vfl.com.au recently chatted to Coburg senior coach Peter German about what could lie in store for the club on the field in 2017.
FACT FILE:
2016 FINISH: 12th (6-12)
2016 BEST AND FAIREST: 1. Tom Goodwin / 2. Ozgur Uysal / 3. Ahmed Saad
2016 TEAM OF THE YEAR: Robbie Fox / Luke Ryan / Ahmed Saad
2016 DRAFTEES: Luke Ryan (pick no.66 to Fremantle) / Robbie Fox (rookie pick no.34 to Sydney)
OTHER FORMER PLAYERS CURRENTLY ON AFL LISTS:
- Selected in 2014: Adam Saad (Gold Coast)
- 2015: Michael Hartley (Essendon)
2017 INS & OUTS:
- In: Damandeep Aujla (Northern Blues) / Ben Barton (Calder Cannons) / Mitch Betson (Terrigal-Avoca, NSW) / Hayden Blythe (Calder Cannons) / Karl Brown (Calder Cannons) / Luke Bunker (Northern Knights) / Connor Byrne (UWS Giants, NSW) / Christian Burgess (Myrtleford) / Billy Cannolo (Calder Cannons) / Tom Cleary (Glenorchy, TAS) / Tyler Curtis (Williamstown) / Nick Dodge (Lauderdale, TAS) / Stuart Donnelly (Southport, QLD) / James El Moussalli (Essendon VFL) / Ryan Exon (Frankston) / Josh Formosa (Bendigo Pioneers) / Cassidy Haberfield (Surfers Paradise, QLD) / Rivva Karpany (Fitzroy Stars) / Hisham Kerbatieh (Northern Blues) / Liam Kidd (Box Hill Hawks) / Patrick Lawlor (Box Hill Hawks) / Sam Lowson (East Ringwood) / Jackson McDonald (Calder Cannons) / Corey McKay (Northern Knights) / Nick Mellington (Richmond VFL) / Alex Mioni (Port Melbourne) / Blake Mullane (Frankston) / Jaidyn Owen (Calder Cannons) / Matthew Perry (Northern Knights) / Angelo Rambaldi (Collingwood VFL) / Jack Reaper (Calder Cannons) / Chas Roberts (Northern Knights) / James Svarc (Corowa-Rutherglen) / Lachlan Waite (Murray Bushrangers) / Tom Wallis (Essendon AFL) / Darrean Wyatt (Collingwood AFL)
- Out (selected): Josh Cauchi / Simon Caven / Jackson Clarke / Lech Featherstone / Robbie Fox (Sydney AFL) / Dion Hill / Lachlan Johns (Vermont) / Jake Kalanj / Rory Lehmann / Nick Linton / Joel Madden / Errol McConnell / Garrett McDonagh / Dylan McDonald / Nick Robortella / Luke Ryan (Fremantle AFL) / Ahmed Saad (West Preston-Lakeside) / Kyle Staples / Matthew Stillman / Nathan Thomas / Callum Urquhart / Ozgur Uysal / Daniel Younan (Essendon VFL)
DEPARTED PLAYERS WHO’LL BE MISSED:
Daniel Younan: “Danny was an outstanding leader and he’ll certainly be missed. He’s just one of those real upbeat, quality young men who added so much to our footy club. But now he’s gone, the best part is that someone else steps up.”
Ahmed Saad: “We’ll miss Ahmed’s scoreboard contribution – he kicked 49 goals (and won the ‘Frosty’ Miller Medal) last year. In today’s football climate where forwards don’t stay home as much and they press up the ground, he showed he was just a quality forward for us. We think that rather than one player covering ‘Saady’ this year, we’ll have a totally different forward set-up.”
RECRUITS WHO COULD MAKE AN IMPACT:
New forwards: “We’ve had Lech Featherstone (23 goals in 2016) move on as well as Ahmed Saad, but we think Nick Dodge from Tasmania is a quality medium half forward and we got Hisham Kerbatieh from the Northern Blues who kicked five goals in a game (against Werribee in Round 17) last year – he seems to have taken his fitness to a new level this year. We also think Tyler Curtis from Williamstown is going to add a fair bit to our height up forward. If we’ve got everyone available, we think our forward line is going to be more than a couple of players.”
High-level experience: “I think the recruitment of Nick Mellington from Richmond’s VFL team and Tom Wallis from Essendon’s AFL rookie list will certainly give us good coverage in the midfield. Down back, we’ve recruited Tom Cleary from Tasmania and Darrean Wyatt’s another one – he’s come off Collingwood’s rookie list. His understanding of football’s starting to grow (he was a former US college basketballer) and we think he’ll be a quality defender for us.”
Youngsters: “We’ve got some really good young kids to our club who have probably just missed out at the drafts previously. Connor Byrne from NSW, Luke Bunker from the Northern Knights and Christian Burgess from Myrtleford – he was on the radar of a couple of AFL clubs last year. Jack Reaper and Jaidyn Owen are a couple of tall players from the Calder Cannons and they’re really exciting. These boys are still learning a lot, and whether they can have an impact this year or after two or three years like (previous AFL draftees from Coburg) Michael Hartley or Robbie Fox remains to be seen.”
BEST-AND-FAIREST CONTENDERS:
“You’d expect the players who were up there last year – Tom Goodwin and Liam Hunt – to be there again. I think Tom’s game will only continue to get better in the ruck and I think Liam showed last year as the season went on that he’s a top-line midfielder. He finished top-five in the competition in total hard-ball gets and contested possessions (during the 2016 home-and-away season) and he’s a player we’d expect to take another step up. If Peter McEvoy plays a full season, he could be one of our key players. He had a terrific year (16 goals in 10 games) up until he broke his leg (in Round 11) but he’s fully fit now.
“I don’t think there’s a big gap between a lot of our players – you don’t have that Gary Ablett or Paddy Dangerfield and then you have the rest. I think we’re so young that we’re quite even across the board. By the end of the year there could be a few surprise packets up there that we didn’t expect to be.”
BREAK-OUT CANDIDATES:
“We think Mark Kovacevic will make inroads with his ruck work and be able to work in tandem with Tom Goodwin. Josh Iacobaccio (pictured) in the back line – he’s grown in terms of his maturity and he’s a leader at the club now. We think he’ll be more impactful this year. Michael Mattingly in his second year – we think he’s taken big steps over the pre-season and he’s going to be a better player in 2017. Ben Allan and Nathan Blair – they’ve had two and three years at the club respectively. We think they’ll continue to grow and be able to add so much more to their game and our team.”
BIGGEST TEAM STRENGTHS:
“A big chunk of what we’re focusing on is our team unity because we’ve got such a young group. I think any good footy club has a real strong culture and that’s really grown after every session. You can see the players really starting to relax with each other now.
“I think our depth is also going to be a strength. There could easily be 30 or 32 players pushing for Round 1 senior spots and that keeps everyone on their toes. There’s going to be a lot more competition for spots which I think will enhance our performances.
“Our defence was probably our strongest line last year and we’ve been able to add to that with Tom Cleary and Darrean Wyatt. We think Sean Gregory’s a lot fitter and Mark Orr and Nathan Blair have another year under their belt. We think our back line can hold up – it’s whether we can stay consistent throughout the year in our midfield and our forwards can hit the scoreboard.”
AREAS FOR IMPROVEMENT FROM 2016:
“I think up until halfway through last year our stoppages and contested ball were pretty good but in the second half of the year we really dropped away there (equal-seventh for average clearances and eighth for average contested possessions per game after the home-and-away season).
“We lost five of our first seven games last year by 11 points or less, and if you win three of them all of sudden you’re talking about maybe having a run at the finals. The start of our season’s going to be really important... but with a young group, they could so easily forget about what’s important by thinking about finals. We just want to win as many games as we can. We’ve won five, seven and six games over the last three years and eight or nine wins is about the goal we want to get to. Rather than having a turnover of 50 per cent of the list again, if we can keep a majority of the guys and they can grow as a core group, that’s when you start to play finals.”
COACHING PANEL CHANGES:
“Paul Kennedy’s been fantastic – he’s going to be our Development League coach and VFL assistant coach this year. He’s made a big difference already just in the way we’re going about our footy. We lost (former Melbourne and Richmond player) Ricky Petterd, but Andrew Sturgess has come on board as our midfield coach. He played for Coburg a few years ago and he’s just a quality football person in terms of his knowledge of the game and how he educates and teaches. We’ve also got Lachlan Waterman in as our forwards coach. He’s originally from South Australia and was in Western Australia for a few years doing a bit of work for East Fremantle in the WAFL. Tony Regan is our defensive coach – he did some work last year with the TAC Cup’s Sandringham Dragons and he’s a school teacher.”
Next preview: Werribee
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Last Modified on 21/03/2017 16:53
