I’d rather we play an extra small back like McNiece and have Gleeson take the third tall. Hartley and Ambrose in the one back line robs us of too much rebound. Typically it’s small defenders who are torching us, not third talls, and the game is moving towards more mobile forward lines. See Richmond’s success last year where only Riewoldt was typically the lone marking target. Also, we could do with McNiece’s foot skills as the likes of Gleeson, Ambrose and Saad are scrappy kicks, yet best 22 locks.
Well yes, if all forward lines looked like Richmond’s…
They don’t though. Some look like Adelaide’s, or GWS’, or ours.
I’d be happy with a ‘horses for courses’ approach to this, but if we are actually relying on Gleeson to take on genuine marking targets, then the extra small isn’t gonna get much chance to rebound.
I’m on the Hurley / Brown / Ambrose train myself atm. McNeice can force out Bags when the time comes.
Although the last two premierships were won with teams with small, mobile forward lines, both times the team they played against who had been more dominant in the H&A seasons had a traditional forward line structure.
I think you’ll see a lot more teams try to emulate the small forwardline this year though.
I agree about the forgotten man browne. I think Hartleys best is better but brown is really reliable, always does his job. Just thinking he could always swap with hooker as well as he could play both ends. It’s kinda similar to luey v bellchambers. Bellchambers best is much better but luey is consistent and rarely gets beaten.
Gleeson can take lynch, but we’d need Ambrose, Hurley and Brown for Walker, Jenkins and McGovern.
Lobbe will go to the ruck, but based on last year, they moved young Himmleberg into that third tall role, and he looked ok. Either way, they try for three talls, considering Cameron is less of a contested mark threat. I wouldn’t be happy with Gleeson on any of them.
Imagine if, in the final, it was Gleeson on Callum Sinclair instead of Hurley? (Probably couldn’t have done worse, I suppose)
I’ll put the question back to you in another way; what third tall in the league would you give Gleeson a fighting chance at beating?
Edit: And I guess this isn’t the right thread for this. So, something, something, Ben McNeice.
I’d probably match Goddard on someone like McGovern and Gleeson against Himmelberg.
I don’t recall Sinclair taking any contested marks against Hurley, or even getting near him. In fact, their are hardly any contested marks in the modern game. If you manage two a game, you are doing very well. So stopping contested marks is a lower priority than using the ball well out of the back line in my opinion.
Looking at the better teams from last year, we had guys like Rampe and Lever routinely playing as key defenders. We would be conceding a bit in the air with only two genuine tall defenders, but that would be more than offset by the benefit of having good ball users. I don’t trust Hartley or Ambrose with the ball. Then you’ve got butchers in Gleeson and Saad turning it over. Of that lot Hartley is the easy ommision in my opinion.
What’s this stuff about gleeson and saad being butchers? Gleeson is a good kick and saad is a good kick except when his running at a million miles per hour.
You reckon? I like Gleeson and Saad as players and think they’re best 22 locks, but Gleeson struggles to consistently kick drop punts and doesn’t have much penetration in his kicking. Saad is going to excite, and he is a pretty good lock-down player as well, but his kicking looks pretty agricultural to me.
I think gleeson weights his passes well and has good touch on his kicking. Saad i like how it spins low and quick to the target. Happy to disagree, but i think overall their kicking is better than average when not under direct pressure or running really fast.