Welcome to the Western Bulldogs Ryley Sanders

[chef]

He seems like a wish version of Ashcroft. Hope he can develop his foot skills better as atm they have no hurt factor.

[hujsh]

I know him personally (as do a few others on WOOF), and he had his own reasons for leaving WOOF, which I feel it is not up to me to mention. However, I will say it had nothing to do with Rocket getting moved on.

Best we leave it there as it is not important.

Okay, FWIW I did meet him a few times IRL as I played at the same footy club as his son.

[SonofScray]

BAD has killed off SonofScray.



Note - he means Sockeyesalmon

Two near misses in a week on the assassination front.

[Grantysghost]

Two near misses in a week on the assassination front.

How's your ear?

[The Bulldogs Bite]

Not worried about his stats. It's the eye test that I expected more.

I haven't seen him hurt the opposition by driving out of contest once and I haven't really seen him use the ball to the point where you stand up and take notice of his skill level.

I get he's young and will improve but I'm not sure how anyone could be convinced on what we've seen so far. That isn't even considering how much we invested to get him.

He has a long way to go before I'm remotely confident he'll make the grade.

[soupman]

I think he's been ok, if not a little safe and vanilla.

I do think we'd feel a lot better if he had have had a few "moments", like a clever kick or works his way out of trouble or outbodies an opponent.

The pre season reports were so positive that I think it's just a matter of him getting used to the level, but definitely he has been underwhelming so far.

[Scorlibo]

You would know as well as anyone Gary, but in the pre-season he was playing very differently in club scrimmages to what he is now. He was cracking in hard, taking running shots on goal and being much more aggressive with his running patterns and positioning.

I believe (the whisper is) after his first couple of games where he turned the ball over trying to bite off aggressive kicks inboard, he was told to cool his jets a bit, play his role and leave those sorts of kicks to our distributors. He was dropped, told to work on the defensive side of his game and he'd find a spot in the team where he was a role player.

He does have the attributes to be a game winner, but at the moment you can just see his first instinct is to do the team thing and move the ball on quickly and safely. I'd love to see him have the confidence to make those more flashy wow plays, but that will come with time as he finds his feet.

He'll be a great player. Talk of his limitations this early in his career are unfair I think, there's still plenty of development scope left for the young fella.

That all sounds about right to me. He was so impressive in those pre season games that the lack of impact with ball in hand since has been hard to grapple with from the outside.

In those games the one attribute that really struck me was his willingness to get the ball moving forward, and to have multiple efforts in the one chain to make that happen. Aggressive forward running with clean skills. It's a bit weird to reflect now on the season he's put together and realise that he's almost embodied the opposite of that approach. Very safe, not a heap of repeat efforts, heading sideways.

With young players it seems like there are two levers that the coaches typically pull - work on your deficits vs find/bring your strengths. I'm hoping that the season thus far has been one big 'work on your deficits' lever, and that we're not far away from seeing Ryley bring his strengths again.

[lemmon]

That all sounds about right to me. He was so impressive in those pre season games that the lack of impact with ball in hand since has been hard to grapple with from the outside.

In those games the one attribute that really struck me was his willingness to get the ball moving forward, and to have multiple efforts in the one chain to make that happen. Aggressive forward running with clean skills. It's a bit weird to reflect now on the season he's put together and realise that he's almost embodied the opposite of that approach. Very safe, not a heap of repeat efforts, heading sideways.

With young players it seems like there are two levers that the coaches typically pull - work on your deficits vs find/bring your strengths. I'm hoping that the season thus far has been one big 'work on your deficits' lever, and that we're not far away from seeing Ryley bring his strengths again.

I think that's also a big reflection on the pace of pre-season games versus the pace of the season proper.

He's looked pretty rushed with ball in hand, and he's simply not quick. One thing he was able to do as a junior was burst through the front of contests, but I wrote at the time we drafted him that I can't see that happening at AFL level because he is pretty slow by foot and he was a well-developed youngster (and I was completely in favour of drafting him, despite that).

I think as an AFL footballer he'll live and die on his repeat effort running and ability to get to contests. I think Treloar is a terrific mentor because that's something that makes his game work - he gets contest to contest and never stops working. He doesn't have Treloar's pace, but I think Riley just needs to get fitter, leaner and grow that aspect of his game.

One part of his game that simply must get better is his intensity around the contest. It's 'optics' more than anything, but as a first-year player, you shouldn't be cruising through that many chases.

I thought he wasn't bad against the Blues - his inside game was alright and he seemed to do a bit of work on Cripps around the contest - but he shouldn't be playing ahead of someone like Garcia. He reminds me a bit of Adam Cerra - pretty good inside the contest and is a nice accumulator on the outside, but there are obvious aspects of his game that need to and will grow.

[mighty_west]

How's he going at the moment?

Daicos is a different beast.

It was weird, Harley started slow for the first what, 5 or 6 rounds? then went bang in a big way, and now he's been brought back down to earth again, one could argue that Reid's best is so dynamic and exciting that perhaps it may be better than Daicos's best, but Nick a lot more consistent at such a high level.

You must be sick of reading about Harley everyday front page, back page in the papers every day over there mjp?

[Angak]

If I was Garcia I would be furious that Sanders is playing ahead of me.

I liked Sanders coming out of the draft because he seemed to have time and space in congestion. He would take one or two steps and create space for himself. The speed of an AFL game has meant that every possession looks rushed. It's almost like he can't wait to get rid of it - doesn't matter where just get it forward looks like his current mindset.

At this stage of young midfielders career all your looking for is flashes of potential, I have yet to see any of that potential.

What gives me the biggest hope is the way his teammates were talking about him in preseason. Treloar couldn't have been more impressed with him on his podcast. JJ compared him to a mix of Libba and Pendlebury. Duryea had similar glowing comments and of course Bevo described him as the best first player he has ever had. I would suggest players and coaches wouldn't have made these comments unless they had seen some special things in training. I also think those comments heaped more pressure on him that haven't helped his development. Let's hope he settles and if by this time next year we are having a similar conversation then undoubtedly panic stations will kick in.

[Mitcha]

If I was Garcia I would be furious that Sanders is playing ahead of me.

I liked Sanders coming out of the draft because he seemed to have time and space in congestion. He would take one or two steps and create space for himself. The speed of an AFL game has meant that every possession looks rushed. It's almost like he can't wait to get rid of it - doesn't matter where just get it forward looks like his current mindset.

At this stage of young midfielders career all your looking for is flashes of potential, I have yet to see any of that potential.

What gives me the biggest hope is the way his teammates were talking about him in preseason. Treloar couldn't have been more impressed with him on his podcast. JJ compared him to a mix of Libba and Pendlebury. Duryea had similar glowing comments and of course Bevo described him as the best first player he has ever had. I would suggest players and coaches wouldn't have made these comments unless they had seen some special things in training. I also think those comments heaped more pressure on him that haven't helped his development. Let's hope he settles and if by this time next year we are having a similar conversation then undoubtedly panic stations will kick in.

To be fair Bevo actually said he was the best PREPARED first year player he had seen, not actually the best player.

[comrade]

Apologies if it?s been mentioned, but does anyone else see Mitch Wallis?

[Angak]

Apologies if it?s been mentioned, but does anyone else see Mitch Wallis?

I've heard a few people make this comparison. Loved Wallis but would be a poor return for a top 6 pick, especially given what we gave up to move up the draft.

[lemmon]

Apologies if it?s been mentioned, but does anyone else see Mitch Wallis?

Not having a go at you, Comrade, as he is a one-paced inside mid but would that still be the comparison we make if Sanders had a different hair cut?

I feel like a lot of the time we default back to 'x plays like x', there's a similar physical appearance as much as a stylistic similarity.

[Sedat]

Maybe we are training Sanders on all the defensive-oriented aspects of the game and are judging him on progress in those metrics in his first year? That wouldn't come naturally to a first year player who would have been nothing but an attacking mid and ball accumulator throughout his junior career.

It's probably a slightly generous assessment but this is what I'm hoping, and that his natural attacking instincts will come to the fore in future seasons with the basis of a stronger defensive game also embedded.