A great team effort

[JF_Bay22_SCG]

Originally posted by robbieando
To me the most notable thing about all our wins is that we haven't yet played our best football. In each win I have seen areas that need to be improved on. This is a good sign as it means we can only get better

I still have heart attacks whenever Leo Barry starts darting for the half back flank. More often or not he gets caught or has to throw the ball away under pressure.

I have always been critical of the Swans taking the pill too wide, and too short, out of defence. I just thought it was an Eade thing.

Barry is more often than not the main culprit.

Do you think it is a thing Roosey coaches into them too?

JF

[Cheer Cheer]

The most pleasing thing for me is that we can continue introduce / play youngsters and we keep playing well - all the "ins" we had on saturday - okeefe, sunny etc all made really good contributions.

[robbieando]

The youngesters are the BEST thing to come out of the season so far for me. Those who knew nothing about this club though we had no real young talent coming though well they were wrong

[Cheer Cheer]

I think people in the media and in melbourne are starting to recognise our young talent. This is a quote from the sunday herald sun on page one about our win :

"sydney have equal to the best list of improved youngsters in the league"

[NMWBloods]

It's not really that surprising that many in Melbourne missed it beforehand. Some of the players who were just barely in the team are really standing up this year, like J Bolton and Kirk, while others like Schneider were pretty much off the radar screens of most people.

It is fantastic though to see we have a great crop of youngsters coming up (looking forward to seeing Malcescki, Thewlis, and some others come up to the firsts) while our slightly older players are now finally playing some regularly good footy.

[Cheer Cheer]

Dont forget our prize pick of em all - Mcveigh is still yet to play and judging by the draft pick he was taken at should be on "paper" our best youngster of all.

[liz]

On the Ball vs Stafford recruiting scenario, remember that Ball wasn't recruited as a ruckman but as a key forward to enable O'Loughlin and Goodes to play more as flanking forwards. Ball's first season with us was hampered by injury - not as much as 2002 but we didn't get much out of him. And then when Stafford lost it in 2001 Ball was the obvious choice to take over in the ruck. By the end of that season he had shown his worth there and Bazza became available, effectively reducing the need to rely on Ball as the FF. So comparing the relative price paid for Ball and received for Staff isn't straightforward. Also, the draft last year was seen to be the best for years and hence draft picks deemed to be worth more.

Having said that, I reckon we paid well over the odds for Ball, particularly since Weagles reportedly were quite keen on off-loading him.

But its a bit unfair on Ball to judge him against what we paid for him. His injuries haven't been his fault and he's been a good to excellent (2001) contributor when fit.

On Stafford at Richmond, I think he's playing a different role. He does seem to have become a better tap ruckman - he was never that great at it for us, and he's showing himself to be a competent FF. But when he was at his absolute best for us it was his around-the-ground work that often killed the opposition. He doesn't seem to be doing that as much for Richmond, probably because he's spending so much time in the forward line. So while I'd agree that he soundly beat Ball in the ruck on Saturday he didn't really inflict any damage on us around the ground. He had far more impact in games while in the R&W from 1996-1999 and even the odd one early in 2000.