Season Preview - Central back on top?

Contributed with our thanks by passionate Doggies supporter, brucetiki



In: Dylan Orval (Oakleigh Charges via Adelaide - Mini Draft), Ben Nason (Richmond), Tom Collier (Brisbane Lions), Jackson O'Brien (Clarence), James Lawton (Coburg)

Out: Daniel Havelberg (Work commitments), Lee Spurr (Fremantle), Nick White (North Adelaide), Ash Duncan (NT Thunder), Jack Gunston (Hawthorn)

There are moments in life where a split second can change the course of history. The past two SANFL Grand Finals have each had one of these moments. In 2010, with about 45 seconds remaining in the game, Tim Weatherald had a shot at goal which would have reduced the margin to one point. The shot scrapes the post, and Centrals do enough from the kick in to ensure they win the premiership.

Fast forward 12 months, and we’re in the final 30 seconds of the 2011 SANFL Grand Final. Centrals had trailed in the Grand Final from the outset, but had come home with a wet sail to reduce the margin from 34 points to four points. There is a bounce inside Centrals 50, Lee Spurr takes possession of the ball from the ruck and has a snap at goal. The shot just misses, and seconds later, the siren goes. The Eagles have won the premiership and Centrals are on the other side of what happened in 2010.

There’s a saying in life, ‘You learn more from losing than from winning’. Had that Spurr snap had gone through for a goal, the areas the Eagles exposed in the Grand Final would not have stood out as much. With the miss, the areas Central struggled in on that fateful day last October stand out, and become motivation to reclaim the Thomas Seymour Hill Trophy in 2012.

The story of Centrals season in 2011 was overcoming adversity. Many key players spent considerable time on the sidelines injured, but that didn’t stop Centrals from finding ways to win even though they didn’t appear to have played their best football. This was perfectly demonstrated in that famous match at Glenelg where despite having two players in hospital and 17 fit players by half time, they were able to completely overrun Glenelg and win by 75 points. The return clash at Elizabeth was a bloodbath – a 93 point demolition that ultimately cost Mark Mickan his job as Glenelg senior coach.

With the high injury count came many opportunities for Centrals younger players to make a mark on the side. This was highlighted by four players winning Powerade Star Search award nominations in Jarrod Schiller (round 4), David Haydon (round 10), Jacob Templeton (round 12) and Damian Hynes (round 22). Jarrod Schiller in particular had a standout year which saw him win that award. Centrals also saw young Troy Menzel become the youngest Centrals player to play league football. If his form in 2011 is anything to go by, expect him to be a league regular well before he is eligible to be drafted to the AFL.

Despite the number of key personnel missing through injury, Centrals reserves scraped into the finals by claiming fifth spot in round 23 before reaching the Preliminary Final in another encouraging sign that the future at Centrals is bright.

The loss of personnel at Centrals hasn’t been too great. Spurr and Havelberg are the biggest losses for Centrals in the off season, however, one of Kyle Jenner or Ben Nason should be able to cover Spurr’s spot and Damian Hynes showed late last season he is more than capable of taking Havelberg’s spot as our key forward until Alan Obst returns from his knee reconstruction, where the Hynes/Obst attack has the potential to become a strong force late in the season.

When Centrals lost their last Grand Final in 2006, they went on a recruiting drive, resulting in the recruitment of Ian Callinan, Trent Goodrem and Heath Lawry. While Lawry has moved on after a serviceable career with Centrals, Callinan and Goodrem have become key players and leaders at the club.

Once again, the loss last year has seen a strong recruiting drive from Centrals with the recruitment of Tom Collier, Jackson O’Brien and James Lawton, the arrival of Dylan Orval via the mini draft and the return of Ben Nason after two seasons with Richmond. All will be handy inclusions to the side, with each player able to add their own value to the side. Throw in the return of key players Jay Nash, Scott Dutschke and Alan Obst from injury, more game time from Ian Callinan, who spent most of 2011 sidelined through injury, and the return of Yves Sibenaler from his work commitments and you have the foundations of a very strong and formidable Centrals line up in 2012.

The Centrals machine is a powerful, knowledgeable machine. Roy Laird knows where the side went wrong in 2011, and he knows what needs to be done in 2012 to ensure a repeat of 2011 does not happen. He will instill the passion and hunger into the players that will have them hungry for success from the opening bounce in round 2 through to the very end of the season, which hopefully will be Grand Final day.

Best case scenario: Centrals hit the ground running from their Grand Final defeat, the injury count remains very low, and Centrals run away with another minor premiership and atone for last years Grand Final defeat with their 13th consecutive Grand Final and their10th SANFL Premiership

Worst case scenario: The recruits struggle, injuries pile up once again, Alan Obst does his knee in a training mishap, Centrals lose a minor final, end up being eliminated in the Preliminary Final, and questions about the dynasty ending are asked as Roy Laird declines a new contract for 2013.

My Prediction: 1st

Nicely put Brucetiki, an enjoyable read.

Yeah....pretty hard to write the Doggies off.

Will be there again in 2012.

Always look like they go in 3rd gear throughout the season but when the word "finals" hits them , the 4th gear locks in....

Hard to beat.

Quality piece, brucetiki, well done.

Centrals have finalised their trial match schedule. Full details are available at

http://cdfc.com.au/cms/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=808%3A2012-trial-games&catid=24%3A2012&Itemid=2

Game 1: Saturday 10 March v Port (Reserves 11:25am, League 2:10pm)
Game 2: Saturday 17 March v North (Reserves 11:25am, League 2:10pm)
Game 3: Saturday 24 March v Glenelg (Reserves 11:25am, League 2:10pm)

Free entry to all matches

Note the u/18's and u/16 play a separate schedule the following day. Full details are available via the above link.

Some real quality writes ups here. Well done by the way Spurr will be a big loss.

CB10 wrote:Some real quality writes ups here. Well done by the way Spurr will be a big loss.

No doubt he nearly single handedly won us the Grand Final last year and had an absolute stunner of a year last year. Having said that, I believe that there are ready made replacements in either Jenner or Nason that will cover his spot on the field.

What happened to this write up on cdfc.com.au.


Don't they allow other websites to be advertised ???

Great job Brucetiki. All the season previews have been great reads.

It is still there, but it's a busy site and it's now on page 2.

The Admin of the site was very supportive, but the topic was abused by a member of another site and the Admin deleted that post and locked the topic, for which I thank him.

I'm confused. How could another site user abuse you on cdfc.com. ???? I thought only people logged onto cdfc.com could post. Although I know nothing about computers ???

Doesn't stop oppostition supporters from creating an account though. Not the first time opposition supporters have trolled the Centrals forum (and prompty dealt with by site admin), and I'm sure most club sites have been trolled by opposition supporters (again, I'm sure the respective site admin have prompty dealt with this).

I think Glenelg's is the only forum where you have to log in to even view topics.

Must add it's fantastic to see the Centrals forum admin team support this site.

Ann Jovi wrote:I'm confused. How could another site user abuse you on cdfc.com. ???? I thought only people logged onto cdfc.com could post. Although I know nothing about computers ???

What's confusing about someone from one site going onto another site?

Correct, but it was a regular member of the CDFC site, who is also a member of a group who isn't happy about this site.

Fortunately he doesn't represent all the other good Central fans.

redandblack wrote:Correct, but it was a regular member of the CDFC site, who is also a member of a group who isn't happy about this site.

Fortunately he doesn't represent all the other good Central fans.

my bad For some reason I thought you meant a non regular user of cdfc. Going mental in my old age.

Shame it's been locked I was going to add my endorsement.

I think I'm the only registered user of campbells sanfl website.

Ann Jovi wrote:I'm confused. How could another site user abuse you on cdfc.com. ???? I thought only people logged onto cdfc.com could post. Although I know nothing about computers ???

Can't speak for the Central site, but I know people would read our (Norwood) forum, and then return to that "other forum" poking fun at just about everything that was posted. Infantile. It's probably already happened, but I have no doubt this forum will be an on-going discussion point over there.

Ann Jovi, the good news is that I kept a copy of what was posted for future action if necessary and have a fair idea of who posted it.

The poster was 'Me'. Do you know him, perhaps, being a regular yourself and seemingly extremely interested about it.

That doesn't surprise me it was 'Me'. There's a very good reason I have his posts hidden.

Anyway back on topic, Centrals have an internal trial tomorrow night before their first 'external' trial against Port in a little over a week.

Yes, Bt, I've been told by several people since then that he's a total......... well, for the sake of politeness I'll leave it there.

Should be a good year for the Doggies they will be up there. They recruit well and keep blooding good players. I wish they would fall down but they will not.

In defence of Me (which is not me), he(?) is certainly knowledgeable across the SANFL context, and often has inside knowledge on matters Central. He's not one to hold back though "for the sake of politeness" - I think he likes to extend the banter from the terraces to the forum so he can enjoy it for the rest of the week. I find his contribution valuable, he generally provokes healthy discussion and occasionally he's just trolling - but we've all drank & filed!

Unfortunately, Doddy, he drank and filed something that was totally gross and unacceptable.

Not for the first time.

We'd rather some 'politeness' here, but he will still have a welcoming forum elsewhere to peddle his particular brand of trolling.

As you say, though, we all see things differently.

I think I'm catching on. Is this forum like the Family Friendly area at the footy? And then maybe safooty.net is like the rest of the terraces, inter-team banter abounds. And then cdfc.info and other club fora are like the things you say to your mates at the footy, rather than out loud?

Not quite, Doddy

I'd say this site is just a friendly place to discuss footy, without the need for personal abuse or obscenities. In other words, normal behaviour, but perhaps not so yobbo-friendly as some other places.

I can't judge cdfc.info, except to say they have been polite and friendly in my limited dealings with them and they were quick to delete 'Me's' drunken rant, which wasn't banter, but unintelligent, obscene gibberish.