Taking the (optimistic) long-term view on our team

[warburton lad]

In the 1987 season, we lost to Sydney in Round One by 91 points and to Hawthorn in Round Three by 77 points.

Our first win came in Round Four when we came from 39 points down at three quarter time to defeat Richmond by 10 points (Brian Taylor kicked six goals).

We ended the season with a win/loss of 7/15- about where I project we will be in 2022 season.

Here is the list of players who represented the Magpies in our Round One 1987 game versus the Sydney Swans at Victoria Park- This was Leigh Matthews first full season as coach

12 Denis Banks
22 Tony Shaw
11 Glenn Howard
33 David Cloke
9 Brian Taylor
4 Paul Morwood
36 Dannie Seow
24 Jamie Turner
17 Michael Lockman
18 Peter Bradbury
30 James Manson
3 Mick Gayfer
37 Athas Hrysoulakis
39 Neil Brindley
26 Gavin Brown
23 Peter Adams
28 Gavin Crosisca
27 Craig Starcevich
21 Michael Christian
6 Grantley Fielke

Out of the twenty players who went out and were duly thrashed by the Swans that day, there were:
a couple of veteran players,
a load of kids with talent (but very little senior experience),
some players who did not go on to solid senior careers.

Nine of the players above became premiership players three seasons later.

My point is that:
we have a new coach;
we have some old sweats on our list;
we have some promising kids;
we have some players who, quite simply, will not make the grade.

Where we go from here will rely largely on:
* the quality and character of player we bring into the club
* the capacity of the (excellent) coaching panel to inspire and instruct the playing group to pursue excellence ruthlessly.
* the astute list-management driven by Graeme Wright
* the emergence of a nucleus of on-field leadership from the playing group
* the continued development of this 'attacking' game style tempered by 'team-defence' when the opposition have the ball.

I know that some see me as just an over-optimistic old guy from up in the Yarra Valley with a 'Pollyanna' approach to football matters but I know that our club can rise again.

Like Martin Luther King Jr, I have seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you comrades, but I implore patience and faith in the new path that the Magpies are taking.

I cannot promise that there will not be pitfalls along the way, and that we may yet encounter some heavy defeats, but, in life, the truism "Tough times don't last; tough people do" has stood the test of time.

Stay the course my Black & White friends...

Floreat Pica
Warburton Lad

[duggieboy]

I think it's realistic Warbuton lad & it's how I'm viewing 2022 also.

Our coach is a gem & like you say with some good recruiting & changes after the Eddie era, the club will turn this around.

I'm pretty sure our new coaching team & personnel are seeing things very clearly - they know what they're working with & what's needed.

[Haff]

Yep spot on. No one should be surprised when we turn up insipid performances like last night.
My only addition is that we need to be ruthless in the players that are not developing. Daddies name (for example) should not keep you on a list.
Haven’t lost any hope but it isn’t 1987 and I really worry that our attempts to rebuild with draft picks starting in the 20’s is not a winning formula.
Patience I agree with but we can already see the players that are not coming on.

[Big T]

Like it WL. The second half was encouraging, certainly not all doom and gloom.

[VicParkTragic]

All you say is true WL. Astute management will deliver results. Only thing that worries me is, as Huff stated, we may be hindered by repeated draft picks in the 20’s and 30’s over the last few years.
Somehow we need to quickly figure out who of the recent crop of recruits can play at the AFL level. This will not be easy as some may have the ability but need development over time, others may never be quite good enough. Given that we have a lot of young players and no way of playing them all at the top level for any length of time , it will be difficult. I think we will need to bite the bullet with the players who are experienced but not best 22 and ask some hard questions. This will mean more shorty term pain. Add in the aging players who will be gone soon and you can see the list could change even more dramatically over the next two years. I think this means we can expect a difficult few seasons.

[simon tonna]

this has been spoken about here for years.
the main point in all of this is the positions of draft picks.
unless we move on those who are good enough to play seniors
like JDG, Taylor, WHE, Side, Mccreery, Elliott, to name just a few
we dont have anything to bargain with to capitalise in low end draft picks.
this has to be done in a fair dinkim way.

[MatthewBoydFanClub]

I really like what Craig McRae is doing. My whole beef with Nathan Buckley was he was too conservative with team selection, staying with certain players too long. Robert Harvey went the other way throwing the team around too much. Craig McRae reminds me a bit like Leigh Matthews. He’s not going to die wondering. He’s working to a long term plan to sort the team out. It’s a work in progress. Hate to compare us to Carlton, but we’re about two years behind them. When we cleared out Treloar, Stephenson and Phillips we went to the bottom of the pack. If it wasn’t for Graham Wright we’d be roughly where North Melbourne and Adelaide are today. We’re clearly above them and competitive against teams like St Kilda. Bulldogs and Richmond are clearly top 4 teams or thereabouts despite where those teams currently sit. We’re about where we were in 1988 and 2006. The players are there, but we need another two national drafts to bring us up to premiership contention.

[SteveH67]

We still need to remember the draft is a lottery.

As we have seen over the years, sometimes high draft picks dont always live up to expectations.

We are guilty of that, with some poor picks.

Freeman and Scharenberg are recent examples.

[What'sinaname]

[GreekLunatic]

Didn't Matthews get rid of some of those players at end of the year. we finished 12th I think that year

[Pies2016]

I still think Malthouses premiership clock analogy stacks up pretty well in this conversation.
The decision was made end of 2020 and the re stumping process had begun. We will now get the benefit of early picks the easy way for the next year or two. Even more importantly, our improvement and development will now be overseen by one of the best in the business. Other clubs will fall away and we will pass them by, some quickly and others, a little longer.
Only twelve months ago, the place was pretty toxic and you can’t just change that environment overnight and you will never get the best out of your players until you provide them with a positive environment. Covid cuts meant we virtually had no development into our young players and that couldn’t have come at a worse time. Weve just beefed up that area, so all the mechanisms are now in place to move forward and a decent rate. The only thing missing is patience.

[Born to Pie]

Our list by age:

Murley 18yr 10mth 178cm 70kg
Harrison 18yr 7mth 178cm 70kg
Draper 19yr 3mth 186cm 75kg
Daicos N 19yr 4mth 182cm 73kg
Ginnivan 19yr 5mth 184cm 78kg
McInnes 19yr 5mth 193cm 85kg
Begg 19yr 7mth 197cm 87kg
Poulter 19yr 7mth 193cm 80kg
Henry 19yr 9mth 189cm 80kg
McMahon 20yr 197cm 88kg
Dean 20yr 10mth 195cm 86kg
Chugg 20yr 2mth 180cm 80kg
Macrae 20yr 2mth 187cm 81kg
Ruscoe 20yr 6mth 193cm 92kg
McCreery 21yr 186cm 83kg
Bianco 21yr 3mth 188cm 73kg
Kelly 21yr 8mth 194cm 93kg
Kreuger 22yr 10mth 196cm 88kg
Quaynor 22yr 3mth 180cm 84kg
Murphy 22yr 4mth 192cm 89kg
Brown T 22yr 5mth 192cm 86kg
Daicos J 23yr 5mth 178cm 77kg
Lipinski 23yr 9mth 187cm 84kg
Brown C 24yr 179cm 80kg
Wilson 24yr 10mth 194cm 86kg
Johnson 24yr 7mth 193cm 85kg
Noble 25yr 1mth 180cm 73kg
Maynard 25yr 7mth 189cm 93kg
DeGoey 26yr 1mth 188cm 92kg
Moore 26yr 3mth 203cm 100kg
Cameron 26yr 9mth 204cm 101kg
Grundy 28yr 203cm 108kg
Adams 28yr 7mth 181cm 84kg
Crisp 28yr 7mth 190cm 90kg
Hoskin-Elliott 28yr 8mth 186cm 81kg
Madgen 29yr 192cm 95kg
Mihocek 29yr 3mth 192cm 97kg
Elliott 29yr 8mth 178cm 79kg
Howe 31yr 10mth 190cm 85kg
Cox 31yr 1mth 211cm 109kg
Sidebottom 31yr 4mth 184cm 84kg
Roughead 31yr 6mth 200cm 100kg
Pendlebury 34yr 4mth 191cm 90kg

[dalyc]

[dalyc]

[Mr Miyagi]

Hear hear, exactly why I’m not worrying until after the trade period.