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You could say it wasn't anight for the big forwards, but JPod did alright, except in the kicking dept.
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Let me try. Big players, wet night, heavy going underfoot. Try picking up a ball at full pace in these circumstances and stay on your feet. If not, try to get up with the ball if you have to get your lumbering frame back up to get going again. And don't even mention that you will also have at least one, maybe a few, of the opposition hanging off your tall frame that are going to stop you from doing just that.
Jesse had Taylor on him (or Jesse was on Taylor, whatever ... ) - Taylor had 6 possessions. If Taylor had been allowed to run free and Jesse hadn't been there (after all, with two possessions, you might as well be playing with 17 men , correct?), Taylor could have hurt us more. It appears to me they kept each other busy in parts of the ground where the ball wasn't. Excellent. A game of football with 17 a side. I have no problem with it.
Johnson, Everitt, Reid, White, Taylor, Mooney, Mackie - all talls on a wet night that didn't add much. But without them there, the scores would be a damn side different.
That may not necessarily be a "defend for Jessie", but it sure as hell comes closer to than you sitting in the stands questioning what a tall lumbering player is doing on a soggy bit of grass trying to grab a slippery bit of leather. He got 2 possessions. And he kept one of the opposition quiet.Comment
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I'm with you Frog. We have to keep working with Jesse. He continues to improve, but one of my worst fears is that if the club loses patience he will come good with another club.
Also (something you can't usually see from the TV), I have the impression that he is working hard on his one percenters - witness the goal he skillfully shepherded through last week. Did anyone see that aspect of his game last night?He reminds him of the guys, close-set, slow, and never rattled, who were play-makers on the team. (John Updike, seeing Josh Kennedy in a crystal ball)Comment
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Jesse's "small man skills" really picked up last year and he started creating some excellent scoring opportunities for others with shepherds, taps, and excellent releases by hand in the tackle when he is prepared to hold on just long enough to set someone up but not get pinged. But if you're 196cm and built like the proverbial outhouse, you can't forge a career based purely on "small man skills". Against West Coast last week, he displayed some pretty decent big man skills too, actually leading and taking marks that way. He is definitely worth persisting with.
But he doesn't have intuitive football nous around the ground so I think things need to be kept simple for him. Which means leaving him in the forward line and giving him the chance to develop in that role. I can't believe that throwing him in the ruck is helping him, and he's terrible at it anyway because he gives us nothing around the ground in the way an undersized mobile ruck should.
It comes back to the message being echoed in several threads this morning - Bring Back Pyke. And then let Jesse do his thing up forward.Comment
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On the subject of Jesse, his appearance in The Irish Corner is a hoot. And such moves!
Swans TV - Official AFL Website of the Sydney Swans Football ClubHe reminds him of the guys, close-set, slow, and never rattled, who were play-makers on the team. (John Updike, seeing Josh Kennedy in a crystal ball)Comment
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If White plays really well will he become the new black?Comment
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Everitt?
Personally I don't think White does enough in the forward line, my solution would be to send him into the back line, as a tall defender, big bodt, which is what we lacked on saturday night, put Seaby in the forward line to share the ruck work. I think Bevan works very hard supplying that defensive pressure in the forward 50, couldn't drop him, and someone has to make way for Kennelly, we need the run, some of the young blokes might need a rest, even Hanners looks a bit tired or lacking confidence, I think Everitt is best started on the bench, I qualify all that by saying we need to pick a side to match up on teh opponent, to me, when we get to play Hawks, who'd matching up on Buddy? White would be the best match in the team, get him some practice playing backYou can't argue with a sick mind - Joe WalshComment
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Everitt should be demoted for the Carlton match, I can see why doggies supporters were so frustrated by him.
Does some nice things but then undoes any good work by some horrible clangers. No intensity or mongrel to his game whatsoever, is hopeless deep in defence and cant be relied upon to beat his man in a contested situation.Comment
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He played 30 games for The Dogs, his first couple of games he was OK and against WCE he won the game for us by being able to go forward and present. When he played for the Dogs he was used inconsistently and sparingly in a number of positions. He always seemed to be named on the bench or as an emergency. When Eade coached us he had 2 top 10 draft picks in Fosdike and Bolton, and he did the same with them sending them back and forward to Port Melbourne but showing no confidence in them when they were named in the ones by resticting their game time. Paul Roos arrives and says he is going to give players confidence by playing them and no crucifying them for mistakes etc. These 2 he stuck in the side and there they stayed with Fosdike being arguably BOG in the 2005GF.
I am happy to give Everitt time to prove himself and hope they leave him in the side, even if he starts on the bench because these days starting on the bench is immaterial to the time on ground they play. I still can't come up with a logical reason why he didn't start up forward last game. Posters have been prepared to go with the..."we have 11 players under 50 games" line after our defeat, but wasn't he one of those 11. Indeed the backline conceded 11 goals.
I know stats can be deceiving but try these:
Everitt 5 possessions.....Time on Ground 50%
White 2 possessions.....TOG 71%
Reid 6 possessions .....TOG 87%
Jetta...6 possessions....TOG 83%
Johnson 8 possessions......TOG 69%
Mattner 10 possessions....TOG 92%
Menzel 5 possessions....TOG 85%
J Hunt 8 possessions....TOG 48%
Taylor 6 possessions....TOG 91%
Mooney 8 possessions ....TOG 70% no scores
Sydney total possessions 322 Geelong 331 being the lowest possession count for the round.
Some handy players in that list. I wonder if the conditions had anything to do with it? Who knows how many more stats Everitt would have had if he had 75% TOG, but he was deemed to be the one to be subbed. Jetta didn't have a touch in the last quarter.Comment
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