SA Footy

I'm a long-time Panthers fan living in Perth. The way we finished off last season was encouraging because there were a few times early in the year when I thought "Oh no, here we go again..same old, same old".

How do you think we will back up in 2007?
Will we be top-5 again?

We've been aggressive (if not wise!!) with recruiting in recent years but so far the only change I'm aware of is that we've lost Damian Cupido and gained Ian Prendergast.
Are we baulking at recruiting because of that 50 grand fine we copped for a salary cap breach?

Your thoughts ..

IMHO you will finish about fourth again but I feels that's due to Port's impressive recruiting, the Eagles will still be top two and I can't possibly see North slipping any further down. Think that South have done well to hang onto what they have and despite the loss of Davey and Cupido, I think you've still got the nucleus of a solid finals side.

westozfalcon wrote:I'm a long-time Panthers fan living in Perth. The way we finished off last season was encouraging because there were a few times early in the year when I thought "Oh no, here we go again..same old, same old".

How do you think we will back up in 2007?
Will we be top-5 again?

We've been aggressive (if not wise!!) with recruiting in recent years but so far the only change I'm aware of is that we've lost Damian Cupido and gained Ian Prendergast.
Are we baulking at recruiting because of that 50 grand fine we copped for a salary cap breach?

Your thoughts ..

Had a very dry winter which helped your mighty Panthers.
2 ways of looking at the Cupido defection
a: He kicked 60 odd goals and that will take replacing.
b: Sometimes when a percieved non disciplined person leaves , morale usually
improves around the club, as players may have been distracted ?

It happened at North when Ryan Occonnor left the club and they improved immensely.

The mighty panthers have spent plenty of $$$$$ recruiting in the last few years.
They have gained plenty of players each year but also lost plenty as well.
This year at last they will enter a season settled and an advantage as they have
had no mass exodus as in previous seasons.

Personally I get peeved off when sides like NA/SA seemingly recruit the cream
each year and as a result improve and become more SUCCESSFULL clubs for it.
I support Norwood and we are in reverse mode and cant recruit the quality and
quantity of the more Financial clubs.

But I will concede that what the recruitment of SA does it brings in some really
talented footballers who drastically improve the standard in the SANFL.
Players like the much MALigned CUPIDO and players like CLARK, ARCHARD
THEWLISS etc are really good footballers to watch.

The style of fast attacking footy SA play is entertaining and great to watch.
I will also poke fun in my posts about the $$$ sprees , salary caps and about the
foreign legion at SA, but what choice do clubs have in an SANFL raped by the AFL.

WESTOZ top 5 likely, SA best form is nearly unstoppable, evidenced by the thrashing
they gave to eventual premier WWT late in the year in 2006

To my mind, there were two teams who were the big improvers in 2006 (performance wise at least) and that was both South and Glenelg ... History would tend to suggest that only one of these could push further ahead, with the other likely to experience a drop off from the season just finished.

Not willing to make any suggestions as to which teams I'd favour or not fancy yet until the squads are finalised for the new season.

mal wrote:

b: Sometimes when a percieved non disciplined person leaves , morale usually
improves around the club, as players may have been distracted ?

Think you can attribute the much improved form of Nathan Lovett-Murray at Essendon this season to the above mentioned point.

SOUTH= LMFAO

westozfalcon,
keep the faith my boy ,keep the faith! As you so correctly pointed out South usually have a mass exodus at this time of the year and so far this hasnt happened. I beleive at last that this shows some stability as we have only lost Cupido & froggy Davey . We were always going to lose Davey after his performances during the year. Cupido leaving will not leave a gaping hole as Elliss ,Warren ,Iljecson and Twomey were far more impressive in the finals than Cupido and given more opportunities will fill the void next year. Prendergasts recruitment is excellent as he will fill a requirement for another tall defender who can also go forward and ruck to give Paz a breather. I do feel we will need to find a small crumbing forward in the Davey mould to kick goals and chase ,tackle and keep the ball in the forward line. I beleive that at this stage we should be able to repeat last years performance at least.
Go Panthers!

mal wrote: Personally I get peeved off when sides like NA/SA seemingly recruit the cream
each year and as a result improve and become more SUCCESSFULL clubs for it.
I support Norwood and we are in reverse mode and cant recruit the quality and
quantity of the more Financial clubs.

Can't see too much cream being brought at Prospect so far this off season Mal? One recruit form the VFL who is not yet a definite and 4 returning Roosters - of which 2 could be re-drafted. Mind you if the rumours are correct all of our surplus funds are being spent "big time" off field in paying some support roles so we can't really recruit too many players this year?

We had one year of decent recruiting (2006) and suddenly we have been doing it for years!

BPBRB wrote:

mal wrote: Personally I get peeved off when sides like NA/SA seemingly recruit the cream
each year and as a result improve and become more SUCCESSFULL clubs for it.
I support Norwood and we are in reverse mode and cant recruit the quality and
quantity of the more Financial clubs.

Can't see too much cream being brought at Prospect so far this off season Mal? One recruit form the VFL who is not yet a definite and 4 returning Roosters - of which 2 could be re-drafted. Mind you if the rumours are correct all of our surplus funds are being spent "big time" off field in paying some support roles so we can't really recruit too many players this year?

We had one year of decent recruiting (2006) and suddenly we have been doing it for years!

And 2005 you got a few over.
Its a SA post ......................

North have recruited in 2004 and 2005 to cover their losses (which were more than the players they recruited).
In 2006 they're recruiting less as they've lost less players.
Common sense and a recruiting policy I'd assume every club with common sense would adhere to.
Now if Mal will let us get back to South....

I think South will miss Davey more than Cupido, Davey really impressed me.
Ben Warren will have to kick a lot of goals now, or maybe it might go back to the bad old days when they had to shift Gerard Bennett down there.
Be interesting to see if Pyman implements a change of game plan with the different looking team.
South should be around the mid table mark similar to this year IMHO.
South have recruited a lot smarter in the last 2 years (except for Cupido) in that they're starting to work out its best to recruit for a position you need filling and not just taking the highest bidding or biggest name player available.
On the right track but might wait till 2008 for the big improvement.

SA have got to find a way to beat NA something they could not do in 2006.

we have done the most recruiting at westies in a few years

mal wrote:SA have got to find a way to beat NA something they could not do in 2006.

That is not going to take a massive improvement Mal. We had the better of them in several quarters last year but couldn't keep it together for the whole of those matches. In hindsight that final was probably there for the taking and whilst North are a quality side we did topple both eventual grand finalists and that was good form. I don't believe North are the side we'd have to beat to claim the 2007 flag, something I believe could be seriously within our grasp for the first time since I've been alive. I am very nervous about the coming season, I'd hate to see the Panthers going backwards from here.

SOUTH have had there fun in the sun and thats it for a while now.