Pack your bags McCartney...

[Mofra]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

Was it a miracle? Doesn't it just illustrate a point? Team sport. Players that stick together and work to a solid plan go places. The Swans have shown this. St Kilda have shown this. Freo have shown this ( minus Griffen, Sandilands and Pavlich, they still are able to jag a win. They know when to get drawn to the contest and when to cover. They have a smart system in place and like at St Kilda probably, Lyon has taught them a tackle inside 50 is as good as a goal )

St Kilda are on the slide, and Freo have a host of 190cm+ 90kg+ mature midfielders who can play forward (the Swans don't need to be mentioned).

[The Pie Man]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

Do you think our recruiting from 2000-2002 was any better? Jordan McMahon, Sam Power, Tim Walsh, Cam Faulkner - not exactly a roll-call of elite first round selections there. If we nailed even a couple of these selections we win a flag and possibly 2. As for the Rohde era, every single player drafted in before his arrival went backwards in their development and many of them were borderline scrapheap material before the new coach arrived. So in effect almost every year of drafting was poor from 2000-2009 - how we got so close to a premiership, with a clearly inferior list to the contenders of the day, was an absolute miracle.

Interesting to look at the make up of the 2009 prelim side

There were..

4 rookies (Boyd, Picken, Morris & Harbrow)
5 trade ins (Eagleton, Welsh, Hudson, Aka & Callan)
5 1st round picks (Cooney, Griffen, Murphy, Higgins & B Johnson)

9 players started their careers in the 90's, swelling to 14 that had commenced before 2002

Ward, Harbrow....Picken, Morris, Higgins & Griffen were the only players that came into the club from 2004 onwards (1st two having now moved on)

6 new players in 5 years made the prelim side. The rest either traded in or drafted 2003 and before.

[Bornadog]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

Interesting to look at the make up of the 2009 prelim side

There were..

4 rookies (Boyd, Picken, Morris & Harbrow)
5 trade ins (Eagleton, Welsh, Hudson, Aka & Callan)
5 1st round picks (Cooney, Griffen, Murphy, Higgins & B Johnson)

9 players started their careers in the 90's, swelling to 14 that had commenced before 2002

Ward, Harbrow....Picken, Morris, Higgins & Griffen were the only players that came into the club from 2004 onwards (1st two having now moved on)

6 new players in 5 years made the prelim side. The rest either traded in or drafted 2003 and before.

Really it doesn't matter how we got those players, we gave it a crack and it didn't work out. I am happy we were there abouts (not happy we didn't get into the GF).

Some say we have wrecked our chances today due to recruitment at the time

Here is the big IF - Put back into the team right now, Ward, Harbrow, Hill and Ray and the team looks very different in the middle age bracket. You can say want you want about Hill, but he virtually won the game on Friday night with three consecutive goals. Ray was good enough to be in the best 22 Saints teams and played in GF, and is still handy. Those two and Harbrow and Ward are better than Vez, Addison, Marko, Austin and many more still on our list.

[Remi Moses]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

Josh Hill would get the second or third tall with us.
With Darling, Kennedy, Le Cras, Cox or Nic Nat,Hill gets off the leash.
He wouldn't get near it now for us.

[LostDoggy]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

I think I've finally come to my tolerance level when it comes to short-sighted, stupid decisions. If we sack McCartney, I think I might just call it quits on the Western Bulldogs. It would only highlight our lack of guts in going on a different path than we've trodden for the past 60 years.

[Bornadog]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

Josh Hill would get the second or third tall with us.
With Darling, Kennedy, Le Cras, Cox or Nic Nat,Hill gets off the leash.
He wouldn't get near it now for us.

I don't want to argue whether these players are good or not, what I am saying is here are 4 players, currently at other clubs, and part of their best 22 that would fill in the age bracket that we lack. Then people may look at recruitment differently. Yes we made a lot of mistakes and we are now paying for it.

[BulldogBelle]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

I don't want to argue whether these players are good or not, what I am saying is here are 4 players, currently at other clubs, and part of their best 22 that would fill in the age bracket that we lack. Then people may look at recruitment differently. Yes we made a lot of mistakes and we are now paying for it.

In the short term WE NEED to recruit a senior 'Head of Football' type position, who McCartney and his merry band of assistants would report directly into (both game day and off the field)...

This person would be charged with helping McCartney develop the following;

Skill development
Strucutres / Set-up
On-field strategies
Tactical movements on gameday
General assistance and leadership in the coaches box

[Bornadog]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

In the short term WE NEED to recruit a senior 'Head of Football' type position, who McCartney and his merry band of assistants would report directly into (both game day and off the field)...

This person would be charged with helping McCartney develop the following;

Skill development
Strucutres / Set-up
On-field strategies
Tactical movements on gameday
General assistance and leadership in the coaches box

Couldn't agree more.

[bulldogtragic]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

In the short term WE NEED to recruit a senior 'Head of Football' type position, who McCartney and his merry band of assistants would report directly into (both game day and off the field)...

This person would be charged with helping McCartney develop the following;

Skill development
Strucutres / Set-up
On-field strategies
Tactical movements on gameday
General assistance and leadership in the coaches box

Could we recruit a premiership coach for this role, ala Matthews, Roos or Sheedy. Would having a Eade (Collingwood overseer) work for us like it does the pies?

[SlimPickens]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

In the short term WE NEED to recruit a senior 'Head of Football' type position, who McCartney and his merry band of assistants would report directly into (both game day and off the field)...

This person would be charged with helping McCartney develop the following;

Skill development
Strucutres / Set-up
On-field strategies
Tactical movements on gameday
General assistance and leadership in the coaches box

Wonder if Neil Balme wants a challenge?

[SlimPickens]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

Could we recruit a premiership coach for this role, ala Matthews, Roos or Sheedy. Would having a Eade (Collingwood overseer) work for us like it does the pies?

The questions is does that set up actually work. Personally I'm not convinced it does, others may disagree.

Which are successful? Hird/Thompson, Buckley/Eade, Voss/Havey....all are doing better then us but I wouldnt consider any successful.

[Bornadog]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

The questions is does that set up actually work. Personally I'm not convinced it does, others may disagree.

Which are successful? Hird/Thompson, Buckley/Eade, Voss/Havey....all are doing better then us but I wouldnt consider any successful.

We currently have Monty as the match day strategist, but is he the right person. I think we could do with a senior assistant to help Macca. I said this from day one in 2012 and I think its still something we need.

[Remi Moses]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

In the short term WE NEED to recruit a senior 'Head of Football' type position, who McCartney and his merry band of assistants would report directly into (both game day and off the field)...

This person would be charged with helping McCartney develop the following;

Skill development
Strucutres / Set-up
On-field strategies
Tactical movements on gameday
General assistance and leadership in the coaches box

I agree with this. Port did that with Richardson( even though Hinkley's an experienced assistant)

[Remi Moses]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

I don't want to argue whether these players are good or not, what I am saying is here are 4 players, currently at other clubs, and part of their best 22 that would fill in the age bracket that we lack. Then people may look at recruitment differently. Yes we made a lot of mistakes and we are now paying for it.

Hill falls in the age bracket,but honestly he marked his own papers.
The point I'm making is Hill is playing in a better forward half than ours where more attention is paid to the other big guns.

[Bornadog]

Re: Pack your bags McCartney...

I agree with this. Port did that with Richardson( even though Hinkley's an experienced assistant)

Pretty sure Richardson was an assistant at our club some years ago. He left for more money.