Nick's Collingwood Bulletin Board

I hope he isn't delisted. Yes he's been given some opportunities this year but you can hardly judge someones future career on 3 games and a handful of gametime minutes. Be fair people. He's still only a kid.

There's no point drafting these young kids if you don't give them a chance to develop. You may as well give away all your draft picks and pick up established delisted players from other clubs (and we all know that is not a strategy for building a winning football team).

If he is here next year with 6 games under his belt (and he wasn't injured) then some serious questions need to be asked but these kids need a fair go.

Good point stinger...

he does need time to develop... id say one more year at most is all that he will get though

But we can't continue to carry dead wood. We have to decide on him now. Three games for about three kicks which all missed the target. I know he may have had a lack of game time, but I am concerned about him. When a young player is dropped, he can go either way. He can impress in the VFL and push for selectio, or he can flop, losing confidence. He did the latter, which is a cause for concern. I think he may be trade bait as he was selected in the top 20 of 2002.

Dead Wood?? Hasn't the guy been out of action due to some problem internally, i.e. like Guy Richards a couple of years back?. From all reports leading up to the draft this kid is a genuine star.....Dead wood and gorrrnnnn at 20/21 years old....far out, i remember a time when that was too young to be playing seniors in the VFL/AFL. Only genuine talent got a game any younger than that....beofre the draft these kids woudl be developing in the Colts and the Reserves...not being asked to prove that they can cope at ages 19-21...

Cheers

Yeah, but list caps make that very difficult for the coaches to manage. Sure, in the 60's, 70's, right up until relatively recently, clubs had Under 19's, Reserves and Seniors sides, so could afford to give a kid a little bit more time to develop. Hell, so many of the famous Hawthorn sides had guys who played 60, 70 Reserves games before getting a chance to crack their Seniors. That meant anything up to four years. But, if clubs can have a maximum of only 40 seniors (plus four rookies) on their list at any one time (compared to maybe 70-80), space is at a premium and makes it difficult to carry guys as Hawthorn used to. I suspect a fair few more young kids will start falling through the cracks, both here and at other clubs, as the difficulties of managing smaller lists bites harder.

Mind you, this situation makes it more difficult to understand why some people are advocating trading for a 30 year old crock with maybe 2 years left in his career and what the Herald Sun calls a "lucrative" contract (which will hurt us badly, salary cap wise). Give Bo preference, is my opinion.

Not sure of his current health status, but Bo is / has been hospitalised with a kidney ailment.

If this is similar to what Limo had a couple of years ago, this would explain his drop in form leading up to the final diagnosis.

We shouldn't be too harsh on the kid if his illness is the cause of the way he played, instead, we should be wishing him a full recovery in the hope he can return to the field in the not too distant future.

If you look at the Willi forum, Nixon was runnign into very good form in recent weeks before getting ill - in the top 2 or 3 for just about every game for a while there.

Cannibal wrote: ...I suspect a fair few more young kids will start falling through the cracks, both here and at other clubs, as the difficulties of managing smaller lists bites harder...

I think this probably affects the clubs more, as they have to let players go too early, and another club picks them up and later reaps the benefit of the investment put into them. Some might not be picked up by another club, but if they are serious will continue to play and develop in the VFL until they show enough to be taken up again.

Northern Pie wrote:Dead Wood?? Hasn't the guy been out of action due to some problem internally, i.e. like Guy Richards a couple of years back?.

Dead wood was a bit too much. I'm just saying I don't really like what I see, as he has questionable skills and decision making. I hope he proves me wrong....

Tough gig AFL footy, think the kid's going to get the chop, though would have been happy to give him another year myself.

Incidently, was recently hospitalised with what was reported as a serious kidney problem, have no further details.

I have heard from a friend of the family that Bo has been told to look for another club.

Well, it looks as if he won't be playing league footy again after suffering a kidney injury. *Not yet confirmed*