Luke Hodge

all spread around the ground.

I know that we had a few times where we brought some forwards.

When we had Ruffy injured, we'd bring some forwards in as a leadership group because we needed them to be preaching the same message as what we're saying in the midfield and the defence.

So where he plays doesn't really matter.

He can do it from the back pocket because what he can do is from the back pocket, you can see ahead of you on the field.

You can be still giving messages to your halfback.

After goals, you can be pushing up, letting your mids know, are they manning up?

Are they squeezing?

Should they spread out a little bit?

You can see the game a lot better from behind the ball to be able to teach and instruct your teammates.

But being in and around the contest, you look what Pendleby's been able to do for years while he was captain, having a midfielder who can do both.

Play midfield and have a bit of an impact when you need to or maybe go in there and shut someone down as a selfless leadership role or sit across half-back and be able to direct from there.

I think his body's banged up, but also the game hasn't helped him.

You sort of look at how they've changed the ruck rule, which has taken away a lot of... O'Brien, for instance, from Adelaide, it's taken away his strengths of ruckman and given to the more athletic ruckman.

You look at Reeves, Meek dominated the ruck for Hawks the last couple of years.

All of a sudden, they're split at 50-50 because Reeves, with the jumping rule, it brings advantage to his way and Meek can do his stuff around the ground.

Um, what it's also do is it's taken away that bigger bulky midfielder that teams have built up for years.

All of a sudden Carlton, Carlton was so good at contest position and they're still really good now scoring from, from stoppage because that bigger bulky midfielder, but it's the next phase that gets you.

It's the spread from a contest.

It's the turnover.