#31,#26 Ben Johnson

[Dusty]

I dont want to put any negatives on last nights performance,but is it just me or has ben johnson have the least amount of skills at the collingwood football club at the moment.Last week he was horrible against Port,and last night he again fiddled and fumbled with it out of the backline.I dont want to put the knockers on a young player but surely we can find space for someone else i.e adkins,kinnear,lonie until he can find some form.Every week he seems to hold on to the ball too long and give away a cheap turnover.

please prove me wrong next week Ben.

[Cam]

Got to disagree about last night. I thought johnson won some hard balls and finished off not too bad. Lonie is underdone, kinnear - im not sure if he's up to it, adkins - may have talent but yet break in to what is a pretty tough team. I think johnson does add an element of toughness - regardless of his sometimes inadequacy with disposal, and maybe thats why mick keeps him in. there are players like that in most teams - pike, half-of-essendon, kellaways, libba, franchina, hulme. Great to see didak given a go - and for him to go well when i got the chance. Don't know why he wasn't given a go against port.

Hard at it. The Collingwood way.

[junkboy75]

I wouldn't want to mess with a winning formula. johnno is part of the excellent rotation that c'wood has in place. one of the reasons why c'wood got over sydney was that they had fresh legs in the last quarter. it's excellent player management and excellent coaching by malthouse.

"..we flew at them as a hawk to his prey, passed through them in the disordered state in which they were, separated them into two distinct parts and then tacked upon their largest division.." -- Captain Cuthbert Collingwood, 1797

[foxy]

don't worry, johnno will be a good player. really tough, and does a lot of good work in close. watching the replay you can pick up a lot of the little things johnno does, especially some of his handpasses. not to mention that save on the goal line in the last quarter.

and his kicking is usually good. his style is just a bit strange-looking, that's all.

[CQ]

lol yes i reckon his kicking is 'a bit strange looking' too!!

nah hes a young player who needs some experience at afl level, put him in the ressies and he will be in the top 3 on the ground, therefore he wont really be learning much. the only negetive that i can really think of is last year he went into the packs a lot harder but hasnt done that as much this season.

adkins has the talent, his fitness etc has been so wrecked the last 2 years, when he was playing seniors he was looking like another young gun but then he got that shit ostiotis pubis or whatever it is and since then hes struggled. but if he can find his form (and bulk up a bit more) then he will be pretty good.

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[This message has been edited by CQ (edited 02 June 2002).]

[^*Cl|T*^]

Ben Johnson needs a spell in the reserves. He reminds me of Licuria in 2000. At times, he is a bit of a ball magnet on the back flank but his disposal, both hand and foot, is not good enough for AFL level, especially in the clinches when the pressure is on. I think if he can improve this side of his game he can become a great player. Put him back, bring in lonie, steinfort, adkins, or scotland and make him work his butt off in that dimension of his game for a while. Dimattina is a poor disposer by foot and thats why he is in the W'town team.


[This message has been edited by ^*Cl|T*^ (edited 02 June 2002).]

[Black_White]

Today on the ch9 sunday footy show, our coach singled out Didak, Leon, Nicky, Josh and Johnson as players that are only in their 2nd or 3rd year of topline footy.
He makes no excuses for any of them but would like people to understand that these guys are still learning the ropes, in fact he stated that we sometimes forget that. And we do.

Time to give Ben a break. He is playing his heart out for the Pies and will only get better.

-Craig

[foxy]

^*CIIT*^ or whatever your name is, go watch some replays of the last few weeks and look CLOSELY at johnno's handpassing. he never misses a target. take a look at the last quarter from the sydney game, and the third quarter of the brissy game. he gave us some serious drive with his handpassing.

i've always said johnno will play 150+ games for the pies, and i stand by that.

[paulie]

i thought Steroids was fantastic against Brisvegas.Last nite he was kept on the bench until the last quarter so it took him a while to get into the flow of things.But he was still working his arse off as usual and puting his body on the line.Granted he did put one kick out on the full.But that can happen when you come on cold.

[Broadie]

Benny? You sure you weren't watching Lica on Staurday?

I've been impressed with Lica's improved disposal this year, but Sat night was a shocker. I was quite amazed to see him only registered with 3 "official" clangers. Hope he gets back to the form of earlier this year, as getting it and turning it over can often be worse than not getting it in the first place.

Broadie

[MarkT]

I love the way Ben plays. He is hard at it and plays for keeps. He cannot kick up to the required standard though. There is no point pretending otherwise.

His relative youth would explain poor decision making from time to time and failure to cope with an extreme pressure situation. I have no problems with him in this regard. His youth does not explain his poor field kicking. He has cost us goals with turnovers and missed shots himself that should have been goals. That is true of many players (even Bucks on Saturday night) but it is tryue too often of Ben.

Taken on balance, I think he has a future - at the moment. He has to improve his kicking or he will be replaced by the next wave of youngsters about to emerge. I also think you cannot take too many players with his poor kicking skills into big games (eg finals). We have a few at present and Ben is not first choice amoung them.

There is no point denying it, his place in the team is under pressure. Rather than looking on that as a bad thing, I am hapy we have alternatives and if Ben does not make significant contributions each week he will be replaced by an in form new star in the making.

Somehow we have fit Lonnie and Adkins back into that side, not to mention Cummings, Richo and possibly Rintoul.

[PiesPremiers]

I think johno's been okay in the last few weeks. Against Brisbane he had 20+ possessions? and played 3 and a half quarters? so we all know he's capable, and when the games up for grabs, like it was last Saturday, you know hes going to run until the end, and maybe get us over the line one day. He's got a big heart.
Definately worth the effort of persisting with him.

Dan

[Clemo]

What I can't handle is fellow Collingwood supporters abusing our own players.There was this "supporter???" sitting behind me. He was calling Freeborn everything under the sun. I almost got into a punch up with him. People like that are an absolute disgrace. They make me sick. It wasn't just Freeborn he was getting into - almost the whole team.

_____________________
Collingwood Forever !
clemo@magpies.net
http://dodo.net.au/~clemo/u/~clemo

[Cam]

Yeah! Agreed! We could all damn well dump on lots of our own - go back to 90 - at times gayfer, kerrison, barwick, starcevich were ordinary - even the frickin norm smith medalist shawy couldn't kick over a jam tin most of the time.

Now Lonie, Presti, Josh, Nick, Johno, Dimma, these guys havent exactly set the world on fire most of THIS year, but what would you rather happen all you knockers - that they get abused on sites like this and at the game by so-called pie fans and they lose their confidence completely? Imagine if Anthony Rocca was permanently tainted by all the crap that's been written about him over the years?

Leave the selecting up to the selectors, bloody rejoice that we have a frickin fine bunch of hard-nut, poised, still-learning 100% goers this year. If a guy can't kick - think of shawy, if a guy goes missing sometimes but is brilliant others - think of daics, if a guy seems ordinary, average, but would die for the jumper - think of jamie turner.

A football club never has 18 bloody faultless super-athletes on the field at the one time. It has 18 blokes that make a force, each combining their own individual pluses and minuses. If a bloke goes missing then its up to the others to drag him up and encourage him to get back in there. Only turn-coats shoot their own wounded. You wanna bag someone, bag the opposition.

Hard at it. The Collingwood way.

[Magpies_rule19]

you do have a good point, but if Ben wasnt good i am shore Mick would have put him in the seconds. The reason he came back to playing senior football, is bacause he proved to Mick when he played for the seconds at least 4 weeks ago(when he got best on ground).

I think he is still very young, and has heaps of good years to come!!
BEN IS A CHAMP!

GO PIES!