I certainly agree with this, Liz. It's just determining where to put the fulcrum. Balance is also the word that comes into my mind when I think about the direction of the team.
We will agree that the game is changing and becoming faster and being played under more pressure. This trend is not likely to change. We will not be going back to a slower game. There is a shift in favour of having more players able to get to a contest, as well as more contests, rather than players who are better at winning the ball once at a contest. This is saying more or less the same thing as the first sentence, i.e. that the game is favouring quicker and harder runners.
Melbourne and Collingwood were the best contested possession teams in the comp. They both have a lot of depth in their midfields. They are both hard running and have contested ball winners in positions all over the ground. It's also no coincidence that they have the best ruckmen in the comp, and that's probably where most of the differential is coming from. It doesn't matter for them if the game is played on the inside or the outside, because they have both areas covered. Maybe with Champion Data, which I don't subscribe to, a deeper analysis can be made. I doubt that having more onballers will help much if we're getting beaten badly at stoppages because of ruck contests. Keeping Nankervis, as we saw tonight, would not be a solution.
In the end, we'll have to find our own unique formula for winning with the developing group of players on our list. The picture is still unclear what that is. The game plan will evolve naturally from the strengths of the players. Our commitment to regenerating the list is too far down the road to change course. We just have to hope that we've chosen the right mix of players to meet the challenges ahead. And also hoping we recruit a couple of quality mature players during the trade period to round things out.
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