CyberKev said:
Chad Morrison is a solid, but unspectacular footballer. I like him as a player, but he is no superstar and has been beset by injury worries. Every club hopes to be injury free, but some clubs are clearly better placed to deal with it than others. Collingwood didn't have a great run in 2004, but other clubs fared worse. Port seem to have bad runs every year and this was no exception... Didn't stop them from winning the flag though. And Morrison will not be the answer to Collingwood's deeper midfield woes. He is hardly a cheetah on the paddock, and Collingwood have clearly been exposed for lack of leg speed out of the centre.
Well I don't expect Morrison to just give us a Premiership just like that. I reckon Julian Rowe is the key, we have to keep blooding our youngsters which I mentioned above. That and Didak and Davis will add pace to our midfield. The only player I wanted that would have been reasonable I thought out of trade week that we did not get was Wojcinski.
Most clubs blood new players during a season and most would have stronger youngsters to blood than that group.
Well I would imagine Maxwell, Rowe, C.Cloke, Richards and hopefully Davidson to be in our best 22 next year.
AI'm not saying anything for no reason. As with most pundits outside of Victoria Park, I'm making an assessment based on the depth and quality of the Magpie list. Its possible that Collingwood underachieved in 2004, but its also true that the club overachieved across 2002-03. Performing above expectations is a fab effort, but it also results in clubs glossing over the cracks inherent in their playing lists and these gaps are widening by the day for Collingwood. The Pies will pick up a quality youngster at 8 (probably a ruck type who will take years to come on) and will most likely get solid types at 24 and 40. Poor drafting and limited top end options in recent years, however, mean that they have fallen behind most clubs in terms of the calibre of youngster coming through.
Well we are getting Travis Cloke one year early and for a 3rd round draft pick so that helps us, remembering Richards will be our number 1 ruck anyway. I would imagine our #10 pick would go for a fast young midfielder. Cracks are there, but we got rid of some of the dead wood, (Williams remains) and we do need depth. After all we started 2004 with only 27 players that had played seniors.
At the end of the day, Collingwood will need a lot to go their way and a lot not to go other clubs' way for them to play finals football in 2005. In real terms, their list is bottom 6 standard and will battle to hold steady much leass improve over the next year or several. Poor rucks, slow midfielders, few genuine class players, and a fragile defence will be hard weaknesses to disguise over the course of a full AFL season.
I disagree on poor rucks, Richards improved a LOT and we have Fraser as fairly handy back up (10 Brownlow votes, all in the ruck). Our midfield isn't the quickest but it is more than capable, look at Buckley, Licuria, Burns, Woewodin, Lockyer, Holland, etc. All great players in their own right. Our class players are enough, Buckley, Tarrant, Rocca, Clement, Burns, Licuria, etc and our defense was the one thing that kept the club going this year. How can you say our defense is poor when it was the catalyst to back to back GF efforts. Clement was AA and won the Copeland, Wakelin was great until he got his arm broken (Lynch hates Wakelins), Presti was solid, Johnson was 2nd in the b&f, Cole is now a first 18 player and Maxwell has cemented a spot for himself.
Time will be the judge of that, but where a side is placed after Round 4 is of little relevance come the close of Round 22.
Look at our draw above.
At any rate, if you think Collingwood are monties to beat a refreshed Bulldogs, an improving Carlton, or an ever respectable Kangaroos during that opening month then you're wide awake in dreamland...
We'll just wait and see.
lol
