Good grief
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He aint playing midfield Scott has mentioned that he will puting players in their best spot and not try to shoe horn them into their non preferd posistion
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to paraphrase BDB,
āim gonna play players where they play best and not force defenders and forwards into the midfieldā
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Yep.
Wouldnāt hate seeing him pushed up to a wing, or set up to course through the clearance.
Has he been tried on the wing or through the guts at any point? I canāt remember what his vfl development looked like. Everyone is currently obsessed players spending their entire career in a single position. Iām a fan of seeing what flexibility a good player has. After all, Tippa was a small defender and he turned out to be a serviceable small forward.
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Walla was a forward who they tried to play as a small defender
Redman started in the vfl as a forward, his absolute most value is as a defender, he is not a ball hunter imo
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Ridley, Lav and Redman are all mid sized defenders playing tall. When we push some actual KP sized players into the 22, that creates a really awkward problem. Redman just seems like the most likely to push up the ground.
Redman doesnt play tall. We almost always have 3 or 4 players taller then him in defence.
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No. They wasnāt my point, so Iāll rephrase.
An ideal mix would be Ridley and Laverde playing medium, Hind, Mass and McGrath small and two actual KP sized players filling out the back 7. We are 1 medium player too many.
With Redman dominating the 2km, heās got the fitness to play up the ground. Heās got size that we lack in the middle. It would be great for the team and the player to add strings to his bow.
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On current form you just play Lav on a tall or drop him or Mass for Redman. No need to overcomplicate it and mess with Redmans form.
On displayed form from 2022, Iād be keeping Lav in and dropping Ridley.
He was a shadow of his B&F winning self last year
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Is that because we played Ridley as a lockdown role, so suppressed his talent? I think playing actual KP sized players would free Ridley up to play with more freedom. Itās the main reason Iām after a change, neither Ridley or Lav are playing the role that suits them as we are forcing them to cover our lack of key defenders.
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I dont agree with that.
I think thatās partially it; imo Ridley was at his best when heās been allowed to play 3rd tall, read the flight of the ball, and intercept everything in sight. Him having to play a lockdown KPD makes things awkward. Imo the other part to it is that I donāt think heās been the same player since Hipwood concussed him behind play (wasnāt even cited by the MRO.) Maybe itās due to the change in position, but imo he hasnāt seemed to be putting his body on the line as much as he used to before that.
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With Scott wanting to play players in their proper positions I doubt weāll see Redman moved. Redman is a small who isnāt short.
Out of Redman, Mass, McGrath and Hind I can see Hind being dropped if we want to bring in a 2nd KPD and relegate Laverde to a 3rd tall spot; McGrath can break the lines with his run and isnāt a liability in defence.
But even then I donāt think we have any candidates with Reid going down to fill the 2nd KPD, so I think weāll be playing BZT, Laverde and Ridley as talls with McGrath, Mass, Redman and Hind filling the small roles
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For the coming season I agree with you that looks the likely backline.
But pretend injuries arenāt a factor, what do we need to coach into our 2023 players so they are the best possible overall team in 2024/25. We donāt need to sacrifice development for wins next year.
We can lock our medium players in the backline, then find ourselves with an excess of single role medium defenders in 2024. Or we can give Lav or Redman some gametime up the ground to give them options when the talls push someone out.
I disagree, Neither Ridley or Laverde are attacking enough nor damaging enough
Neither have Redās foot skills or pace, nor the natural instinct to take the game on
Question marks also on Ridleys ācompetitivenessā (in comparison to Red)
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Not Lavs fault that the ball lives in the backline where heās costanly undermaned and under pressure
If he was playing in a team thatās decent at defending he would be one of the best miduim type defenders in the league
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Lav just gets dropped if theres a better option at FB. Problem solved.
FB Mcgrath Hayes Ridley
HB Redman Reid Hind
Mass on the bench.
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Itās likely something like Lav being pushed out. Injuries generally keep 1 player out of the side, so everyone would play a significant number of games through the year.
It does feel like a bit of a waste for the solution to be pushing someone to the vfl instead of upskilling them to play a secondary role.