whufc wrote:Personally im not so sure about North yet, no doubt they have a brilliant side on paper but they had a good side on paper last year as well.
I have two question marks over North one being their defence, i tend to think there a tad bit small back there, they can throw Gill or White or in defence but i can see them two playing yo yo roles this year which could unsettle the side a bit.
The other question mark i have is their midfield, while they have guys that can get lots of the ball they don't tend to hurt other sides as much as they should, i know it's only a trial game but against the Dogs they had almost 100 more possesions yet had less scoring shots. There midfield doesn't hurt teams on the scoreboard enough imho.
I would love to know how many goals their midfielders kicked compared to other teams, SPELLY?
Believe it or not whufc I agree with you in the main!
Our defence will depend upon the availability of Davis which looks the case early on at least. With him in the back pocket and McIntyre and White at FB and CHB then our size and height is fine. Take Davis out and we are left with Cunningham and Gallman to play on the third tall fwds which they do well from time to time but over a season may be asking too much? Pollock may come into consideration at some stage if we need additional height without Davis being available?
According to Healy he will keep White at CHB and Gill up fwd although Gilly could go back if we had the case where Stewart, Wundke and Alleway are all vying for fwd spots?
I think our midfield is better than last year in terms of grunt and speed and I think the quality and amount of touches that Allan, Archard, Wright, Elstone will pick up and along with the pace of Ryswyk and Connors should see plenty of inside 50 ball for our fwds who most teams will (or should) have trouble matching up on if they are all fit and firing. We also have the likes of Younie who can still play a burst in the midfield along with Thiele and James Bennett so I don't think that is a problem to be honest.
Where I think we still have a slight problem is the mental application against teams like Centrals and Glenelg who go at you hard all day and stop that smooth flow we like and going by the stats from last weeks trial game too much side ways mucking about possession footy (which probably accounts for the 100 touches) instead of a more direct style? Also our tackling needs to improve significantly to apply the same pressure back on teams. 18 tackles in a game such as the Centrals trial game is just not acceptable even allowing for the fact it was a trial played in warm weather!
On paper we do look top 3 but as we all know you don't play football on paper!
Posted: Mon Mar 22, 2010 7:53 pm
