• After the siren: Four questions for 0-4 Carlton
• Nine things we learned from round four

IT WAS another mixed round for NAB AFL Fantasy coaches with a host of late changes, injuries and popular players donning a substitute vest.

Leading into the Friday night lockout, most coaches were faced with forced trades that may or may not have worked out in their favour as the round unfolded.

Here’s how round four panned out for Fantasy coaches.

There was some doubt on whether they’d take their place for the Magpies on Friday night, but midfielders Dayne Beams (131) and Scott Pendlebury (109) starred in their side’s win.

Dane Swan (105) scored his first Fantasy ton of the season.

For the Tigers, forward Sam Lloyd (107) made a very impressive debut. He joined the ‘goal with his first kick in the AFL’ club finishing with three for the match. With the lack of forward cash cows less than $200,000, he might be worth trading in this week even after his first price rise.

FWD/MID Dustin Martin (107) gathered 29 disposals to be the equal top scorer for Richmond with Lloyd.

In a very intriguing contest, Brent Macaffer (67) held Richmond captain Trent Cotchin (70) to just 13 disposals. As Calvin suggested last week, Macaffer is the form tagger of the competition and we will have to be wary of his upcoming opponents over the coming weeks.

In the most talked about result of round four, defender James Frawley (122) finished with his second score of more than 120 for 2014 thanks to 24 disposals, 14 marks and two goals.

Carlton midfielder Ed Curnow (147) had 33 disposals, nine marks and nine tackles. Defender Kade Simpson (107) was the only other Blue to score triple figures.

Popular midfielder Dom Tyson (75) had Fantasy coaches sweating early in the game after giving away two free kicks to be on minus four at quarter-time. The cash cow followed up with 33, 18 and 28-point quarters to finish well above his breakeven of 16.

Forward Jay Kennedy-Harris (45) played his first full game after starting in the green vest in the opening three rounds.

Port Adelaide won by the biggest margin of the season and a whopping ten players topped the Fantasy ton.

Midfielders Brad Ebert (152), Kane Cornes (145), Matt White (144) and Travis Boak (136) all had a day out racking up 140 disposals between them.

Cash cow midfielder Jared Polec (105) was fantastic against his former club collecting 25 disposals, seven marks and kicking a goal.

In his first game, midfielder Sam Gray (87) booted three goals. The debutant will see positive price rises over the coming weeks.

With 13 tackles and 30 disposals, Tom Rockliff (133) was the good news story for the winless Lions.

Injury struck early in the game as ruckman Matthew Leuenberger (10) was subbed out of the game in the second quarter. He is likely to miss a few weeks with a knee injury. DEF/MID Pearce Hanley (44) was coming off back-to-back 110-plus scores but succumbed to a hamstring injury in the third quarter.




Kane Cornes continues to shine in his twilight years, scoring 145 Fantasy points. Picture: AFL Media

When the final team sheets were lodged prior to the match, more than 31,000 Fantasy coaches were left without their No.1 ruckman as Shane Mumford was a late withdrawal.


Mid-priced midfielder Jack Macrae (138) had 30 disposals, 13 marks and five tackles to take his season average to 118.25 Fantasy points.

A game-high 39 disposals from Matthew Boyd and Shaun Higgins’ 29 disposals and 12 marks saw them finish with 127 points apiece. Higgins is starting to repay the faith for those who stuck with the mid-priced forward.

Defender Curtly Hampton (99) and midfielder Adam Treloar (94) were the best for the Giants.

GOLD COAST v HAWTHORN – Metricon Stadium
Hawthorn forward Jack Gunston (138) topped the Fantasy scorers as he booted five goals in his side’s 99-point win.

DEF/MIDs Luke Hodge (127) and Sam Mitchell (122) finished with 32 and 36 disposals respectively. Both players have missed a game each this season, but if Hawthorn players can keep scoring as well as they did on Saturday night – 11 players scored 90 or more – they are looking like must-have players in defence.

Fellow defender Matt Suckling (106) posted his second score of more than 100 in as many weeks.

Mid-priced midfielder Liam Shiels (99) has been scoring well above what he’s priced at so far this year. It looked like he was going to be down on his previous efforts but he came home like a steam train in the second half scoring 74 points after the main break.

The two most popular Suns, Gary Ablett (132) and David Swallow (123), were the best for the home team.

Ablett is the walk up captain in almost half of the teams in the competition and he didn’t let any of his coaches down. He received a knock in the first quarter that saw him holding his wrist. He soon shook this off and racked up 35 disposals with eight tackles.




Luke Hodge and David Swallow both scored tons in their clash on Saturday night. Picture: AFL Media

GEELONG v WEST COAST – Simonds Stadium
Midfielder Steve Johnson (168) will continue to be the most expensive Fantasy player due to his 37 disposals, 11 marks, eight tackles and one goal to post the highest score of the season.

Joel Selwood (125) was once again one of the best for the Cats with 27 disposals, nine marks and three goals to his name. Mathew Stokes (125) kept his Fantasy average higher than 100.

DEF/MID Jimmy Bartel (117) kicked two goals and mid-priced defender Cam Guthrie (117) was free to do what he liked collecting 24 touches while laying a game-high nine tackles.

Roy’s advice to trade out Josh Caddy (38) would have been a masterstroke after the FWD/MID was the starting substitute for the Cats. To be fair, he did score pretty well for approximately a quarter of football but that won’t stop his price from dropping.

For West Coast, Andrew Gaff (90) was the top scorer in what was a dirty day for owners of any of the visitors.

The most popular Eagle, Xavier Ellis (61) was solid, but still 44 points down on what Polec posted earlier in the day. Yes, I was one of those who benched the wrong guy.

Dean Cox (69) was quiet and fellow ruckman Nic Naitanui (16) was subbed out in the third quarter due to soreness after not having much influence on the game.

In wet conditions in Sydney, North Melbourne ran out 43-point winners as midfielder Ben Cunnington (131) gathered 30 disposals and laid the most tackles for the match with 11.

FWD/MID Leigh Adams (127) and forward Daniel Wells (113) had plenty of the ball and found themselves amongst the goals to be the next best Fantasy scorers.

Midfielder Josh Kennedy (113), defender Nick Malceski (112) and DEF/MID Jarrad McVeigh (102) were the best performers for the Swans.

We’ll be seeing some further price drops from midfielder Ryan O’Keefe (62) and FWD/MID Tom Mitchell (67). It’s tough for those who have them, but tasty for the rest of us looking for some fallen premiums over the next few weeks.

Before the match, Daniel Currie was a late withdrawal. This upset quite a few Fantasy coaches who were relying on the ruckman as their emergency for Mumford. He was replaced by Robin Nahas (79) who had a massive first quarter scoring 52 points in his first game for the Kangaroos.

For the Swans, popular bench players Gary Rohan (25) and Tom Derickx (31) wore the green and red vests respectively.

ST KILDA v ADELAIDE – Etihad Stadium
It was all Adelaide in its thumping win over St Kilda.

Midfielders Rory Sloane (131) and Scott Thompson (128) were the major ball winners finishing with 30 and 32 disposals respectively.

With Tom Hickey injuring his calf on Friday, I had enough cash in the bank to trade him to Sam Jacobs (125). Mumford was my first choice, but I didn’t have the money in the bank so settled with Jacobs. A big win for me as the Adelaide ruckman finished with 22 disposals to go with his 39 hit-outs.

Mid-priced FWD/MID Matthew Wright (99) and defender Matthew Jaensch (96) scored highly as ten Crows scored more than 90 points. Matt Crouch (85) gathered 23 touches in his second game.

Nick Riewoldt (110) was the best for the Saints and remains as the No.1 Fantasy forward in the competition.

FREMANTLE v ESSENDON – Patersons Stadium
Despite his side’s loss in the final game of the round, midfielder Dyson Heppell (140) was the top scoring player in the match thanks to his 35 disposals, seven marks and nine tackles.

Defender Luke McPharlin (127) had one of his best Fantasy games of his career with 31 disposals and 13 marks.

Michael Johnson (110), Matthew Pavlich (107), Zac Clarke (105) and Matt de Boer (100) also cracked three figures for the Dockers.

Ryan Crowley (64) went to Jobe Watson (78) keeping the Essendon captain to his second sub-100 score in a row after starting the season with 152 and 120.

One of the most popular forwards brought in this week after his 131 last week and negative breakeven was Jackson Merrett (67). As the Bombers started getting goals piled on against them, Merrett scored just 20 points in the second half.

As predicted, Paul Chapman and Dustin Fletcher were late withdrawals, but they also lost David Myers due to illness before the game and Brendon Goddard (12) was subbed out with a groin injury.




Luke McPharlin played one of the best games of his career on Sunday. Picture: AFL Media
 
HOW DID THE TRADERS GO IN ROUND FOUR?
Calvin was the top of the table this week with an impressive 2193, despite some below par scores from some of his stars. Team Calvinator was helped out by Steve Johnson’s massive game on Saturday night.

My Warne Dawgs scored 2080 which saw me drop outside the top 200 for the first time this year. Paul Chapman’s late withdrawal hurt me but I was quite happy with my Hickey to Jacobs trade, boosting my boys to a win over my Fantasy sparring partner, Chopper.

Roy’s team destROY is climbing the rankings with his respectable score of 2051 after a couple of weeks he would like to forget.

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