Raph Clarke !!

[stinger]

you guys picking on ralph and fiora obviously have overlooked sneider......at least the other two were playing for the saints......i thought that the swine had 23 players out there tonight ...to our 21......bet roos was pissing himself laughing.....

[Tassie Saint]

I get nervous watching him play (see the rundown!!) but last night I thought he was pretty damn good personally. Still looks lazy when kicking or handpassing, especially under any sort of pressure, but is a huge improvement on performances last year

[rexy]

Raph had an average game tonight. Did a couple of good things along with a couple of clangers. As for his pace, he is definitely not slow, its only his decision making which is.

I would suggest that when he takes the 1st option his decision making is fine. It's when he is confronted with more than one option that he sometimes gets confused !!

I would suggest that when you only have one option there is actually no decision at all?

[Unforgiven]

I thought it was obvious before tonights game. Raph OUT, armitage IN

Not that smart a move. If Max went down injured (which imo was a high probability) we needed another tall. With Blake being an late withdrawl, Raph was needed to take Micky' O.

[brown-coat]

That final quarter run down holding the ball...

Classic Raph Clarke awareness.

"opmg omg omg don't bag raph he's a super talent"

Whatever.

[skeptic]

Gram, Gilbert and Fiora showed us why Raph is in this team... he can spoil. He gets to contests and puts his fist on the ball even when he's out of position... the other 3 were woeful at this all night.

he made a few bad disposals did Raph but he is a quality defender, I think he needs to play further in the back line and not be a quarter back... at least atm.

One thing i liked about Raph's game was that he consistently tried to break the lines.

Gram is a liability down back... needs to find a place in our midfield... Goddard to take his spot on a HBF

[matrix]

14 disposals (8 kicks and 6 handballs)
6 uncontested marks
3 contested possessions, 13 uncontested possessions
2 inside 50's
2 clangers
1 free for, 1 against
spent 96% of game time on the ground

[Solar]

just a warning for anyone who might be sitting near me in the social club area next week, I am all for peoples right to bag a player for making a mistake but take off the eye patch and relise that certain players not only do a lot of hard work and positive play but others also make mistakes. I can't stand people sitting there all match picking on 2-3 players "oh guess what, raph just made a mistake, get him off" despite the fact that there is no talking to him as he is run down. Or the constant calling fiora fiona etc. It's pathetic and no wonder the swans were making more noise then we did, all our supporters do is sit their and take pot shots at the boys!

Agree about raph being the second best defender out there. Great in the air, punches very well but still lacks that confidence to know where to pass the ball. Didn't help that as he broke the lines he had a wall of about 30 players in the midfield. Wouldn't you want to make sure of the kick if you knew the ball would go over your head if it's not.

[matrix]

id pick him next week.

[The_Dud]

i can't believe what I'm reading

second best defender? you have to be kidding, i can't remember him actually beating his opponent.

I remember him basically handing Goodes an easy goal, i remember him not wanting to put his body on the line to cut off a pass to Hall (handing him a goal), i remember him being second to the contest constantly, i remember him getting run down, even tho he clearly has pace ( ), i remeber him repeatedly fumbling the ball under basically no pressure, i remember him being unable to do anything BUT a hospital pass, i remember him nearly killing Roo with one of these passes

i remember him having 3 quality possessions for the whole game (without going over the video tape)

i want the guy to succeed, but he is way too much of a liability, and we can't continue to carry him, it'll cost us a game one day

put him in the 2's and make him EARN his spot, not recieve it on "potential"

[st.byron]

i can't believe what I'm reading

second best defender? you have to be kidding, i can't remember him actually beating his opponent.

I remember him basically handing Goodes an easy goal, i remember him not wanting to put his body on the line to cut off a pass to Hall (handing him a goal), i remember him being second to the contest constantly, i remember him getting run down, even tho he clearly has pace ( ), i remeber him repeatedly fumbling the ball under basically no pressure, i remember him being unable to do anything BUT a hospital pass, i remember him nearly killing Roo with one of these passes

i remember him having 3 quality possessions for the whole game (without going over the video tape)

i want the guy to succeed, but he is way too much of a liability, and we can't continue to carry him, it'll cost us a game one day

put him in the 2's and make him EARN his spot, not recieve it on "potential"

Harsh Dud. Goodes was in a much better position when he outmanouevred Raph to kick that goal. The ball was long and all Goodes had to do was give Raph a nudge. I thought he was ok last night. Knows how to spoil and is still developing confidence. Took a timely overhead mark under pressure down back and his disposal was ok most of the time.
Remember he's still gaining confidence after a long struggle to be injury free.

[The_Dud]

Remember he's still gaining confidence after a long struggle to be injury free.

i reckon thats excuse is absolute bull

and if so, let him regain confidence in the 2's, not in the seniors where it'll cost us

[maverick]

Gram, Gilbert and Fiora showed us why Raph is in this team... he can spoil. He gets to contests and puts his fist on the ball even when he's out of position... the other 3 were woeful at this all night.

he made a few bad disposals did Raph but he is a quality defender, I think he needs to play further in the back line and not be a quarter back... at least atm.

One thing i liked about Raph's game was that he consistently tried to break the lines.

Gram is a liability down back... needs to find a place in our midfield... Goddard to take his spot on a HBF

Completely agree Raph can spoil, the same people bagging Raph are probably bagging Max. Why does Gilbert get spared as an example? Gilbert clearly got beat but kept trying, Raph defended well, took a couple of good grabs in defence, one in the dying minutes of the game and turned it over a couple of times.

Harvs missed two sitters and got run down once as well, care to bag him as well???

No I didn't think so.

We desperately need Raph as a third tall defender at present, a spot he was not recruited for but needs to play for team balance, I have never heard him complain, he just gets out there and has a crack. as does Gilbert...

Get off Raph's back for god's sake.....

[bigcarl]

Gram is a liability down back ... needs to find a place in our midfield ... Goddard to take his spot on a HBF

wing, where his prodigious long kicking can be best employed

[st.byron]

Remember he's still gaining confidence after a long struggle to be injury free.

i reckon thats excuse is absolute bull

and if so, let him regain confidence in the 2's, not in the seniors where it'll cost us

yep, understand your frustration, but I redkon he's worth persevering with. Every club has guys that need game time in the heat of senior footy to sharpen their intensity and nous. In the footy record yesterday there was an interview with Chance Bateman. No in depth stuff but he did say he'd been around senior footy for nine years and only now feels he knows what it's about. Takes time for some guys to develop. They don't all just need one or two years. to blossom. Plus Raph has had injuries.
Dud I agree that he's been disappointing up until now and needs to produce or piss off, but IMO is worth at least this season. It's the first pre-season he's had at the club where he's been injury free.

[CURLY]

Did I miss somthing? People saying that Raph was well beaten has me confused. Sydney had one winning forward for the night and that was Okeefe. All the others were kept in check. Its plain and simple those that bag Raph are the people who look at dream team points and judge a game as most of Raphs work is purely team orientated.

[busso mick]

Our defence is our "achilles heel" at the moment for team balance. Raph should stay there and get some game time into him, you can't have 22 champions on the park because we don't have them on our list. I reckon there is more upside to Raph than probably any other player we have. If he can string together a few games in a row then I feel he can improve immensely this year. A stable backline is what flags are made of, not chopping and changing after Round 1.

[sunsaint]

People seem to judge backmen by different standards.
Raph was ok
And the argument that GODdard is an automatic starter is a bit premature. At the moment he will need to replace Sam Fisher who has taken the loose man sweeper role that Goddard used to play. SO you would have to ask is Goddard better than Fisher? Besides I have seen goddard run down from behind many times as well.

[bigcarl]

i thought raph was pretty good last night.

sure he got mowed down at one stage but at least he was backing himself.

i noticed that schneider was also mowed down in the last quarter (after not heeding the umpires call to play on) and no-one's calling for his head.

raph made up for his mistake minutes later when took a very handy mark when it was in the balance.

i say perservere with raphael.

[saint66au]

Our defence is our "achilles heel" at the moment for team balance. Raph should stay there and get some game time into him, you can't have 22 champions on the park because we don't have them on our list. I reckon there is more upside to Raph than probably any other player we have. If he can string together a few games in a row then I feel he can improve immensely this year. A stable backline is what flags are made of, not chopping and changing after Round 1.

Actually I disagree..I thought our defence was very composed last night. Led by Max and Chipper, they were very cool at the end when Sydney threw everything at us...given the amouunt of times it came in I thought their work was good

[st paddy]

just a warning for anyone who might be sitting near me in the social club area next week, I am all for peoples right to bag a player for making a mistake but take off the eye patch and relise that certain players not only do a lot of hard work and positive play but others also make mistakes. I can't stand people sitting there all match picking on 2-3 players "oh guess what, raph just made a mistake, get him off" despite the fact that there is no talking to him as he is run down. Or the constant calling fiora fiona etc. It's pathetic and no wonder the swans were making more noise then we did, all our supporters do is sit their and take pot shots at the boys!

Agree about raph being the second best defender out there. Great in the air, punches very well but still lacks that confidence to know where to pass the ball. Didn't help that as he broke the lines he had a wall of about 30 players in the midfield. Wouldn't you want to make sure of the kick if you knew the ball would go over your head if it's not.

Best post this week so far - beautifully said!

[Huzzad]

I can't stand people sitting there all match picking on 2-3 players "oh guess what, raph just made a mistake, get him off" despite the fact that there is no talking to him as he is run down.

Has anyone actually said this was due to lack of communication on the feild? Was this the reason, or just an assumption? Did the players around or he himself comment on that?

[St DAC]

We'll never know.

Raph had a couple of brain fades last night, but he was far from our worst. That timely grab in the last 2 minutes was very handy, and he combined with X several times under pressure in the last quarter to run the ball out of the back half and earn a chance to score. He'll keep his spot I suspect.

[stinger]

"Lyon said Jones was among several young Saints who impressed on Saturday night, with the coach also praising first-gamer Jarryn Geary, Sam Gilbert, Leigh Fisher and Raphael Clarke"



.....i'm happy to go with the coach's assessment of raph...rather than some of the self appointed experts on here......

[The_Dud]

.....i'm happy to go with the coach's assessment of ralph...rather than some of the self appointed experts on here......

yeah, but i wonder what he thought of Raph

he's cons far out weigh his pros, he shouldn't get a game next week