Dean, Jagga, Cowan, Wilson, Ainsworth and Haywood have all been great this year and made us a more even listDean and Smith will suffer 2nd year blues, all players do, will we'll have to sack the new coach for making them go backwards!
Watch this space!
He had his left knee heavily strapped early in the season
Dean, Jagga, Cowan, Wilson, Ainsworth and Haywood have all been great this year and made us a more even list
The next year Cripps won the Brownlow, Curnow kicked 64 goals and we recruited Hewitt and Cerra - How good a coach was Voss? Did Teague get any credit for player development?
Fit or not fit we are heavily dependent on Cripps still and to a lesser extent Walsh if they dont play well we still struggle.
Its not healthy moving forward and not sustainable imho, Bulldogs have the same problem with Bont having to be in the best players on the ground each week for them to win.
If folks want to make comparisons between Voss and Fraser look don't look at recent history.
Look at the last half of 2023 and now.
Same/same
That 2023 run we built on the back of relentless pressure and effort, double teaming in tackles.
We lost our way in 2024- 2025.
A lot of that was the result of injury and in 2025 off-field disaffection and division.
That pressure and effort...and belief is back now.
You know what else is the same???
A fit Patrick Cripps.
Was he fit at the start of the year? No.
Walsh? No.
Makes a difference when your good players are fit. Who'd have thunk it?!
Rewatched the game, a few things stood out for me in this game;
Umpiring. I just don't understand so many calls, even worse are the awful missed calls.
Dreadful delivery into F50 by both sides. Park football stuff.
Woeful goal kicking... We kick from angles far too often but we waste so many set shots. Talor needs to nail the few chances he gets and he ain't. Thirty metres out should be simple.
Our marking targets McG- Kemp-Harry are an issue. Harry plays better up the ground, Kemp can't finish reliably and McG is barely going.
If Derkson is going to make it he needs a kicking coach...he lays back on every kick and its heart in mouth stuff every time as a result.
Cerra's lack of pace and current "third wheel status" in the midfield - going to get squeezed out I reckon.
There was an amazing contest between Ainsworth and a Giants mid in the square, both players went real hard and it was great....I shudder to think about Jagga slammed like that.. He is still very small and light and it was really obvious against the likes of Stone, Callaghan, Daniels etc