Over the course of this week, we'll be doing a mid-season review, line-by-line. First up is Brad Gotch with the backline.

THE backline has been pretty consistent overall, given the team has been under the pump in several games, so I'm quite happy with how they've performed.

We’re rated sixth in terms of percentage of scores against for inside 50s against. That shows we’re one of the better defences in terms of pure score stopping.

[ Vote to win: Best marks and goals of 2012 ]

We could probably add a little bit more in terms of our attacking capabilities and that’s something we’ll work on in the second half of the season.

We’ll look at different ways of moving the ball out of defence but you can’t knock their effort and energy down in defence. Most of them have played a majority of the year down there and they’ve held up pretty well.

Have your say on the backline at the bottom of the article

Player reviews

Troy Chaplin
12 games, 130 kicks, 74 marks, 59 handballs, 189 disposals, 16 disposals per game, 23 tackles
He’s played all 12 games and has been pretty consistent. According to the Champion Data stats, he’s the 17th ranked defender overall. He rates highly in terms of intercept marks and spoils. He did some good jobs on guys early in the year like Goodes and Riewoldt and on top of that he’s been getting a fair bit of the ball. We want him to continue with that consistency in the second half of the year.

Alipate Carlile
11 games, 63 kicks, 32 marks, 59 handballs, 122 disposals, 11 disposals per game, 14 tackles
He let himself down a bit by getting dropped for Round 12 but we’ll keep pushing that message to him that he’s got some high standards that he needs to meet in terms of professionalism. They are the standards we set and we think they’ll hold us in good stead going forwards.

You know what you’re going to get from Bobby and he showed that against Lance Franklin, restricting him to just four goals after he’d kicked 13 the week before. We were under the pump that day and he was able to match him pretty well. He always gets the main forward and he’s conceding just 2.3 goals each week, which is a good sign. Bobby is efficient when he gets the ball, we’d still like him to get a little bit more of it.

Jackson Trengove
11 games, 83 kicks, 55 marks, 85 handballs, 168 disposals, 15 disposals per game, 12 hit outs, 36 tackles, 1 goal
Jacko would be a bit frustrated having gone in for finger surgery prior to the bye. The finger has just been giving him a few problems and it’s probably just kept his marking numbers down a bit. He’s still averaging six marks per game but we’d like him to be getting a couple more than that. He’s averaging 16 disposals and has been a good third defender to back-up Chappy and Bobby. He typifies the way we want our defence to play.

Jacob Surjan
12 games, 83 kicks, 44 marks, 72 handballs, 155 disposals, 13 disposals per game, 29 tackles, 1 goal
Surj has played every game and has conceded just 14 goals against him, which is a pretty good result having played on the likes of Milne, Jetta, Ballantyne, Betts and Rioli. Noone has really got hold of him and that reflects in his stats. He’s ranked quite high in intercept marks and that shows how well he reads the game. He’s another we want to up the ante from an attacking point of view, but we just need to make sure he’s able to maintain his defensive duties.

Ben Jacobs
12 games, 107 kicks, 46 marks, 102 handballs, 209 disposals, 17 disposals per game, 21 tackles, 3 goals
Benny has started to push up onto the wing a little bit more but spent a fair bit of time in defence to start to the season. When he was playing down back he was pretty miserly in terms of conceding goals, but he was playing on the higher forwards who spent more time up the ground. He’s had some really good patches and spells of play and we just think if he can put that together for four quarters he could be a real asset for us. We have to remember he’s only 20 years old and we’re happy to be getting games into him.

We want to see him use his acceleration and take the game on from defence, and that starts with getting more of the ball. He’ll continue to split his time between the midfield and defence. He’s a great kid to work with and he’s in my office all the time analysing his games and asking what the next thing is that he needs to work on. He’s very thorough and that can only be a good thing for his development.

Darren Pfeiffer
8 games, 58 kicks, 29 marks, 60 handballs, 118 disposals, 15 disposals per game, 16 tackles, 1 goal
He’s been a bit of a surprise packet and he’s started to settle down back in the past month or so. He’s strong defensively, he can win his own ball and he can run and rebound, which are some good attributes to play down back. If you think back to the final quarter of the North Melbourne game, he won some decisive contests where a goal to them could have just about ended the game. He has a few errors that creep into his game at times - a fumble or two and concentration at times - so we’ll work on that in the second half of the year.

Tom Logan
3 games, 20 kicks, 15 marks, 23 handballs, 43 disposals, 14 disposals per game, 8 tackles
Tommy’s form at Glenelg has been outstanding and has probably been a little bit stiff at times to miss out on AFL selection, but you can only fit so many small defenders in. If Surj is doing a job on one small and Jacobs, Pfeiffer and at times Dom, we can’t fit them all in. We know what we get from Tommy when he plays though. He had 20 touches against Fremantle but wasn’t as efficient as we’d like him to be. He’ll work hard on that in the back half of the year.

Dom Cassisi
12 games, 112 kicks, 35 marks, 101 handballs, 213 disposals, 17 disposals per game, 61 tackles
He’s moved into the backline over the past five or six weeks and that’s given a couple of young players more of an opportunity in the midfield. You know what you get from Dom. He leads from the front, he plays tight and he looks to attack. Dom is enjoying the fresh challenge of playing down back. He needs to keep attacking out of defence, even when we’re under pressure down back.

Paul Stewart
12 games, 93 kicks, 43 marks, 64 handballs, 157 disposals, 15 disposals per game, 30 tackles, 7 goals
Stewy is very versatile. He’s played wing, mid, half forward and down back on the tall/medium types. He played down back in Round 12 with Bobby out and now with Jacko out, you’d expect him to play a bit more down back. The Bulldogs’ game was one of his better games defensively, but unfortunately he got cramp in the third quarter. Another who’ll benefit from adding a more attacking string to his bow.

Cam O’Shea
3 games, 11 kicks, 7 marks, 14 handballs, 25 disposals, 8 disposals per game
We saw a little bit of him early but hit a flat spot and went back to South Adelaide. We wanted him to go back to the SANFL and relax and develop his footy. The last couple of weeks he’s started to get back to where we want him to be. He’s starting to get that confidence back and is looking steadier on the field. As a young players, sometimes you have to go back to the SANFL and play some consistent footy down there to understand your role a bit better.

Jasper Pittard
No AFL games in 2012
He’s had such an interrupted year, but we’re hopeful we can build him up over the next month or so to give him a chance of playing some AFL later in the year. He’s got great skills and is a hybrid defender who can play tall and small, plus he can take the game on with his pace. He’s got all the attributes but we just can’t rush him back.

Nathan Blee
No AFL games in 2012
He’s someone who could come into the equation in the second half of the year because he’s that little bit older. He’s developing quite nicely at North Adelaide and he may be required over the coming weeks with Jacko out.