Well the point is to see if he can be a consistent shooter ready to lead a forward line over the next 5 years. Not doubting that he can be great as a defender but with the group you have referred to, the need there is clearly not so great.
As you know one of his assets is his great speed. He is also very strong physically and a beautiful kick. He is the closest thing to Buddy we have had in living memory.
He is not wasted in defence, but this season is gone and taking the time now to hopefully give him, and the coaching staff, confidence in his capacity to go forward, would be an advantage.
So how will you tell that this season?
I'll take you back to last season with Noah again. Trained as a forward, then was moved back. How did he play last year? Within himself, confused, as well as this year? I'd think the answer for those 3 questions is self evident.
So now this season, trained him back and kept him there, playing the best footy of his career, a real weapon defensively and offensively, and you want to swing him forward, where he hasn't trained all year. Guess how that will go? Playing within himself? Confused? As well as he has in the 1st half of the year?
My guess is, we would learn absolutely nothing about Noah if we moved him forward. I still don't think he's a forward, his leading patterns are all wrong. I remember when he was swung forward against GC earlier this year, Clarke was running to pick up a loose ball on the boundary about 15m outside of our F50, he had a player on him so was going to pick the ball up and kick it quickly, the only feasible place for him to kick it was to the pocket. Balta's man marks it on his chest as he ran past Noah who was leading towards the top of the square expecting Clarke to roost it 70m across goal.
He seems to read the ball a lot better when the ball is coming in from the opposition hence why he's been so good at intercepting (you know he's ranked 2nd in the AFL for intercepts right?).
I just don't see how swinging him forward is anything other than a short term move (and a poor short term move) when we should be coaching players for the long term.
Its the same arguments as Bauer. People say play him forward, he's tall etc, but if the club sees that the best LONG TERM view is to play him down back if they feel thats where his skill set lies, why would we follow the short term route?