Carlton Supporters Club

What's your ideal back 6 Jim?..of those likely to be available.

As usual the very little we get out of our youngsters is reducing the effectiveness of our older players.

The snowball effect is massive and I find most criticism of our players a tad unfair on that basis.

We need our senior bodies back asap.

On the flipside, I did the same exercise for the Crows:

http://www.afc.com.au/season/statistics

(Note you have to go to advanced options, and you select what fields you want).

These guys didnt have a bloke over 91% game time (Josh Jenkins at the top end) and Wayne Milera aside who went off with a Hamstring injury, didnt have a player go under 79% game time.

We need to be a bit more level headed about things and appreciate what our blokes are giving us.

What amazes me from those Crows stats is that they can afford to have a bloke like Hugh Greenwood operating at, on average, only 74% on-ground time !.......I'd suggest that his input & effectivness for the time he's actually on the ground would be enormous.

And they payed basically nothing for him, still makes my blood boil.

The guys at the bottom end are not giving us anywhere near enough in terms of time on ground, and need to be maximising their impact for the amount of time they are spending on the interchange bench.

Thats the point though malo.

Hes a 26 year old mature recruit, who's been on the list for 2 years, and has a background as an athlete.  If he had to play 5% more per game, he probably could.

What I was hoping to highlight is that the blokes in our team who are probably struggling with disposal, are shouldering a much greater load than they should be.

That's another aspect to those time on ground stats we should consider.

If your impact player plays 80% of a game as opposed to 90% can that be more effective overall?
In his best years for us Judd went at around 80-83% of TOG....usually came off buggered but gave a 100% for the time he was on the ground.
In previous years Cripps has been about the same 80-83%...he's over 88% average this year

We pick two rucks again for what reason again. For all his hard work Phillips just doesn't give you enough around the ground or up forward. We can pick a smaller running type instead. and be alot more mobile.

Our ability to structure a side for modern footy is hopeless. We need to pick our two key backs when fit, Weitering and Marchbank, our key forward, McKay, Casboult as a forward/ruck, Kreuzer the one main ruck then pick a decent running side around that rather than a side from the land of the jolly green giants.

Why can Fraser use SOS as an inside mid in two games now and Bolton leaves him to rot on our impotent forward line. Give him a run there sometimes. It'll help his confidence like it does Levi when he gets to have a run in the ruck. Levi seems to lose alot of confidence when he's a full time forward. He's not going to be a 50 goal forward, he's a forward/ruck.

Real slow in the NB's. I didnt rate his game, disposal was ordinary and he needs more tricks to play midfield......

Agree. Only came good when the pace was off after 3rd quarter.

In fairness to SOJ, this is all new to him; just learning the midfield craft... so when you factor that in, what becomes a positive is his reading of the play which he can do naturally, attack on the aggott/man and ability to take possession... disposal/strength etc will improve in time. His ability to find the ball in tight is a huge plus and worth building on, or at least giving it a crack. Let's cut the kid some slack... anyone remember how ordinary SOS was early on in the Magoos, until he found his niche?

Yep, he is a beginner and probably needs two full seasons at NB level to get it sorted.

I'm sure that means we will play him next week as a starting midfielder!

After which the experiment will be deemed to be a failure

My preference is he stays in the VFL for a bit longer and learns his mid-field trade there.
However if he does play seniors there's probably no harm in him spending a few short bursts in the middle just to give him an idea of the difference at that level.
(I'm not sure we haven't tried that already...I have memories of him starting in the centre... but it may have been a VFL match I was watching)