How much are we missing Shedder and Lambert?

[Hard Roar Tiger]

We talked up the acquisition of Taranto and Hopper which I still think time will show to be a good decision for the club.

I have barely seen any talk of how the retirements of Shedder and Lambert’s have had on our leadership and richmond way.

IMV, they were the architects of our forward handball game - a way we are continually turning the ball over under pressure.

In fact, it played in the Doggies hands - who are more of a corralling wait for mistake type of pressure team as it gives me more numbers ready to run forward when ball is turned over.

It worries me a little that we don’t appear to have tweaked that part of our game without acknowledging that the 2 players who did it best are no longer there.

We’ve replace Bachar with Rioli, Rance with Balta, Astbury with Tarrant/Miller/Young you could even argue Georgie has been replaced with Jack Graham  so it is easy enough to see the player coming in has a similar role to play.

I just don’t see it in the same way with Lambert or Shedda despite the same game plan and wanted to get thoughts on this one.

[WilliamPowell]

Not sure about Shedda as I think he went a season to long. He was horrible a lot in 2022 but the Shedda pre 2022? Yes missing him big time

Lambert is the one for me,. We missed him last year. For the handful of games he played last year his presence was IMHO instrumental in wins. Leadership, courage etc. I still think if he was fullyvfit going into season 2022 he would have been made captain

BTW Graham, hasn't taken over the George role, Mansell has. Not sold it is working.

I would actually suggest Graham has taken the Lambert role only because of the 2 way gut running between the arcs with the odd venture to the middle

We are currently in a transition phase and I reckon the majority (and I'm one) are losing patience

[TigerLand]

Bang on WP, I hate seeing Graham forward, give him Lambert role 100%

[lamington]

Easily the lambert role. Shedda as well but lambert was always consistently our highest kms covered offensively AND defensively through the midfield. Not to mention he always ran to the right spots racked up really effective possessions and was a fairly decent user of the ball.

Not a surprise that once his body was cooked our ability to play 4 quarters went down the toilet. To me that he lambert role is the most important hole in our system that needs fixing

[georgies31]

Graham no way no has the running capacity of Lambert no way near it.

[Hard Roar Tiger]

Not sure about Shedda as I think he went a season to long. He was horrible a lot in 2022 but the Shedda pre 2022? Yes missing him big time

Lambert is the one for me,. We missed him last year. For the handful of games he played last year his presence was IMHO instrumental in wins. Leadership, courage etc. I still think if he was fullyvfit going into season 2022 he would have been made captain

BTW Graham, hasn't taken over the George role, Mansell has. Not sold it is working.

I would actually suggest Graham has taken the Lambert role only because of the 2 way gut running between the arcs with the odd venture to the middle

We are currently in a transition phase and I reckon the majority (and I'm one) are losing patience

Agreed on Shedda but if we start to look at what has happened from 2021 it can then include Shedda’s gradual diminishing influence with no obvious replacement.

That is what I cannot work out - who has been earmarked to replace those roles as the game plan hasn’t changed and the execution but hand through the midfield is now riddled with turnovers - something both players were masters at helping us to navigate - Shedda was eye of the needle precision within which he handballed through congestion.
That precision is basically gone.