Tommy Walsh Highlights from VFL

[joffaboy]

In all seriousness, how far away is Tommy depends a lot on what you want from him. If you're prepared to let him learn and develop while playing senior footy then you could make the case that he's not far away.

I am very heartened by what I have seen live.

At the intra club he was very ordinary, as expected.

I then saw him after four games down at Willi and he actually looked like he could read the play, had a good step and more often than not was beating his man.

Against port Melbourne where Sandy copped a 20 goal hiding, once again he looked OK with his kicking improving to at least VFL level.

Seems like he is concentrating hard on his kicking.

I was suprised to see him up forward on the weekend, and even more suprised how he went about it, considering it was his first time up front.

After 7 games, he is still learning the game, but I am very confident that if he gets a gig in the seniors he wont let us down.

[samoht]

Still a fair way off.

Having said that, he's a lot further progressed than where I thought he would be at this stage of the season.

I can see nothing but GOOD THINGS with Tommy.

Assuming we can judge from his single effort forward ..
.. are you implying our current crop of big men/power forwards are that far ahead of where he's currently at ?

I have to think he would not be far away at all.

How far away is he? About 13 klms - the distance from Etihad to Trevor Barker Oval.

In all seriousness, how far away is Tommy depends a lot on what you want from him. If you're prepared to let him learn and develop while playing senior footy then you could make the case that he's not far away.

But if you really want him to develop all his skills and get them to the point where they are second nature, then it's going to be a bit of a wait IMO.

And with a team in its premiership window you have to carefully weigh up the advantages of Tommy's "X" factor against the possibility he'll make fundamental, and perhaps costly, errors in an important match.

Don't get me wrong - I'm as excited as hell about TW. But if Ross wants to take it slowly then I have no problem with that.

To answer how far away he is .. I think we need to do that within the context of the position we have in mind for him to play in and therefore how far behind he is from the current crop of key position players/forwards (or defenders) who he would be competing against for that position.

So the way I see it is - it may not actually come down to how far Walsh needs to develop to make things seem second nature for himself - it's if the current group of players are kicking enough goals or taking enough marks to keep him out of calculation and consideration.

If he draws level with any of these players in what he's achieving on the football field - then he should be promoted ahead of those players as his upside means he is going to go past them.

[Stillwaiting]

Still a fair way off.

Having said that, he's a lot further progressed than where I thought he would be at this stage of the season.

I can see nothing but GOOD THINGS with Tommy.

Assuming we can judge from his single effort forward ..
.. are you implying our current crop of big men/power forwards are that far ahead of where he's currently at ?

I have to think he would not be far away at all.

How far away is he? About 13 klms - the distance from Etihad to Trevor Barker Oval.

In all seriousness, how far away is Tommy depends a lot on what you want from him. If you're prepared to let him learn and develop while playing senior footy then you could make the case that he's not far away.

But if you really want him to develop all his skills and get them to the point where they are second nature, then it's going to be a bit of a wait IMO.

And with a team in its premiership window you have to carefully weigh up the advantages of Tommy's "X" factor against the possibility he'll make fundamental, and perhaps costly, errors in an important match.

Don't get me wrong - I'm as excited as hell about TW. But if Ross wants to take it slowly then I have no problem with that.

I think he has just arrived at Southern Cross Station

I would be happy to see RL give him a run if he thought the time was right. Get a few games in the ones. But I have no problem with him at sandy for the rest of the year

[Sainternist]

The kid shows promise. Reads the play well, can take a strong grab and has a reasonable kicking action. I guess he has his work cut out for him to become a firsts team contender at this stage. Hopefully patience will be a virtue and we'll see him the red, white and black until not too long.

[SaintTom]

Can't wait to see him get a guernsey, but the basic mistake of that kick in the backline shows he has a bit to go yet. If he did that in the seniors and gave away a goal it would eclipse the good I can see him doing. I haven't seen enough of him, so that may have just been a brain fade, but he still seems to have a massive scope for improvement before he gets a game.

Can't wait to see him named in the 22! But I can't tell who I'd be more excited to see named yet... Walsh or J Smith?

[markp]

Maybe he's so good that his seemingly wayward kicking is a result of him emulating his senior teammates a little too precisely....

Someone just needs to tell him it's actually meant to go through the middle!

With the performance of many others in mind, and in all seriousness I dont think we should be too critical of what we've seen of his kicking.