just sack our recruiting department. then ill accept the build. for me, its honestly very hard to believe we’re going to be okay one day whilst dodoro is around
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Correct. And nor would almost any coach without the commitment from the very top that systemic cultural change was required to start this process. Barham taking over the board and reverting to an external review was the big mindset reboot and blueprint required to kickstart this reboot and provide us the necessary drive to create a new pathway out of the past.
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As I said…he has a clear picture for Reid, but definitely not the others.
The way that reads is “we won’t be rushing them back into the side for the sake of it”
He said as much when he was hired.
That was his whole ‘stability’ shtick too.
It is very hard to gauge who Essendon is when we are getting wildly polarising results within a year and from year to year.
‘‘When we get Zach Reid back in our side, we want him back for good. Cox fits into that category too. They won’t play in the early rounds because we’re not going to take a short-term view.’’
Very clear, couldn’t be clearer.
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From various bits and pieces I’ve heard over the years, this may pre-date the Saga, too. The club really did lose its way in so many areas, becoming a parody of what it thought it needed to be.
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What a nothing article.
Only take away is that Dodoro will be gone at some stage, and they’re just waiting for a low key moment. Everything else in the article is what we already knew
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Correct. We don’t have information and don’t have any background or context. Sometimes there’s pressure to play players so they get to minimum games to unlock contract incentives etc. that happened in late 2020 and hamstrung the list management team as an example. So a player was selected in a late season match. Outcome was he wasn’t delisted. Now, nobody knew that but list management and the clubs other internal departments were conflicted. That’s culture.
While that is true, most of us are a bit over excuses.
Our list is average and we have injuries to key young hopefuls, but playing some of the blokes today is just sameold stuff.
Redman Ridley Zerk-Thatcher
Kelly Laverde McGrath
Heppell Merrett Shiel
Durham Weideman Langford
Davey Jones Perkins
Draper Setterfield Parish
Caldwell Phillips Martin Menzie
Heppell, Phillips, Langford and Kelly are definitely not the future. I want to win more than most, but if Scott is to be believed then maybe we should be seeing blokes like Bryan, Massimo, Tex, Voss and Balwin plaaying.
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It’s not really. I read it as before Cox “returns for good” he needs to work on his game and get confidence in his body. There’s no guarantee on any players and Scott would be the first to admit this.
As already stated, he has made it clear he wants to see what we have on the list. Which means he is going to play people you and me might not think are up to it. You also need to have senior players out there in various parts of the field, you can’t just have all young inexperienced players.
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Yep. Playing Hep, Kelly and Phillips is an odd way to sell a rebuild.
Pretty good article. Confirms what many have said, both on and off Blitz (Rohan C, Lloyd etc.). I was one of the “happy clappers” that thought (until the Port game) that maybe we needed to stick with Rutten and we just needed time. It wasn’t until the Lunchtime Pod with Rohan that I began to get some concrete understanding of how poor things were. Scott clearly has a very real view of things. Some of his actions may not meet the “play the kids” optics, but he has a plan. I don’t subscribe to the view that it’s all Dodoro’s fault (although the Shiel etc. trading was off the mark by a long way), and has had a tough draft hand. It is culture and development that was clearly terrible. Hopefully we are finally at the start of something good
PS We are going to need patience…lot of it
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Langford is one of seven players (Draper, Ridley, Merrett, Laverde, Wright and Reid the others) who have a contract at Essendon beyond 2024 at the moment.
Unless either Langford agrees to leave, or Essendon pays him out, he’s at the club until the end of 2026. So he is by default part of the future.
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He doesn’t have to sell it, it’s sold. It is happening whether we like it or not.
And I don’t necessarily think a rebuild for us constitutes playing the kids at all costs. Ours certainly seems much deeper than that, building an environment where the kids can succeed rather than chucking them to the wolves.
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Good way to start one though…because you get to see their value early and pivot early.
This is probably their last chance.
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There also had to be something going on when the last three people have had the same issues. Considering that Murphy did a decent job at Hawthorn.
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Yes and no. You can’t field only a crop of kids that internally you think aren’t ready. By default, the side we play will be young. A few older heads in specific roles isn’t necessarily undermining that. You adapt and reshape as you go.
Phillips selection , to me, suggests that Weid and Jones now need to be the permanent forwards , Weid won’t be the relief ruck as much and Phillips may be the sit-under-the-ball escape clause for the small forwards to work under when not giving Draper a spell.
Voss, Baldwin and Bryan clearly viewed as not quite ready as yet. Cox and Reid definitely not ready yet.
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Great article, but we traded in Setterfield and Weideman this off-season. Being a bit disingenuous there