Thanks. Excellent report. How’s Giles looking?
A reply to: @Zimmer regarding QuoteLink
Thanks. Excellent report. How's Giles looking?
Cooked apparently.
Top notch.
I’ll chime in from the Gladdy Park flank.
Was going to write a little about Langford. He does look the goods: Quick, competitive, Good hands and strong by foot. Spent most of the match simulation in the Ambrose role. Will be interesting to track his development. leading into the NAB cup. Might surprise a few.
Was standing beside Laverde’s family who were genuinely pumped to see their boy out there. At one point someone exclaimed ‘■■■ he’s on Fletcher’. Still looks a little overawed out there But took a nice contested mark against aforementioned 392 gamer.
Edwards’ goal was another tease. For every Jizzz.gif moment there are 1 or 2 face palms. As Jackie mentioned, improve the tank and work on decision making and this kid will shine.
Coondog complained about his back after the soccer match, which wasn’t bad enough to stop him running laps.
Seems to be ALOT of conservative player management in Crowie’s approach. Which may make people nervous, due to a 3rd of the list being absentees. I’ll be worried if we’re still nursing 15 or so in 3 weeks. On the bright side, at least we appear to have some solid depth emerging for the 1st time in aeons.
McKenna progressing well. Slotted a sensationally Crumbed Snap on his left in match sim. Has plenty of tricks in his bag.
Giles looked handy from where I was standing. Was blowing hard after the multi 500s after 90 minutes of intense training, but who wasn’t? Joey was a stand out struggler at this point too!
Gleeson not setting the world on fire. But you’d expect him to hit his straps in time for NAB.
Random thoughts:
Langford was impressive. Good pace, presented to the footy, excellent kicking skills in the scratch match. This continued in a keepings-off type drill where he could spear low passes through traffic and defensively made several intercepts.
Long. Lid firmly on…but… a mid-ball-drop change of mind, regather, baulk and nailed pass at 90 degrees to original direction!? Spare me. Looks a really rounded player, good skills and good understanding.
Joe. Took a mark. Hirdy ran from the boundary yelling “miss this joe and you run a lap”. Goal calmly slotted from 40 out on the angle in tricky wind conditions and a beaming smile at the coach. Lloydy appeared late and put Joe through some goal kicking. Looks much improved.
Kav! It’s not over.
Chappy: in goal kicking drills on “etihad”, the standard from players kicking into a strong cross wind was, frankly, horrible. Except for this fella. Gather the loose balk, two paces to steady, drills it with deceptive ease. Calls it how he sees it too.
Jerrett has clearly added muscle. Looks solid. Modified training though.
Zac. Freak. Over the should 20 meter handball to open player. Precise kick to position for leading players.
Hams and Browney smashed out some huge running meters. Hopefully both can join in the field play shortly.
Laverde. Build wise looks ready to go. Apparently has been training really well, but today he didnt stand out to me. Did show good anticipation in the keepings off though.
Gwilt: not a huge fan of his recruitment …but… he stands up in the contest against bigger bodies and certainly knows what he is doing. I dare say we will be happy to have him at stages, even those of us who scratched our heads.
It was the first training session ive seen this preseason, but i thought the match work was good. Pretty high tempo and some intent on display. Fatigue running seemed a focus, with periods of no interchange being allowed. Presumably a scenario where rotations are getting thin on the ground.
They finished with small groups running laps. Run under a target time, short break, run another. The front group was Stants, Bj, zaka and kav. By repeat lap three, stants had put a gap on the others. He ran under “30” ( presumably 1 minute 30), zaka and kav a couple of seconds over and bj a couple of seconds after them. All were stuffed - except stanton who wandered over to a drink bottle , took a swig and started having shots at goal. Forget the time trial results, this lad is playing with them.
A really good session, i thought, with lots of intensity in match play and some targetted drills in certain area’s.
There was good 20 seconds of hooker going troppo for people to shut down the defence releasing the ball, ended up in a turnover and a hooker goal. (yes hooker was forward).
Im pretty sure in the photo above Jake had just marked the ball and Hurls told him to take his time and calm down about 4 times in a row, just for some context.
Very raw is Jake. Talented but raw.
A reply to: @alex.f.94 regarding QuoteLink
Im pretty sure in the photo above Jake had just marked the ball and Hurls told him to take his time and calm down about 4 times in a row, just for some context.Very raw is Jake. Talented but raw.
I think it was after pig was screaming at kav to kick it.
Thanks. Excellent report. How's Giles looking?
Contesting well but last in all the 400 reps.
A reply to: @saladin regarding QuoteLink
Random thoughts:Long. Lid firmly on…but… a mid-ball-drop change of mind, regather, baulk and nailed pass at 90 degrees to original direction!? Spare me. Looks a really rounded player, good skills and good understanding.
lid now out of the kuiper belt for me
For the Langford watchers, is his frame capable of playing 2015 AFL footy in the senior side?
There has been a lot of hype on laverde already and they both can play the half forward role by the sounds of it.
I am excited to watch the NAB Cup games just to see these young blokes run around.
A reply to: @saladin regarding QuoteLinkRandom thoughts:Long. Lid firmly on…but… a mid-ball-drop change of mind, regather, baulk and nailed pass at 90 degrees to original direction!? Spare me. Looks a really rounded player, good skills and good understanding.
lid now out of the kuiper belt for me
Well theres a surprise… lol
A reply to: @Houli Dooli regarding QuoteLink
For the Langford watchers, is his frame capable of playing 2015 AFL footy in the senior side? There has been a lot of hype on laverde already and they both can play the half forward role by the sounds of it.I am excited to watch the NAB Cup games just to see these young blokes run around.
Yes, Lang and Lav are pretty much the same size if you ask me. Langford might even be a bit stocker in the lower section than Laverde.
A reply to: @Houli Dooli regarding QuoteLink
For the Langford watchers, is his frame capable of playing 2015 AFL footy in the senior side? There has been a lot of hype on laverde already and they both can play the half forward role by the sounds of it. .
i think the next month of Match play will let us know whether Langford is ready to dip his toes in the big pool.
Harvey ear marking him as one to watch lets us know how highly the coaches rate him after his 1st 6 weeks.
I’d expect him to push for a debut in the 2nd half of the year. It’s gonna be a pretty hard team to crack into in 2015.
Great reports! Thank you 
Thanks for the reports guys. Appreciate the efforts
Thanks everyone, love your work.
Laverde is clearly “better built” than Langford in terms of body size and development. But in a sense, thats meaningless and its just a question of whether a particular physique can perform a particular role.
A reply to: @Soft Tissue regarding QuoteLink
A reply to: @Houli Dooli regarding QuoteLinkFor the Langford watchers, is his frame capable of playing 2015 AFL footy in the senior side? There has been a lot of hype on laverde already and they both can play the half forward role by the sounds of it. .i think the next month of Match play will let us know whether Langford is ready to dip his toes in the big pool.
Harvey ear marking him as one to watch lets us know how highly the coaches rate him after his 1st 6 weeks.
I’d expect him to push for a debut in the 2nd half of the year. It’s gonna be a pretty hard team to crack into in 2015.
Nah, I’m sure your username will open up a few opportunities.
Hows he Melk shaping? If he thought he had competition in the midfield last year, its only going to be more difficult in 2015.