After managing only nine games in 2015 due to a lingering shin injury, St Kilda young gun Jack Billings was exposed to plenty of senior football in 2016, with the highly rated midfielder taking the next step in his development.
Although it wasn’t all smooth sailing for the former No. 3 pick, with an ankle injury striking after an impressive start to the season.
Billings shone on the MCG in Round 3, collecting a career-high 30 disposals on a day where the Saints paid homage to the 1966 premiership side. He found another 27 touches a week later against Hawthorn in Tasmania and was impressive in the win over Melbourne in Round 6.
But not long after that, an ankle injury restricted Billings’ output and ultimately forced the classy wingman out of Alan Richardson’s side for an extended period.
The 21-year-old returned to the senior side in Round 17 and put a frustrating patch behind him by playing the final seven games of the season to build some momentum into the pre-season in the process.
Billings polled votes in the Trevor Barker Award in four of the final five games, with the pick of his final month coming on the wide expanses of the MCG against Richmond. After a quiet opening half, Billings accumulated 12 possessions in the third quarter and 20 for the second half to help lead the Saints to a gritty win in Round 22.
Alan Richardson’s Views:
“‘JB’ had an interrupted early part to the year with his ankle. We probably brought him back into the team a little bit too early and he found himself going out of the team. But he just wasn’t quite right physically for a period in the early part of the year. But I though the built really well into the year. We all know that ‘JB’ has some elite qualities with respect to gaining possession and his use of the ball, we started to see him mark the ball a lot more – the Carlton game was a good example of that early. Because he’s played most of his footy with us as a forward he needed to sharpen up a little bit around the ball in terms of his understanding of his role and what he needed to do at stoppage and that improved weekly.
“He’ll benefit enormously from another pre-season; he’s really only had one pre-season, so we’re looking forward to getting a lot of work into him this summer, to get him stronger and to make him an even better athlete than what he already is. We think he can go to another level with his footy if he can have a really strong pre-season. He’s got to continue to work on the midfield components of his play, he’s predominantly played forward, so he’ll continue to learn about midfield play, the running patterns, the structures. So he’ll improve there but his biggest growth will come from his strength and his endurance improvements. He’s already a pretty good athlete, but as he starts to go to an elite level in those areas then his footy will follow.”
The Numbers:
17 games
20.2 possessions
14.6 uncontested possessions
4.2 marks
3.3 tackles
3.0 inside 50s
