better than he was and Gresh is inconsistent but we know they have
If Billings learns to kick straight for goal he could go from being an okay player to a great one overnight

Then if course you Dasher who runs through there too and does ok.

The midfield is where it gets tougher
Today we had Steven, Steele, Stevens, Ross, Acres, Sinclair and Montagna run through there
And of course they had help from Billings, Roberton, Newnes, Weller, Dasher etc.

It's a really good mix of ball winning ability, clean disposal and run...

Of the players out of the team pbly Armo is the only real walk up start and he threatens the spots of pbly Dasher, Stevens (though he ain't looking too vulnerable if he can back that up)... and on balance he's pbly most similar to Steele, Ross and Acres though none of them seem under threat at the moment.

Dunstan appears to have really fallen from grace fast... hard to see him get his spot back until he really steps it up or someone really drops their bundle.

Then of course you have the ruck...
Hickey seems to be getting ministered in the taps
Longer not doing enough around the ground
Bruce seems hopleless in the centre and it impacts his game forward
I liked Gilbo in the middle looking to exploit them in run

Not sure what the answer is there.

And the final dilemma seems to be how to fit Paddy back in... I'm loathe to lose a Sinclair or a mid for that matter... hmmm

Big game next week... can't wait to see it happen