I'm somewhere in the middle with Thomas. I liked his hardness early on but i think his skills and lack of speed became more apparent with every game. A battering ram can be useful in the clinches, but Miles coming in reduced our need for this . Hopefully the extra addition of Lambert will mean that Thomas has to fight it out in the twos.
I agree to an extent, but the problem is that Miles at the hulking figure of 178/79 isn't really a battering ram. He's tough as nails and has balls in spades, but being tough isn't enough. We need players with big bodies and core strength.
Look at blokes like Watson, J Kennedy (Syd) etc. Huge blokes, smash midfields all day. Thomas isn't THAT big and certainly nowhere as good, but his physique is something we need nonetheless.
I agree that we could use a few big bodied mids, but for all intents and purposes Miles plays like a big bodied mid. His clearance and contested possession stats attest to this.
He may not be tall but he's pretty thick through the legs and hips.
hmm so c/ps and clearances are everything .
miles 13 games, 24.38 disposals, 4.31 tackles, 6.62 clearances, 11.15 c/ps.
thomas 13 games, 20.46 disposals, 5.92 tackles, 4 .85 clearances, 9 .31 c/ps. for a rookie pick these stats are sensational. for an inside mid they are very good.
top 7 for disposals, only martin, deledio, miles, cotchin, ellis, jacko, houli had more,
1st for tackles, says it all. it is an area you expect inside mids to have good stats.
4th for clearances. only cotchin miles and jackson had more.
3rd for c/ps. only cotchin and miles in front of him.
what do you want from an inside mid. c/ps, tackles, clearances, and an ability to get a bit of ball. people have the blinkers on when it comes to thomas for a rookie ouick we could not have asked for more yet we got more with miles. imo both were success stories for us.
as long as his out put does not drop away i am happy to have thomas. like tuck as long as he tackles, wins clearances and c/ps, and gets his share of ball i can live with the turnovers as long as hes working on em and they become less and less.
i have often asked, how many deficient players can a side carry i did it with tuck and i now do it with thomas. he has two glaring deficiencies pace but lets face it for an inside player pace is not the be all end all ask anthony miles. the other is his turnovers which is a problem but for me as long as they dont get worse what he delivered in other areas made up for them imo.
overall we suck as a clearance side. we suck as a tackling side, far too many are as soft as butter and cant get much contersted ball for as long as we have al of these types letting us down in these areas i will put up with thomas.
and just to finish people moaning about him wake up to yourselves what do you want a bloke who will have a genuine dip who will always put his head over the ball or the likes of vickery ellis grigg newman oh stuff it you all know the many culprits.
poor old tucky copped exactly the same sort of criticism and i can tell ya all thomas last yr was no worse than tucky he was a very solid contributor who performed a role that very few could.
to finish he was replaced by miles i think he played just 4 of his 13 games after miles came into the team.with the retirement of jackson and even with the rise of miles we seriously lack c/p players which is why the club went and got b ellis and had a good sniff around greenwood, we lack even more big bodied c/p beasts thomas at least has a crack unlike the many weak as pee soft pricks who get a game every week give me thomas over them any day.