Pro:
- Kreuzer - his best game for the club and many many more to come
- Gibbs - Was BOG imo and finds spaces in tight spaces like the elite
- Murphy - I didn't see him miss a target. Was brilliant
- Judd - I recall about 5 times he burst out of packs... he is back ladies and gentlemen
- Scotland - I don't recall him doing a mistake. He was all polish
- Betts - his best game for the club and i don't mean the goals. His pressure was magnificent
- Hadley - his best game for the club. What a warier. Absolutely loved his game
- Wiggins - his best game for the club (better all round performance than the dogs game last year). Had he had his kicking boots on, he would've got 5
- Thornton - quickly.... very quickly becoming our most underrated player... houla the only one fight him for that tag. Complete polish. He is the general down back
- Houla - Laid 6 tackles... i think that beat his total tackling all of his career. Set up i think about 4 shots a goal. Had two beautiful kick not taken by fev. He looks free and willing.
- Robinson - Saw him lay 3 tackles that are as good as they can get. My boy is all quality.
- Jamo - Did his job with 0 mistakes. The way he shuts down his player doesnt allow for the opposition to go to him. Wears his opposition like a glove
- Bower - Had a complete game. One mistake that cost us a goal, but other than that he did little wrong.
- Waite - Reversed the roll on Richo in style. Brilliance from ratts to come up with the plan, brilliance from waite to execute the plan and briallance from the entire team to be part of the plan
- Johnson - did get outmarked a couple of times... but gee wiz he had a ripper night with his disposals and close work... when he had the ball, he never looked in danger... brilliant get
- Jacobs - As good a debut game for a ruckman as you can get. Disposal and marking was crisp. His tackling and roving the ball was extremely positive and his ruckwork was first class
- Joseph - Had Nathan brown really early and he only touched the ball once. then was moved onto cousins where brown started to get a few touches... but cuz stopped... was then moved to nathan brown and see ya later nathan. He has become one of our most important player... Very special kid, with great pace, great tackling, great disposal and not afraid to take the game on.
- Garlett - His pressure was sublime. His touches were good one time and average another... but it was his pressure... his ability to keep in the contest... oh boy have we got a good one here
- Russell - Another guy i failed to do anything wrong (bar that shot out on the full - but redeemed himself with that snap). He has grown on me. Was very calm in tight places... and his disposal around the ground was top class
- Fevola - Was one of his most complete team game i have ever seen and he was injured. He didnt care about getting goals himself (which i was scared that he might be like that because of what happened last year).. his pressure scared the shit out of richmond
- Simpson - He did miss a few target... but that was just a bad night for him in that department. He is normally a much better kick. runs al game.

- Ratts - This guy loves his players... and the players love him. He sees a problem and assesses it. He makes it clear what he want our boys to improve in, and gets the job done. His game plan tonight was extremely impressive. The attention to skills and tackling was extremely impressive.

- Depth - I thought Armo's effort through the NAB cup was top class and deserves a spot... but there are no vacancies... and with Walker, Stevens, Grigg, Fisher and Carrazzo all to come back... and having browne and hammo and Yarran to debut... wow do we have good depth... also players like setanta, bentick, bannistor and ando are not bad inclusions when they are 12-15th down the track.

- Media attention - Loving the media attention not on us. Loving it that its on Richmond... shows the boys what happens if they dont perform and put a terrible effort as richmond did. Why have attention on us, when the job is no where near complete.

- Fitness - We are the fittest team in the AFL...

- 2nd and 3rd quarters - this is we lost i would say every one of our games last year. We would start of brilliantly, die off for two quarters and come back in the last. in the NAB cup and round 1, we have won 7 in total and lost 1... the one that we lost was by 2 points....

- 4 quarter effort - haven't seen that in a while... but i'm sure i'm gonna see it alot more often.

- Winning the ruck dual - when was the last time we done that in a h&a season? was it when mark porter & matthew allen were our rucks?

- Tackling - of how that has improved since ratts has taken over... it's not that they stuck on thursday, it's the fact that they were legal. Hardly any were high, or without possession. they were hard, and they were effective. Players like murphy, houla and scotto all contributed to that.

- 23 goals ... 2 from fev - another problem that the whole football world thinks is our Achilles heel seemed to be forgotten on thursday. This is without fisher and no goals from cloke. and we missed a few sitters...

- and making them pussies cry and break their heart. I hate them as much as you can hate a football club, and the pathetic club that they are came out on thursday...

Cons

- are you kidding me...

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cruise (Kreuze) missile:
a very accurate flying bomb.
SOURCE: http://library.thinkquest.org/3785/glossary.html

He's a medium forward (184 - 186 cms). He exposed Johnson with his pace, not his height or aerial ability; he has neither.

Riewoldt exposed him for height. Johnson is a half-back when matchups suit, otherwise he's a backup or midfield depth. He might get replaced as soon as this weekend.

Nothing wrong with him, there are just better options.

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29 different attributes,
And only 7 that you like;
20 ways to see the world,
Or 20 ways to start a fight.

Morton is 186cm, he is a mid sized forward, not a tall forward.

Johnson is 188cm, so he is actually taller.

How do you know what Johnson was recruited for? Good kicking, but probably a bit more than that too.

I don't think it is unreasonable he should be expected to handle a player who is shorter than he is, in the air.

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It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

Its not unreasonable at all, but i beleive that Morton plays above his height and was Richmonds best marking option for the night. In my opinion i dont think CJ was recruited to nulify the opps best marking forward regardless of height.

Morton certainly plays tall. Very good mark. I also have my doubts about those heights. Morton looked taller than Johnson to me.

PRO's

- Murphy was BOG and is going to be a superstar
- Judd was supported properly in the midfield and burst the tigers open on numerous occasions
- Hoops played his best game in 5 years...like a new recruit
- Hadley has a huge tank..I forgot how good he was
- Mitch was incredible...played above his weight
- Kruezer and Sammy will make Warnock earn his jumper
- Eddie was incredible...will be dangerous all year

EVERYTHING!

CON's

- Fev was injured...lucky it didnt hurt us
- Johnsons first half was weak...he came good though
- Richmond may give some kids a false sense of security...time will tell

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They coud'nt.....could they?

Players listed heights and weights are always a bit dodgy - usually their stats are put up when they are listed and these go by their Draft Camp heights and weights - they usually amend their weight stats every year but I dont think they amend their height stats.

Bryce Gibbs was very coy about his height when interviewed on Before the Game last Saturday - despite Sam Lane constantly asking Bryce that he looked taller. Bryce is listed as 188cm - but I reckon he may even be 191cm.

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"Hence you will not say that Greeks fight like heroes but that heroes fight like Greeks"?

Winston Churchill

Doesn't make any difference.

Point is they are both mid sized players. 1 or 2 cms either way is irrelevant.

And point is opposition coaches who have done their homework will now know Johnson can be exposed by those who can take a grab. So there's an edge to be had here.

It's like Carrazzo, hurt factor in his kicking aside, he is a decent enough player but can be toweled on-one-one down back.

If you play down back, you'd want to be able to compete in the air, against men of similar or lower stature. It's just how it is.

Scotland might be unaccountable but he is pretty good one-on-one in the air for a fairly short player. Johnson needs to work on that side of his game if he wants to survive down back. The other poster is kidding if he thinks the club recruited Johnson for things other than being able to compete in the air and don't think he needs to work on that. See Riley's article online last week - he made it clear more than once players have aspects of their game they need to work on and improve. Houlihan needs to get harder and more inside. Armfield needs to address his kicking. And so on.

Ratten took Johnson off Morton very early in the game, when the warning signs were blaring loudly. But he put him back on him later in the game, so if Morton's is notoriously good in the air for his height then Ratt's clearly is trying to get Johnson to elevate his game in that regard and improve.

Well Johnson needs to work on his contesting work in the air, or he'll be seen as inadequate down back.

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It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

I dont think i said anything along those lines. All I said is that he did a pretty good job on the oppositions best marking forward for the night, which i dont think is reason why he was recruited. Of coarse he can get better at it, but you could just as easily say that Andrejs Everitt should'nt be beaten one on one by Fev because they are the same height! Should he be worried about his spot in the Bulldogs line up if this ever occured??

Fevola is not Morton.

Morton is not a tall forward, so I think you're stretching it a bit when you say he was their best marking forward on the night. He might have been on Thursday, but it's not like we had Johnson playing on a Matthew Lloyd type. Morton is no world beater, as decent as he is. If Johnson can't handle a Morton he might find himself in a spot of bother at some point again in 2009.

You said Johnson wasn't recruited for his marking. But as I said, if he's playing down back, he'd want to be better in the air than what he showed last week on a mid sized Morton.

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It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

Pros....plenty of them as others have described especially the newbies...

Cons....probably Johnson as a defender as others have discussed.
Johnson kicked the ball well and hit all targets except one....Morton kicked 4 but could have kicked six.
If he doesnt pick up his defensive work then his value as a professional punter is limited.....6-8 targets hit vs 2-4 goals kicked against us each week doesnt add up or does having to find him a soft opponent that doesnt cut him up.
I'm not a fan as yet but he probably deserves a series of games of some good opponents to see if Ratten can improve his defensive work as he only has 30 odd games experience and not very good coaching behind those games.

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"When you have the attitude of a champion, you see adversity as your
training partner."
- Conor Gillen

Johnson's going to have a very short shelf life if he can't compete with a medium marking tall.

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"I will rejoice in their anguish, delight in their failure and revel in our success"

We are Carlton, @#$%&! the rest !!!!!!

You guys DO realise that not all of Morton's 4 goals can be directly seen as Johnsons fault right?

The goal he kicked when he crumbed off the pack was when he was on Scotland... he kicked a beauty from 50m near the boundary and i doubt any defender could have stopped him marking that pass which he didnt have to break stride for...his 3rd was actually caused by Bower's shocking turnover when trying to pass to Simpson, which resulted in him kicking the easiest of goals from on the goal line...and the last was in junk time...

Plus, i did recall Johnson winning some 1-on-1 marking contests as well throughout the game.


Did anyone else realise how good we were in transferring the ball to our forward line after a kick out from a Richmond behind?
Too often we used to just bomb it to a contest outside 50 and the ball would just come straight back or go out of bounds (Thornton did this once when he took the kick in which resulted in a Richmond goal)...

With Johnson doing the kick outs, i felt at ease that we would easily get it out of our D50...which we did. His passing was sharp and pinpoint, which actually set up good attacks and eliminated the threat of a costly D50 turnover. His only mistake was when he was trying to pinpoint Russell, but apart from that they were all great kick ins that set us up.

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Carlton Premiers '10

Not to meantion his pass inside fifty to Garlett was absolutely sublime!

I think that we will have to accept the fact that Johnson is going to get beaten at times, but then there aren't many backmen that don't get beaten on occasions. Its the nature of the game. as jt pointed out morton's goals weren't entirely his fault. he did get beaten on the lead a couple of times but he at least pushed him wide on those occasions for one excellent kick for a goal and another for no score. one was from a handball over the top on the goal line etc. He also got scored on at the back of the pack by schulz grubbering which I thought he could have done a little better.

On the other hand his kicking out was superb. the way we brought it out of defence when Johnson was involved was terrific. He is still relatively inexperienced. I think there is plenty to work with and he could develop into a josh hunt type.

Having said that I don't know that he will last once Nick Stevens is available, but he is a great back up and a part of the fantastic depth that has developed at Princes Park

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Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.

Incorrect, Russell was on Morton when he kicked his second goal from the crumb.

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oh ok you sure?

I was just going on the basis that the commentators said Johnson was replaced by Scotland like 15 seconds before the goal...

the point is it wasnt Johnson

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Carlton Premiers '10

..Johnson is definately a good kick (long and accurate for the most part), and is a monty for designated kicker after a behind.. ..even when Stevo comes in, i think Johnson serves us best in this area.. ..it's a definate balance across the HBF these days.. .you can't have them all be hard defenders, it's simply not the way the game is played anymore, there's need to address field kicking too.. ..he's best served on a forward that plays a lead-up style game i reckon.. ..and don't belittle Morton, i reckon he's gonna be a v.good forward..

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..if you can't be good, be good at it..

Positive, I watched the game again on the weekend and Russell was on him for that passage of play, followed Morton all the way from the fifty to just outside the goal square, gave him five metres goalside and Morton took advantage with a crumbing goal.

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In any case I'd say Morton is going to be a gun and for Johnson to lose to him in the air is a weakness but one that many other teams will have. Richmond has already realised this letting him play one out in the square on long leads, despite their forward options.

I think he'll end up the best Morton despite Cale going at No.4 in his draft.