2023 Best 23s: The Bombers have promise... but can Brad Scott unlock it straight away?

The countdown to Round 1, 2023 has officially begun – so throughout January, I’ll be looking at all 18 AFL clubs and doing my best to put together an optimum team for the new year.

I’ll take injuries and suspensions into account, but this won’t be a predicted team for Round 1 – think of it more as a guide to what your team’s best 23 (the 22 starting players plus the new unrestricted substitute) could look like as the year unfolds.

Adelaide, Brisbane, Carlton and Collingwood have already been looked at – today, it’s everyone’s favourite punching bag, Essendon.

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After a strong first season under Ben Rutten in 2021, last year was a disaster for the Bombers.

A bottom-four finish, a botched coach sacking, an ill-fated pursuit of Alastair Clarkson and an off-field wipeout left the Dons reeling come season’s end. The positive, though, is that expectations are virtually zero for new coach Brad Scott as he walks through the doors at The Hangar.

There’s plenty of talent on Essendon’s list – they proved that in 2021 – but unlocking it, as well as adding a defensive steel that has been lacking for the better part of two decades, has proved beyond five coaches now since their last finals win in 2004.

Can Scott be the man to break the drought? It won’t be easy, but given the man worked wonders with a largely mediocre North Melbourne list to drag them to the preliminary final in 2014 and 2015, the Dons seem to have the right man for the job.

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Defenders

The first problem Scott will need to solve is the Bombers’ backline. Only the pitiful North Melbourne and West Coast had more scored on them than the Dons in 2022, with their 2087 points against for the season nearly 100 points worse than fellow strugglers Hawthorn and Essendon.

Their issues were twofold: they have neither the cattle to cope against high quality oppositions, particularly those with tall marking options, nor a solid enough structure to make up for that deficiency. Actually threefold: they also turned the ball over a lot. Like, a lot.

No one has arrived to take pressure off Jayden Laverde as the number one key defender, a task he has performed admirably for the last two seasons – unless Sam Weideman makes a shock move into the backline – so Scott will have to devise a plan to protect his defence as much as he can. Whether that involves extra numbers shifting behind the ball at every opportunity, or is predicated around his more well-stocked midfield upping their game to dominate possession and territory, remains to be seen.

Like Laverde, Jordan Ridley also punched above his weight as a key back in 2022. He won a best and fairest as a third tall and intercept marker in a breakout 2020 season, but has often been required since as a key back, especially with Mason Redman improving out of sight as a dashing rebounder.

Expect to see Ridley and Brandon Zerk-Thatcher, who was one of the few Bombers to make meaningful improvement last year, to take the second and third opposition talls if they’re around, and if not to shift over and give Laverde as much of a chop out as they can.

Meanwhile, Jake Kelly will likely be in charge of the best small defender (his job on Charlie Cameron was a critical part of the Bombers’ upset win over Brisbane), leaving no room in the starting team for impresive mid-season recruit Massimo D’Ambrosio.

Nick Hind will be an interesting watch – his exceptional pace was crucial to the Bombers’ surge in late 2021, but became a bit of a hindrance as Rutten moved to shift the game plan to become more defensive in 2022, where his inability to provide pressure and frustration with the new system showed more with every passing week.

Scott’s North Melbourne, particularly in their formative years, played attacking footy – they ranked third for points scored in 2012 and 2013, despite finishing eighth in one year and missing the finals altogether in the other.

He had more success once they became more defensively sound in 2014 and 2015, but the likes of Shaun Atley were always given the licence to run and gun. I’m expecting he’ll let Hind off the leash in 2023.

Probably the most interesting Bomber heading into 2023 is Andrew McGrath. Rutten spent two and a half years trying to get him to take the next step as an A-grade midfielder, but with limited output and a stack of other options, the 2016 number one draft pick spent most of last year either at half-back or in the casualty ward.

Scott has already hinted that McGrath will remain in defence, where he won the Rising Star in his debut 2017 year. I’d love to see him given a licence to look to break lines and dash from defence like Redman does – he’s a weird case where his kicking is better when at full flight than when he’s trying to pinpoint someone from a standing start.

Or Scott could look to mould him into the kind of player Nick Dal Santo was in North’s prelim years – a calm, assured presence in defence with a neat kick.

McGrath’s presence, and Redman’s outstanding 2022, leaves Dyson Heppell‘s place in the team up in the air. Bombers fans turned on him a bit last year, with his disposal in particular letting him down too much for a player of his class and experience.

At his best, he can be another calm presence in a defence that badly needs organisation, which is why I still think there’s a spot in this team for him. At the time of writing, he’s still captain: if he remains as skipper come the start of the season, you can basically guarantee Scott has a plan for him, otherwise he’d surely have given the gig to someone else.

(Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

Midfielders

The Bombers’ midfield really should be better than it was in 2022. As a starting group, they have three All-Australians at one time or another in Zach Merrett, Dylan Shiel and Darcy Parish, plus an up-and-comer in Jye Caldwell and the explosive Jake Stringer; yet despite ranking fourth for clearances, they were only 12th for total inside 50s.

Bizarrely, they finished second-bottom – ahead of only West Coast – for average contested possessions in 2022. On the plus side, it shows they were efficient at stoppages – they didn’t need a lot of ground-ball wins to get themselves a clearance – but on the other hand, it shows that outside said stoppages they just weren’t able to win the hard ball.

Expect Scott to fix both things, and fast. I’m tipping his first move will be to install Caldwell as a bona fide ball-winning tagger, a role he performed exceptionally in 2022 against Lachie Neale.

Ben Jacobs and Sam Gibson were both crucial players for Scott’s golden-era North as minders, with Jacobs’ scalp list in 2015 briefly turning him into the best stopper in the game. Interestingly, he finds himself at the Bombers in a coaching capacity this year, making him ready and available to pass on some pointers.

Don’t be surprised to see Nic Martin perform a Sam Gibson-esque role and run alongside some of the game’s elite outside players, either. A revelation as a pre-season supplementary period, Martin was tremendous as a hard-working winger for much of last year. Predominantly offensively-minded, I’d be shocked if Scott didn’t give him the odd shutdown role on the likes of, for instance, Hawthorn’s Karl Amon in the opening round to add some defensive strings to his bow.

As for the other wing, Kyle Langford has issues with his body virtually every season, but at full flight he’s a unique package: a tall, powerful midfielder capable of pushing forward and impacting the scoreboard. He did a bit of run-with work late last year, but I’m adamant his best role is more on the outside.

Scott loves workhorses around the ball – his peak North midfield had Ben Cunnington, Jack Ziebell and Andrew Swallow as the starters. That he made it work is golden news for the likes of Parish and Shiel, both of whom have the capacity to be excellent inside ball-winners and aren’t blessed with elite kicking skills.

Shiel’s boot has caused Bombers fans plenty of grief in his time at the club, but neither Swallow nor Cunnington were or are particularly damaging kicks, and they were both critical cogs in the North machine. A similar role would suit Shiel, as well as Parish, down to the ground.

If not them, then it might be Will Setterfield, whose recruitment from Carlton both puzzles and fascinates me. With the likes of Ben Hobbs and now Elijah Tsatas developing as future mids, it’s not like Setterfield fills a glaring vacancy, unless Scott saw more from his time on the wing at Carlton than I did.

A bigger body than Shiel or Parish, he was a ball magnet as a junior but was seldom given the engine room opportunities at Carlton he needed to thrive. He’ll get them at the Bombers, no doubt: but the question is, can they have Setterfield, Shiel and Parish in the same midfield?

If they do, then it’s likely one of Hobbs or Tsatas will need to bide their time in the VFL, lest that engine room become too crowded. I was a big fan of Hobbs’ debut year, where he always had a red-hot crack despite seldom if ever getting the inside midfield opportunities that made him such a junior star; but the Bombers had their sights set on Tsatas with their pick 5 for a while, and I’d be shocked if they didn’t want to unleash him at the first chance possible.

Merrett looms as the conduit between those inside ball-winners and the leading forwards: he’s the bloke in the Bombers’ midfield you want the ball with for that crucial kick inside 50. In Scott’s peak North Melbourne, that was Brent Harvey or, in 2015, Shaun Higgins.

Merrett doesn’t have Harvey’s speed, but he’s a smart player and penetrating left-foot kick whose offensive capabilities weren’t truly harnessed by Rutten, especially last year. If he can play a role similar to Chad Warner at Sydney – winning handball receives from the grunt workers and hitting big Peter Wright on the chest at every opportunity, the Bombers might just have a chance at defying a few expectations in 2023.

Scott didn’t have to worry about his ruckman for his last half-decade at North, because Todd Goldstein owned that position, hardly missed a game, and basically rucked all day. Sam Draper isn’t quite ready to go it alone just yet, but with the likes of Wright in attack as capable back-ups, I’d be surprised if Scott didn’t trust Draper with the number one role ahead of Andrew Phillips as opposed to alongside him.

Newly appointed Essendon coach Brad Scott. (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

Forwards

In my view, we slept on how good a 2022 Peter Wright had. To boot 53 goals in a side with as many struggles as the Bombers had last year was a remarkable effort, and there were times when the opposition just couldn’t stop him.

I’ve already made too many North Melbourne comparisons, especially from a decade ago, so I promise this is the last one – he’s Scott’s new Drew Petrie, or Ben Brown: a spearhead to form the rest of the attack around.

Scott has always been a coach to favour height in attack. Petrie, Brown and Jarrad Waite were the cornerstone of North’s 2015-16 finals teams, while lesser lights Aaron Black, Majak Daw and early-years Robbie Tarrant were given all the opportunities in the world to make the grade in attack.

The bottom line is that Brad likes his key forwards. That’s great news for newly minted Bomber Sam Weideman, who you can all but lock in already as the second tall alongside Wright.

Weideman was always tantalising at Melbourne, but his 2018 elimination final breakout remains the best game he’s played four and a half years on. The Demons weren’t the greatest team to be a key forward at over his time there: the Bombers, if history is any guide, won’t be kinder, but you’d think at least he won’t be one bad game away from the VFL in red and black.

I couldn’t fit him into a best 23, but I’d be surprised to see Harry Jones not get plenty of opportunities as well. He’s still ultra-raw and developing as a tall, but you’d expect Weideman and Wright to get most of the attention in attack in 2023, leaving the youngster with an easier match-up than he’d had to contend with in his first two seasons.

Jake Stringer is a major conundrum for Scott to solve: his best work in the midfield had him on the cusp of All-Australian honours in 2021, but he’s never shown the requisite fitness or consistency to make it a permanent role.

Unlocking him could be the key to turning the Bombers into a premiership contender down the line; but with enough quality options in the engine room, Scott can always start Stringer nearly permanenty in attack and challenge him to earn midfield minutes. We saw in 2015 at the Bulldogs just how difficult a match-up he is as a forward.

The freshly returned Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti will be goalsneak and terroriser in chief at ground level inside 50 for the Dons, while expect to see new recruits Alwyn Davey Jr and Jayden Davey get opportunities as well. The newly refurbished sub rule strikes me as a great way to expose at least one of them to AFL level as an impact player off the bench sometime after half time.

The likes of Will Snelling and Matt Guelfi will also be in contention for that role, but at his best AMT is a best-23 lock, and the excitement of the two new youngsters might be worth more for a building team than the relatively known quantities of the senior duo.

Another Bomber who might begin, at least, up forward before pushing onto the ball is Archie Perkins. The breakout 2022 that was foretold never quite came to fruition, with his 20 disposals in Round 1 against Geelong as good as he got. Nevertheless, the kid has some X-factor about him, and it could always be him rather than Stringer that heads into the midfield when the team needs a spark.

Essendon Best 23 2023

Backs: Jordan Ridley, Jayden Laverde, Andrew McGrath

Half-backs: Mason Redman, Jake Kelly, Nick Hind

Centres: Kyle Langford, Darcy Parish, Nic Martin

Followers: Sam Draper, Will Setterfield, Dylan Shiel

Half-forwards: Archie Perkins, Peter Wright, Zach Merrett

Forwards: Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti, Sam Weideman, Jake Stringer

Interchange: Jye Caldwell, Dyson Heppell (c), Elijah Tsatas, Brandon Zerk-Thatcher

Substitute: Alwyn Davey Jr

Emergencies: Matt Guelfi, Ben Hobbs, Harrison Jones