What a gun this guy is.
Unfortunately I think at some point his spot will be taken by one of Francis, Gleeson, Ridley.
HOWEVER. If Baguley does not go on next year, and I think it’s 50/50 at this stage, I would consider playing Dea in the defensive half forward role. I think every premiership team needs that psycho HFF who is just hard as a cats head and will do a job on the attacking HBF’s.
He’d have watched this game wondering how he got dropped. We were crying out for mobile defenders who could match them in the air. Terrible decision to drop him.
200% agree on this.
Obviously the coach thought McNiece would be a better match up to the quick Pie forwards. Now we know it didn’t work and Dea would have been more than handy down back. Hopefully (surely) he is straight back in next week
Except it did work. Thomas did nothing.
Mcneice did a good job.
Sea comes straight in for Ambrose
Comes staright back in
True - perhaps I am underestimating McNiece’s role in stopping his direct opponent which after all is a defenders first priority. I just think we missed Dea’s Intercept work today and he should be back in.
But I want Francis in as well - can’t I have it all!
Does anyone really think that McNeice is that much quicker than Dea, if at all? Wouldn’t be much in it, I reckon.
McNeice would have him for disposal (but even then, I think that his kicking is incredibly overrated on here) but dropping a bloke who’s in good form was always a dicey decision.
my goodness this guy leaves a gigantic medium sized defender hole in our team
can actually defend a marking player
Our second half problem of not being able to defend Degoey when he went forward was that the best physical matchup we had was Hurley. Degoey is a big (191cm), very mobile and skillful player.
Dea, as an experienced and strong bodied defender, while much shorter, would have been our best chance. I think many of us were gobsmacked when Ben McNeice was picked over Dea. As the game played out, our worst fears were confirmed. A classic ‘Lost at selection’ scenario.
Ambrose would have been playing on DeGoey but did his hammy.
So not lost at selection at all.
On running ability far better match up than Dea.
Someone in one of the other threads questioned our selection policy over the whole year, not just this game. It’s hard to disagree with them - it has ranged from the puzzling and odd to the outright bizarre and wrong. Replacing Dea with McNeice was head-scratching in the first place. By the time you added Jake Long to the mix, we all of a sudden had two C-graders (at best) in the team for our biggest game of the season.
Frustrating doesn’t even begin to cover it…
Ambrose going down early and not having the chance to stop De Goey was all because Dea wasn’t selected, that is what Blitz has declared.
We set ourselves up to lose the game, almost at the selection table.
Agree. Ambrose would have played on Degoey when he was forward and not in the midfield. With Ambrose injured though, Buckley saw a lack of an appropriate matchup and moved Degoey forward and he was very difficult to contain. Dea would have given us more options and considering his form of late, I couldn’t understand why he was relegated to bring in two fairly standard reserves players, McNeice and Long. Having said that, Long was pretty good and Josh Thomas’s numbers weren’t huge, so it could be argued McNeice did his job too. However, I believe the team would have been better served with Dea down back.
Another good game.
Dea is no longer ‘depth’
Has passed Ambrose imo
“Yes he is.” Worsfold probably.