Gold Coast
Coach – Stuart Dew
2019 –
Points For – 18th
Points Against – 18th
Top 5 Best and Fairest
- Jarrod Witts
- David Swallow
- Darcy MacPherson
- Jarrod Harbrow
- Brayden Fiorini
2019 Rising Star Noms
Ben King (Round 19)
Ins – Matthew Rowell, Noah Anderson, Sam Flanders, Jeremy Sharp, Jy Farrar, Malcolm Rosas Jr, Brandon Ellis, Hugh Greenwood, Zac Smith,
Outs – Jack Leslie, Jack Martin, Callum Ah Chee, Brayden Crossley, Tom Nicholls, Connor Nutting, Michael Rischitelli, Brad Scheer, Harrison Wigg, Aaron Young
My Prediction
Hard to know what to think with this team. You see the tease of the young talent who are signing on and they definitely have better talent coming in than what they have lost. That being said, last year was the worst we have seen from an AFL team in quite a while, a serious improvement is required to move from atrocious to poor.
Their backline is reasonable on paper but it is hard to know when their midfield just doesn’t cut it. They have to deal with a lot of ball coming in to their opposition. Thompson and Collins are reasonable KPDs without being outstanding and they have reasonable run from Hanley and Harbrow. Hombsch looked like a solid pick up and still has growth left. I think they have the bones of a good back group.
The midfield is the worst in the competition and they have drafted this year to cover it with Anderson and Rowell likely to play a lot of games early in their careers. They traded for Ellis and Greenwood who will give them greater strength over the ball. Swallow is coming off a good season and Fiorini was solid. They never seemed to settle on a best midfield last year and suffered with change. They will still be well below the standard next year but they have at least invested in the future.
Ben King is a hell of a player to build a forward line around. Hopefully for Wright it takes some pressure off him and he can strong some games together and realise his potential. They have reasonable smalls in the forward line with MacPherson finally stringing games together and Rankine and Lukosius likely to have an impact.
Somewhere over the past couple of years, Witts became a quality ruckman and a good player around the game. He has matured and his game just continually seems to be improving. They have brought back Zac Smith but will be hoping they don’t need him. It is too early still to judge Dew but I suspect that another season of being smashed weekly will put the questions around him.
I like the way they are developing but I don’t see enough improvement in them for them to suddenly start winning serious amounts of games. They are rightfully planning for the longer term and I think this year they will likely win more games than last year but not enough to finish anywhere other than eighteenth. Last for mine.