Is he moving as freely as he should be? Seems a bit laboured at times to me
Am I mistaken?

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There's so much I could say...

Playing the entire game does that to you I'm told.

Brilliant answer wise arse
I was concerned whether he's carrying an injury or something was a miss...sheesh!

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There's so much I could say...

Sorry. Let me rephrase. I didn't notice any undue labouring on Steven's behalf. Perhaps someone else can shed further light.

I thought he moved well and played a good game.

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"We used to sit around and talk about how bad the game plan was." Anthony Koutoufides

So did I, don't know why he was labelled as a down hill skiier by Parkin.

Tried to get to a lot of contests and missed out on a few, he's not superman.

Taken in context, he called both Nic and Crawf downhill skiers because they were playing so far off each other that it was easy for them to both wrack up stats.

Yeah but like Crawf and Stevo would spend the whole match sagging off packs when they're not manned up.

few contested possessions, a lot of cheap ones running past, no accountability, was on hodge for a large part of the night - who do you think was more damaging?

Mate, you can't have an each way bet and expect a player to make an impact, he was good value.

I haven't watched the replay in its entirety because I listened to radio and haven't had the stomach to watch us cough up a game again but he's supposed to be a match winner, people are supposed to keeping an eye on him, not the other way around.

Can someone pluck up his handball receives for the game and for the season, because I saw him fish a bit of his own ball. But generally speaking for a balanced mid, you'd be stoked if he had 10 contested possession out of 29, but you wouldn't be happy if he had accumulated 19 handball receives.

Update: Stevens had 7 contested possessions, 22 uncontested, but that only tells half the story.

I dont think anyone thinks Stevens is as good a player as Hodge - would you expect Stevens to have beaten him?

of course not - but I would have expected a bit more accountability rather than stevens sittin off the pack goal side hoping that we win the ball so that he would be running forward. That is what campo was criticised for. Nothing wrong with doing it on ocassion but you have to look at who your opponent is - hodge is always going to hurt us more the other way so its not worth taking that risk

think your last 2 sentences show who is having an each way bet

Were Hodge and Stevens going head to head?

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"You are being watched. The government has a secret system. A machine that spies on you every hour of every day. I know because I built it." - Finch

for parts of the match yes - dont think many midfielders go head to head for an entire quarter (let alone match) anymore

There's a difference between negating a player and being responsible for a player.

Do you know what you're talking about or are you just targetting playing styles you don't enjoy? 7 contested possessions is a pretty good effort, but contested possessions are loosely defined.

Think how Stevens would be battling in a contested situation compared to Judd, or Hodge, where his team mates know where to run all the time, who and how to block for Hodge to get a clean run out of the contest.

Our boys are getting better at this, but Stevens still gets put under the pump pretty quickly in a contested situation.

22 uncontested possessions from foot and hand passes.

We are playing a contested brand of footy. We are tryong to be consistent in trying to get numbers on the ball. For each uncontested receive somebody was either at the bottom of a pack feeding it out to him, or he was spotted by foot in the clear.

When a ball is being dished out either way somebody has to receive it. If Stevens wasn't adding to the numbers at the contest who would be receiving these assists?

The answer is somebody has to be there; and it happens to be our best ball carrier, who also happens to have the best disposal in the team. All makes sense to me. He's playing the role the coach expects him to play week in week out.

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Everyone looks good in Navy Blue

Or the ball spilled and he ran to gather.

The game high for contested possession was Luke Hodge, with 11.

I don't think enough people actually understand the meaning of the terms contested and uncontested possession and hard and loose ball gets. In this case the terms are interchangable, but a handball out of the bottom of a pack is not the only kind of hard ball get.

Technically, a direct tap receive and run out of the stoppage by means of blocks placed for you by team mates is a hard ball get.

7 contested possessions in a game as a midfielder is not a poor effort. It is a little down on Stevo's usual numbers but the game was riddled with errors and his possession count was 4 or 5 up on the usual haul.

What does this tell us? Stevens was running himself ragged cleaning up a mess, missed out on a few of his usual efforts at ruck contests but (probably) found plenty of his own ball.

Nick Stevens is not a soft receiver.

Hardball Get= When a player picks up a disputed ball in a pressure situation that has spilled onto the ground and a clean disposal follows. The player has retrieved the ball under direct physical pressure and hasn't been immediately dispossessed or effectively tackled.

Looseball Get= When a player picks up the ball in an uncontested situation that has spilled onto the ground and a clean disposal follows. It rewards the player's ability to read the play around a pack or just be in the right place at the right time to turn a 50/50 situation into a loose possession.

Contested Possession= A ground ball get, contested mark or free kick. The player needs to win some sort of contest.

Uncontested Possession= A handball receive, intended ball get or uncontested mark

BW, are you trying to suggest my assessment is incorrect? I don't mean that as though I'm infallable, you just did nothing other than list the definition of all the terms that have been mentioned.

The terms are interchangeable, I did not say identical. They are similar, related.

I was a bit vague with the tap analogy, maybe I should have used talking marks. How often does anyone see a palm to a rover, blocks provided and not one hand laid on the rover? Pretty rare, so I'm referring to a 'clean' run.

My point? Analysing Hodge's statistics vs Stevens' statistics is not just about them, it's about ruckmen, fellow midfielders and team disposal.