Draft guru Matt Rendell believes South Australian Mattaes Phillipou is a polarising prospect in the upcoming National Draft.
The talented midfielder currently sits ninth in Cal Twomey’s phantom form guide, the Herald Sun have him at 12, while ESPN has him ranked second.
Reports suggest clubs see things similarly, with most having him in the 10 to 15 range, while others see him as a top five prospect.
“Some people have him at five, some have him well outside 10. He’s a polarising selection in the draft,” Rendell told SEN SA.
“I’ve been through this many times.
“What I’m hearing is some of the clubs can’t work him out personality wise.
“This happens quite a lot. And the blokes who you can’t quite work out usually get pushed down the list.”
Rendell named Hawthorn star James Sicily and GWS All-Australian Sam Taylor as examples of this he lived through in his time as a recruiter.
“I’ll give you an example of one with me at Collingwood. We couldn’t work out James Sicily for the life of us,” he said.
“We had discussions for days and days trying to work out whether he was going to be competitive enough an AFL footballer and whether he was too soft a personality.
“Was he going to be hard enough to cope with feedback and training and the like. I could name you four or five others. Sam Taylor was another one we couldn’t work out.
“This happen with every club. We ended up taking one we couldn’t work out which was Tom Langdon and he ended up being a really good player until his knee forced him out.
“But this happens a lot so this is why some clubs have him inside pick five and they probably reckon they know and some clubs well outside 10 who can’t quite work him out.
“They love to be tell the coaching staff what the player is going to be like which is hard because they’re 18 and have differing levels of maturity.
“That’s why players drop down. If you wonder ‘how did he fall so far’, that’s usually the reason. Clubs haven’t been able to work them out.”
Sicily fell to pick 56 in the 2013 National Draft, while Taylor was selected with pick 28 by the Giants.