The lost players that keep list managers up at night ... so who has your club lost to rivals?
THEY can be the players that can end careers, that keep list managers up at night. More than 180 players are on their second or third club at the moment and there might be a few people regretting letting them go.
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THEY are the players that can end careers, those that are let go before blossoming at a new environment.
List managers wake up in the middle of the night in cold sweats, hoping that what can be an agonising decision doesn’t come back to haunt with a best on ground in a Grand Final.
Often coaches can be the catalyst of such moves as they grow impatient for success, in the knowledge that the sack is never far away from their own necks.
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Remarkably reigning premiers Richmond currently have just two players in Matt Dea and Brett Deledio at other clubs, and for different reasons neither has hurt the Tigers since leaving.
Alternatively expansion team GWS has 27 former players currently on the books of rival AFL clubs, and there are more than 180 players in total on either their second or third team.
As a Team of Century member and four-time premiership player with Hawthorn in the 1980s, Gary Buckenara was never in a position where he could have been shipped of to another club, but in a later life as a recruiting manager for the Hawks he saw the other side often enough.
“I guess Josh Kennedy was one at Hawthorn. The Hawks didn’t want him to go but in the end it was done and he’s now captain. He’s one they would look back on and say maybe we were a bit premature,” said Buckenara.
“And then there are times when you don’t want to lose a player, such as Carlton when they had to give up Josh Kennedy to the West Coast Eagles to get Chris Judd.
“They are really hard decisions. Do you let a 27-year-old with three or four good years left in him go to get a draft pick to use on a young kid who may give you 10 years?
“Some guys develop later than others and coaches are very quick to make calls on young players, too quick I think.
“Ruckmen and raw key forwards usually get longer because they often take longer, although a lumbering key forward in today’s game is going to struggle the way it’s played.”
Buckenara looks at Gold Coast losing players like Josh Caddy, Charlie Dixon, Jaeger O’Meara and Dion Prestia as a product of an environment that needs to be improved.
“The go-home factor is a big thing because of the environment at the Gold Coast where some of their young players haven’t developed, whereas at a club like the Sydney Swans they flourish.
The NEAFL competition isn’t as strong as the WAFL and SANFL and that can stifle development although Sydney seems to overcome that. Whatever they are doing to develop their rookies should be looked at closely by some of those other northern clubs.”
Every AFL club now employs our own version of the pro scout, a person hired specifically to look for a player they consider to be under-performing at a level beneath the AFL.
Find the right one and you have potential gold.
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