Certified Legendary Thread Race for the flag, in squiggly lines

[Richo83]

Yeah I wouldn't call Malthouse's Collingwood free flowing. Sure, they were more free flowing than St Kilda, but it would be hard not to be. But they're not really analogous to Hawthorn. Hawthorn play a risky game based on precise kicking, and it may come unstuck come finals. Geelong just won because it worked over Collingwood mentally weeks before and because they were an amazing side. I'm not sure it disproves that grand finals favour more safer defensive contested based sides. The point is that, even if Hawthorn are favourites, I'd argue that they'd be much bigger favourites in a home and away match. Finals football suits Lyon/Roos type sides. It's why they've generally over performed in finals (I'd argue). In essence, I agree that Fremantle's game comes with risks, but so does Hawthorn's. If Hawthorn choke infront of goal, which they have done on occasion before, they have a massive chance of losing.

The other issue with Hawthorn is that their defensive record is somewhat poor, especially compared to the aforementioned sides. If Hawthorn's defense was typical of a 1st ranked team, you'd see them as the obvious victor, but Hawthorn's goals per inside 50s ratio is not great for a 1st ranked side. If Fremantle can get say 50 inside 50s, which is possible, they're a massive chance. They've also got arguably their best team on the park as well bar Mirabito, that generally helps. That hasn't happened that much this season. I'd say Hawthorn are slight favourites, but it's slight and it's mainly due to the fact that it's being played in Victoria on Hawthorn's home ground. At a neutral venue, I'd almost give favourtism to Fremantle.

 

[SJ]

Has a club ever won the premiership with an offense outside the top 8 clubs?

Sydney 2005 - 14th in 'points for'.

 

[Final Siren]

For a free wheeling side they sure conceded very few points. They conceded a full 240 points less than Hawthorn have this year (nearly two goals per game). Or to emphasise the point, only 100 points more than the uber defensive Freo of 2013.

They were far closer to 2013 Freo defensively than they were 2013 Hawthorn.

Yeah, but they scored about 500 more points! The reason Geelong didn't concede big scores was because they were too busy belting the ball between the goalposts. That's a world away from a Ross Lyon stoppage game.

Geelong's scores after Round 8 2011 were: 102, 139, 148, 88, 100, 125, 111, 88, then they REALLY got started, 133, 113, 233!!!, 188!!, have a breather, 96, 86, BACK INTO IT, 149 (against Collingwood!), 98, 117, 119. Incredible stuff.

 

[Final Siren]

How's Collingwood's squiggly line looking?

Not much movement the last couple of weeks, sorry to say.

 

[Hawkk]

Sydney 2005 - 14th in 'points for'.

Fair point. Is it more rare for a club to win a flag with the top offence and 5th best defence, or the best defence and the 12th best offence?

 

[Hawkk]

Yeah, but they scored about 500 more points! The reason Geelong didn't concede big scores was because they were too busy belting the ball between the goalposts. That's a world away from a Ross Lyon stoppage game.

Geelong's scores after Round 8 2011 were: 102, 139, 148, 88, 100, 125, 111, 88, then they REALLY got started, 133, 113, 233!!!, 188!!, have a breather, 96, 86, BACK INTO IT, 149 (against Collingwood!), 98, 117, 119. Incredible stuff.

Hands down one of the best teams of all time!

People talk about the Kennett curse but its amazing we got within a bulls roar of that team! Our 19pt, 5pt and 31pt losses indicated a significantly improved performance when playing the Cats.

 

[SJ]

Fair point. Is it more rare for a club to win a flag with the top offence and 5th best defence, or the best defence and the 12th best offence?

I think the other thing that we need to consider is that Final Siren 's work is perhaps more accurate than merely looking at 'points for' or 'points against' as it takes into account opponent and such factors.

 

[Final Siren]

How much more defensive was Collingwood truly? They only conceded ~70 points fewer than Geelong for the year in the H&A. They may have been a highly defensive side, but that doesn't mean Geelong lacked defensive accountability.

That points differential would look quite different if Geelong hadn't beaten them three times by a total of 137 points. Collingwood were the best defensive side of 2011 by a long way; they just couldn't beat Geelong.

But you are right of course that both teams were strong in both attack and defence. That's almost always the case. We're really just talking about their strengths relative to each other (and Grand Finalists in general).

 

[barmy44]

Fair point. Is it more rare for a club to win a flag with the top offence and 5th best defence, or the best defence and the 12th best offence?

a team has won more recently (sydney '05) with an offence outside the top 8, than a team with a defence outside the top 4 (brisbane '03)...

but not sure that really says much if anything about saturday.

in my mind, attack is favoured because the margin for error is lower...

• if it turns into a shoot-out, hawks will win; but
• if its a defensive grind, freo should win — however it only takes 5 minutes of hawthorn getting loose and they are liable to lose.

there is more room to move when you can pile on goals than when you rely on strangulation. lapses throughout the game dont matter as much when the other team is pure defense. they are a killer when the other team can score heavily.

however, freo can be pretty potent at times... ive watched a few of their games, and i dont find them boring at all.

 

[Final Siren]

Fair point. Is it more rare for a club to win a flag with the top offence and 5th best defence, or the best defence and the 12th best offence?

I dunno, but I think it's a bit misleading to talk about Freo having the "12th best offence," because the gap between 12th and 4th or 5th is small. That's the problem with rankings: they conceal different sized gaps.

For mine, Hawthorn is the #1 attacking team, then there's a gap to Geelong and North, then another gap to a big bunch of teams, including Freo. So I'd almost call it an "equal fourth" best attack. If we ignore Freo's St. Kilda game, it might be clearly the fourth best attack.

 

[clogged]

Has a club ever won the premiership with an offense outside the top 8 clubs?

West Coast 1992 and Sydney 2005. West Coast under Malthouse in the early 90s was, relative to the rest of the league, the most defensive side of all time.

 

[clogged]

Yeah, but they scored about 500 more points! The reason Geelong didn't concede big scores was because they were too busy belting the ball between the goalposts. That's a world away from a Ross Lyon stoppage game.

To be fair, Geelong of 1992 was regularly belting the ball between the goal posts but managed to concede more points than Freo scored this year. Just because you're kicking goals doesn't make your defence good.

 

[clogged]

That points differential would look quite different if Geelong hadn't beaten them three times by a total of 137 points. Collingwood were the best defensive side of 2011 by a long way; they just couldn't beat Geelong.

But you are right of course that both teams were strong in both attack and defence. That's almost always the case. We're really just talking about their strengths relative to each other (and Grand Finalists in general).

My point is that Geelong weren't freewheeling. I think that does a disservice to just how good their defence was between 2007-2011. They were a perfectly blended balance of defence and attack. Geelong of 1992 were freewheeling, North this year were freewheeling. But Geelong of the recent era were exactly what you want from a premiership team.

Hawthorn of this year, up until finals, looked closer in terms of attack and defence blend to Geelong of 1992 than other recent premiers. As we have moved to finals Hawthorn's defence has tightened, and may get stronger still. I'm not sure I would call Hawthorn freewheeling as such, but I guess the last game will determine what we think of them.

 

[Packedlunch]

I dunno, but I think it's a bit misleading to talk about Freo having the "12th best offence," because the gap between 12th and 4th or 5th is small. That's the problem with rankings: they conceal different sized gaps.

For mine, Hawthorn is the #1 attacking team, then there's a gap to Geelong and North, then another gap to a big bunch of teams, including Freo. So I'd almost call it an "equal fourth" best attack. If we ignore Freo's St. Kilda game, it might be clearly the fourth best attack.

You would also need to factor in the higher scores they were able to kick by having a higher proportion of games against lower ranked teams.

 

[Hawkk]

Another consideration is looking at total scoring shots. As a point of reference, I thought the Hawthorn defence did an excellent job restricting Geelong to 22 scoring shots for the evening. The fact that Geelong kicked so accurately (15 goals, 7 points) ultimately negated this effort. Had the Cats kicked 7 goals, 15 points that defensive effort is seen in a different light...

 

[barmy44]

Another consideration is looking at total scoring shots. As a point of reference, I thought the Hawthorn defence did an excellent job restricting Geelong to 22 scoring shots for the evening. The fact that Geelong kicked so accurately (15 goals, 7 points) ultimately negated this effort. Had the Cats kicked 7 goals, 15 points that defensive effort is seen in a different light...

yeah, i agree... the inside 50 count was heavily skewed in hawthorns favour from memory, but i dont have the exact totals handy. we had to kick straight to be any chance.

 

[clogged]

Scoring shots is meaningless. Kick a goal and the play is reset at the centre. Kick a behind and it resets from kick in.

 

[cryptor]

Another consideration is looking at total scoring shots. As a point of reference, I thought the Hawthorn defence did an excellent job restricting Geelong to 22 scoring shots for the evening. The fact that Geelong kicked so accurately (15 goals, 7 points) ultimately negated this effort. Had the Cats kicked 7 goals, 15 points that defensive effort is seen in a different light...

And on top of that if we could've kicked accurately ourselves (lots of gettable set shots) it would've been even more pronounced.

 

[Hawkk]

Scoring shots is meaningless. Kick a goal and the play is reset at the centre. Kick a behind and it resets from kick in.

I can't believe this post. If you're going to assess defence capabilities on the basis of scoring than surely the amount of scoring shots is a pretty obvious indicator of performance. Just how accurate the goal kicking of the forward is ultimately dependent on the capabilities of the player lining up the shot (its got nothing to do with defence)

Some of these Fremantle fans

 

[clogged]

I can't believe this post. If you're going to assess defence capabilities on the basis of scoring than surely the amount of scoring shots is a pretty obvious indicator of performance. Just how accurate the goal kicking of the forward is ultimately dependent on the capabilities of the player lining up the shot (its got nothing to do with defence)

Some of these Fremantle fans

As I have stated before, not every behind can translate into a goal. A behind becomes a kick in. If that kick in is chopped off, it's another inside 50 and possibly another behind. That doesn't mean both behinds could have been goals. If the first entry was a goal, then play restarts in the centre.

 

[cryptor]

As I have stated before, not every behind can translate into a goal. A behind becomes a kick in. If that kick in is chopped off, it's another inside 50 and possibly another behind. That doesn't mean both behinds could have been goals. If the first entry was a goal, then play restarts in the centre.

Given we dominated the centre clearances on Friday night and Geelong are quite good at rebounding from their defensive 50 it's actually a lot more likely that a Hawthorn goal would result in another Hawthorn I50 than a Hawthorn behind would.

 

[Hawkk]

Given we dominated the centre clearances on Friday night and Geelong are quite good at rebounding from their defensive 50 it's actually a lot more likely that a Hawthorn goal would result in another Hawthorn I50 than a Hawthorn behind would.

Wow wee that's a pertinent point...

 

[The Passenger]

Yeah, but they scored about 500 more points! The reason Geelong didn't concede big scores was because they were too busy belting the ball between the goalposts. That's a world away from a Ross Lyon stoppage game.

Geelong's scores after Round 8 2011 were: 102, 139, 148, 88, 100, 125, 111, 88, then they REALLY got started, 133, 113, 233!!!, 188!!, have a breather, 96, 86, BACK INTO IT, 149 (against Collingwood!), 98, 117, 119. Incredible stuff.

people don't seem to grasp that a defensive game plan needs to take into account both points for and against. as you say if a team is busy scoring points, then that stops the opposition from scoring them. You're not stoppping them from scoring because you have a defensive game plan.

When taking into account both for and against, Ross Lyon coached teams have finished bottom of the ladder for total points in each of the last five years.

 

[clogged]

people don't seem to grasp that a defensive game plan needs to take into account both points for and against. as you say if a team is busy scoring points, then that stops the opposition from scoring them.

Simply not true. See Geelong 1992 or North Melbourne this year.

 

[Hawkk]

Simply not true. See Geelong 1992 or North Melbourne this year.

Evidently Hawthorn's squiggle has converged into a mix of North Melbourne 1999 and Brisbane 2001. As for Fremantle???

I'm not sure what relevance Geelong 1992 has with Hawthorn this season, clearly the Geelong squiggle was far more volatile and patchy in the lead up to the 1992 GF.

How 'boat we go back to looking at the squiggle?