Naitanui debut lives up to the hype

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Naitanui debut lives up to the hype

Authored by: Sean Finlayson
on Thursday, June 18 2009 @ 12:21 am ACST

Forgive me for begging the question, but how does a player that has not had prolific statistics in the lower grades make the Under 18 All-Australian Team ?

Some research here would be great. Your article makes it seem that he was picked for raw potential, but in fact he made actually made an early debut based form.

Seriously if 15 possessions, 21 hit-outs, 4 goals and a spectacular mark for a young ruckman to earn the AFL call-up from the WAFL isn't prolific then I don't know what is .....

Naitanui debut lives up to the hype

Authored by: Brett Northey
on Thursday, June 18 2009 @ 11:57 am ACST

What an innocuous topic to get fired up about. Naitanui missed the previous draft by just 2 days so was older than most of his competitors at the Under 18s, and being drafted at number 2 he would be expected to debut this year and become an absolute star of the competition in future. He would also be expected to be a prolific possession winner, at least in terms of ruckmen - the best now play almost as an extra onballer around the ground or if not, take a lot of marks and threaten around goal. If you had followed his career statistics as I have you would know that he has not been a prolific ball winner. But with less of a footy background than most players, and enormous athletic qualities, he was drafted a bit higher than the numbers would probably suggest, i.e. a judgement made on potential.

That's a sensible decision and it was reported at the time that he would need to develop his all-round game. All those aspects quite clearly justify my implication that his potential and athleticism were unquestioned but his ability to convert that into star footballing ability was yet to be seen - most of the footy world including myself are hopeful he succeeds and his last WAFL game and his AFL debut augur well. Quoting stats from one game hardly proves your point. I do object to your occasional complaints about lack of research when you clearly had no idea what was put into a story - disagree with the conclusion but don't make unfounded statements.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

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