Sydney fractured the cheekbone a month ago and missed two. He had a good game the day he was injured. But has been up and down since.
Suppose we want him to play two good ones in a row. Not unreasonable. He's struggled there. Consistency has been a problem all season. He's not stringing them together.
Sydders was down a bit for the two weeks after resuming from the cheekbone. But he did play some outstanding football as an outside mid. There was something new.
On the weekend we played a suburban side. Vermont or some such. Not VFA quality. But they did have a dip and they were quick.
In this setting Sydney Stack played the best half of football of his career. No longer an outside mid but a link up high forward. He covered ground urgently, ran to receive then ran again. Ground game terrific and Sydney was hard super industrious and blue-collar when he had to defend.
He got over a lot of lawn and split the traffic with his ability to pick the holes, receive and then send teammates to holes. Constructing plays. Classy use.
In the third quarter he looked gassed. Not covering the miles, one effort in the link up then done. And a couple of skill errors.
In the final quarter it looked to me that we were trying to feed him a goal. Get him a boost. A reward. He was paying lead up forward and at one stage Samson Ryan tried to ping him with an improbable pass when he was near certain to kick it himself. (Ryan is a good type. Like.)
Sydney did rally. Had he played two halves like the first he'd be hammering the door down. Was it enough? We'll see.
If he misses this week we'll be looking for another big VFA game next round.
