I'm sick of hearing this furphy.
We have plenty of second rower depth: Tenterfield, Sippers, T-Rex...
DESpicable never picked them.
Good point. Some of those guys deserved a better shot this year
Is anyone.....truly.....surprised we didn't use T-Rex though?
Des strikes me as loyalty guy. Signing T-Rex to begin with, and then persisting with the same team in the critical period of the season, when changes seemed the most viable, shows this. Last year it paid off. This year, not so much.
Face it, repay that loyalty with effort or you get 'The 2020 Purge', you get T-Rex on the sidelines the whole season, you get the broom through the Barrett-era. Not that it isn't warranted - we are a club that demands/expects results, else Union would have sunk us for good in the Northern Eagles era.
I may not agree with why Des chose not to blood youngsters earlier - but I understand why it might have been necessary - to show that loyalty. The team overachieved last year - lets not deny it. Des legit turned a 15th-placed team into a top-8 team - almost the same team, missing players that would kill most teams. Lightning didn't strike twice this year, and some players just couldn't reproduce - those players are being shed right now, or being left to 'explore their options'.
If someone builds their brand on loyalty to get the best out of players, then chopping and changing every week on a knee-jerk whim of single-game poor-performance would expose Des as a hypocrit - buy into my Kool-Aid, show me loyalty, and in return i'll cut you when you drop your game one week? - how did that chop/change/dump strategy work out for the Tigers/Michael Maguire this year? Almost had a full-blown player revolt.
Fact is, regardless of this perceived loyalty, how Des responds to under-achieving is evident right now - no-one can deny the dead wood is being thrown into the fire right now.
So yeah - I back Des back-filling our depth, rather than having to rely on mediocre players Barrett selected, that Des has to super-motivate just to compete.
Make of that as you will.