Essendon list boss Adrian Dodoro has explained why the club opted to take four key position players in this year’s National Draft.
The Bombers had three picks inside the top 10 of Wednesday night’s draft, presenting them with a golden opportunity to refresh the club’s list after a 13th-place finish in 2020.
Dodoro drafted the athletic Nik Cox with pick eight, midfielder/forward Archie Perkins with pick nine and versatile defender Zach Reid with pick 10.
While also recruiting Next Generation Academy pair Cody Brand and Josh Eyre – who are also key position players – Dodoro said it was crucial the club replenished their tall stocks as the likes of Michael Hurley and Cale Hooker enter the twilight of their careers.
“That’s an interesting one,” Dodoro told SEN’s Dwayne’s World when asked if the club recruited too many tall players.
“If you look at the demographics of our list, you see that we have a number of spine players that are probably coming to the latter part of their careers and we have to look to the future.
“This draft was about the future of our club and doing the right thing about our club, in the next two or three years we’ll be turning over the majority of that spine and there will be a brand new spine.
“We’ve lost Joe Daniher, we’ve lost Tom Bellchambers so we’re already a couple of men down in that area so we wanted to own this draft this year in term of the talls.
“You talk about being too tall, a guy like Nik Cox is 200cm but he can play on the ball, it’s not like he’s a key position forward who doesn’t have agility, he’s actually a really nimble young man and very exciting.
“Archie Perkins will play in the midfield and when you have a kid like Zach Reid that’s available at 203cm … you see the forwards like the King brothers who are coming through, it’s a no-brainer and you need to plan for the future.
“Then our other two boys are NGA players that were later in the draft, people may think (we took too many tall players in the draft), but we certainly think we can settle on our talls and look to other areas in the next few years.”
Essendon will be hoping their trio of top 10 draft talent will provide the catalyst for an improved season in 2021 under head coach Ben Rutten, who takes the job outright for the first time after sharing the coaching duties with John Worsfold last season.