THE FORM of forward Jack Watts and utility Matt Jones has been praised by coach Paul Roos leading into round two.
Roos said the duo’s form had been strong so far this year in Melbourne’s three NAB Challenge wins and its opening round victory over Greater Western Sydney at the MCG last round.
“He (Watts) has been really important. We’re seeing the players now who are starting to action some of the things we value as a coaching group. It’s probably taken a little bit of time, which we understood. But the two things that stood out to me [from round one] were Jack Watts and Matty Jones,” he said.
“Matty has improved significantly over the break and he got some really honest feedback at the end of last year and Wattsy missed round 23 last year against the Giants.
“They’re the great things in coaching, when you see players take things on board and what the coaches are trying to work with. You can see genuine improvement and they’re two who have genuinely improved.
“I thought Matty and Wattsy were terrific players last week and hopefully they can continue in that form.”
Roos was also delighted with Clayton Oliver receiving the NAB AFL Rising Star nomination following his round one debut, as it was recognition across the club.
“What we’ve tried to do now is establish a coaching group and a developing coaching group with Macca [Brendan McCartney], Brett Allison, Daniel McPherson and Plappy (Justin Plapp) and all of the other assistant coaches who predominantly work with the senior team and game plan,” he said.
“It’s starting to pay off and the players are listening and we’ve got a definitive game style now and definitive behaviours that we wanted to see from the players.
“In recruiting, what Jason Taylor, Todd [Viney] and all of those boys have done is taken what we want as a coaching group and translated that into the type of players they’re picking for the footy club.
“I think we saw the rewards of that last week with Clayton Oliver being the Rising Star, plus Buggy (Tom Bugg) and [Ben] Kennedy being really productive players for us, who have come in during the off-season.”
