Always Right Match Committee - Round 8 Vs Carlton 2021

[merantau]

When it comes to Cordy vs Young, some points:
- Young has a way bigger upside and ability to actually 'play tall'
- Perception from Bevo/reality that Young isn't mentally up to the level. I heard someone on here compare him to Geoff Hayward from The Club, I have thought the same. How much of his confidence issues come from him and/or Bevo not giving him a sustained time in the team is the big one here.
- I think it becomes a safe 3/10 option with Zaine vs 1-7/10 range with Young. Young and Schache are two guys who can just have a big crisis of confidence in game (or just not get near it).

I think Zaine's ceiling is very low and what he offers simply isn't enough to not take the punt on Young.

Zaine has not improved in four years. He lacks the tools to improve. He is too small to compete with the bigger guys and too slow to compete with smaller but more agile players. He tackles well, he spoils well. He doesn't intercept mark. He doesn't run with the ball. When he has the ball he invariably opts for the short kick sideways or at 45 degrees and generally executes this well.

I think Young has a lot more upside and needs to be given a decent chance to prove it. He is a more attacking player. He has pace and marks well. We are yet to see the best of him because he has been ignoredfor three years. We have seen the best of Zaine I think. 2021 is decision time for both players.

I totally agree with your assessment. It's time to bite the bullet and go with Lewis Young.

[Mantis]

I think we are looking for a key defender that fits well positionally into our zone defence/press, and is disciplined and competitive in contests.

Gardner is definitely both those things, plays his role well in a system, clearly has a great attitude and I'm also pretty sure the club rates his kicking (yes I remember his absolute howlers early on).

Cordy I think is pretty good at being in the right place, is competitive in contests (although probably lacks the ability to truly have an impact) and has the trust from the MC that his attitude and discipline is good.

Young I suspect doesn't play that positional game as well as we'd like, and also his competitiveness can appear inconsistent. I also think we don't rate his disposal, in that as MJP has pointed out before he shies away from taking the riskier options we want our players to take. Cordy does it (loves an inboard kick on his left), Gardner obviously does.

Young has attributes the others don't have (much better in the air mainly) but I don't think that is what we want first and foremost from our FB and I reckon ability to stick to the gameplan is rated number one on our board and Young comes across as the least capable of doing that of the three.

Fwiw I very much agree with everyone else that I would like to see him given a run of games in Gardners absence if the other option is just stick Zaine back there, but Young always comes across to me like a 15 year old kid playing footy with his mates where he relies more on raw ability than playing his role. If thats the same pov the coaches have then no wonder he can't get a game.

That all makes sense, but a couple of queries:

1/ If the ability to take on the ''risky'' kick is an important asset, and perhaps one that defines who plays for our key defenders why isn't it the same for our medium sized defenders, mainly Crozier & Wood? Their distribution by foot is poor to say the least and the strength they did have, intercept marking has fallen away too.

2/ Is our game-plan suited to play to the strength our developing key defenders? We defend super high and against good teams we get caught out the back. Should we have our key defenders defend back shoulder?

3/ Why play Young at all if your points are the case? He is what he is, a raw developing key defender who gets lost on occasion, but he has some athletic & ball winning traits that we seriously lack and our development of his game has been extremely poor. Getting dropped after a 10 goal win was just plain dumb given we kept the opposing side (who are actually a decent team) to ''0'' goals for a half, it really should've been a time to pump up Young and give him some confidence that he's on the right path... but instead we dump him for a player who has been tried & tested in the same role and has failed to nail the spot down, with his only advantage over him is that he has a dip... spare me.

[soupman]

That all makes sense, but a couple of queries:

1/ If the ability to take on the ''risky'' kick is an important asset, and perhaps one that defines who plays for our key defenders why isn't it the same for our medium sized defenders, mainly Crozier & Wood? Their distribution by foot is poor to say the least and the strength they did have, intercept marking has fallen away too.

I don't think I said that we expect Young to do the risky kick. Nor Wood, nor Crozier. But we do expect them to follow certain patterns. Cordy frequently when he gets the ball hits the kick 25m inboard. Gardner similarly often looks to switch the ball quickly. Both are maybe slightly risky kicks at times but are clearly a directive to open up the ground and are both pretty achievable moves. Wood and Crozier similarly are not given the license to create like Daniel, Dale or Williams but i am confident they follow the patterns dictated by the gameplan. Young has at times tended to either hold onto the ball too long and back himself into one of those "retain possession backwards or kick the ball long down the line" corners, or alternatively he almost panic plays on and tends to just pop it long. I suspect he is instructed to look for certain passes from certain spots and he doesn't naturally do them.

2/ Is our game-plan suited to play to the strength our developing key defenders? We defend super high and against good teams we get caught out the back. Should we have our key defenders defend back shoulder?

Our gameplan is designed to hide the weaknesses of our defenders. We aren't great one on one, especially deep, so we aim to press up and prevent the ball getting in that situation as much as possible. By doing so we concede goals out the back or have our defenders exposed to situations where we are outnumbered or outmatched, but i suspect we think by playing the press we expose them to maybe 10 situations a game where we probably almost definitely concede instead of numerous more where we are slightly better setup defensively but sheer weight of numbers dictates we will concede more.

The biggest issue is that this relies on our midfield limiting supply when we can't set up, especially from centre bounces. Once we are on the back foot and stuck deep in defence thats when we are in trouble.

3/ Why play Young at all if your points are the case? He is what he is, a raw developing key defender who gets lost on occasion, but he has some athletic & ball winning traits that we seriously lack and our development of his game has been extremely poor. Getting dropped after a 10 goal win was just plain dumb given we kept the opposing side (who are actually a decent team) to ''0'' goals for a half, it really should've been a time to pump up Young and give him some confidence that he's on the right path... but instead we dump him for a player who has been tried & tested in the same role and has failed to nail the spot down, with his only advantage over him is that he has a dip... spare me.

I don't disagree. I'm not advocating for Cordy over Young. I'm just trying to explain why I think the MC don't like him. They know our defenders are limited, so want to pick one who at least plays the team structures right and follows the gameplan well. I suspect they don't think Young does that very well, which mitigates the advantages his raw talent has over someone like Gardner. He only got two games but maybe in those games he demonstrated that it wasn't a confidence issue, but more an inability to do what is asked of him. I can absolutely see why he would be given nearly no chances if when he does he doesn't do what is asked.

[Mantis]

I think it's a crucial week to get our structure in better order and look forward to what our team might look like at the back end of the year.

We have really struggled to find someone to play on the wing given Hunter's shift forward so I'd like to see Butler who is being groomed in that role given the opportunity to develop.

Lots on the bench who deserve one more go, but hard to drop a number of these after just one game against the competition's benchmark team.... as I drop Schache after one game, but realistically he was poor and only filling in for Tim.

In: English, Young, Khamis, Butler, McNeil

Out: Schache, Cordy, Crozier, JJ, Scott

---------------------

B: Wood, Keath, Khamis
HB: Dale, Young, Daniel
C: Butler, Macrae, Smith
HF: Hunter, Naughton, Treloar
F: English, Bruce, McNeil
R: Martin, Bontempelli, Liberatore
Int: Duryea, Lipinski, West, Hannan

Emerg: VDM (Sub), Wallis, Garcia, JUH

[comrade]

I think it's a crucial week to get our structure in better order and look forward to what our team might look like at the back end of the year.

We have really struggled to find someone to play on the wing given Hunter's shift forward so I'd like to see Butler who is being groomed in that role given the opportunity to develop.

Lots on the bench who deserve one more go, but hard to drop a number of these after just one game against the competition's benchmark team.... as I drop Schache after one game, but realistically he was poor and only filling in for Tim.

In: English, Young, Khamis, Butler, McNeil

Out: Schache, Cordy, Crozier, JJ, Scott

---------------------

B: Wood, Keath, Khamis
HB: Dale, Young, Daniel
C: Butler, Macrae, Smith
HF: Hunter, Naughton, Treloar
F: English, Bruce, McNeil
R: Martin, Bontempelli, Liberatore
Int: Duryea, Lipinski, West, Hannan

Emerg: VDM (Sub), Wallis, Garcia, JUH

That defence looks a lot more capable in the air. I like that 22 a lot.

[1eyedog]

We’ve gotta play Lewis Young this week. His form up and downs are pretty akin to Cordy’s but his ceiling is so much higher, and he really was excellent in the 2s.

Agreed but I'm really concerned about the yo yo-ing of Lewy. We know Schache came in for Chilli so Schache will go out but if we bring Lewy in it will likely mean that Zaine goes out, after two games. I mean, c'mon guys make a decision on this position!

It's like, 'Lewy, we brought you in and you played really well, then you had an average game so we dropped you, so we brought Zaine in who had two average games so we dropped him, so we'll bring you back in Lewy but if you have an average game we'll drop you and we'll likely bring Zaine back in'. That's the trend. It's a joke. As many here have asked why can't we just give him a block of games in order to provide him with the best chance of finding some consistency? We did this for Gardner and surprise! He slowly became a better player. That said, I'll laugh hysterically if we change out Zaine for Lewy this week because the MC will acknowledge they made the wrong decision (again), and we'll be back where we started with Lewy i.e. the Brisbane game. Does my head in. As it stands if he comes in he's potentially a deer in the headlights against McKay. I'd feel much better about this if we'd just played him each week from when he was selected for the Brisvegas game.

It will be interesting to see if one of Westy or Hannan drop out this week (unless its for a returning VDM then fine), but for Wally? If this happens it will tell me that the MC really do draw player 20-22 out of a hat. How can we keep making so many wrong decisions re. selection? Ultimately I'm tired of seeing us get minced up by key forwards. We really should know better and I fear that if we don't change out Zaine we are going to struggle over the next two games. I've lost confidence in the ability of our mids to defend well enough across an entire game, and with Chilli playing forward (i.e. unable to help our defenders), I'm getting really nervous about Zaine playing on one of Casboult or McKay this week and one of Dixon or Marshall the following week.

[Jam Donuts]

Agree with this.

I don't see a highly competent AFL defender in Gardner yet. Sure he has improved (from a low base), but he isn't great 1 on 1 and doesn't back himself in the air to take a grab when he has the opportunity to... which is vital in the modern game.

I too have NFI why he has been favored so heavily to Young.

In my observations Young is far too inconsistent and i fail to see the huge up-side in him that others can. Gardner whilst not a world beater is improving nearly every game. It is not my style to criticise any of our players too heavily, but to be fair Young has a long way to go, despite the bleatings on here about why he is not getting played, I would give Buku a run before Young gets another chance, but like all comments on here it is just my opinion, and opinions are as we know, like arseholes.........Every one has got one.

[bulldogsthru&thru]

The reality is that no matter who plays KPD between Young, Cordy, Schache, Bruce, Gardner etc, we are just papering over the enormous hole we have at that position. The only way to fix the problem is through the trade period this year. Whoever plays there this season won't be able to stop the issues we saw on Friday. Cordy wasn't up to it, but neither are the others. I think Gardner is an upgrade on Cordy but even then the Tigers still win. Unfortunately, it's up to our mids to not expose our weak defence.

[westbulldog]

Give Young some continuity, a decent run at it, say 4-5 games, and then drop the guillotine if necessary. He has more natural ability then Cordy or Gardner. Perhaps attitude is the issue. Cordy is cooked as a KPD and Gardner is very inexperienced imo. Khamis should come in too.

[1eyedog]

[/B] In my observations Young is far too inconsistent and i fail to see the huge up-side in him that others can. Gardner whilst not a world beater is improving nearly every game. It is not my style to criticise any of our players too heavily, but to be fair Young has a long way to go, despite the bleatings on here about why he is not getting played, I would give Buku a run before Young gets another chance, but like all comments on here it is just my opinion, and opinions are as we know, like arseholes.........Every one has got one.

Playing Devil's advocate have we really provided Young with the same opportunities i.e. a solid block of games to give him a chance to improve his game at the top level, like we have to Gardner? I'm not saying Young is the answer but I'd like to ask the question of him at least. I've seen Young play pretty bad but I've also seen him play pretty good at AFL level. Why not give him an opportunity to close that gap a bit?

[The Bulldogs Bite]

Khamis over Crozier would be a great call.

Hard to see us doing it though, internally Crozier is rated highly.

[Scraggers]

I think it's a crucial week to get our structure in better order and look forward to what our team might look like at the back end of the year.

We have really struggled to find someone to play on the wing given Hunter's shift forward so I'd like to see Butler who is being groomed in that role given the opportunity to develop.

Lots on the bench who deserve one more go, but hard to drop a number of these after just one game against the competition's benchmark team.... as I drop Schache after one game, but realistically he was poor and only filling in for Tim.

In: English, Young, Khamis, Butler, McNeil

Out: Schache, Cordy, Crozier, JJ, Scott

---------------------

B: Wood, Keath, Khamis
HB: Dale, Young, Daniel
C: Butler, Macrae, Smith
HF: Hunter, Naughton, Treloar
F: English, Bruce, McNeil
R: Martin, Bontempelli, Liberatore
Int: Duryea, Lipinski, West, Hannan

Emerg: VDM (Sub), Wallis, Garcia, JUH

Not having a go, just curious for your perspective ... what do you think Butler brings that Crozier doesn't? I agree with your other changes, just not sure on the Butler v Crozier (I realise they play different roles). I would give Crozier another couple of games if only for his spoiling ability.

[Grantysghost]

In : English, Weightman, McNeil, Khamis
Out : Schache, Scott (looked sore late), JJ, Cordy

If LVM is OK and passes a test I'd probably have him instead of Weightman. But I've liked Weightman's VFL form. Has a bit of similarity to Jamie Eilliot.
Wouldn't be upset if Garcia got a crack either but can't see a spot for him.

[comrade]

In : English, Weightman, McNeil, Khamis
Out : Schache, Scott (looked sore late), JJ, Cordy

If LVM is OK and passes a test I'd probably have him instead of Weightman. But I've liked Weightman's VFL form. Has a bit of similarity to Jamie Eilliot.
Wouldn't be upset if Garcia got a crack either but can't see a spot for him.

Good luck to Naughts taking a grab with Cody buzzing around

[Mantis]

Not having a go, just curious for your perspective ... what do you think Butler brings that Crozier doesn't? I agree with your other changes, just not sure on the Butler v Crozier (I realise they play different roles). I would give Crozier another couple of games if only for his spoiling ability.

As mentioned (and you did too) I have them in different roles. Khamis is coming in for Crozier to assist in defence and to provide a bit more height & athleticism and Butler to come in to play as a wingman in place of Scott or JJ as we aren't getting much from this position at present.