I think Lyon is definitely the man for the job. He has got the most out of a reasonably talented squad. Clearly there are some glaring deficiencies. I read Simpson today saying that 'high-scoring shootouts are the new frontier of football' and whilst obviously preaching from his own book I am inclined to agree with him. This is the opposite to how Freo play which has me worried because if we can dominate for three qtrs, say, and then the high scoring team has one good qtr we could still easily lose. It sounds obvious I suppose. We just do not have quality forwards.
Which leads me to my next point. Do we accept that we don't have a premiership team? To me this squad is not premiership material. We were/are good but just not quite good enough. Which means Freo need to look to the future by playing guys that are young but not quite good enough yet and maybe write this year off. To me, there is almost no point playing Pav unless we are a chance for the flag. Guys like Barlow and D Pearce have very limited upside because of age. C Pearce, Deboer, Suban, Muzungu etc need to make way for Blakely, Weller, Ethan Hughes etc. Collins has to play, Pearce has to play as full back where he looked great, not full forward as an act of desperation. Even Ballantyne looks nearly done to me. Mayne is in a 4-year form slump but still gets a game. It is a sign of desperation that Silvagni is mentioned as a must inclusion here.
It was only one loss and you don't want to throw the baby out with the bath water but I reckon the weekend was a potentially scary reminder of what the future may hold if we are not careful. Old, slow and no forwards. It might be time to make some bold decisions for long term health.
