Great players: Bunton, Nash, Strang
There are three great footballers in the League to-day—Bunton, Nash, and Gordon Strang. Bunton and Nash are well-modelled athletes, and all their actions are perfectly controlled. Bunton, with his position play and his effective moves as a rover, handles the ball more than Nash. Nash, who can occupy any central position on the field, has an advantage over Bunton in the air. Those delightful marks of Nash's—with the high leap and the ball balanced on the tips of his fingers—cannot be done by Bunton, good mark that he is.
Both of these players look like thorough-breds in fields of hacks. They are too clever and too accomplished for most footballers. They have the temperament for the game, and a supreme confidence in themselves. League football is easy for Nash and Bun-ton. Gordon Strang, of Richmond, is a different proposition. His long arms give him an almost ungainly appearance, yet those same long arms and the vice-like grip of the fingers on the ball, combined with uncanny judgment, make him one of the greatest marks the game has known. He does not handle the ball on the ground so cleanly and cleverly as Bunton or Nash, but he is an honest ground player, and makes no mistakes. He cannot turn rapidly out of trouble like the other two, but he always manages to feel his kick and gets rid of the ball quickly. He can even deliver it safely with his left foot.
Bunton and Nash have distinct personalities on the field. Strang has a still stronger personality, and the attention of everyone—of spectators, of opponents, and of his own players—is focused upon him. He is not so calm nor so very confident as the others; there is more of a nervy eagerness about him. He appears to be on edge, waiting for the ball to come, and he prowls up and down and around his position. The impression is all about him that when the ball comes near it will be his—and it is.
Strang could never be called the adventurer in football. Roaming the field as a ruck man in search of marks or kicks does not seem to suit his temperament. On the forward lines, where he has to make his own play, he is also not at his best. It is at centre half-back that Strang is at his greatest, and it is in that position that he is a greater player than either Nash or Bunton. Turning back attacks and waiting for the moves of opponents seem to string him up to concert pitch, and the tighter the fix that his team is in the better be plays.
Strang at centre half-back will not be beaten, and has the power in him and the determination to win a game by himself. Courage he has, and so have the others, yet his action last Saturday was something more than the others have yet shown. With a webbing of a hand badly split he refused treatment until he was promised that the 19th man would not be sent on the field. When he did return to find Richmond in a fix he marked and played as if the heavily bandaged hand meant nothing. It was only when the side was out of danger that Strang remembered his painful injury, and kept it out of trouble.
When other players would be satisfied with this performance and spell for a week, Strang says now that, injured hand or no injured hand, he will play on Monday against Essendon. It may be hoping for too much, but if only South Melbourne and Richmond will keep Nash and Strang stationed at centre half-forward and centre half-back, respectively, what a great entertainment the public will have.
Richmond not too old
On Saturday Richmond apparently solved a problem that had its birth at the beginning of last season. It was thought then that many of its players had become too old—that they had been playing together too long, and that their pace was definitely slow. It took a brilliant finishing effort, in which it outclassed South Melbourne in the finals, to convince its critics that youth and fire remained in the team. Once more practically the same team has given the same impression early in the season. Particularly against Carlton were its players slow. "Old age again" said everyone. "These players are using weight and strength alone to crush opponents, rather than pace and system." The lie direct was given to this when a rejuvenated Richmond team vanquished the speedy Fitzroy team with a great show of pace and system.
It was such a good display that opinions veered to the other extreme. "Here is the premier team," it was said. "We do not need to look any further." That is, perhaps going a little too far. Richmond played better, without a doubt, than any team I have seen this season. The nearest approach to it was the exhibition given by Carlton and South Melbourne, when they played against each other. But the season is still only in its infancy. Much may happen in the matches to follow. A few strangers in the team may upset the Richmond players, who, all except Harris and Baxter, have been playing together for so long, and know each other's methods so well, it will, however, need an exceptionally good team to oust Richmond from its favouritism for the premiership.
Richmond has a weakness, and it is on the forward lines. The players are all good, but they are apt to lapse into inaccurate kicking, which may lose Richmond a vital match. So sure was Richmond of its strength in the rucks on Saturday that it worked with three men only instead of four. This is not an innovation, and works quite well in modern football. With two men on the ball, and one resting in a forward pocket, one of the two on the ball changes with the third at the end of about seven minutes, and after another seven minutes he goes back to relieve the first man in the ruck. Thus no player is actually in the ruck for longer than a quarter of an hour.
Effect of boundary law
Before the boundary law came in this could not be done. The play was too strenuous in the rucks, and the players kept up with the play to be ready for the "throw-in" from the boundary. Now a ruck man seldom bothers to be up with the play, as a "throw-in" is very rare. He simply wanders about the centre, if he is wise, picks up his opponent if the other side is attacking, and goes to the forward line only if he sees an open space. Still, the system of placing three men in the ruck has its risks. If Dyer, one of its men, had been injured early in the game—he went off the ground in the last quarter—the necessary reshuffling of the team might have put Richmond in a bad way.
Dyer, by the way, very nearly comes into the great footballers class. Last year he had inclinations toward playing the man instead of the ball. This season he has put that foolishness to one side, and he is a better player. Probably the fastest ruck man in the game today, Dyer is a beautiful mark and a good ground player. What is more, when spelling on the half-forward flank, he is as good, if not better than, the pacy smaller men, who should play in that position.
Footnotes
Title: Great players: Bunton, Nash, Strang Author: Ivor Warne-Smith Publisher: The Argus (Melbourne, Victoria: 1848-1957) Date: Friday, 31 May 1935, p.13 Web: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12243992
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