iwhat i mean is, if you have to rely on premier leaguers stepping up (and i think sometimes you do have to take that risk), then you're probably in trouble. the fact is that the good teams don't change their team much.
you pick a squad of 25 players at the start of the year, and you basically just use those guys. in fact, barring injuries, you should really only use about 19 or 20 players - the 17 plus a couple of extra for the inevitable form slumps. you do have to look at premier league options in some respects, but only the guys you've either earmarked at the start of the year, or guys who are absolutely gunning it there.
i think this season, however, we had a high number of form slumps. the premier league players deserved high consideration because they were going great while first grade was struggling. this is where i think elliott's "positivity" and "faith" in the first grade guys prevented him from seeing the potential of the premier leaguers. looking back, i'm sure we can all agree that elliott made the wrong decision in keeping a lot of those players out. but to be fair, it's always easy to see these things in hindsight. some of us, though, saw it coming (ie, the disaster in sticking to things that worked last year, eg, toots at 5/8, mclinden at half and boogers over phil)
