Those of you who bought the NAB Cup ‘08 AFL Record would have been interested to see an article about Steve Morfesse, winner of the 2007 AFL Dream Team with his Peckin Away squad. Amongst tales of his derring-do were snippets about how he only made one trade before round 8 due to his travelling in Europe, how much he valued his bench and how much research he did before the season. This year, Steve’s Peckin Away team starts as follows:
Backs: Chad Cornes, Joel Bowden, Heath Shaw, Brett Jones, Martin Mattner, Adam Hartlett, Jake Edwards, Scott D. Thompson, Albert Proud.
Centres: Jimmy Bartel, Kane Cornes, Daniel Cross, Nick Stevens, Ricky Dyson, Kieran Jack, Craig Bird, Cale Morton.
Rucks: Dean Cox, Troy Simmonds, Cameron Wood, Matthew Kreuzer.
Forwards: Matthew Pavlich, Nick Riewoldt, Jonathan Brown, Brett Deledio, Jason Porplyzia, Cyril Rioli, Kurt Tippett, Ryan Gamble, Jarryd Morton.
I like this team a lot, especially from a structural point of view. He’s starting five rookies, which is consistent with the high-risk strategy that wins championships. You could point at Dyson, Deledio and Hartlett as poor picks given their round 1 performances, but that’s not the point - the structure is the thing that gets you there. I particularly like how he has spent big on Kornes and Jimmy, in line with his comments in the AFL Record article about how he likes to buy “the absolute best players in the game”. This is where I differ in thinking from those who are on the bandwagons of both Lenny Hayes and Cross due to their prices being slightly deflated compared to their best previous form, as opposed to spending top dollar to get Kane or Jimmy. I have tried to follow Steve’s lead and not pinched pennies with my premiums.
The one big flaw in Steve’s team based on round 1 scores is that too much faith is being placed in mid-priced younger players and not enough in mid-priced older players whose prices are discounted due to recent long-term injuries. Stuart Dew, Brett Burton, Nathan Thompson, Daniel Bradshaw, Tadhg Kennelly, Mark Nicoski… these names are under-represented in elite teams but they all delivered on the Easter weekend. Then again, it’s a long season and those old bones may start creaking again while the young pups are still jumping around. We shall see!
Monty with regards to the flaw that you point out, you actually said to be very careful about most of those players in an earlier blog. “10 signs your fantasy side is terrible” refer to point #8 and you will see most of there names.
What is the story Monty????
Bradshaw and Thompson are named in that earlier post, Brent, not the others. Bradshaw did indeed have a pretty slow pre-season. Thompson ended up doing alright in the pre-season, though I didn’t quite trust him kicking bags against fourth-rate VFL sides. I’ll be interested to hear how they pull up after the weekend, they’re both candidates for “soreness” making them miss a game here and there.
I’ll take a guess and say that Steve (and the EDT’ers) don’t like taking risks with older injury prone players, and would rather take the risk with a younger player. I would be very surprised to see the majority of those older players listed see out the full season, but stranger things have happened.
I’m with Brent here monty I actually had dew and bradshaw before i saw that post and though better of it (I’m not blaming you of course haha) but it did confuse me when i more recently saw you post on a blog that your forward line would (and did) contain 5 premiums and 2 of the 3 cheap oldies. Also there are players such as Bhall who are in the same bracket but didn’t fire. Overall im ruing not picking dew and thommo up but its only round 1 so i guess we’ll see.
m0nty
what do you mean when you say you like this team “from a structural point of view”?
henry: I mean that I like his balance of guns, rookies and mid-prices. Specifically, that he spends more on absolute guns and fills up his side with rookies. He’s only got five or six mid-price players (apart from Stevens and Simmonds) which is an excellent strategy IMO.
Great post Monty.
Very interesting to see Steve pick both Kane and Jimmy. I’m the only one in my league to go for Bartel, let alone have the 2 most expensive mids in there.
hey i’m just gonna put this out there- but is anyone really that interested in ANY demons players this year? bar maybe bruce, mcdonald, white? ..
Yep, got Nathan Jones and I’m pretty sure he can deliver this year. Him and McLean played well in a team that got flogged last week, so I think there is an upside for these guys.
yeah i just found hard to decide as i try to make my team as broad as possible (as far as players from most clubs). and after that display by melb on the weekend i was stunned to see names like bruce, mcdonald, davey, white- all below 65! well below their typical outputs.. even if they did get belted
Damn right simon, that young nathan jones is gonna be a star in the no too distant future. His attack on the ball and hardness at the bottom of packs makes him perfect for SC, lays pleanty of tackles too which is good for both styles of fantasy footy. Is it just me or does cale morton look like he’s about 12 years old?
Haha yes dymes he did look 12…. not just you
He is quite small as in frame, so I hope his body holds up as I have him.
this guy stole my team!
change bartel for corey, dyson for geary, proud for pfeiffer and deledio for s johnson and this guy has the same team as me
Melbourne players are rubbish!! You should have picked up on the fact that when sides win they get more of the ball and hence score more. You need to pick from the teams that are going to be winning a majority of there games EG Geelong, Port, Hawthorn, Etc as even the mediocre players in those sides score over 100. Also Monty sorry for questioning you above but I was a little confused similarly to Simon as I had Dew and Thompson but then went with your advice.
Monty how did you find this squad? Did you hunt it down by searching through the leaderboards, is this guy in one of your leagues or you found it by some other method?
The squad was posted on BigFooty.
Brent, I didn’t include Dew in that list in the earlier blog entry, so you can’t blame me for that one! Thompson and Bradshaw, sure. I probably should have updated it to include the later news that they had both had better pre-season outings. Sorry about that.
Don’t like his team much. i can’t see how you can win with so many unproven players. What happens if a few of them get injured/dropped? Nobody to replace them with. I think Steve was lucky last year and won’t be in the mix this season.
hey monty! love the site mate! any chance you could post cashas squad and go through a dtailed analysis of it?
Coggers back soon boys!
his SC side i meant
yeh i dig that team but then again anyones team can be hosed at the start of the season it depends on what your trades are. my team was absolute dogmeat early doors last season and i like to think i traded myself into a good position in the end.
hes got dyson you nobcheese jilsy so im not that far off the ball. cooker.
Do you think he will use a trade to get rid of Morton to Hill?
He said last year he only had one 0 all year. He has 5 rookies starting and 3 on his bench got zero’s something tels me he will trade out players like proud, hill, or harlett (suspended) for soe guys who are playing. What do other people think he will do?
Jamie.. Im considering the same question. I have loaded up on rookies. Most playing but i got stuck with Palmer and Barlow cause i got booted off the website when the teams were coming out. Debating weather to bring in Jack and another cheap back.
wouldnt worry about palmer. he be playing soon enough
wow he’s climbing the rankings already and he’s gogin to have a lot of spare cash playing that many rookies guess his plan is working out
i dont really like this team at all definetely should not of started backs as he said o the nab record u dont have 2 take that much risk!!!
peckin away has come in the top 30 the last 3 years. thats not luck, the guy is a machine. a couple of dodgy rookie picks isnt gonna stop him.
the key is trading right, and having the best players in the game.
those who have wasted trades on midrangers like thornton, bradshaw, osborne are gonna suck when they run out of trades.