Imo we are miles away from winning a flag.
we are competetive with a lot of sides.
two words, quality and depth. we dont have enough of either.
we are at a stage where we have filled holes and gaps with the appropriate numbers. now we need to upgrade and improve each area with quality and depth.
we also have a lot of development players who have struggled.
an example of the lack of depth is assuming a edwards, petterd, banfield and thomas are not best 22 those four are the only players remaining on the list who have played more than 50 games.
while we are some chance of making the 8 so are 14 other teams one bad run with injury and we wont even be talking finals.
i dont get the impatience at the end of 2009 just about every man and his dog would have taken a finals apperance in 5yrs time. well we are travelling 1 yr in front of where we realistically should have been.
we have gone from imo a perenial cellar dwellar regular bottom 4, to a middling team 5th thru 13th that needs plenty of work to become a genuine contender.
last yr we were a middling team yes we finished 5th on the ladder but i reckon the carlton loss gave us a better indicator of where we were at.
we all complain well most of us complain about the need to drop players from our best 22. players who imo will not get us anywhere.players who let us down regularly in pressure situations and who are limited . we still have too many.
yep atm those players produce a little more than others do. but we dont need em for their age /experience anymore or their bigger bodies we have addressed much of that. we need to continue to put games into players who are more well rounded without the basic deficiencies.
the reality is though, there has not been anyone who has shown enough to displace em. that in itself should tell everyone where we are at.heavily reliant on 16 - 22 players.
the need to improve is great.this is why i argue on here the need to continue playing kids with potential instead of playing barely up to standard players. we still need to get games into younger players with the right attributes to play at the level.
as i said we no longer play total hacks, but we do have plenty who are very deficient and we must upgrade on them. unfortunately to date there has been no players aged 22 and over who have done enough to displace em. maybe the mature intake this yr can provide that competition.
we have 12 juniors. ellis, conca and vlastuin are already established. we need 5 of the remaining 9 lennon, mcdonough,mcbean,elton, mcintosh, arnot, ohanlon, williams and darrou to step up and become regulars and push out some of those deficient glass half fulls. this will take a little time. with only lennon being a first rounder and our history with picks after the first round it could take forever. but imo there is plenty of potential there and a good percentage should make it.
we have 32 players aged 22 or more at the start of the season. its here we have problems still. 16 or more of those 32 have serious questions about longevity. weather it be age, performances to date or chronic weaknesses in their game. its this lot some of whom have been okay that we need to be looking at and attempting to upgrade on imo.
there we go should get us at least to a third page.
