Short term pain long term gain

[Museman]

Bona-fide member of the sunshine and lollipops is our Bux....in 17 he'll slide that to 19-20.

[thompsoc]

[Dangles]

On a positive note we finished 11th last year and are currently sitting in 11th, so we're on target to go Back-To-Back.

[thompsoc]

[Wokko]

We've had a second year in a row that's like 2006, I was really thinking this year would be more '07 but we've stagnated.

Probably something to do with some draft picks not coming on in the last couple of years (injuries etc) and our trades/mature signings not quite coming off (Beams deal is probably as good as the Tarrant deal was though).

If Shazberg works out and we can net Treloar as well as cut the dead wood then the list should make top 8 next year and then start contending. If there's another massive form drop off mid year then I'd suggest looking at coaching/tactics and what might be going wrong there because the list is almost complete for a flag run.

[Cleomenes]

Our season has collapsed around us over the last month. From being well ahead of expectations, we have dropped to somewhat behind them.
My expectations were higher than many at the start of the year, but they most of all included Ben Reid. Despite his absence, we did well. Varcoe showed far more than I could have hoped for, and so did Crisp. The thin midfield did far better than it should have.
We can now see that it all depended far more than we thought on Cloke and Elliott. Without them, there are few goals scored.
The very young backline did extremely well, but oppositions know now how to get past them, Their endeavour is fine, but the kicking out of defense remains terrible in overall terms. When two defenders (Toovey and Brown) cannot be included in direction shifting chains, the alternate exit methods are just too few. A third (Frost) is only a bit better.
The defense is potentially a lot better, with quite a crop of young players looking to have what it takes. Unfortunately, one of them ( Marsh) is not a good kick.
Moore offers promise to the forward line, but won't be consistent for a while. The two young rucks should eventually provide a difficult forward match up between them, but they are still getting there. A really fast, smart, accurate crumbing forward in the Betts mold is a glaring lack on our list. Kennedy isn't it, perhaps Sinclair needs another try there.
The side has lost confidence now, and is unlikely to recover it this year. Hopefully, everyone has learned a lot from the season, and this oh so young list can pick up from where they left off at the end of June this year in 2016.

[RudeBoy]

[Dangles]

Anyone know what the average age and games played of our list is at the moment and what the averages for the 2010 team was? Maybe that's a comparison we could use to gauge the progress of the current crop.