St Kilda Development Coach and Sandringham Senior Coach Jake Batchelor runs through each AFL-listed player's performance following this weekend's VFL win over Frankston.

Sandringham 15.9 (99) def. Frankston 7.10 (52)

SANDRINGHAM  7.1  9.4  12.7  15.9 (99)
FRANKSTON  3.2  4.6  6.7  7.10 (52)

GOALS
Sandringham: Byrnes 3 Dunell 3, Allison 2, Owens 2, Billings, Carey, Lohmann, Lowe, Riordan
Frankston: Begley 2, Burton, Duman, Nayna, Stern, Walker

BEST
Sandringham: Byrnes, Highmore, Dunell, Owens, Jones, Billings, Bytel, Geary, Joyce
Frankston: Mynott, Fordham, Duman, Rendell, Duman, Reidy, Stoddart

Zak Jones

20 disposals, three inside-50s, two clearances

Zak just did what he needed to do and got through unscathed. It was really good to see him out there after missing last week. He was really strong the week before against GWS and it didn't look like he'd missed much heading out there this week. He's just an Energiser bunny, he just runs around and sometimes at his own detriment because he’ll run out of a good spot to help someone out, but he was clean, tough and we’ll see whether or not he plays with us this week against Northern Bullants. 

Jack Billings

23 disposals, five tackles, one goal

JB was a designated forward in the first half and got a couple of shots on goal. He chased and harassed and looked pretty good... pretty clean for a bloke that hasn’t played footy in a while. Second half we chucked him inside just to get him closer to the contest and hit more bodies, and he ended up with five tackles and 10 contested possessions which is great for him. He did what was expected, he’s too good for that level. It wasn’t quite as good as the last time he played for Sandy against Frankston which I was unfortunately on the wrong end of, but he performed well, his attitude was great and I think he enjoyed the week leading up to it.

Ryan Byrnes

25 disposals, six clearances, three goals

Two from two for Byrnesy. All he can do at the moment when the (AFL boys) are performing well is to perform at VFL level and put pressure on the players in the level above. Once again, good contested numbers but his running is just standing out as an in-and-out midfielder. He’s got the flexibility of playing forward and had five shots on goal and 25 touches, so that’s a pretty good return. All he can control is his performance on the weekend and he’s done that again really well, so another really good opportunity comes up again this week.

We had Zak Jones and Mitch Owens back this week, but we knew we still wanted to get him in the middle because he can move and cover the ground really well for us and he’s got really good hands under pressure. We started him forward knowing he was going to play most of his time in the midfield still, but with Jack Billings and Jones on limited minutes, we wanted to get hm involved in the midfield rotation because it would help us out in the long run.

Jack Bytel

17 disposals, six clearances, four inside-50s

Jack started the game really well. He had a purpose with his running and looked to challenge the opposition’s best midfielder and go head-to-head with him it seemed without us even having to tell him. He looked like he had a good, strong purpose and was tracking that way, so it’s disappointing he had to finish the game halfway through the third. Hopefully he can go again, because that’s what he’s got to do.

Jarryn Geary

23 disposals, seven marks, five inside-50s

Last week Gears was three quarters wing, one quarter half-back and we flipped that this week. We really wanted to be stable behind the ball this week and knowing that Darragh Joyce and Tom Highmore were playing, we thought we’d put Gears behind there as well. We managed to have some good wingers to cover for him too. He just set us up really well and the amount of times he ended up in the goal-square stopping one of their dump kicks or being an outlet in the same sort of play... he just reads the game so well behind the ball. He’ll do anything basically, I love coaching him and hopefully he gets an opportunity back in the ones soon.

Tom Highmore

21 disposals, nine marks, three rebound-50s

I think ‘stability’ when I think of Tom. Very rarely do we get beaten out the back when he’s on our deepest line. To come off five or six hours of sleep off a flight from Cairns and get to the game an hour early and still have the same attitude, and not only that but perform at a high level, it’s really good to see. Whenever he gets his opportunity at AFL level he’ll be ready because he’s doing the work and he’s performing well.

Mitch Owens

14 disposals, four tackles, two goals

Mitch had four scoring shots from a mid/forward, he jumped on a few heads and got in a little bit of a scuffle with his brother, so he had a little bit of everything on the weekend! The good thing was we didn’t need him inside with the midfielders that we had, so we thought it was a good opportunity to give him a little bit of a chop-out and play a little bit forward, especially after coming home from Cairns 20 hours prior. He showed some really good signs, 10 contested possessions and four tackles from (playing) predominantly forward, it was good to see. I’m not sure what the team will be like this week, but we’re going to keep looking at how we can play him forward, not just to help him, but to help us as a team.

Darragh Joyce

14 disposals, five rebound-50s, five marks

Darragh was probably in our top-three in terms of performance. He just led and took space really well, organised our backs and didn’t lose a one-on-one contest. He’d lost a couple in the previous weeks that he was a bit disappointed with, so to bounce back and take some good intercept marks, contested marks and use the ball well... hopefully we can get some good continuity into him going forward. Like Tom Highmore, he’ll be ready to take his chance when it comes his way.

In the last 12 months he’s become a lot smarter knowing what space is dangerous as a defender, where he can get beaten, where he’s happy to get beaten versus where he felt maybe last year that he had to stop absolutely everything. He’s playing smarter and saving himself a few petrol tickets as well. I love coaching him.

Leo Connolly

16 disposals, five rebound-50s, three tackles

Leo started the game fairly well and then faded out a little bit. A bit like Jack Peris, he was watching the ball a little bit too many times and opponents got to dangerous positions on him, so we just need to keep working on that. First halves have been good for Leo in terms of his running to receive and support an option, but we just need that to go throughout the whole game. The challenge is when he doesn’t get the ball, how does he keep finding ways to be really dangerous, because his opponents are worrying about him, which is a great sign of respect that he’s doing something really well. Keeping Leo engaged for the full game is going to be the next progression for him.

Matthew Allison

14 disposals, six marks, two goals

It was the most purposeful game he’s had this year. He probably played 60 per cent forward, 40 per cent wing and we knew we’d have a shorter forward line when Max Heath was off. We chucked Matty there as a key position forward for us and he impacted really well. He saw the ball, just ran at it and jumped and that’s him playing to his strengths. We’ll see where that takes us in the coming weeks, but he just looked like he had a really strong purpose and was really proactive with his running which was great to see.

Max Heath

16 hit-outs, eight disposals, four clearances

He was in a good battle against Frankston’s ruck. Maxxy didn’t have the impact on the scoreboard or ahead of the ball marks-wise, but he still competed really well down the line for us and his follow-up work around the ground was still fairly good. He’s played five out of six games for us coming off hardly any footy last year and he’s performing well, so we’ve just got to make sure we manage his workload.

Oscar Adams

11 disposals, four marks, two inside-50s

Oscar’s improving every week. He’s also one that’s learning what dangerous space is and where it is relative to your opponent and why we take it. We saw a couple of good ‘come-forwards’ and presses this week because he was standing in front and gave himself the opportunity to do what was required for the team and saved his teammates a couple of times. There's still some stuff with the ball in hand to work on. A big focus for him the last few weeks has been composure and he did that really well. We’ll keep working on that but he’s got the basis there.

Jack Peris

11 disposals, three inside-50s, three clearances

It was a bit of an in-between day for Jack. He didn’t defend well enough in the first half and his awareness around that at half-time was really pleasing to see – he knew that and he changed that in the second half. That (second half) is the expectation for him around defending your opponent first and then the attacking side of things can come from that. He chases, he harasses and he’s so quick, so the challenge will be how we use his genuine legspeed proactively as opposed to stopping someone, whether that’s by winning the ball back more or turning it into an intercept mark or something like that. He’s got the traits and got some things to work on, but he’s looking more settled down there which is good.

Dean Kent

Four disposals, one tackle, one rebound-50

A down day for Dean. He had a sore knee from the previous week and didn’t look to have that high speed and burst that he’s usually done so well. He still led and was vocal and organised the young forwards really well, but it wasn’t the same output that he’s had the last couple of weeks. Hopefully he gets a good block of recovery in and he can go again.