2025 Starting Line-Up

[Rocco Jones]

Overall mate this is such a great post. Clear explanations...genuinely loved it.

Not sure why you LOL Harmes as the sub though. Inexperienced players are terrible subs as they come on late and cant pick up the speed of the game in close contests and make COSTLY errors.

Harmes is (to me) the absolutely rolled gold perfect sub. Experienced. Knows it's a way 'IN'. Can run. And has shown he can kick goals.

Bloody great idea if you ask me.

A player like Harmes is not only a great option as sub in terms of trying to win games but also means young players don't play the crappy role. Better for them to get full games at VFL level I think.

Fans are going to be harder on Harmes type.

Being reductive for the sake of quick example, fans see a young guy who offer like a 3/10 performance much higher than an experience guy who brings a 5/10 type performance.

[Rocco Jones]

Yeh I'm not trying to shit on Libba, but he is 33 next season with a pretty significant injury history. The likelihood that he plays less than 15 games next year is pretty high. I'm okay with him being on the list but think his form didn't always warrant him being a walk up start, and realistically for our team to improve we need someone to be taking Libba's spot next year. The worst thing we can do is have him as a 70% CBA best 22 mid until the day he retires - it's time for succession planning.

Its great that he led us for tackles and clearances, but that was his role. If Garcia/West had been given his CBAs and opportunities, they probably would have led this stat.

Not sure I agree Garcia/West would probably have done the same automatically by just being there but I think Libba can't be seen as a lock anymore. And if he isn't in CBAs, he is done.

[soupman]

Overall mate this is such a great post. Clear explanations...genuinely loved it.

Not sure why you LOL Harmes as the sub though. Inexperienced players are terrible subs as they come on late and cant pick up the speed of the game in close contests and make COSTLY errors.

Harmes is (to me) the absolutely rolled gold perfect sub. Experienced. Knows it's a way 'IN'. Can run. And has shown he can kick goals.

Bloody great idea if you ask me.

Slightly unfair on Harmes, and agree with the 3 vs 5/10 thing Rocco mentions above, but geez Harmes is a hard player to like based on everything and despite nearly winning me over with a couple of excellent games he is a hard player to get around.

I will concede though that he is in of the few and best players we have at accepting a role that isn't "starting mid" or "target forward", and despite my post I do trust him to contribute more than guys like Gallagher or Jones.

[soupman]

Calling for Libba to be tapped on the shoulder seems quite premature and slightly disrespectful.

I'm not delusional, he's declining. No doubt about that. But he still led our club for clearances and tackles per game.

Heck, he was second to the bloke who broke the record for brownlow votes in a year in average clearances per game competition wide. If we are down by 5 points and need a clearance he's still my first picked to go into the centre square in 2025.

He was part of a midfield/team that got slaughtered by Hawthorn in the final. He's prior games before that he was quite good.

He's game time needs to reduce. He was around 80% most weeks, I believe that needs to dip to 65-70%. Allowing Richards to play a more prominent role and give opportunities to Sanders, Kennedy ect. He's also a prime candidate to be subbed out some weeks.

I'm still backing him in to have a really solid year and be easily best 23.

To be clear I was raising him as the Macrae example where despite being a good player still if he drops off at all/maybe not even we might be better off fielding a side without him in it, even when his replacement (let's say Scott) is definitively not as good a player.

[BornInDroopSt'54]

With the above in mind I'm gonna run with this 22, in the scenario where Libba isn't a clear best 4 mid guy at that point of pre season.

Backs. Basically the standard set. Except I'm not picking the third tall unless they really earn it. I'd rather go in undersized with more pace and quality than pick JOD because he is better suited to playing on North's third tall.

Jones, Lobb, Duryea, Freijah, Bramble, Dale, JJ

Mids. No Libba means a big slice of CBA gametime to share around.

Bont 70, Treloar 70, Richards 70, Garcia 50, Kennedy 20, Weightman 20

Gets more pace in there through Garcia and Weightman, Sanders next in line to replace Riley.

Wings Williams and Scott are my preferred choices. Both versatile, hold their space well, good mix of attributes and cover ground well. I like the idea of Davidson but think he is next in line. Would push Freijah up here if we wanted an extra tall back (and Scott out).

Forwards Jamarra, Darcy, Naughton, Weightman, Kennedy with McNeil and Vandermeer clearly our best two pacy options at this stage, despite their actions with ball in hand. They get those spots until pushed out. West also in there as the best crumbing option, with the smaller guys helping out on the wings (and as already stated mid rotations.

English ruck. Looks like this

29, 19, 15
31, 7, 27
34, 4, 28
30, 33, 23
3, 10, 2
44, 20, 1


39, 38, 8, 14

Sub the best performed of Davidson, Jones, Harmes (lol), Gallagher.

if we wanted the extra tall Scott to sub, and probably Khamis but very form dependant. Khamis at least is good at something, JOD is a bit meh all round at this stage, Buss unproven but happy to try.

I can't find fault with your logic, great effort.
Your s⁷ide acknowledges the shifting of the guard and that Libba hasn't proved everything in '24 as an essential player. Strong club bonds mean he'll be picked but loyalty shouldn't be the factor.
We need pace in the centre. Libba's pace is in his hands and brain but his lack of pace was a liability in our final in such a telling way.
Libba is a champ but for how much longer?
We'll see.

[Rusty12]

Okay, I'm working on the assumption that we are focusing on our early games against North and Collingwoood

Backs: Duryea - L.Jones - Freijah
HBacks: Bramble - Lobb - Dale
Centre: Williams - Richards - Garcia
HForward: West - Naughton - M.Kennedy
Forwards: McNeil - Darcy - Weightman
Rucks: English - Bontempelli - Treloar
Int: Liberatore - Johannisen - Ugle-Hagan - Vandermeer - Sanders

Tempted to replace Sanders with O'Donnell but happy to run the risk of going in with a smaller line-up vs the Pies and perhaps he's a stronger candidate against North.
Ugle-Hagan is a cautionary selection and he needs to come back after the break with some momentum.
Tempted to name Harmes but mainly for spite purposes
If we had to go taller then JOD to the back pocket, Freijah to the wing and Garcia to replace Sanders on the bench.

Garcia on a wing never entered my thoughts, however I hope this works out and he makes it his own. Big fan, would love to see him find his place.

[Rusty12]

Bont is the best all-around player and midfielder in the comp; any talk of him spending more time forward is madness and, if required, is evidence that Naughton, Marra and Darcy are not getting it done. Bont's forward time should be taking his tagger, who is more than likely very limited in their skill set deep.

[Rusty12]

It's not like Bailey Williams is fast...and Freijah showed enough pace off half back imo.

I think endurance is more important than speed, but think your point about him getting 'lost' is a concern. Half back is just about the easiest and most natural position in terms of field placement, and wing is up there with half forward as the hardest.

Unless Bevo has had a brain transplant, players like JJ being used as a utility is expected, and is the plan always has been; why would that change now?
JJ played the VDM high-half forward role early last year, after starting in the back pocket against the Dees, before his body let me down again.

M Kenndey constantly being referred to as an inside mid-fielder is just wrong. His ground time at the blues, says the opposite, and he was top 10 in their B&F, not in that role, which put's him easily in our best 22, without being an inside mid. The whole concept of inside mid is almost redundant in modern AFL anyway, you still have to be able to run and contribute outside and both ways of clearance anyway.

[mjp]

The whole concept of inside mid is almost redundant in modern AFL anyway, you still have to be able to run and contribute outside and both ways of clearance anyway.

Patrick Cripps says a big HI.

So does Liber, Lachie Neale, Caleb Serong...the list goes on forever.

Suggesting that inside mid is a redundant role is just silly. Very (VERY) few are good enough to exist solely in that role - hence Kennedy at Carlton finding a spot forward as he was behind a few others - but the very best mids in our game play inside, win stoppages and link play together with hands and feet...

[Brody23]

Bont is the best all-around player and midfielder in the comp; any talk of him spending more time forward is madness and, if required, is evidence that Naughton, Marra and Darcy are not getting it done. Bont's forward time should be taking his tagger, who is more than likely very limited in their skill set deep.

Yeah I don’t think he’ll play ‘forward’ or shouldn’t anyway…..but with Bevo you never know.
My tip is he’ll continue to push hard forward like this year and early 23, hunting the mid-match and hitting the scoreboard. His running patterns definitely shifted this year.

[Rusty12]

Patrick Cripps says a big HI.

So does Liber, Lachie Neale, Caleb Serong...the list goes on forever.

Suggesting that inside mid is a redundant role is just silly. Very (VERY) few are good enough to exist solely in that role - hence Kennedy at Carlton finding a spot forward as he was behind a few others - but the very best mids in our game play inside, win stoppages and link play together with hands and feet...

Crippa is so good because he developed his game to hurt teams on the outside and inside, kicked goals and got forward of the contest. He is an all-round elite footballer who is also good on the inside. The best players in the game do many things at an elite level, including inside, and the VERY best, get forward of the contest, they are not stuck inside it.

I think you are making my point for me, Very Very few exist solely in that role anymore, and that will only continue to decrease.

A criticism of Serong, outside of racking up meaningless stats, was not impacting games. It is only this year, he has started to add those other aspects to his game, and impact winning.

[mjp]

I think you are making my point for me, Very Very few exist solely in that role anymore, and that will only continue to decrease.

UM. It wont. Few exist because there are maybe 2x spots for pure inside mids on a LIST - and they are the BEST PLAYERS AT THE CLUB. Guys who play inside battle to get a game because they have been winning the ball 35+ times per game since they were 8 years old and only understand one way to play footy.

That's why players can't make a go of being 'solely' inside mids...'cos if they aren't the best players in the game, they can't play that role and are forced to do something else...which isn't their natural position and they battle to find consistency because it isn't footy as they understand it.

Kennedy (Matt) is 100% an inside mid. He has developed a few tricks to play forward but make no mistake - he's a inside mid with a forward string to his bow, NOT a forward who can play in the centre square. Yep - he will probably play forward pushing up as a 5th + stints inside the game for us...but because he starts high doesn't make him a forward.

As an aside, I'm not sure what Serong has done to upset you...he's won the Dockers B&F 2-years in a row + been in the AA squad 2-years in a row. Suggesting he made some kind of leap in 2024 might be because a few media people accidentally tuned into a Freo game during 2024.

[Mofra]

Bont is the best all-around player and midfielder in the comp; any talk of him spending more time forward is madness and, if required, is evidence that Naughton, Marra and Darcy are not getting it done. Bont's forward time should be taking his tagger, who is more than likely very limited in their skill set deep.

Bont spent more time forward in 2021 than he did in 2024 and we made the GF.

I'd rather we don't flog him into injury. We've played our best football in recent years by rotating harder through the middle, not by throwing the keys almost solely to Bont, Libba, Treloar and Richards and expecting 18 other blokes to just play as a support cast.

We have no clear second wing (Williams aside) - it's a difficult, specialist role to play full time as well. I'd rotate a couple of players there too. Freijah has been training as the HB distributer in the pre-season reports but I'd get him up for a few minutes each quarter.

[Rocco Jones]

Bont spent more time forward in 2021 than he did in 2024 and we made the GF.

I'd rather we don't flog him into injury. We've played our best football in recent years by rotating harder through the middle, not by throwing the keys almost solely to Bont, Libba, Treloar and Richards and expecting 18 other blokes to just play as a support cast.

If we are to play Bont, Libba, Adz, Ed, M Kennedy, Garcia and Sanders, something has to give with the CBAs. I am going on and on about it, but there's a really limited amount of inside mid time. If all of our main 4 are going to spend vast majority of their TOG as inside mids, there will be at best, say 25% inside mid TOG left to share between Sanders, Garcia and Kennedy.

We either:
- find more time via Bont, Ed and/or Adz spending time elsewhere (think Libba is inside mid or finished)
OR
- Kennedy, Garcia and/or Sanders have to justify a game playing a role outside of inside mid as that's where at least two of them will spend nearly all their TOG

[mjp]

It's a great point RJ.

If a game goes for 100 minutes there is 300-minutes of inside mid time.
Assuming each player spends 80% TOG, then that means your primary inside mids are spending a max of 80-minutes in the midfield per game. There CBA attendance will vary from week to week (a bit) as their CBA will be based on when goals are kicked...but over a season it will be solid as a rock. Last year Treloar was over 80%, Bont and Liber over 70%. Richards around 30%.

Since Richards spent a few weeks down back and missed a few weeks, you could probably say he was really at about 60% in those games he played as a mid...that's ALL the rotations we have...If you want to make a case that Williams becomes part of an inside/outside rotation with Richards also sliding outside, I'm buying that. But if the off-ball winger can't play inside mid that will always be a limited rotation.

Because of all this 'stuff', most teams use a pretty simple 4 or 5 player rotation - some who go inside/outside have a bit more flexibility - but even finding 3-5 mins per quarter in another role is required EVEN for a 4-man rotation...or you end up with your BEST PLAYERS down at sub 70% TOG. Which you don't want.

It's a real struggle...plus if you are trying to include half forwards in the mid rotation...well, that means a mid has to go forward - otherwise the forwards are a rotation short. And again, that's fine, but it needs to be part of a plan. Do I wish for a return to the days when our half-forwards and wingers regularly had stints inside? Of course...but it's hard with our personnel right now.

I know everyone seems to think coaches are just up in the box calling moves and rotations left and right...they just aren't. They would make 3-4 moves per GAME - the players play in their spots.. The rotations are spinning based on time and GPS numbers in 99% of situations. Each week there MIGHT be 1 (extreme 2) defensive matchups where it will be "Player x only comes off if oppo player Y does"...that's it. That's why doing things like having one tall too many etc absolutely screws with the team...