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Craig McRae\u2019s fledgling side has lost three of its past four matches, including a narrow defeat at the hands of the Dogs last Saturday, sitting half a game behind 10th-placed GWS entering Round 13. <\/p>\n
Twelve games into the campaign, the Pies\u2019 next six-week block will be crucial in determining where they sit for the stretch run home as they plot a finals berth in the league\u2019s extended format. <\/p>\n
\u201cOver the next six weeks, they face the biggest banana peel run of all time, because these are games this Collingwood outfit would have designed to win at the start of the season,\u201d First Crack\u2019s Jay Clark said on Fox Footy. <\/p>\n
Melbourne, Port Adelaide, Richmond, Gold Coast, North Melbourne and Carlton are Collingwood\u2019s next six opponents. <\/p>\n
\u201cAt the start of the season, they would have thought they\u2019d win five of those six,\u201d Clark said. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd if it doesn\u2019t pan out like that, what becomes of Collingwood? What sort of cuts does this football club make? <\/p>\n
\u201cBecause if they lose some of those games, they\u2019re not making the top-10, they\u2019re not playing finals, and one of the oldest teams in the competition is where?\u201d<\/p>\n
Two-time North Melbourne premiership star David King put it in blunt terms, while remarking that the Pies\u2019 upcoming slate was unlikely to deter from the \u201cpath\u201d they\u2019re already on. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think you\u2019re either setting to win a premiership, or you\u2019re wasting your time,\u201d he told First Crack on Sunday night. <\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think you set your list to make top-10s and top-eights, you gear it to win a flag. So, I don\u2019t think it drastically changes your decisions. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think you\u2019ll have a path plotted, and you just work in order of that. Now, what does that do for Pendlebury, Howe, Sidebottom, Membrey, these guys who are out of contract? Well, it puts them in a really sticky situation. <\/p>\n
\u201cBecause if you\u2019re not contending, what\u2019s the point of just purging games on older guys for the sake of giving them a different number on the end of their CV?<\/p>\n
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA – MAY 30: The Magpies look dejected after the round 12 AFL match between Western Bulldogs and Collingwood Magpies at Marvel Stadium, on May 30, 2026, in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Daniel Pockett\/AFL Photos\/via Getty Images)Source: Getty Images<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve got to get games into the kids, they\u2019ve got to trial the next wave as soon as it\u2019s not viable, and work out who\u2019s there for the journey.\u201d<\/p>\n
McRae has gotten games into young midfielder Angus Anderson, while the likes of Harry DeMattia, Joel Cochran, Sam Swadling and Tyan Prindable continue to bide their time. <\/p>\n
In addition to the names raised by King, Magpies also out of contract this year include: Ed Allan, Joel Cochran, Harrison Coe, Jack Crisp, Billy Frampton, Noah Howes, Wil Parker, Mitch Podhajski, Liam Puncher, Jakob Ryan, Jai Saxena, Iliro Smit and Lachie Sullivan. <\/p>\n
Dual All-Australian Leigh Montagna claimed Collingwood\u2019s \u201cplan\u201d was always to phase out its veterans, but noted that it would have to get crafty with its on-the-run retool, given Tasmania\u2019s list and draft concessions. <\/p>\n
After not picking in the first round in each of the past two drafts, the Pies own their first-rounder this year. <\/p>\n
It currently sits at No.8 overall, with Collingwood not having picked inside the top-18 since nabbing Nick Daicos at No.4 in 2021. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis was always, I think, a plan that was going to be a three-year transition where these veterans were all going to drop off,\u201d he said on First Crack. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey were going to stagger the drop-offs, and they\u2019re hoping that in the same period of time, they can nail their draft picks, recruit some free agents, and find a couple of steals \u2026 that\u2019s, for me, the only way they can go about it. <\/p>\n
McRae: “Changed the game for us!” | 08:11<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are in a position now where they can\u2019t go down (the ladder) because of the Tasmania draft situation. They have to try and be creative, like a Geelong, and find ways to get talent in without necessarily getting high-end, early draft picks. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut it\u2019s going to be a battle – it\u2019s going to be hard to do – but while they\u2019ve got Nick Daicos and a few other players there, they\u2019re always going to be competitive.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked if he, if in charge of Collingwood\u2019s list operation, would pursue Lachie Neale as a free agent, Montagna said he would. <\/p>\n
\u201cI understand the theory of getting any free agent you can – because with the free agent, you\u2019re not giving up any draft capital,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cSo you\u2019re bringing in a free agent and some draft picks, I would look at it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Regarding the Pies\u2019 overall outlook moving forward, King capped off the discussion by saying: \u201cYou reap what you sow. It\u2019s as simple as that. And that may have been left to dead with the rules, but that\u2019s part of the lot, isn\u2019t it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An intriguing slate of Collingwood fixtures could leave the club\u2019s list gurus with a clearer picture of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":707816,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[170575,63,689,189128,344291,344290,344296,10133,10143,3499,1818,15832,344294,5334,338732,1119,2105,2485,43,344297,42717,3231,33332,233579,19125,233545,14362,176166,344293,344292,647,126754,44,296464,677,6082,701,3418,1124,344295,41,39,42,40,660,56650],"class_list":["post-707815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-angus-anderson","tag-australia","tag-australia-and-new-zealand","tag-banana-peel","tag-banana-peel-run","tag-brutal-calls","tag-clearer-picture","tag-collingwood-magpies","tag-craig-mcrae","tag-daniel-pockett","tag-david-king","tag-draft-picks","tag-draft-situation","tag-finals-berth","tag-finals-frame","tag-football-club","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-gold-coast","tag-headlines","tag-intriguing-slate","tag-jack-crisp","tag-jack-jovanovski","tag-jai-saxena","tag-jakob-ryan","tag-jay-clark","tag-joel-cochran","tag-lachie-sullivan","tag-list-analysis","tag-list-gurus","tag-list-operation","tag-melbourne","tag-montagna","tag-news","tag-noah-howes","tag-oceania","tag-port-adelaide","tag-queensland","tag-sam-swadling","tag-south-australia","tag-stretch-run-home","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-victoria","tag-wil-parker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=707815"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707815\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/707816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=707815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=707815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=707815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}