Footy Tragic

Brisbane vs Carlton:

Looking Good:

• Matthew Leuenberger: Played a super game as the dominant ruckman on the ground. He is beginning to prove his worth as a top draft pick, displaying his strong footy brain and a willingness to put his big body in dangerous spots to win the ball. He won’t clock up too many more tons this year, but this game was of a super standard.
• Chris Judd: Juddy seemed to win every centre clearance and looked to enjoy the freedom allowed to him by Brisbane – Simon Black played on him. Whilst he didn’t quite hit the ton (he was on track before going off late with the blood rule), he was the most dominant player on the ground.
• Sam Jacobs: Stepped up in Kruezer’s place and looked very comfortable and confident in this role. Is a bit of a crash-and-bash ruckman who likes to lay tackles, whilst also picking up a bit of the ball around the ground.

Disappointing:

• Shaun Hampson: Hampson played the game which all Warnock owners were wishing for – he had very little effect on the contest as a ruck/forward. He finished with just 4 disposals and 10 hitouts.
• Ash McGrath: Every time he got the ball he seemed to turn straight into oncoming track – clearly his hamstring injury effected his cognitive ability! Was really poor and turned it over constantly. Voss does have a habit of bringing players back a week too early from injury, so perhaps McGrath will come good soon.
• Luke Power: Played the majority of the game as a forward and struggled to have any effect on the contest.

Blip on the Radar:

• Andrew Walker: Walker has had a reasonable season this year, but this game (and also his past few) could prove costly to his position in the team – his current role is as a playmaker off the half-back line, but his ability to keep turning the ball over was a major issue on Thursday night, a problem which may see him given a different role, such as tagging, in the coming weeks. I would avoid him for this reason alone.

Hawthorn vs Western Bulldogs:

Looking Delicious:

• Sam Mitchell: Really led his team well at the clearances with 28 well-earned disposals, plus one of the late goals that eventually got Hawthorn across the line. His 8 tackles were also a highlight.
• Brian Lake: Ran off Franklin all night, and as usual collected plenty of cheap ball in the backline. What originally looked like a blip on the radar for Lake has turned into a consistent event – he can almost be counted on for a good regular score nowadays, thanks especially to his huge amount of marks – he finished this game with a whopping 18 marks!
• Luke Hodge: Continues on his great season after a bit of a dip last week – he played this game purely as a midfielder and finished with 28 touches and 6 tackles. Playing in a winning team is certainly helping!

Disappointing:

• Barry Hall: Kicked just two goals and did very little else, thanks to a good defensive game by Gilham.
• Michael Osborne: Was hardly sighted for much of the match as he stayed fixed to the forward line for most of the game. Finished with just 9 disposals.
• Ryan Hargrave: The trend continues – a good game last week and a shocker again this week. Was given the role as a defender on Peterson and was given little opportunity to zone off. I think it is safe to say he will likely finish off the year in similar up-and-down fashion.

Blip on the Radar:

• Liam Picken: Picken has played his year as a tagger (as he did last year), but more often than not he is taking a smaller forward, rather than a midfielder. This week though, he landed the job on Mitchell and therefore spent much more time in the midfield, allowing him to more disposals. Don’t be expecting any sort of regularity to this scoring, even if the midfield move does continue. He is a tagger first and foremost.

Fremantle vs Port Adelaide:

Looking Good:

• Rhys Palmer: Was great in the midfield all day, but especially late in the match as Freo ripped the game from Port’s grasping claws. Unfortunately though, his day was soured when he shattered Barlow’s leg when going for a low mark.
• Mitch Banner: Was Port’s main architect in the second quarter as they came back strongly. He finished the game as Port’s best midfielder with 23 disposals.
• Aaron Sandliands: Carried on his great form with another dominant display. He continues to be a great go-to option for Freo, and as I have said time and time again, his contested marking is a highlight, and one that will help prevent him from getting many sub-100 scores this season.

Disappointing:

• Michael Barlow: Such a sad story to come out of this game – the injury to Michael Barlow. Those who saw it will attest to it being something they wouldn’t want to see again – the injury was graphic and clearly painful – some TV shows won’t even show the footage of him standing up afterwards, with his leg collapsing below him. A very sad story indeed after such a brave and awe-inspiring debut year from the kid… He will now miss the remainder of the season (stay tuned to www.footytragic.com to find out what to do next!)
• Daniel Motlop: He spends his time either pleading for free kicks or for his teammates to give him a cheapie out the back of packs. He needs to step back and look at how far his game has deteriorated and start learning about working hard for his disposals.
• Kepler Bradley: With Johnson’s return from club suspension, Bradley’s role was stripped back significantly and he ended up spending less time on the ball. Still played OK, but I wouldn’t be considering him now with the ambiguities Johnson’s return brings.

Blip on the Radar:

• Michael Johnson: Played his first game in a couple of months after his club suspension for drug possession. He played well as a defender-cum-ruckman, and got more than his fair share of disposals, plenty of which came from chipping around. He is not the type of player you want at this stage of the year – inconsistent and unreliable.

Collingwood vs West Coast:

Looking Good:

• Dane Swan: He just didn’t stop – and you can probably thank John Worsfold for that – after racking up 47 points by quarter time, Swan pushed on to score 161 points thanks to his 38 touches and 14 marks. He was simply prolific – in fact, it looked like there were five of him out there. He just keeps bobbing up for kick after kick, and knows exactly where to run to find the pill. He is the perfect captain.
• Darren Jolly: He proved that last week’s best on ground display was no fluke, following it up with a four goal, 20 possession game. He is clunking marks strongly and looking really good across the ground. If I had my time again, I’d trade Hille to Jolly, rather than my poor option of Cox.
• Scott Pendlebury: Despite the tag, Pendles still came to the party, racking up 27 disposals with a bonus two goals. Finally, 2010 is presenting itself as a good DT season for Pendlebury – not just Supercoach!

Disappointing:

• Chris Masten: Yes, it was his first game back from injury, but he was poor. Now averages 45 DT points over the past three games – stay well away – he is the DT antichrist!
• Beau Waters: Was given the hard forward tag by Lockyer, and it worked. He was out of the match until given the chance to junk some stats late in the fourth quarter.
• Dean Cox: He just looks to be going through the motions without really pushing himself to his full form. He doesn’t look half the player he once was and my guess is he may be rested as the season comes to an end. Don’t be as stupid as me – stay well away from this DT booby-trap!

Blip on the Radar:

• Jack Anthony: Played the game in defence and wasn’t too bad. But with the imminent inclusion of players such as Maxwell, Anthony will find himself back in the VFL very soon.

Adelaide vs Essendon:

Looking Good:

• Scott Thompson: Thompson continued his great recent form with another best on ground performance. He racked up 34 touches and 8 tackles for the game, and looks to be invigorated by Adelaide’s good recent form.
• Kurt Tippett: Is he back? Well… it certainly looked like it! After being starved of anything resembling form all year, Tippett finally looks to be the same player who finished off 2009 so strongly. He finished this game with six goals, his best for the year, whilst also picking up 16 disposals from his time in the ruck.
• Patrick Ryder: Paddy once again just fell short of the ton, but he was still impressive. He is still carrying the sole ruckman mantle at Essendon and doing it well, finishing the game as the best ruckman on the ground with a game-high 29 hitouts.

Disappointing:

• Bernie Vince: Was tagged out of the game by Welsh and couldn’t join in the party. As I said last week, he is going to struggle to break tags with his lingering injury, so is one to stay away from.
• Michael Quinn: The young Irishman was a somewhat surprise inclusion (especially for owners of Howlett and Prismall who have had to put up with zeros due to their ‘poor disposal’), however he won’t be a surprise dropping for next weeks teams after an ordinary display.
• Michael Hurley: Played at full-forward but was kept scoreless by Rutten. 2010 has proven not to be his year, so I think it’s time we stopped holding our breath, waiting for him to come good.

Blip on the Radar:

• Andrew Welsh: Welsh has proven in previous seasons, and even in this one, that he is capable of the odd DT ton, but he has also proven (much more frequently) that he is capable of very low scoring in the 30-50 range. He may have scored well this week, but as a tagger, this is not what his game is based around.

Geelong vs North Melbourne:

Looking Good:

• Paul Chapman: Straight back from injury and into the action was Chappy. Many coaches breathed a sigh of relief when he wasn’t a late withdrawal, then proceeded to jump for joy as he was the top scorer on-field. He finished with 37 disposals – most of which were by foot.
• James Podsiadly: After a shocker in the wet last week, Pods bounced back with his obligatory five goals at Skilled stadium. But what stood out about his game was not his goal kicking, but his forward pressure. He tackled and harassed all day, which would certainly have impressed the coach.
• Joel Corey: Corey has spent many weeks on the sidelines, so the expectation was that he would come back slowly. But, amazingly he didn’t, not only finishing with 27 disposals, but also an amazing 10 tackles. What is also worth noting is that his game percentage was a very low 75%, intimating that he is back to his ball-winning best.

Disappointing:

• Jack Ziebell: Unfortunately broke his leg very early in the game, ending his season. More sad injury news to another young rising star.
• Travis Varcoe: Maybe I have my sights set too high for Varcoe, but again he did much less than I expected of him. Only the one goal and 13 disposals whilst playing on the much slower Rawlings was a loss for Varcoe – perhaps don’t be taking my advice of a couple of weeks ago to trade him in.
• Lindsay Thomas: It seems that one amazing performance of a few weeks ago will be a once-off for Thomas. He spends too much time going for the freakish, rather than concentrating on the basics. He was penalised with a free against on a couple of occasions for going for speckies when he had no chance of marking the ball… This is proof why you don’t trade in a player after just one game!

Blip on the Radar:

• Matthew Scarlett: Scarlett is a reasonable rebounder, but is typically Geelong’s last line of defence, meaning he plays very deep. Occasionally he will rack up largish scores, as he did in this match, but it is not the norm. This score was thanks to him manning up on the resting ruckman – players very easy to run off, allowing him to pick up more ball across the half-back line.

Richmond vs Sydney:

Looking Good:

• Daniel Connors: Played up the ground and continues to push his game to new heights every time he steps on the football field. He racked up 26 touches and 10 marks whilst playing on O’Keefe and looks to have a lot of confidence in his own ability, which is great to see in such a young player.
• Ryan O’Keefe: O’Keefe is back in the good books after being seemingly out of form for a little while . He was back running through the midfield, clocking up 29 disposals, although it was his huge 11 tackles that really stood out on the stats sheet!
• Jude Bolton: Bolton played a fantastic game, especially in the first half as he really pushed Sydney to their strong lead. He is a great unheralded midfielder, although may be a little inconsistent to be pushing the elite category.

Disappointing:

• Tadhg Kennelly: Was shocking in his first game back from injury. He must be experiencing déjà-vu from when he played his last season of AFL – a year marred with injury and poor form after such a strong start. Now priced under $200k, all his owners will be baffled by their decision to stick with him!
• Ben Cousins: Ben is/was a great player, but at Richmond there are two issues – firstly, he is always the first tagged, and being in a young team he rarely gets support. Secondly, he simply loves to handball – his kick to handball ratio is so poor that even a 30 disposal game will likely see him fall short of the ton.
• Heath Grundy: ‘Reg’ had such a strong start to the year as an attacking defender, however this past month has seen him move back into a more defensive role, killing his DT ability in the process. Averaging just 66 points across the last five weeks, now may be the time to count your losses with him.

Blip on the Radar:

• Will Thursfield: In Thursfield’s 63 game career as a defender, his 96 DT points beat his previous best DT score by more than 30 points! He is strictly a dour defender, and games like this only happen every… well… 63 games I guess.

St.Kilda vs Melbourne:

Looking Good:

• Clinton Jones: Was best on ground by my opinion – spent the first half tagging Davey out of the game, then was freed up to be a midfielder in his own right. He then proceeded to get his hands on just about every clearance and looked to get a whole new lease on his game. This won’t happen very often, however it was good for him to show Ross Lyon what he is capable of.
• Leigh Montagna: Joey just keeps running and running and presenting and presenting. He is such a hard worker and it is no surprise he is constantly racking up the dream team points. Even when the game is done and buried he is still working hard to win the ball.
• Brendon Goddard: Started forward and was the focal point of most of St.Kilda’s attacks. And although he cracked it that he wasn’t kicking enough goals of his own, he was still able to rack up plenty of the pill, finishing with 31 touches.

Disappointing:

• Tom Scully: Played all game on a HFF, which was strange and St.Kilda’s strong defence was able to shut him out of the game. I doubt this is a new role, but rather a way of resting him.
• James Gwilt: Played the best game of his career last week, and whilst again very good against the Dees, Jimmy didn’t rack up nearly the same amount of ball as his did then.
• Nathan Jones: Played the whole game as a tagger, as he has been all year, and it is obviously effecting his scoring.

Blip on the Radar:

• Kyle Cheney: This was his first game for the year, and whilst serviceable to a degree, his strength was his defensive work, not his rebounding. So if he does get another game, don’t be expecting too many dashing runs from defence to accompany it.