Tigerblood said:
I said centre square midfielder. Look, I think Deledio is an awesome player, but his awesomeness has been established everywhere but in the centre square. We are getting into semantics here, but I don't count him as a great midfielder, I count him as a great playmaker off the backline.
I can see where you're coming from TigerBlood but i disagree for the following reasons:-
1) When you talk of mid field - centre square players, ideally you want guys that are going to win the clearance from the middle. In that regard, we're better equipped than almost any side. We have inside mids to burn - Foley (often on the burst), Martin and Cotchin are genuine in and under mids, both very hard to tackle. Tuck - no explanation necessary, and he has a habit of getting a string of clearances when the game is up for grabs in the 3rd and last quarters. Jackson as the nullifier who can also win 20 possessions a game. Grigg who is also good under and has shown he's capable of 30 possessions a game. They are all genuine centre square players. In the cases of Cotchin, Martin, Tuck and Foley - damned hard at it ball winners.
So why second bottom? We had so many new players in the first half of the season that we were always going to struggle to win a game. When we did get on a roll, it came to a halt when we lost Cotchin for 4 weeks, Jackson for 4 weeks, Foley was gone before he got started and Cousins towards he end was on one leg. That left us with a first year player in Martin along side Tuck and then basically putting other guys in that we’d prefer as transition mids outside the centre square.
2) When we talk of mid field players we’re really talking about our flankers as well these days – guys who get possession in transition. Virtually as important as your midfield, is the ability to run it out of defense and deliver it accurately. In our case, we’ve lacked sadly in this area and as a result been hurt on the scoreboard more than any team on turn overs – because we’ve turned it over in our back half. This is why I’m happy to see Lids playing back there. Maybe with some of our recruiting he can be released back into the middle now, but I still don’t mind if he stays back.
If we are any good in 2011, it will be because the likes of Conners and hopefully Farmer kicking on. I have a feeling Batchelor will be fast tracked into this role as well – manning the 3rd tall and providing a spring board from defense. In this regard, Moore may become vulnerable simply because he may be over taken by guys who are better at turning defense into attack.
The mids in transition – Nason who typically played back, but knew when to spread and provide a target out of defense. White did the same but further forward. Morton I think will be pivotal in this role, particularly under pressure as he is so strong in the air. In a pinch you could go to him in a competition and he’ll mark it 7 out of 10 times. Webberly is another that was more important than I think most posters give him credit for – because he knew when to spread and provide that running option.
Edwards is an interesting one in that I don’t consider him a centre square mid, but I feel he needs to follow the lead of Nason and get on his bike and win more uncontested possessions. He came along well last year, but if he was in space more often, he’d go from averaging around 18 possessions to averaging 24 – 26 a game. It’s why he isn’t prolific. He relies on his inside work too much particularly relative to the number of inside mids we already have – in my opinion.
With the additions of Houli and Conca as mids playing most of their footy outside the centre square I like the way our running game is coming together.
All this isn’t to say that guys like Conca, Houli, Edwards and co won’t ever be used in the middle. You’d have to in order to keep rotations up, but predominantly I think the majority of their work and value will be in driving it forward once your inside mids have got it out.
The other obvious thing is this - 12.08am on a Saturday night and i'm on here! I got to get a girl friend!
