Forward Line

[B.M]

Backs as per usual
Wilkie - Cordy - Stocker
NWM - Battle - Sinclair
Int: Bonner

Centre
Marshall - Steele - Windhager
Hill - Ross - Wilson
Int: Byrnes - Garcia

Fwd Line

King - Membrey

Collard - Higgins

Caminiti - Owens

Int: Phillipou

Sub
Jones

[Vortex]

Backs as per usual
Wilkie - Cordy - Stocker
NWM - Battle - Sinclair
Int: Bonner

Centre
Marshall - Steele - Windhager
Hill - Ross - Wilson
Int: Byrnes - Garcia

Fwd Line

King - Membrey

Collard - Higgins

Caminiti - Owens

Int: Phillipou

Sub
Jones

Collard isn't ready but Buttler is not delivering so what are the other options available to the coaches....it's slim atm.

Caminiti is worth an extended trial as the deepest key tall and put King into the ruck or play him the same way Lyon has been.playing Sharman behind the ball and get him running straight lines behind the ball and also helping out in the ruck.

[B.M]

Butler is not ready or deserving of a game

He did zero preseason and can’t get a kick or put on pressure

He needs to earn his spot

I don’t think Lance is ready neither but 6 goals in the VFL from his last two games

And it might make up for his ridiculous debut

[skeptic]

I’ve read that he might have done a hamstring

[Yorkeys]

Collard King Membrey
Wilson Caminiti Henry

Int. Higgins Sharman

Lot of goals there.

Did you see the acrobatic one hander from AC which he finished off with a goal. Good stuff.

[Scollop]

Collard King Membrey
Wilson Caminiti Henry

Int. Higgins Sharman

Lot of goals there.

That's not how we roll.

Forget about the fact that we can score quickly when we play attacking footy. Forget about the fact that we scored only 6 goals in 3 quarters playing Saints Footy ( the players call it playing 'our way'...but it's really...Ross Lyon's way)

As soon as Webster, Paton and Howard are ready and available these 3 defenders are back in. That means no room for Caminiti and Sharman and certainly no room for Collard

[Yorkeys]

We shall see.

[Scollop]

We shall see.

Why do you think we like to do long bombs continuously into the hot spot? That's what they're told to do. It's a defensive and conservative way of entering inside 50.

It allows your mids and wingers and half forwards to defend any rebound.

Our KP Forward's don't practice leading. They don't do what comes natural to them. They're told to crash packs. They're told not to lead straight up the ground 45 metres out in case there's a turnover.

The instruction isn't look for a leading forward. Lyon is not interested in Sharman being a leading forward option or King or Caminiti for that matter

[spert]

Collard King Membrey
Wilson Caminiti Henry

Int. Higgins Sharman

Lot of goals there.

That's not how we roll.

Forget about the fact that we can score quickly when we play attacking footy. Forget about the fact that we scored only 6 goals in 3 quarters playing Saints Footy ( the players call it playing 'our way'...but it's really...Ross Lyon's way)

As soon as Webster, Paton and Howard are ready and available these 3 defenders are back in. That means no room for Caminiti and Sharman and certainly no room for Collard

The defence isn't a big problem, it's from the centre line forward where we need to lift and get more pace in there.

[Otiman]

The defence isn't a big problem, it's from the centre line forward where we need to lift and get more pace in there.

Pace, ground ball pressure, contested ball wins. It's all missing right now.

We aren't taking advantage of the height mismatches from playing so many tall forwards, so there's no point having King, Sharman, Membrey, Caminiti, Owens all forward. Drop 2 if not 3 of these for some runners who can chase and win ball at ground level.

[Vortex]

The defence isn't a big problem, it's from the centre line forward where we need to lift and get more pace in there.

Pace, ground ball pressure, contested ball wins. It's all missing right now.

We aren't taking advantage of the height mismatches from playing so many tall forwards, so there's no point having King, Sharman, Membrey, Caminiti, Owens all forward. Drop 2 if not 3 of these for some runners who can chase and win ball at ground level.

Basic skill errors too, we've been very fumble for a few weeks now, not taking the ball cleanly, symptomatic of a young side I guess.

[The Fireman]

Gotta get Sharman in there and leave him there

[Yorkeys]

It's unfortunate for Cooper that Tim can't pinch hit in different positions, so it falls to Cooper to be the coaches Mr Try to Fix it.

[B.M]

Cooper is thrown around because he’s not getting a kick forward

[Scollop]

Cooper is thrown around because he’s not getting a kick forward

What utter nonsense. Do you like to make stuff up do you?

Round 1 he spent half his time in defense. The heat map clearly shows he got most of his possessions in the backline

Round 2 similar. Most of his possessions are deep in defense on the last line and on the wing.

Round 3 he was subbed out. Before he was he ...AGAIN spent most of his time and got the vast majority of possessions in the backline.

Round 4 ...same story... 50/50 in defense. 9 possessions in the backline plus 4-5 high half forward, then a few deep in the forward line

Against GWS he wasn't good but he wasn't Robinson Crusoe there...and ...just in case you were wondering - 75% of time spent in defense!

[B.M]

Isn’t he playing wing and just doing what wingers do and push back into d50 to support defence

Because we have 6 defenders (on ground)

Wilkie - played solely in defence
Battle same
NWM the same
Cordy the same
Stocker the same
Bonner the same

We have been very healthy down back and that group has been stable


Sinclair was moved around last week - started in d50

Cooper started on the wing (again) and literally did not get a kick in the first half!

He couldn’t play forward
We had King, Caminiti, Membrey and Owens up forward

[Vortex]

The argument about Sharman playing in defence confuses me, if he's such a good forward, why isn't he playing as a forward? You hear regularly the claim he's a natural forward with great running patterns but he's hardly played as a forward for almost the majority of his 40 games.

And I think with fans now questioning whether King is suited to being our deepest forward you'd have to say there are some concerns about our forward line.

I hope Camaniti plays the whole game as our number one forward in King's absence just to see how he performs with the main responsibility.

[Scollop]

The argument about Sharman playing in defence confuses me, if he's such a good forward, why isn't he playing as a forward? You hear regularly the claim he's a natural forward with great running patterns but he's hardly played as a forward for almost the majority of his 40 games.

You're right about one thing.

It's confusing not playing him forward when he was successful last game against GWS and he proved he was worthy of a spot in the team

Here's his stats....oh...it was a FINAL by the way.
16 disposals - 11 of them CONTESTED. 6 marks - 3 of them inside 50.

2 goals. 6 x Inside 50 's. 8 score involvements. 2 Goal Assists

If King didn't get suspended and we kept the same side as the one that played Collingwood in Round 2, then Caminiti doesn't play. Anthony wasn't selected in Round 1 versus Geelong either.

If Wood was available in Round 3 and if St Kilda's game plan involved leading up to a kicker streaming down from the wing or the centre of the ground, then Sharman would play as a forward.

We played All our talls against Richmond and we tried to exploit Richmond's lack of tall defenders. It ...sort of worked...we did get the win ...but it meant it was lean pickings. I reckon Ross felt bad about dropping Caminiti after the Richmond game because Anthony has a great attitude and we can't just keep dropping him to the VFL.

He had a pretty good game against Essendon, even though the team lost. Anthony repaid Ross's faith and we nearly pinched a win up in Canberra.

Playing King, Owens, Caminiti, Membrey and Sharman in the same side isn't going to work. The sooner they figure out who they want as their long term KP Forwards the better

[Vortex]

The argument about Sharman playing in defence confuses me, if he's such a good forward, why isn't he playing as a forward? You hear regularly the claim he's a natural forward with great running patterns but he's hardly played as a forward for almost the majority of his 40 games.

You're right about one thing.

It's confusing not playing him forward when he was successful last game against GWS and he proved he was worthy of a spot in the team

Here's his stats....oh...it was a FINAL by the way.
16 disposals - 11 of them CONTESTED. 6 marks - 3 of them inside 50.

2 goals. 6 x Inside 50 's. 8 score involvements. 2 Goal Assists

If King didn't get suspended and we kept the same side as the one that played Collingwood in Round 2, then Caminiti doesn't play. Anthony wasn't selected in Round 1 versus Geelong either.

If Wood was available in Round 3 and if St Kilda's game plan involved leading up to a kicker streaming down from the wing or the centre of the ground, then Sharman would play as a forward.

We played All our talls against Richmond and we tried to exploit Richmond's lack of tall defenders. It ...sort of worked...we did get the win ...but it meant it was lean pickings. I reckon Ross felt bad about dropping Caminiti after the Richmond game because Anthony has a great attitude and we can't just keep dropping him to the VFL.

He had a pretty good game against Essendon, even though the team lost. Anthony repaid Ross's faith and we nearly pinched a win up in Canberra.

Playing King, Owens, Caminiti, Membrey and Sharman in the same side isn't going to work. The sooner they figure out who they want as their long term KP Forwards the better

Two things I can’t reconcile about that Scollo,


His games are very far and few between where I find myself being wowed and think he could be a 200 gamer or something to that effect. Well not like I have when other youngsters have got their start and like I did with Hugo on the weekend.

And the games where he got on the end of some goals was against apposition that were happy to give him some space, the final was a good example if you breakdown his goals. Put some work into him and put a decent defender on him and he’s struggled in the forward line as a main target due to his obvious weaknesses.

[Scollop]

Sharman came on the scene in the mid season draft of 2021

Cooper has played under 40 games of AFL.

Let's compare his goal tally and stats with a guy who people recognise as a very good forward who delivers in finals and delivers when it matters. He too is not a power forward. He's a lead up forward. He's basically your third tall

HE ALSO CAME TO THE AFL AS A LATE BLOOMER. In other words, the talent scouts weren't interested in him until he was 20/21 years of age.

In 2019 this player was the same age as Cooper was last year, so have a look at this player's output for 2019 in the AFL compared with Copper Sharman's output in 2023. By the end of 2019 this player had played over 40 games of AFL. Cooper hasn't played 40 yet

Cooper did not get a consistent run as a forward last year and came on as sub a couple of times I recall, however his stats compare favourably. This other bloke doesn't play on the wing or get asked to help out defenders deep on the last line of defence.

Goal assists per game, Contested marks per game. Marks inside 50 per game and ... Goals per game compare very favourably

https://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/ft_ ... fopt2=2023

We all know that Cooper is STILL not getting a fair run as a forward.

[Otiman]

Hard to compare stats when Sharman isn't being played in his position.

What is really telling is comparing Sharman 2023 to Sharman 2024. It's clear he isn't being used to his strengths.

The question is this: Does playing him to his strengths do more for the team than using him as a utility/gap filler?

[Scollop]

Hard to compare stats when Sharman isn't being played in his position.

What is really telling is comparing Sharman 2023 to Sharman 2024. It's clear he isn't being used to his strengths.

The question is this: Does playing him to his strengths do more for the team than using him as a utility/gap filler?

I think with both Liam Henry and Mason Wood injured it means match committee is forced to gap fill with Cooper playing up the ground. Byrnes would normally be in and out of the side depending on his form, but he seems to have cemented one of the spots on the wing. Sebby and Cooper and Brad Hill sometimes line up at centre bounce on the wing as well.

It will be interesting when Webster, Henry, Wood and Paton are all available where Cooper fits in

The President's email says we want to be a consistent top 4 team. We are prioritising development over getting into finals at all costs.

I'd love to see Cooper playing regularly as a forward (and based on his output and his form he plays there permanantly).

[B.M]

Who would you like to see out of the forward line to accommodate Sharman?

King - no
Membrey- no
Caminiti - no
Owens - no

[Vortex]

Sharman came on the scene in the mid season draft of 2021

Cooper has played under 40 games of AFL.

Let's compare his goal tally and stats with a guy who people recognise as a very good forward who delivers in finals and delivers when it matters. He too is not a power forward. He's a lead up forward. He's basically your third tall

HE ALSO CAME TO THE AFL AS A LATE BLOOMER. In other words, the talent scouts weren't interested in him until he was 20/21 years of age.

In 2019 this player was the same age as Cooper was last year, so have a look at this player's output for 2019 in the AFL compared with Copper Sharman's output in 2023. By the end of 2019 this player had played over 40 games of AFL. Cooper hasn't played 40 yet

Cooper did not get a consistent run as a forward last year and came on as sub a couple of times I recall, however his stats compare favourably. This other bloke doesn't play on the wing or get asked to help out defenders deep on the last line of defence.

Goal assists per game, Contested marks per game. Marks inside 50 per game and ... Goals per game compare very favourably

https://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/ft_ ... fopt2=2023

We all know that Cooper is STILL not getting a fair run as a forward.

Yep...stats.

But why is he playing so badly when he's given a go in the forward line, he's hardly been utilised there by Ross and Ratts. My guess is it's because of his significant weakness without ball in hand.

ToG is getting lesser by the week too.

Something doesn't add up if he's a natural forward?

I genuinely have no explanation.

[B.M]

I do

He’s not very good

Remember- he went undrafted- he was a mid season pick at 21

He’s played around half a dozen good games out of 40

It’s a bit like a guy been given lots of opportunities to open the batting- eventually they score - then you’ve got to keep them in for a few more games - they fail a times - but you are seduced by their good knock, so you give them one last chance. Then they score again. And so it goes

At the end of the season they’ve held their spot all year and made 3 scores (as a tease) but failed 11 times