Who will be delisted and traded?

[NMWBloods]

There's very little evidence to suggest we have any quality in our midfield.

[liz]

Originally posted by NMWBloods
There's very little evidence to suggest we have any quality in our midfield.

We do have two current / recent AA midfielders in our team! That has to be some evidence of quality, does it not?

[NMWBloods]

Originally posted by liz
We do have two current / recent AA midfielders in our team! That has to be some evidence of quality, does it not?

Who? Williams and Kirk?

No question those two are great midfielders, and I'm a huge fan of both of them, however we also need to recognise their weaknesses. Williams is obviously past his peak and Kirk is not a prime offensive midfielder.

[liz]

I am not trying to argue that our midfield is brilliant - merely counteracting your statement that there is"very little evidence to suggest we have any quality in our midfield" (emphasis mine).

[NMWBloods]

But in context, of needing a 'quality' midfielder, that statement is correct. Of course it depends on what 'quality' means, however it in these discussions it has tended to refer to elite (or near) midfielders.

[TheMase]

I think all our midfielders are quite good footballers, and they generally all have very good skills.

What we lack is the person on the bottom of the pack to feed it out to them CLEANLY to enable us to thrust forward.

We probably need another CLASSY ELITE running midfielder to complement them.

Get those two players, and a strong CHB, and I think we are well on our way.

Not all Brisbanes players are stars. But you'd be amazed how good a player can be made to look around the right kind of players.

[Schneiderman]

Originally posted by TheMase
We probably need another CLASSY ELITE running midfielder to complement them.

Get those two players, and a strong CHB, and I think we are well on our way.

Spot on.

One with skilled hands and feet (like Black)

One fleet of foot and full of confidence (like Power)

[liz]

Originally posted by TheMase

Not all Brisbanes players are stars. But you'd be amazed how good a player can be made to look around the right kind of players.

Agree absolutely.

A huge part of the battle is what they believe they can do and what they've been told to do.

Last year we rejoiced in a change of style from the Eade era and this was mostly recognised by the less insular media. Whereas in past years the players headed for the boundary line at all opportunities, they were suddenly playing more down the guts and trying to keep the ball in play. We became renowned as a team able to score a rush of goals. The problem was, we could only do this for periods of games, and were susceptible to rushes of goals kicked against us as well.

This year the change has been discussed at length. We have still shown the odd spurt of goals in a hurry (eg the final q against Carlton, the third q against the Saints at the SCG) but we've seen less of this. In the main we've also been less susceptible to rushes of goals against - the second Kangas and second Saints games being the obvious exceptions. As part of this we've seen the players heading for the boundary line or trying to create stoppages far more than last year.

But essentially it was the same group of players. They were just playing to a different set of objectives / team rules.

Neither style is likely to win a premiership but a fine tuning, a combination of the two, might just be it. That's one of the main challenges for the team over the off-season, I reckon, to find an effective balance between the two now that they know they can do both.

The personnel probably aren't quite right yet but, as the Mase said, the core senior players we have are all pretty decent players and they have shown they are committed and disciplined, able to work to instructions most of the time.

It may be that the introduction of just one or two quality players will be enough to change the mindset enough, to instill confidence in Roos and the players to switch the balance between attack and defence sufficiently to create an offensive improvement right across the board.

[NMWBloods]

Originally posted by TheMase
Not all Brisbanes players are stars. But you'd be amazed how good a player can be made to look around the right kind of players.

Definitely. That's why I think a couple of great midfielders plus maybe a CHB could be enough to make us a challenger within a year or two. Adding (purely for example) some players like Crawford, Bruce and Simmonds into our team for this year or last year would have made a lot of difference. Not only does it add class to our team, but the rest of the team improves - look how good our team looks when Hall or Goodes are firing. Add a couple of class midfielders and how effective will players like Kirk and Bolton et al become.

[Ajn]

Wouldn't be suprised to see stafford come home and as for midfielders, I'm sure that Notting will be high on the list....especially as he is versitile and able to earn a lot more here than at Brisbane (surely 4 premierships will be enough)

[NMWBloods]

Yep - I'd like to see us get Notting. And after 4 flags with Brisbane, maybe he'd like a couple just slightly south...

[ugg]

This article has mentioned a few names:

http://foxsports.news.com.au/story/0,8659,10772100-23211,00.html

including Notting.

[NMWBloods]

Wow - imagine if we could pick up Bruce, Notting and Everitt/Ottens!!

And maybe Simmonds and turn him into a CHB!

[dread and might]

i am a fan of everitt, except of course when he destroys us, however i think hawthorn would want too much for him and he is surely nearing the end of his years at the top. if we got someone like that it would reek of the crows all or nothing one year tilt at the flag. imagine if we had to give up a few youngsters to get him, then he got injured

i do like the sound of bruce and notting, as well as simmonds.

[ugg]

Really, there'd be no chance of us getting Everitt and unless he specifically wanted out of the Hawks, and then every club bar St Kilda would be chasing him. I'm still keen on the idea of Notting, I don't think he would be too pricey (although Lethal might think otherwise) and he would have huge scope for improvement.