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For the best part of two years since the supplement scandal began, there has been a whirlwind of uncertainty around the Essendon Bombers surrounding their performance and different scenarios that could play out.
The club has seen the players rise together to deliver extremely emotional performances. However will Essendon continue to be strong or will they be struck down?
No one outside the club can truly know the impact of the scandal, and we have been given mixed signals. Paddy Ryder’s determination to leave the club indicated that it was having a severe impact, but Jason Winderlich’s comeback from retirement also showed how the saga drew the players together to find positivity in an impossible situation.
Although James Hird has been backed all the way to coach in 2015 and with Mark Thompson seemingly out of the picture, we have learnt that anything is possible. With that in mind, predicting their 2015 outcome is a hard task. They could be a top-four team, improving from their seventh placed finish last year, or they could tumble out of the eight.
Essendon have great experience in the team with Jobe Watson, Brent Stanton, Paul Chapman, Dustin Fletcher, Brendon Goddard and the newly added Adam Cooney among the club’s elite hoping to lead the way. The club is also gifted with the younger generation of stars Dyson Heppell, David Zarharakis, Joe Daniher and Jake Carlisle who are more than capable of sharing the load of their more experienced colleagues. They also have a fair list of very young and essentially untried players who could turn a competitive side into a premiership side in just a few seasons.
Essendon is brimming with potential, however there are some holes, fillable holes, but holes nonetheless that are apparent in the side and will need plugging before this team becomes a serious contender.
The first hole is the ruck stocks. The Bombers now have Jonothan Giles and Tom Belchambers who, it has been signalled, will share ruck duties. Without writing them off as average players forever, neither is an out-an-out brilliant ruck or forward. This means that the Bombers don’t have a very established ruck or tall forward, given that Joe Daniher will need at least one more year to develop into what Essendon are after, and it is always difficult to function without a 40-50 goal tall forward. Neither Belchambers or Giles are the right solution for a key forward and considering Jake Carlisle’s role down back, he does not seem viable either (how nice it would be to have two of him).
Essendon are reasonably well placed at the moment and are not without hope, however some holes need plugging and the Bombers are still at risk of the supplements saga uncertainties. 2015 may see the distractions at their highest and with that in mind the Bombers may be felled, but the red and black faithful have to remember, whatever happens, it won’t be without a fight.
Prediction: tenth.
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