I’m very much troubled by your continued insistence that Brad should see out his 4 year deal, without seeing how he handles 2025.
If he continues making the same bone headed mistakes for another year, he should absolutely get the flick, and I know I’m not alone with this opinion.
Not wanting to chop’n’change coaches again is NOT a good enough reason.
You are making too many excuses for him !
Ok we get a new coach and he gets the same results then what? every time we hire a new coach we are restarting the process
Club will have to fork out another big payout we like wasting money as a club don’t we.
How is the club and team going to form any kind of consistency if we keep changing coaches. no wonder our players continue to struggle when they are dealing with a new coach every 3 years. Merret will be thinking “oh fark this” and leave
I may be in the minority here but the way I see it is Brad was brought in because the board thought we were close they were extremely wrong, but they had a list manager whispering in the ears convincing people that he built the list and everyone else was wrong.
So initially he coached and selected teams to try and get that elusive finals win, now it seems there has been a shift a new list manager in place and an acceptance that youth is the key.
The question will really be does the selection on game day mirror that if not then we have a problem but in the same time I don’t want players gifted games because they are young
In my view it’s less about win loss performance and more about can we see a path forward. As the other poster said. If Brad keeps making the same mistakes in 2025 then his job should be under review. For mine that’s twofold:
If we play all the kids, see improvement in their performance throughout the year and in gamestyle but just can’t get the wins then I’d maintain Brad, if he makes the same confusion decisions in team selection and we don’t see improvement in gamestyle then he should absolutely go. We can’t just give someone free reign with no KPI’s. I would have set KPI’s for him around kid development and game style progression
Pretty sure he does it for argument sake.
I think Brad is safe this year unless we finish bottom 4.
Biggest issue is still instilling our brand.
Fast attacking footy, but also have the slow possession footy to counter momentum changes in games and to have a breather.
Midfield / forward line is where it’s won these days. On paper our midfield is ok, but only middling compared to better clubs need improvement from across the board.
Forward line was a shambles last year. Need Caddy and Kako to come on for us to. E competitive. Plus Langford will be the main target, more pressure in him.
Wright can’t bank on him, if he delivers more than last year will take it. Looks like Tarzan plays like Jane. Think Rutten helped him, Scott not so much.
El-Hawli and Davey need to add some much needed pace to the side. That will come down to selection with Brad.
And therein lies the problem…
If his selections this year are again as head-scratching, obstinate and downright idiotic as they’ve been so far (not just the individuals picked, but in team balance and picking sides to suit conditions) then he’ll have fully deserved close scrutiny coming his way.
Being fearful that a new coach might be a bad coach like Brad or Rutts, is not a good enough reason.
The only question that needs to be answered at the completion of 2025 is…
Is Brad Scott the right man to take us forward ?
3 years of data is enough to make that decision.
As for Merrett, I wish he had have left because he would have netted us 2 Top 10 Picks, and consequently dropped us further down the ladder for a year or 2 to improve further picks.
Yes, he’s one helluva player, but we’re still sh*t with him.
I don’t even think that in itself would make him unsafe.
We could win 8 games and finish 15th. But it’s how we get there. For example, by prioritising the kids and making changes to game plan to address clear flaws etc. it becomes a non-issue. Stick to the same old and there might be some trouble.
Great post, agree with pretty much all of it.
We need a forward line that can win its share of contests, break even in more of the contests that we don’t win, and put enough pressure on the ball coming out to force disposal errors.
Until we have that we will be mid table at best and our backline will look ■■■■■.
Whether 2MP can be part of a forward line that can do that is one of the things I hope we determine pretty early in the season and then move forward.
Lots of questions, not many answers
Can we play Wright, Draper and Bryan in the same team?
Is Wright good enough to make up for his clear limitations on the defensive side?
Do we have two AFL grade small forwards out of Gresham, Kako, Davey?
Where does Perkins play? Jones? Guelfi? Cox?
Is Langford a key forward or a medium forward?
Can Caddy hold down a key forward role this year?
I have zero idea what the ideal mix looks like and I don’t think the coaches do either.
Yeah bottom four with Bryan, Reid, Jones, Cox, Caddy, Tsatas, Kako, Perkins, Roberts, Hobbs and Hayes all playing 11+ games would be very tolerable.
Bottom four with Goldy, Shiel, Wright, Guelfi and Laverde playing most weeks? Cannon.
Where is the report on Richardson doing that? Also, when did he do that?
So, the team was very poor except the period we were coming out of our first (smallish) rebuild and before the Saga cooked us…
So, we did draft alright and develop across that period, to get a team you say was performing well?
Given I explicitly stated I’m running off public information, and what has been publicly written about versus what hasn’t, please don’t make things up.
No point continuing this if you’re just going to misrepresent what I said.
At the end of the day i dont think the club will be moving on the coach they are 100% behind him they gave him full controll to try and fix the club.
You heard Barham stability and unity moving on the coach goes aginst that.
You could be right in terms of Barham honouring the initial 4 year deal.
I’m not interested in this notion of stability, if we’re still caca with no measurable indicators of improvement.
I think they will honour his 4 year contract. come at the end of 2026 they can decide if they continue with Brad or not.
I have my concerns about Brad. His recent statement that the Stringer trade was a great thing for both clubs. More likely a great win only for GWS. How could pick 53 for someone who kicked 42 goals be a great outcome.
Look at the stats for pick 53 and see how many make it, let alone be someone who can kick that amount of goals on a regular basis.
I have watched all of the highlights from games from last season and Stringer clearly was the difference between winning and losing In many of the games.
it is also rubbish that Stringer was not defending . Have a look at the game highlights.
The win for us can potentially be the development opportunity for other players and a better balanced forward line. Having Jake Stringer drag us over the line in a few games a year just inflates our position and delays a much needed rebuild.
We wanted to get younger and play a more balanced forwardline.
Jake wanted 2 years, and if we granted it, we’d be obliged to play him because he’s still a decent footballer.
It’s a Win/Win trade.