Bankers & Anchors: Rnd 9, 2025 vs Gold Coast
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He not any better than the new recruits given his outputs. He judged on preseason form and protected for some reason. He has got a goal a game but most of them in last qtr. If he was a quality forward that has 3 kicks 3 goals you can live with it. But he not quality and his opponent is killing us the other way. There was a play in the last qtr where Noble won the ball and McNeil will be credited with a pressure act but Noble still got away and set his team up. Pressure act only valuable if it results in a mistake to the opposition.Comment
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I think we know what Naughton's ceiling is now, and we have to re-evaluate our expectations.
He's your 'Josh Darling' type second forward - you'll get 40-50 goals per season, he'll work his butt off to chase and harrass, but the best key defenders in the comp have an edge on him and he's not really going to get off the chain without the main guy next to him. That's fine - those players are hard to find and valuable, but he's not going to develop into the top-tier key forward that we thought he might.
Jarryd Roughead managed to step up as 'the man' when Buddy left, but we just haven't seen it from Naughton, and this should have been his forward line since Josh Bruce went down.
I think the good news long-term, is that we have the Kennedy to his Darling and the Lloyd to his Lucas in Sam Darcy, but right now we need to find ways to manufacture marks in the forward 50 with another lever - whether that's Lobb forward, Bont playing down there or Croft when he has some form.
He will go well this week against Essendon.
The best we can rely on with Naughton as a forward, is that when Darcy comes back - he will get the 2nd or 3rd tall, and probably have more impact.
His chance to be an out and out star of the competition was as a defender, but we missed the boat on that and crowbarred him into a forward role. It doesn't matter too much if we are winning. But I do think about what might have been.Comment
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I think we know what Naughton's ceiling is now, and we have to re-evaluate our expectations.
He's your 'Josh Darling' type second forward - you'll get 40-50 goals per season, he'll work his butt off to chase and harrass, but the best key defenders in the comp have an edge on him and he's not really going to get off the chain without the main guy next to him. That's fine - those players are hard to find and valuable, but he's not going to develop into the top-tier key forward that we thought he might.
Jarryd Roughead managed to step up as 'the man' when Buddy left, but we just haven't seen it from Naughton, and this should have been his forward line since Josh Bruce went down.
I think the good news long-term, is that we have the Kennedy to his Darling and the Lloyd to his Lucas in Sam Darcy, but right now we need to find ways to manufacture marks in the forward 50 with another lever - whether that's Lobb forward, Bont playing down there or Croft when he has some form.
Last year on a player ratings per minute on ground basis he was the second ranked key forward in the competition (behind Hogan, with Jeremy Cameron third). That's elite.
We were without a mainstay key forward for the best part of 20 years and (speaking only for myself) there was pent-up romanticism about what a key forward could provide. When Naughton emerged and broke the duck all of that expectation was heaped onto him. Yet he's not a conventional key forward in many ways, his conversion is awful and for that reason alone will never win a Coleman. Yet I would never trade him and all his strengths for a one-trick pony like Larkey, individual goal tally be damned.
All that said, he's well below his standard right now and needs to find some form urgently.'And the Western suburbs erupt!'👍 3Comment
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I agree that we've seen his ceiling, but reckon you're underselling that ceiling.
Last year on a player ratings per minute on ground basis he was the second ranked key forward in the competition (behind Hogan, with Jeremy Cameron third). That's elite.
We were without a mainstay key forward for the best part of 20 years and (speaking only for myself) there was pent-up romanticism about what a key forward could provide. When Naughton emerged and broke the duck all of that expectation was heaped onto him. Yet he's not a conventional key forward in many ways, his conversion is awful and for that reason alone will never win a Coleman. Yet I would never trade him and all his strengths for a one-trick pony like Larkey, individual goal tally be damned.
All that said, he's well below his standard right now and needs to find some form urgently.FFC: Established 1883
Premierships: AFL 1954, 2016 VFA - 1898,99,1900, 1908, 1913, 1919-20, 1923-24, VFL: 2014, 2016 . Champions of Victoria 1924. AFLW - 2018.Comment
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