Shiel was a A grader before he came to us 
Merrett A Grader - most other club fans would agree
Essendon rose coloured glasses
Parish is A grader on his day,
Martin has the potential.
Wright very close as a KPF.
Shiel if he has a good year probably isn’t that far away too.
Saints don’t have an A-Grader. Steele works hard but he’s not in the elite category. King doesn’t have a proper kicking action or routine, otherwise he would be. None of their kids are developing especially well. No one seems to hit their ceiling as a player, and they don’t have a list which can push into the top six in its lifetime. They remind me a lot of Essendon, except our list is younger and so not confined to the trash heap yet, and we didn’t make the disastrous decision of making Lyon coach. They’ll win spoons again before his tenure is done.
Brad Crouch was the best mid in Adelaide’s grand final team, and statistically he’s slightly better than Shiel over his career (more clearances, contested possessions, tackles)
I would say neither were or are A graders. They both can’t kick
Sos their new list manager rofl
LOL
Reads like a delusional essendon fan
Yep, If Shiel could Kick (goal kicking and passes inside 50), he would be rated a lot higher and be a lot more dangerous.
The HoTA hires the list manager.
I would say Crouch now is nowhere near as good as Crouch then.
somewhat surprised that nobody has gone with SOS THE LIST BOSS yet.
I suspect they will perform worse than in 2022 - Lyon will need a year to get a system of play that will be effective.
I still don’t understand why they sacked Ratten when they did.
It just didn’t make any sense what so ever.
There was no change in the board, no new CEO, etc.
I don’t get what changed between say Round 20 and mid October.
I understand they were in the 8 at the time, but did they expect to beat two of Geelong, Sydney and Brisbane to make the 8?
This is a club that was disappointed with their result last year, yet I think they did exactly what was expected of them. If everything went their way, they could play and lose a final. They had an average year with injuries so they did pretty much just contended for a spot in the bottom two spots of the top 8.
I don’t think Ross is the difference between them being top 4 and missing finals, but I do think he gets a bit more out of this team than other coaches.
Players like Dan Butler, Tim Membery, Steele, Ross, Sinclair and Zach Jones will thrive in a Ross Lyon type style of make the opposition work as hard as possible to score style. But that’ll come at the expense of some of their attacking players. Higgins, King, Mason Wood, Billings and Brad Hill will have to be defensively accountable.
Somewhere between 7th and 12th is about right for them. And if injuries hit, they could slide as far as 14th.
Why did Essendon sack worsfold when they did, or Rutten?
Coaches are magic beans.
Ross will have them 2 or 3 wins better. Won’t actually get them anywhere.
It’s more the timing I’m questioning.
They had re-signed Ratten in the middle of the year. By October they sacked him. For memory, there was no change in the CEO or President.
I’m just surprised that it changed so quickly.
If there was doubt on him, they probably should have acted before North, Essendon and GWS had already completed and announced went through their process of finding a coach.
I just found the timing odd.
I can’t recall of many coaches that didn’t make finals and were sacked in October.
If I had to guess? Ross made the first call.
Soon after realising “the vibe” wasn’t right, at the other clubs interviewing.
Geoff Walsh steps down… family reasons
Time for Vozzo to get to business and welcome Walshy to the Hangar instead
Ahh that’s absolute ■■■■ luck. Poor bloke.