We haven’t recruited developed state league players, sure. But is that a weakness like you say, or is it a strategic plan?
A state league player generally has some deficiencies, but can be useful for a defined role that suits their strengths. If we already have mature players on the list to fill these roles, there’s no point getting another role player. The cost of getting a role player is you miss the opportunity to draft a kid with more upside. You also prevent a kid with talent from getting senior game time.
I’m quite happy with the volume of kids we are bringing in. I’m not happy with the amount of opportunities we give these kids. We have a heap of talent in the vfl side and no interest in giving them afl experience.
Guelfi has had the majority of all he senior games given to draftees recently. He’s basically the state league player you were chasing.
I dont know but jagging cheap role players is important. We change coaches so often the whole strategy of what we want or need changes and it all goes out the window
Geelongs rebuild on the fly has been thanks largely to cheaper and astute mature age recruits from both AFL and State leagues.
Kelly, Blicavs, Stewart, Menegola, Henderson, Tuohy, Stanley, SSelwood and now Dahlhaus, Rohan, Ablett and Atkins from their own VFL side.
I think this year we may need to look at bringing in some established and developed mature agers to play specific roles that complement the strengths and especially the weaknesses of our team.
Not saying that we haven’t added in important players, but particularly in our midfield group we need ready-to-go players who complement what we have currently as most of our fringe midfielders possess similar flaws to our core group. We especially need more defensive grunt and more run in that group.
Kelly
Coniglio
Whitfield
Ward
Treloar
Shiel
Smith
Scully
Griffen/Hopper/Taranto
More importantly, how could that midfield not win 5 flags in a row and would any player leave a club that was guaranteed to win 5 flags in a row?
Is that better than the famous WCE midfield?
Would hardly call him an elite endurance athlete and he doesn’t have elite pace or burst power. I’d say he has average pace for a midfielder these days and is made to look a bit quicker because he is surrounded by some genuinely slow mids.
In hindsight it’ll be the best collection of talent ever seen, unfortunately for them they kept losing players every year as they entered their peak and so they were essentially a feeder club providing elite midfielders with finals experience for other clubs enjoy.
The year the Dogs won was their year but they lost out to a more spirited team with half the talent.
Ah, still here with the same criticism based on the same history. This is still the club that has not won a final for 15 years so if you think a win in round 4 against last years bottom 4 team somehow negates that then you are a fool.
not a fool. 2 wins and this thread goes quiet. last week we beat last years prelim finalist, you went quiet then also. this week we beat an undefeated team who were 2nd on the ladder.