- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Are we ready to talk about footy again? The round of football just gone was set alight on Friday night by Adam Goodes’ war dance, directed at opposition Carlton supporters.
It dominated the public debate from that point on.
There were six new AFL pieces posted on The Roar yesterday, with five of them using Goodes as the focal point. Add to this Sarah Olle’s Saturday column, which followed her remarkably prescient article a few days earlier.
The conversations that Adam Goodes seems to incite with his behaviour need to be fleshed out. It’s hard not to think that he is simultaneously opening eyes and closing minds. There seems to be a great divide.
Anyone who thinks it’s not largely racial is kidding themselves.
But, on the field, the story of North Melbourne under Brad Scott continues to be one of elongated mediocrity.
Scott took over a side that needed regeneration heading into 2010, having finished 13th the year before. He kept the Roos around the finals mark in his first four seasons, finishing ninth, ninth, eighth and tenth, before driving them to a preliminary final berth last year.
In 2015 though, North’s season is teetering on the brink.
The bottom five teams on the ladder – St Kilda, Melbourne, Brisbane, Gold Coast and Carlton – are no chance of playing finals football this year.
The team immediately above these forlorn sides is North Melbourne. They have won four and lost five, but also have a percentage higher only than the five stragglers below them.
Scott is renowned for keeping faith in his players. To his detractors, it’s one of his biggest failings.
If we go back to 2010, Scott’s first year in charge, of the 16 players that played 17 or more games, 13 are still on the North list. If we apply the same formula in 2011, 14 of the 16 most played players of the year are still rocking up to training at Arden Street.
Collingwood won the premiership in 2010, and they had 19 players play 20 or more matches for them. Only seven of those 19 players remain at the Pies.
That’s the sort of turnover required in the AFL system. Collingwood has turned over 63 per cent of the top end of its list since 2010. North is running at 19 per cent in the same time, despite being the definition of middle-of-the-road.
They were mediocre then, and with so many of the same players, they’re mediocre now.
Added to the playing group have been recent high-profile recruits Nick Dal Santo, Shaun Higgins and Jarrad Waite. Sam Gibson is one of North’s most effective running players. Robin Nahas is ensconced in the best 22, playing arguably career best football.
Handy additions all. But has the Kangaroo youth developed?
Ryan Bastinac is perhaps the poster child for lack of development at North. He was a first-year player in 2010, playing every game. He was top five for disposals and top three for clearances and inside 50s. He’s been the sub in four of his last 12 matches.
Shaun Atley, a 2010 draft alum, is always the pre-season pick to ‘take the next step’. It hasn’t happened thus far. He too has worn the starting sub vest in recent times. Surely we expect more of a supposedly highly rated fifth year player? North supporters are entitled to see graduation, not more education.
Of the recently drafted youth, Ben Brown has impressed with his liveliness and spark, while Luke McDonald went close to winning the Rising Star award last season.
Will these two improve year-on-year, or should we expect stagnation, if not recession, at some point?
North Melbourne can’t continue on the way they have been. Big wins against top teams, followed by bad losses against bottom sides. Beating up on the cellar-dwellers, then capitulating completely against the best.
Or giving up all momentum against middle-tier opposition, as they did on Sunday against Collingwood.
The hard questions deserve to be put to Brad Scott. He’ll avoid them for a while, due to his upcoming back surgery, but he must surely ponder them from his hospital bed.
But does he have the answers?