#18 Michael Hurley -- now coaching

If he has broken collar bone in the middle 6 weeks, if its the joint ligaments ( eg he popped the joint ) up to 4 wks, if he has broken the collar bone at the joint…season

Worst part about this injury is no more hooker forward…

Pretty sure he will be back promptly if we use our regular surgeon. Top notch and also a Bombers fan.

not necessarily

He may be preserving himself on the bench for the first 3Qtrs to see if we need him in the last.

I’m going to get flamed for this but, if we get Ambrose back in two weeks for the dogs, Francis takes the bit between the teeth as the 3rd tall with Gleeson giving him relief for particular matchups, our defence may actually improve.

Hurls is not our number one stopper, Ambrose is. He and hooker basically have taken it in turns, depending on match ups, to be the third tall. Hurley’s best performances this year have come against medium sized players. I can’t think of a single tall scalp either he or hooker have taken. Between Francis and Gleeson we have some good flexibility and options to run through for the 3rd tall or medium forwards and both are very capable, if not more capable intercept players than Hurley.

I think Hurley routinely slows us down with ball in hand. His decision making is slow and his kicking, which was once very damaging, is simply not what it used to be. I think both Gleeson and Francis have him covered in an attacking sense.

Obviously if Ambrose doesn’t come up or hooker goes down we have a real problem but if they stay fit and Francis can produce a few 2018 games I think we’ll be in good shape. I think Francis will benefit immensely from the job security down back and his confidence will build with every game. He was very important in the last quarter yesterday.

We’ll see…

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Was tracking for another AA this season I reckon

Speedy recoveries fella

Dear Mr Ivan

You are rarely wrong, but this time you are.

Michael Hurley has been dependable and attacking, his strong marking and kicking the ball to advantage has been excellent. You mistake, in my view, slow decision making with tactical positioning.

Like most others, he does make mistakes, but less than any other in defence other than Patrick Ambrose, whose stopping role, needs a Hurley type to be the defence general.

And to be fair, Michael Hurley never shirks a contest, always runs straight and hard at the ball and is strong in supporting team-mates run out of the backline.

While I think that Aaron Francis can move into this role, it will be another season or two before he is as consistent as Hurley

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We can certainly cover the loss of hurls, if he was the only major injury. But we cannot cover belly, joey, smithy & hurls with hepp, raz & hooker all missing or playing injured and our best defensive tall back ambrose out as well.
That’s 8 quality players. Hurls’ injury is another anvil on the camel’s back.

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I can’t see Francis being anything more than the third tall backman. ZERK will Replace Hooker, not sure who will be our Hurley yet.

You aren’t the only one thinking and hoping that this may be true.

There are a couple of things that it does rely on though.

  1. That Francis actually settles into that role. While he is so clearly suited to it, he is such a confidence player that you just never really know. Particularly if he is in form for a couple of weeks and the opposition start targeting him. Can he hold up? I don’t really know.

  2. That Ambrose comes back with a similar level of form as to what he had pre-injury. I have this recollection that he didn’t return to the same standard last time he went down with injury.

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Can’t really argue with any of this save that I think Hurley’s slow decision making with ball in hand is a big part of why we get pinned back at times.

There is certainly an element of looking for the silver lining in my post above. In terms of runs on the board Hurley remains quite clearly ahead of Francis. But what if…

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Early in the 3rd quarter Hurls busted his shoulder. The runner comes on and Hurls yells to Redman/Hooker that he has to leave the ground. The ball goes deep into our end of the ground and he starts running to the bench. Hooker is in defence by himself, the ball is turned over inside our 50 and North rebound very quickly. Hurls is half way to the bench but turns around and runs back to defence to support hooker. He mans up on Brown with a busted shoulder and stays on him until the ball is forced out of bounds and the rest of our defence resets. You can see the pain on his face.

What a f#cking animal! You can see it all happening in the background from when he takes the bump with 17:40 minutes (game time) left in the 3rd.

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When I watched the replay I was really surprised how early in the 3rd the injury was. We basically played the whole second half a man down and hooker had to play against type for the whole half, no wonder he was cramping badly by the end.

I think this was a huge win for the club and the playing group. There has been a resilience on display I haven’t seen for a while.

I also haven’t heard the theme song belted out like that from the stands in a long long time.

@Your_Team may be on to something

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Yeah I was surprised at that on the replay too, and it really highlighted how much Francis stood up.

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Do we have someone on the list with bad wrists?

Himself, Hooker, and Hurley are heart and soul players, fark id like to see these guys involved in a flag for us before the end of there careers.

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Yep. Most deserving players on the list.

Yep and him staying on the ground causes Norf’s I50 to be wide to the boundary and eventually over the boundary. From that throw in we take it the length of the ground to Brown who kicks the goal. Small sacrifices can make big differences.

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