TOPIC:

Good posts men. The blue and whites have a bit to prove given the club's effort in the finals last season. 

Who’s Buddy, and what’s Tallangatta got to do with anything.
 

Work it out and take a chill pill Cess

When it comes to tipping comps, I couldn’t pick a pig in a poke, but here goes.  It’s really hard to pick the bottom 5 and what order.

Clar
EF
WP
Freo (depending on availabilities - could end up anywhere)
EP
Subi
SF
P
SD
WCE

Premiers EF - with a fair amount of trepidation.

Can't see SD finishing 2nd last....with Glass-McGasker back, allows Jones and Palmer to help Noble up front, probably will get ex WBD Brad Lynch back to strengthen their already talented midfield( Turner, Clarke, Fisher, Pina) with Anderson back from his ACL...Germs is a quality ruck,with help from Ireland...plus they have picked up another good small forward in McLachlan from the VFL too.....SD top four for me, have lots of tall options to swing back n forward, depending who is on and who is not.

Freeze, agree with your comments about Perth, Billy took 2 plus years to get EF competitive and he started with a better list than Perth currently have. I'd Rate Bill at least in the same class as Germo as a coach, so 2 years of development and then Perth might be challenging for the 5 in 2025. Germo took over a pretty good list at Subi but the culture was flawed, he and Maloney changed the culture and Matt Barber got them bigger fitter and stronger.
 

At this stage our losses probably slightly outweigh our gains in quality and experience but there’s a few scenarios to play out that could fall our way, a young 200cm plus ruckman, a key forward and a couple of electrifying indigenous lads that could return from the AFL.

I’m just looking forward to seeing the new mindset, skill level improvement, better level of fitness, better coaching and mentoring and a more attacking mindset and game plan. We might still be a fair way off as others say or we could improve quicker than people think.

WP, EF and Cl will dominate the comp, the rest will fight it out amongst themselves for 4th and 5th spot while trying to avoid the dreaded spoon.

I agree with those that say that EF, WP and C will lead the pack in 2023 but I don't think there will be a huge gap between these and some of the others. Injuries as always will play a big part and I wouldnt count anyone out of contention for finals action.
Hopefully West Coast Eagles will be more consistently competitive each week so that we don't have so many of the 100+ point blowouts that happened last year

Top 3 and bottom 2 pick themselves: EF, C, WP; WC and P. Sadly, I think P will be last by some margin. There is no way the recruits cover the losses. Only Manzone and Thompson present as ready made league players. Getting Bradtke, Stack and Narkle would make us more competitive, but not enough to avoid the spoon. Otherwise, we lost about 15 players from last season, and will be relying largely on players stepping up from our last and second last placed reserves and colts. 

WC should be a little better, depending on injury, and Waterman should kick at least 40. EP have a very good midfield, especially with the addition of Crowden, but would seem to lack goal kicking and KPP options. SF won't be as bad as people think. Lost some key players, but Dragovich and Parker return alongside a core of good players like Schlensog, Florence, Strom, Miller and others. Subi look weak in the midfield, but Sokol and Borchet will always be hard to counter. SD should improve slightly, with Anderson back. Then there's Peel, whose reliance on the Dockers makes them hard to pick. So my ladder is:

EF
C
WP
SF
SD
PT
EP
S
WC
P

Ted Nugent wrote:

Top 3 and bottom 2 pick themselves: EF, C, WP; WC and P. Sadly, I think P will be last by some margin. There is no way the recruits cover the losses. Only Manzone and Thompson present as ready made league players. Getting Bradtke, Stack and Narkle would make us more competitive, but not enough to avoid the spoon. Otherwise, we lost about 15 players from last season, and will be relying largely on players stepping up from our last and second last placed reserves and colts. 

WC should be a little better, depending on injury, and Waterman should kick at least 40. EP have a very good midfield, especially with the addition of Crowden, but would seem to lack goal kicking and KPP options. SF won't be as bad as people think. Lost some key players, but Dragovich and Parker return alongside a core of good players like Schlensog, Florence, Strom, Miller and others. Subi look weak in the midfield, but Sokol and Borchet will always be hard to counter. SD should improve slightly, with Anderson back. Then there's Peel, whose reliance on the Dockers makes them hard to pick. So my ladder is:

EF
C
WP
SF
SD
PT
EP
S
WC
P

Teddy i find it very strange that you have a better grasp of the Royals list than the clueless E.P.. board.