Will be too raw to ruck
Printable View
I guess because whilst the intentions may've been to change our ruck stocks, not all of the variables are in our control.
We may very well have been keen to bring someone in, but maybe the asking price was too steep, or a player we were keen on changed their mind or decided to go somewhere else.
I think it would be a different scenario, had we not needed to hoard picks to stave off early bids on Darcy, but that's just the way it is.
Sweet was very poor v the Swans (Callum Sinclair) at the Whiten Oval in what was I think the second last game our VFL side played. He was shifted forward and JGM thrown into the ruck.
Hopefully it was a blip and he can have a massive pre season and be pushing for the round 1 side because our options are extremely limited for next year if he doesn't come on.
Darcy is a rake. If he touches the ruck within three years I'll be amazed.
Only 3 VFL games to judge and it was all closed up after that. Dug up his stats and doesn't look awful. Those HO numbers are huge and sure could have used some of those at stages.
https://vfl.aflmstats.com/player/Jordon_Sweet
I think it was the game against the Swans where I saw him change the game in one quarter of footy with the help of a WO breeze.
I saw that one as it was televised. Sweet did turn his game around after a poor start.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-X0T_J_aR8
Yes that game when he was moved forward because he was awful in the ruck, the position where we need him. Taking a couple of marks up forward is nice but really not very relevant to the part of the ground where we need him. I am hardly Robinson Crusoe in being disappointed in his work in the ruck that day (early at least).
If this is it from Power for our trade period I'll be marking it down as our first fail of a trade period under him. Overall I'd say our list is in a weaker position then it was going into this, losing depth players (no matter how ones might rate them) for draft-kids isn't great, another pick up in the backline is good, zero improvement in the ruck department..
Please, prove me wrong, I still cannot wrap my head around us going into next year with Martin, English and Sweet...
I share your frustrations with not getting a ruck and KPD. But without knowing who’s available, who Bevo and co want to target etc it’s hard to judge how much of it is Powers fault. If there are no ruckman and KPDs available what can Sam do? You can go hard and try pry out a contracted player but we don’t have the picks to bargain with. That probably has never stopped Dodo before and with us challenging for a flag you’d think players would be licking their lips wanting to come to us. I just don’t think we can put it down to a failure on Sams part.
A mature ruck to cover Martin when he inevitably goes out with injury and an actual KPD like Tarrent or Talia (As unlikely as that would of been) to help bolster our backline, nowhere else to me needs improvement, some new senior coaches should hopefully fix up our other lacking areas on the ground.
Ill die on this hill, but Tim English is not a number one ruck, and never will be, and hasn't even shown signs of it over the journey. The competitions best Forward/Second ruck? Yep, but no way is he even close to first ruck material.
The messaging from the club and what has actually happened has been nothing short of a disaster, you cannot say ''Power has been given license to go hard this trade period'' and ''our ruck department will look vastly different next season'' and then not even remotely deliver on either of these.. Disappointing would be an understatement.
Two and ahalf days to go, hope I'm 500000% proved wrong, but I ain't seeing it right now.