I agree to your post to a certain extent.
To answer your question about the criticism, not sure criticism is the right word.
It was being pointed out that Byrne had a poor game on Sunday and if Thomson was an option he would have been the ideal player to throw in the midfield.
It should be said though, it was not just Byrne, the only player with pass marks from Sunday is Halkett (and Lithgow to an extent before his pen miss). The rest looked like they were out in having a piss up with the fans the night before.
Having said that, they are a young team, they had a long journey and they have been playing well recently and still held their own and were very unlucky not to be in the next round.
The three players you mentioned are pivotal as you said, and I don't think anyone would disagree. They are brilliant players but as all players do, they will have bad games. It would be good to have an option of the supposed quality of Thomson to use to rotate the squad when necessary, and In my opinion, Sunday was one of those days.