TO BE blunt, I’ve always believed in the old saying that it’s impossible to make strawberry jam out of horse manure.

Given Collingwood have half a team of rookies and lowly ranked draft choices that have been instrumental in the Magpies' surge to the top of the AFL ladder, the effectiveness of Mick Malthouse’s coaching and development operation is reversing that well-proven theory.

And I use this analogy in the nicest possible way because the outstanding Collingwood form has some unique features. 

Firstly, there is a big group of Collingwood players whose performances this season have been very good despite them not being established, proven senior players.

Looking through the side that dismantled Richmond last Saturday, I found 11 players who wouldn’t exactly cause shockwaves if they were left out of the side in the weeks ahead.

There’s Dayne Beams, Jarryd Blair, Leigh Brown, Chris Dawes, Tyson Goldsack, Ben Johnson, Tarkyn Lockyer, Brent Macaffer, Steele Sidebottom, Alan Toovey and Sharrod Wellingham.

These are players who would still be a bit nervous ahead of selection every Thursday night. That’s not to say some of these players haven’t been playing well.

Only last Saturday Brown received a vote in the 3AW Player of the Year award, as he’d done the week before. Clearly, he’s had two terrific games.

Beams has averaged 21 possessions and kicked 17 goals in 16 games, and Sidebottom 18 possessions a game for 16 goals in 16 games.

Johnson and Wellingham have averaged 21 possessions from 15 games, while Dawes, with 21 goals in 11 games, sits second on the club goalkicking list, equal with Travis Cloke and behind only Didak (29).

But what I’m saying is that these players are not necessarily permanent fixtures in the senior side and might not survive a few down weeks and still hold their spot.

I’ve always believed that while playing for your position each week may be a good motivation, it can also be quite nerve-wracking and not exactly conducive to maximising performance levels.

At Collingwood, though, this ‘living on the edge’ process seems to be working a treat.

But back to my first paragraph..

The thing that hits me the most about the Collingwood team at the moment is the unusually high number of players who have come into the AFL system with a relatively modest draft ranking.

Sure, they’ve got the normal handful of high draft selections. And by ‘high’ I mean 1-20. There’s Dale Thomas (pick No.2), Alan Didak (3), Scott Pendlebury (5), Ben Reid (8), Simon Prestigiacomo (10) and Sidebottom (11). Plus Luke Ball, who was originally taken at No.3.

Their list also includes two comparatively cheap father/son signings in Heath Shaw and Cloke, and what you might term a high-price recruit in Darren Jolly, who cost the Magpies selections No.14 and 46 in last year’s national draft.

Otherwise, it is a line-up dominated by players from humble football beginnings.

I must say I’ve always been a bit cynical when I hear clubs talking of a five-year plan. To me a month is a long time in footy, and next year is an absolute eternity away.

The process of recruiting raw talent and developing it to maximum potential is the obvious first step in any club operation.

Enormous credit must go to the Collingwood coaching and development system which has churned out a big group of players who were low-ranked horse-manure draft and rookie choices, but are producing strawberry jam performances.

With Shaw and Cloke missing from the top side last weekend, there were no less than 15 players who were drafted at 25-plus, including an extraordinary seven players who started out as rookies.

The ex-rookies are a talented list in their own right - captain Nick Maxwell, Harry O’Brien, Wellingham, Lockyer, Macaffer, Toovey and Blair.

To have seven players in the top team who started their careers as obscure rookies is quite remarkable.

Of the others, there was Dawes, taken at selection No.28, Beams (29), Leon Davis (34), Dane Swan (58), Johnson (62), Goldsack (63) and Brown (73), plus Ball, whose price tag to the Pies was selection No.30 in last year’s national draft.

As hard as it might seem to be underrated playing for the heavily publicised Magpies, there are a lot of relative young unknowns playing well above their reputation. And, oddly, there are some more high profile types not in the side. Like Jack Anthony, Nathan Brown, Brad Dick, Josh Fraser, Paul Medhurst, Shane O’Bree and Cameron Wood.

Interestingly, too, only one Collingwood player - midfielder Swan - is a certain All-Australian.

Didak might be classified as a ‘likely’ All-Australian choice, with O’Brien a possibility, but otherwise they have no genuine Team of the Year contenders.

No doubt this year Jolly, as a strong power ruckman, and Ball, as another in-close ball-winner, have been valuable additions to the Collingwood side.

The biggest improver in its own ranks is full-back Reid. Drafted at No.8 in 2006 as a highly-rated key forward, he had played only eight games in three years prior to this year. Last year he played two senior games while spending most of his time learning to play key defence in the VFL.

Obviously he did so with very good effect in what is further proof of a development process that requires young players to be given time, patience and training at a lower level to gain the necessary confidence and skill-set to be successful at the top level.

Leaving aside first-year players in terms of those who can be measured from season to season, Reid might just be the competition’s most improved, progressing from out of the team into a very competent key defender.

Collingwood started the season as one of the five clubs that I thought could win the premiership and their chances have only grown after 17 rounds. And they have got to the top with a champion team more so than a team of champions.

Therein lies that nagging doubt because to win the flag they will have to find a way to beat the mighty Geelong, who have the proven double: they are both a champion team and a team of champions.

The views in this story are those of the author and not necessarily those of the clubs or the AFL.