The Elephant in the room

[PaulP]

No farken chance Pauly

No, I guess I let my man love for Cripps get the better of me.

[spf]

More realistic might be Witts from Gold Coast.

[ElwoodBlues1]

More realistic might be Witts from Gold Coast.

Think he signed a 5 year deal till 2024 for good coin and is co captain, that horse has bolted.
Probably should have shown a bit more interest in Preuss given he is wasting his time at Melbourne, type of hombre we need vs Mummy on Sunday.

[JonDorotich]

Let me throw another elephant into the room. Marchbank. Couldn't be more impressed with his Rottingwood game and how he has grown a little taller with his two buddies (Simpson and Newman) missing.

Great call Baggers - good to acknowledge his performance as he’s been a bit of a whipping boy

[flyboy77]

Preuss was taken in the rookie draft....there must be a stack of blokes his size around...just need to look and do due diligence?

Don't need to be the prettiest of players if they're hug and have mongrel?

[northernblue]

Don't need to be the prettiest of players if they're hug and have mongrel?

You big ol softy you ????

????????

[flyboy77]

You big ol softy you ????

????????

:-[

hug should have been big! oops!

[No1inParticular]

It'd take a lot to pry him out of Collingwood.

I reckon whatever Adelaide will offer (is offering) will blow us out of the water (7 year 1mil+/year offer) so we should focus our efforts elsewhere IMO.

And more than likely they'll have a very early draft pick (unfortunately) to help trade negotiations along...

[LP]

Preuss was taken in the rookie draft....there must be a stack of blokes his size around...just need to look and do due diligence?

Don't need to be the prettiest of players if they're hug and have mongrel?

There is a shed load of more traditional Mumford rucks in and around clubs that are targets.

In recent years they feel out of favour with the clubs prefer to recruit athlete types like Phillips and turn them into rucks in the mould of mobile rucks like Blicavs and Kreuzer. A few of us have talked about them in the Mid Season Draft thread, as the gain maturity and endurance they would be more than useful in a role like a Nankervis.

Commentators like Wilson and Browne have no idea when the state there is a dearth of rucks available, they are just talking about TAC Cup types that aren't in the Grundy or Kreuzer grade. Anyway, we've already De Koning in that range, we need an intimidating monster not another cross country runner.

[Lods]

When I started this thread it really wasn't because I thought Cripps was a 'magnificent beast'.

No the "Elephant in the room" is the fact we'd be pretty much f**ked without his presence at this stage of our development.

It's often said a player was a difference between winning and losing.
It's a bit of a throwaway line sometimes, as there are lots of factors in a game.

But I think that you would probably get general agreement that we wouldn't have won the game yesterday without Cripps.
Other players were great contributors...Walsh, Weitering, Ed Curnow, Kreuzer all had very good games.

But Cripps was colossal.

In  junior football you sometimes get that more mature kid who dominates a game.
It was a bit like that.
A man playing with and against a group of kids.

His play not only brought others into the game but enthused the playing group and the supporters.
The young kids developing around him could have no better example.