- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Opinion
It was a promising start on the weekend for the Pies – in the first quarter, we brought the heat.
We out-pressured the Swans, who rank among the best in the comp for pressure, and the whole team profited from it.
If I was Nathan Buckley, my game review would consist of replaying the first quarter and telling the team that, no matter who we’re playing and how the scoreboard is going, this is the minimum effort required.
Because if you have any pride in yourself and any hope of being a good AFL footballer then this is the time to prove that when your feet are to the fire, you don’t cower and hide.
In saying all of that, we lost halfway through the second. We had been in control for the entire quarter to that point without scoreboard reward.
You could see it unfolding.
I said to my half-empty tinny: “If they score first after all this, we’re cooked,” and lo and behold, cooked we were.
That will happen playing the kids and that’s okay, as long as Bucks and the coaching staff are coaching resilience. They have the perfect game to teach that most important lesson to our kids. I hope they are taking advantage of it.
Now onto those aforementioned kids, the focus of the rest of my year’s game reviews.
I’m already a big fan of Caleb Poulter. He has started his AFL career wonderfully.
He runs hard up and down a wing and isn’t afraid of the contest.
It’s very early on but I can see young Poulter’s glorious mullet flapping up and down a wing for a long time yet. Just while I’m in the wing, I have called for Will Hoskin-Elliot to be dropped for a long time now.
He had his best game in a long, long time.
Maybe we see him on the wing for the rest of the year – it seems to force him into the game. While Will’s skills and athletic ability have never been in question, his ability to impose himself on a game from the forward line has.
This could be just what he needs, because if it’s not this, it’s nothing.
(AAP Image/Julian Smith)
Oliver Henry once again looked lost – you actually feel sorry for the young bloke.
It’s not an easy spot to come into our team at the moment, up forward. But from my couch, cross-eyed from tinnies, he looks like he needs more mongrel.
He needs to be locked in an MMA cage with Levi Greenwood and Brayden Maynard between rounds. Might get some mongrel about him. Hopefully we can make it a bit easier for him sooner rather than later.
Another in the same kind of boat but in his first game was Tom Wilson.
Hard to judge the young fella’s first game – he seemed to have got caught in some precarious positions for the majority of the time he was involved. Look forward to seeing more of him.
Tyler Brown continued in the middle and without setting the world on fire continued to look like he belongs there. Of course, there were some errors, but more than acceptable for a player at his stage.
Callum Brown was used more at a half forward and would love to see him afforded more time in the middle to develop.
What more can I say about Josh Daicos that I haven’t already said? He is a gun now.
Isaac Quaynor played more of a defensive role on the weekend and while he will clearly be an attacking half back, it’s great to see them give him defensive assignments for an entire game here and there to develop that side of his game for the future.
Mark Keane continues to show good signs and should have a bright future. Beau McCreery didn’t have his best game, missing his normal pressure inside forward 50.
One last player I wanted to mention is Darcy Cameron. I know he didn’t set the world on fire, but can we all officially say sayonara to Mason Cox? We should never see him pull on a Pies jumper again. Darcy Cameron: good. Mason Cox: bad.
I hope the rest of the Pies supporters out there have now come to terms with where we are at, as I have, because there are positive signs for the future there.
Let’s hope the administrators at the club can manage to avoid turning the rest of the year into a circus.
Who’s in your ultimate team? Pick the best team and compete with other fans for daily prizes on Draftstars. For the best odds on the game try out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Think. Is this a bet you really want to place? Set a deposit limit.