Preview Round 1 2023 - v Western Bulldogs, Saturday 18 March, 7:25pm @ the MCG
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Assuming May misses the selection will be a fascinating “tell” on the philosophy of the match committee.
In recent times Melbourne have stuck pretty hard to using Casey as a genuine development team.
You watch Casey and many times they were running with a full VFL centre bounce setup while AFL listed players were on wings or flanks - but that’s so those AFL listed players are developing in the role they will play at AFL level if they get a chance.
Anyway, point is for me that’s why Laurie is in. He’s a forward, he trained as a forward, he knows what a forward is meant to do in Melbourne’s system. There was a spot available for a forward, so it’s him. If he has a shocker, ar least it shouldn’t be because he doesn’t know what he is meant to be doing.
So for a May replacement the ones who I think have trained in similar like-for-like roles in preseason are the much maligned Tomlinson, D.Turner and then Hibberd as a bit of a wild card.
If they go Tomlinson that’s going for similar size but backing experience, even though if we can see Tomlinson is not what he once was physically then of course the match committee can see it.
Hibberd would be a lack of faith in Tomlinson, but a nod to experience being able to overcome the lack of height to play as a key defender.
Then D.Turner would be a nod towards rolling the dice on an inexperienced player who might be physically more able than the other two. For all we know his strength numbers and form in preseason suggests he could play as a genuine tall defender.
Schache is touted as a possible May replacement, but as far as I know he has only trained forward at Melbourne. Back lines are so much about working as one that I can’t fathom them throwing an untrained Schache into there. If the brought in Schache and were willing to switch McDonald back, that’s another very interesting insight into the match commitee’s philosophy. I don’t think that will happen as that would be seen too much as worrying about the opposition instead of backing in what Melbourne want to do.
In recent times Melbourne have stuck pretty hard to using Casey as a genuine development team.
You watch Casey and many times they were running with a full VFL centre bounce setup while AFL listed players were on wings or flanks - but that’s so those AFL listed players are developing in the role they will play at AFL level if they get a chance.
Anyway, point is for me that’s why Laurie is in. He’s a forward, he trained as a forward, he knows what a forward is meant to do in Melbourne’s system. There was a spot available for a forward, so it’s him. If he has a shocker, ar least it shouldn’t be because he doesn’t know what he is meant to be doing.
So for a May replacement the ones who I think have trained in similar like-for-like roles in preseason are the much maligned Tomlinson, D.Turner and then Hibberd as a bit of a wild card.
If they go Tomlinson that’s going for similar size but backing experience, even though if we can see Tomlinson is not what he once was physically then of course the match committee can see it.
Hibberd would be a lack of faith in Tomlinson, but a nod to experience being able to overcome the lack of height to play as a key defender.
Then D.Turner would be a nod towards rolling the dice on an inexperienced player who might be physically more able than the other two. For all we know his strength numbers and form in preseason suggests he could play as a genuine tall defender.
Schache is touted as a possible May replacement, but as far as I know he has only trained forward at Melbourne. Back lines are so much about working as one that I can’t fathom them throwing an untrained Schache into there. If the brought in Schache and were willing to switch McDonald back, that’s another very interesting insight into the match commitee’s philosophy. I don’t think that will happen as that would be seen too much as worrying about the opposition instead of backing in what Melbourne want to do.
I think a one game role for Laurie, to give him a taste, ahead of Fritta's return round 2.
This is likely a couple of weeks at least at May's age, going by his limping on TV news. So, a tall such as Scache, or Tommo.?
Or TMc goes back into defence, to help Lever and Petty..?
I would have Hibbo in the starting back-line, anyway.
I would have McVee as Salem's replacement. Maybe for a couple of games.
May is the hardest piece of our puzzle to replace.
Disco will be close.
I reckon TMc is the closest we have, like for like with May.
May isn't really an aerialist, like TMc. But both are strong in body. TMc's decisions aren't as good as May's.
I would say, all in all, Hibbo is a must to replace May's attacking ways.
I reckon McDonald only plays in defence if there's an in-game injury to a key back.
- Jun 14, 2015
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Tomlinson is literally the slowest player I've ever seen in the AFL. Like even those massive fat campaigners that bigfooty turned into memes, Relton Roberts or whatever, those dudes looked like Speedy Gonzalez compared to Tommo. He's cooked.
Yeah Tommo is cooked. But I think they see him as a decent matchup on Lobb. Petty goes to Naughton and Lever to JUH. Not convinced they play 4 talls down forward. Darcy i can see rotating with Lobb or floating back. Brayshaw will be important as will Bowey who both can read the play and fill that hole in front of the leading forwards. I think with 4 of our best 10 out this becomes a real 50/50 game, even slightly Dogs as favourites now. Dogs have shortened to 2.28. Still overs IMO and worth a pineapple.
- Jul 7, 2015
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A few of our typical best 22 out but hey, we get a look at some new players and a pretty different team dynamic to what we saw for most of last year. Bring it on and let's see what happens.
Tomlinson was the obvious choice in place of May, if you ignore his recent form and pretend it’s still early 2021.
If Tomlinson was genuinely physically cooked that would surely show up in his strength, speed and agility testing numbers.
Got to trust that the match committee know more than some people on an internet forum I guess.
If Tomlinson was genuinely physically cooked that would surely show up in his strength, speed and agility testing numbers.
Got to trust that the match committee know more than some people on an internet forum I guess.
- Jun 14, 2015
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No.
It's a bit of a surprise but I'm glad they aren't rushing may back. Tomlinson doesn't need to reach his early 2021 form, he just needs to come in and lock down his opponent, nothing special purely in to help keep the structure.
That’s true, Lever did look super proppy when he came back pretty much bang on a year after his knee injury. Hurt it round 11 2018 and we didn’t see the best of him until 2021.
It’s getting near on two years since Tomlinson’s injury and Tomlinson was hardly twinkle toes to begin with. Always was a slower endurance type guy. Lever also not a speedy guy, and if Lever took the best part of 2.5 years to get to his best then maybe Tomlinson still has time to come good.
Bluelegs
Digging into the why
We were never playing May on one leg for round 1. Not going to risk ****ing up his whole year for one game.
Like we were playing injured late last year but that's what you have to do when you're going into finals. You don't put your players on ice unless your seasons cooked.
Topkent
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Classic except they didn't.
How's all these people writing off Tomlinson, may as well write off the season if everything is based on 2022
A bit of hyperbole there, if May's injury was that bad he would have been ruled out much earlier and he wouldn't even be considered for a cut throat final. Do we even know the extent of his injury?
Bluelegs
Digging into the why
Not necessarily. Pretty common for clubs not to show their hand until the last second. Chris Scott is pretty famous for his late changes.
We famously played May with a completely buggered hamstring in a Grand Final, so that's really not true at all.
Our backline for round 1 last year was
[44] Joel Smith, [1] Steven May, [29] Jayden Hunt
[3] Christian Salem, [20] Adam Tomlinson, [10] Angus Brayshaw
There's really no point in risking players at the start of a season. It happens later in the year because it's do or die and you have to weigh up whether one of your half fit best players is better than the best replacement at Casey.
I wouldn't describe May's hamstring during the gf as completely buggered, he had a tear in the hamstring. To me completely buggered is torn off the bone and would definitely be out or Burgess is truly the second coming of Jesus.
There's a difference between a slight risk to being on one leg imo.
Bluelegs
Digging into the why
We're getting into semantics but it was bad enough that the fitness staff hid how bad the tear was. Goody said right after the only reason he played was because it was the GF.
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Tomlinson was the obvious choice IMO. I'm fine with it.
Hopefully the Gawn/Grundy duo causes some headaches for the Dogs defence, don't think Grundy was ever much a goal kicker for the Pies, but looked good against the Tigers, who aren't great but still, 2-3 from Him and Max would be gold.
Yeah exactly. If Lever was out, Turner would be more like-for-like.
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Because Grundy gets asked about this every time he’s interviewed, I’ve heard him say he basically never played any significant time as a forward at Collingwood.
He said his goals were kicked as a ruck drifting forward.
So he’s quite the unknown at this stage in the real stuff playing out of the goal square.
Could be woeful, could be amazing, likely to be somewhere in the middle.
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