Yeah, that’s right. The only influential Premiership Defender who was super-tall in the last decade or so is Dustin Fletcher, who measure in at around 198cm.
The great Brisbane team had Leppitsch and Michael, both of whom were closer to 190cm. The rest of their taller defensive roles were filled by players like the Scott brothers, Martin Pike and Daryl White, all of whom were closer to tall midfielders. If I remember correctly, White was the tallest and he was around 192.
Port Adelaide had a Wakelin (192cm) at full back and I seem to recall that in their Premiership year, Chad Cornes was the CHB. Bishop at around 196 cm or so was the third tall. The WC and Sydney premiership teams both had smaller key defenders such as Barry (184cm) Bolton (190), Glass (192) Hunter (190). Roberts-Thompson was the only uber-tall defender in those teams.
Now Geelong. Scarlett (192), Harley (191), Milburn (189), Mackie (192), Egan (196) and Taylor (193). The story is similar.
What we can say about these Premiership tall defenders is that that are likely to be around 189 cm to 193 cm but they are heavy and strong. Most of them would weigh somewhere around 90-95 kgs. They are all quick enough to keep up with all-comers on the lead and strong enough to hold their own in the body-on-body stuff. There is no evidence that teams need extra-tall defenders, but plenty to suggest that they need quick talls who are very strong. In fact, the only recent example of an excessively tall defender who has played in a Premiership team in the last 10 years or so is Fletcher. He is tall, wiry, agile, quick but not particularly strong. It does not follow that taller will mean stronger.
Even when you look at the current contenders for Geelong’s crown, the story is the same. They are more likely to be tall running players than out-and-out monsters.
St Kilda: Dawson, Fisher, Gilbert, Goddard, Blake.
Bulldogs: Lake, Morris, Hargrave, Williams when fit.
Collingwood: Presti, O’Brien, Maxwell, Goldsack
Adelaide: Rutten, Bock, Stevens, Otten
Our guys are too light and some of them are not as skilful as their counterparts at other teams. I doubt that replacing them with much taller players will achieve much, unless we can find a couple of Dustin Fletcher “Inspector Gadget” types.
Was right on the money in a lot of cases.
