lol at revisionism.
Deledio wanted out near the end of his career after twelve fantastic years of service to the footy club. Yet he is treated like a pariah.
One thing i do agree on is he was past his best and his body was failing so we would not have got the best footy out of him with injuries that subsequently happened. its likely he would not have played in the 2017 g/f. Make no mistake though a fit Deldio near his best would have added to any side including us in 2017.
As it panned out he managed just 25 odd games in three years while at gcs. What cannot be denied is just how good he was though. Yet people talk down his career with us.
Even in leaving us he helped us. Here we had a failing body wise nearly 30 yo who got us a first round pick and a third round pick given what panned out not a bad return at all.
He left because and im honest unlike most when it comes to this, like me and like nearly everyone thought after 2016 we were headed to another rebuild of some sort and father time as was proven was catching him fast, he wanted to see if he could get a bit of success before he had to retire. Bloody hell can anyone blame him for wanting out.
Sheesh do people forget the turmoil we were going thru with a shocking year on field, challenges to the board after said poor year and a whole review of the club that saw many go.
I don't begrudge any player leaving for a bit of success and that goes for Deledio as well. Yes surprisingly with a total new system and a different way to play we shocked the whole footy world including most of our own supporters our club by winning a flag the following year.
I don't think if he stayed it would have made a bit of difference either way, It would have been a great way to send a great player out with a flag Yet very shallow stupid people begrudge him this Because he had the temerity to go and look elsewhere.
As for his football ability fmd.
He won
2 best and fairests
r/u twice
3rd twice
4th once
5th 0nce
Was AA twice and made the AA squad three times. Not a lot of players at our club got as heavily tagged as he did either.
To finish there are only 22 players in our history who have won the best and fairest multiple times. This century imo if we did a team he walks into it.