And Lewis Young .

The problem I as I see it - It is ok to run with 1 ruck if you have the 3rd banana up forward who can take a grab.
When we use Harry as 2nd ruck and TDK or Pitto go to the bench it leaves Charlie 1 out in the forward 50 and he gets defended to easily .
When we go with two rucks neither TDK or Pitto are viable options as that forward 50 target or they are not very good at drifting back a kick behind play to cut out the ball coming into back Half.
TDK is up with the best with his follow up after the ruck contest and is good at taking the ball from boundary throw ins and sending it forward. Pitto tap work is good and his abilty to block and create space for the midfield is also very good.

When you look at the Dogs their forward structure is Naughton, Ugle and Darcey - When English has a rest and Darcey rucks they still have two forward fifty targets.
Same applies to Swans - they have Macdonald Armarty and Maclean and throw in Heywood - so when Grundy comes off they still have options in attack .
These two sides still manage to defend the ball coming out of their front half and create repeat entries so either our smalls are not getting to work when we have 3 tall forwards - Or our talls are giving up once the initial marking contest is lost.

We are going to get found out with only one genuine ruck - but with out JSOS I am not sure what the solution is

That was a fkn mighty effort by TDK yesterday considering what we know today.

The problem has been that going in to a game with one ruck this year hurts us forward of the centre with Harry rucking.

And Lewis Young .

Very much so . Rather than be deflated we should be inspired . Fight on in the face of adversity .

Win/loss tells a different story.

blows my mind, the only real stat that matters is win/loss ... and people overlook it.

10-1 with one ruck is elite territory, and plants us right in the thick of flag convos. fix up the defensive lapses (bcos i think structurally, we are all right) and we are right there.

Yes Swans are 14-4 this year playing 2 x KPF and 2 Rucks - just struggle to see why people cant get their head around it
and Pies won the flag doing the same thing last year

Mind boggles really

further to this debate -

We have just run our 3rd most influential player into the ground who may or may not get back onto the park this year
We have been using a 1.0million a year forward who is on track to kick over 50 goals as relief ruck putting him in Jeopardy
And Lastly we have a 1.5 Million dollar a year potential Brownlow medalist and best clearance and contested player in the game taking ruck contest against blokes that are 6 inches taller and 10-15kg heavier

If you want a recipe for dumb this is it

not at all. the swans have genuine swingmen/ and 1 ruck - grundy. same as dogs. big men who also play well below their knees supplementing english - the number one guy.

what we have is the gawn/ grundy comparison. two numbers ones, that don't offer much outside of rucking duties. neither are key forwards/ backs.

and melbourne worked out really early, two number 1's doesn't work.


you got a brain syd ... how's about you start using it, old pal.

but they dont sacrifice a key forward they still run with two KPF - we sacrifice a forward - here in lies the difference

Melbourne would have loved to have Grundy on weekend

holy shit, man. you don't have a back up ruck of number 1 quality in today's salary cap landscape, just in case your first choice gets hurt. afl/vfl has forever been a league where the healthiest teams in prelims make gf's and win flags. it is, what it is.

Grundy’s salary wasn’t a problem for the Dees.

Nor is it a problem for Sydney.

grundy and gawn's was. too much money tied up in ruck. don't forget swans get a higher salary cap too. the mythical "sydney cost of living cap"

Like most people, I’ve forgotten about Sydney’s COLA because it was abolished in 2017. If it does come back, it’ll be a soft cap allowance, not TPP.