Who’s hot and who’s not.The hits and the misses. Ballarat’s AFL Tracker line-up has experienced the lot in seven rounds.
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MATT CROUCH, DAVID ASTBURY and MARTIN GLEESON have been among the big winners.
Crouch and Gleeson are among those to have made their debuts.
Adelaide called up Crouch, who is in his first season with the Crows, in round three and he has not looked back in chalking up five games.
Gleeson is another to have made a strong impression, having played in the first six games before being rested with general soreness.
JAKE LLOYD (Sydney Swans) and MICHAEL CLOSE (Brisbane Lions) have also debuted.
At the more experienced end of the scale, CLINTON YOUNG (Collingwood), JAMES FRAWLEY (Melbourne), DAVID ASTBURY (Richmond) and ADAM GOODES (Sydney Swans) have all been hits.
Young, Astbury and Goodes will all be relieved just to be back out on the park.
Young had a horror first season with the Magpies in 2013 thanks to hamstring trouble, with the raking left-footer making just a few appearances.
He has bounced back to fitness this season, with his form underlining why Collingwood acquired him as a free agent from Hawthorn.
Astbury looks to have finally put a series of injuries behind him and began to settle in as a key defender – something he promised to do since debuting in 2010.
He has strung together an uninterrupted run of seven games.
Frawley can be considered a winner on the basis of his successful move from defence to attack.
It was a brave move by the Demons to shift the 2010 All-Australian defender forward, but it has worked and Frawley has been able to show another side of his game.
And of course Goodes and the Swans are just pleased to have the champion back on the park after a knee ended his 2013 season early.
When it comes to the losers, they are largely injury-related with Adelaide duo BRAD CROUCH (broken leg) and RICKY HENDERSON (broken leg), Fremantle’s TANNER SMITH (hamstring) and the Western Bulldogs JORDAN ROUGHEAD (shoulder) all sidelined medium to long-term.
Premiership players BRAD SEWELL (Hawthorn) and NATHAN BROWN (Collingwood) have been frustrated by hamstring and shoulder injuries respectively.
Sewell is yet to ad to his 190 AFL game tally, while Brown has recovered from his setback, but has been unable to force his way back into the line-up.
Port Adelaide youngster JAKE NEADE is another yet to be sighted this year after a highly promising first season.
david.brehaut@fairfaxmedia.com.au