2018 Rd 4: Carlton vs North Melbourne in Hobart

[cookie2]

Agree...Youth also gives you an excuse if you lose,  its easier to sell failure to the poor huddled masses and blame inexperience rather than anything
wrong from the coaches box.
Lets face it we are back to square one shuffling deck chairs on the titanic, the rebuild has hit an iceberg as our senior playing group are not good enough to carry the juniors while they develop and one of the worries when you rebuild is you hope other teams dont improve at the same rate as you but that hasnt been the case. There are no easy games and other teams who we thought we should beat have actually improved more than we thought, teams that should have collapsed into a screaming heap after cycles of success like Hawthorn, Swans etc refuse to die and bottom out.
We have no choice but to continue with youth but it isnt going to be pretty watching and unless Bolton can improve his coaching and planning on game day to make up for our deficiencies its going to be a long couple of seasons ahead with no guarantees..

Yep. I think there may be a good case to bring in an old proven tough and canny warhorse or maybe two, if any are available, as the Lions have done with Hodge. I'll be very interested to see how that works out for them this year. As you say I don't think we have many, if any, of his calibre,

[Lods]

Agree...Youth also gives you an excuse if you lose,  its easier to sell failure to the poor huddled masses and blame inexperience rather than anything
wrong from the coaches box.
Lets face it we are back to square one shuffling deck chairs on the titanic, the rebuild has hit an iceberg as our senior playing group are not good enough to carry the juniors while they develop and one of the worries when you rebuild is you hope other teams dont improve at the same rate as you but that hasnt been the case. There are no easy games and other teams who we thought we should beat have actually improved more than we thought, teams that should have collapsed into a screaming heap after cycles of success like Hawthorn, Swans etc refuse to die and bottom out.
We have no choice but to continue with youth but it isnt going to be pretty watching and unless Bolton can improve his coaching and planning on game day to make up for our deficiencies its going to be a long couple of seasons ahead with no guarantees..

There's the problem....and it's the same problem we've had since 2003-4
Our youngsters don't have the advantage of developing in an environment where senior players provide an example, support and yes... even protection.

They're forced into this "getting games into kids" philosophy.
Fine, great.... if you're getting games alongside a Hodge, Mitchell, Lewis etc
Yep, we have a Cripps and even a Murphy but that's about where it ends for our young mids...and Cripps especially is always under extreme pressure as our main man, so it's hard to provide a lot of aid to the young guys.

So we have a choice...we steer away from the course we've chosen and add some experience or we stick with the youth approach.

If we're going to go down the "games into kids" path I suspect some of them are going to get broken.
The hope is enough make it through unscathed to provide the leadership and support for the next generation.

[LP]

Weitering to have a blinder playing Marchbank's role.

Will O'Shea return to do that role, or will Rowe return and free Weitering up to do that role?

There's the problem....and it's the same problem we've had since 2003-4

If you keep thinking about this you'll come to an ultimate conclusion about certain players, and what effect them being OK periodically has on our playing list! We have some long standing players who excel when some kid comes in an takes the focus allowing the experienced player to be the 2nd fiddle, and posters here give the experienced player votes for being good when he gets a chop out from a child!

[cookie2]

Expecting a win, we can't possible go to 0-4.

Weitering to have a blinder playing Marchbank's role.

Good thought. Hope you're right MBB.

[flyboy77]

Whilst Polson isnt setting the world on fire, we are at a cross roads with him.

Hes on his third year on the list, and from what I saw on friday attempted to apply a lot of pressure, just needs to catch people and tackle them a bit more.

A little more polish and he would have jagged a couple of goals too.

we need to see him operate over a number of games and see what he can and cannot do, and decide whether or not hes worth persisting with as time is running out for him before he graduates to list clogger.

Im not in favour of dropping him particularly whilst the other smalls are not in the team or similarly not performing all that well.  Basically, Lebois form against Collingwood was ominous and hes started to knock on the door for a potential senior birth if our small forwards don't get a wriggle on.

We need to see Polson for a couple more weeks and then figure out whether or not he's worth persisting with because when he exits this team, hes currently first delist off the rank IMHO.  The rest of the blokes on our list have shown they have the ability to compete at AFL level, and have specifics they need to work on.  Polson hasnt shown anything yet.

Yet was not doing much in the 2s in any event? Where's the consistency then with making Big H 'wait' till he's earnt it.

Blokes like Polson are a dime a dozen quite frankly.....blokes like Big H are not. If we're going to lose by playin under ripe kids, play harry FFS.

And finally are we trying to win games or not?

Surely, play Kerridge/Graham - you know what you'll get at minimum. Then if Polson's or Dow's (or O'Brien's) form warrants selection in the 1s they get promoted.
Not rocket science.

[cookie2]

@FB

I think we are definitely trying to win games (not very successfully so far) with the team that we send out, but the selection of that team obviously is more  in line with other agendas. 

[Hubba]

@FB

I think we are definitely trying to win games (not very successfully so far) with the team that we send out, but the selection of that team obviously is more in line with other agendas. 

It is supposed to be a Super Draft this year  . Wouldn't surprise me if we play the kids all season have a terrible year and go deep into the well one more time at the end of the season.

[Thryleon]

Yet was not doing much in the 2s in any event? Where's the consistency then with making Big H 'wait' till he's earnt it.

Blokes like Polson are a dime a dozen quite frankly.....blokes like Big H are not. If we're going to lose by playin under ripe kids, play harry FFS.

And finally are we trying to win games or not?

Surely, play Kerridge/Graham - you know what you'll get at minimum. Then if Polson's or Dow's (or O'Brien's) form warrants selection in the 1s they get promoted.
Not rocket science.

Its a balancing act Fly.  What do we do?  Play Kerridge and Graham, get the wins vs North and a few others, finish 10th, and then come end of season cut Polson after two years on the list and two games and say that we are looking to the future?

Or play Polson now, finish 16th winning a few games less, cut him at the end of the year finding out hes not good enough to compete at this level, and go to the draft with an improved drafting position.

Regarding what you say about Harry, there is a couple of blokes ahead of him keeping out of the team, but you wont find an argument for me as to why he should have played against the Gold Coast (on the flipside, we know Harry can compete at this level, his issue seems to be between the ears, regarding workrate and consistency).  Polsons seem to be making an impact.

[spf]

It is supposed to be a Super Draft this year  . Wouldn't surprise me if we play the kids all season have a terrible year and go deep into the well one more time at the end of the season.

That's not the worst idea, considering that we are already 0-3, history tells you the season is nearly gone already. By round five, if we are 1-4, the season is gone. The North Melbourne game is a real danger for us right now. I only rate us a 50/50 chance here given form and injuries.

We need to know if Polson can play or not, will there be a future? Same with McKay, Kerr and if Jack Silvagni can play another role. Perhaps its now becoming a development year and we need to acknowledge it. I understand with not coming out publicly with that message, players might simply drop their bundle, take on self preservation and performance drops off even further.

[Pratty]

I'd probably go with something like:;

Out - Marchbank (inj), Lamb, Polson
In - O'Shea, Kerridge, Graham

Team v Roos:

B: Mullett, Jones, O'Shea
Hb: Cuningham, Weitering, Simpson
C: Murphy, Cripps, Petrevski-Seton
Hf: Garlett, Plowman, Fisher
F: Wright, C.Curnow, Dow
Foll: Kreuzer, Kennedy
Rov: E.Curnow
I/c: Casboult, Graham, Kerridge, Thomas
Emg: Lamb, McKay, O'Brien, J.Silvagni

*Murphy to tag/keep a close check on Higgins. His job is to become the tackle and defensive aggressor from now IMO.