Autopsy Round 21 - Post Match against St Kilda

[Billy Bob65]

Commiserations on the loss.

Here are the midfield frequency stats from the game. If you haven't seen a previous post, this is an overall summary of how often your players were lining up as one of the 5 mids at bounces.

Overall Summary - 23 Bounces

Fyfe 20
Langdon 17 wing
Tucker 16
Walters 15
B.Hill 15 wing
Conca 14 wing
Mundy 10
Brayshaw 7
Crowden 1

Rucks:
Sandilands 17
Darcy 6

Centre Clearances (as per Champion Data/AFL.com.au)
Tucker 3
Fyfe 2
Mundy 2
Conca 1
Darcy 1
Blakely 1
Sandilands 1

1st Half - 13

Fyfe 11
Walters 11
B.Hill 11 wing
Langdon 9 wing
Tucker 8
Mundy 7
Conca 6 wing
Brayshaw 2

Sandilands 8
Darcy 5

Final Term - 4

Fyfe 4
Tucker 4
Conca 4 wing
Langdon 3 wing
Brayshaw 2
B.Hill 1 wing
Mundy 1
Crowden 1

Sandilands 4

Notes:
- Most ever inside starts for Tucker in analysed games. His previous high was 12 in Rd 2. This was his highest starts (of any kind) since Rd 3 and only the 3rd (of 12) analysed games where he has been among your top 6 most used mids.
- Most ever wing starts for Conca in analysed games, surpassing his previous high of 7 in 2 separate games last year
- Fewest starts for Mundy in analysed games since Rd 15, 2018. 60% of his starts came in Q2

 

[apuchar]

Blakely is a horrible defender, that's all I think I know

 

[Scham]

Blakely is a horrible defender, that's all I think I know

I just can't get the images out of my head of him dominating in the Swans midfield as a 17yo or for that matter in our midfield in the pre-season games of his first season with us as an 18yo.

 

[E Shed]

I just can't get the images out of my head of him dominating in the Swans midfield as a 17yo or for that matter in our midfield in the pre-season games of his first season with us as an 18yo.

Exactly, the closest thing I've seen to another Haselby. Put him in the middle and tell him to get the footy.

 

[apuchar]

I just can't get the images out of my head of him dominating in the Swans midfield as a 17yo or for that matter in our midfield in the pre-season games of his first season with us as an 18yo.

Yeah I remember him playing for Swans. Couldn't believe we got him where we did in the draft.

 

[GingerDocker]

Exactly, the closest thing I've seen to another Haselby. Put him in the middle and tell him to get the footy.

And if he's not ready for that, our player development needs to go under the microscope

 

[Scham]

And if he's not ready for that, our player development needs to go under the microscope

It already is.

 

[Fat Nyfe]

I just can't get the images out of my head of him dominating in the Swans midfield as a 17yo or for that matter in our midfield in the pre-season games of his first season with us as an 18yo.

I can remember him bursting through packs in a few games for us too, just a couple of years ago when it he was on the brink of breaking out in the AFL before the injuries.

It’s the biggest mystery of the season why he’s not playing there. The year after we lose our second best mid. Beggars belief.

 

[Van_Dyke]

I just can't get the images out of my head of him dominating in the Swans midfield as a 17yo or for that matter in our midfield in the pre-season games of his first season with us as an 18yo.

Not to mention 2016 at AFL level and early 2017 as well

 

[apuchar]

I'm surprised he re-signed. He must have been tempted to look elsewhere.

 

[BlueE]

Not all players have issues with free throws but the NBA do get in specialist shooting coaches for certain players.

I would love for Robertson to work with Darcy, and Fyfe on set shots.

I've described a goal kicking drill adapted from Andre Lamanis's Australian team designed to duplicate the pressure of kicking a set shot after the siren, as one example. It also translates to improving every set shot for goal.

It's not just technique and coaches should be devising drills that replicate the pressure as much as possible for training IMO.

 

[eastfreo75]

I've described a goal kicking drill adapted from Andre Lamanis's Australian team designed to duplicate the pressure of kicking a set shot after the siren, as one example. It also translates to improving every set shot for goal.

It's not just technique and coaches should be devising drills that replicate the pressure as much as possible for training IMO.

A side point Lamanis is a knob and isn’t a great coach. He doesn’t understand the major idea behind the Flow offense.

Lucky he had a great team at New Zealand breakers and after that has been a total flop at the Brisbane Bullets.

Total joke selecting two bullet players over Europe and NBA players.

In regards to free throws, you can only replicate the tiredness of a game situation by running or push ups.

In regards to goal kicking, you need to do it after a hard work out.

 

[Kram]

Blakely is a pretty decent player but geez I reckon he's overrated on here.

 

[E Shed]

Blakely is a pretty decent player but geez I reckon he's overrated on here.

But how could we know when he's being played in wrong role. He's a natural, ball winning stoppage player. He's not a defender. Even so in the early rounds of last year he was brilliant off half back before he got injured. Now like a lot of our players who get forced into defensive roles (Sutcliffe, Cerra) he's gone back into his shell and seemingly lost a bit of confidence.
We get these players who look wonderful playing natural attacking footy as juniors and turn them into defenders. God I hope they don't do it with Sturt.

 

[jedi mind tricks]

yeah been pretty well established.

reminds me of when I was in high school and we'd have a double S&E. no teacher would walk in and after 40 minutes, when everyone realised the teacher wasn't coming and we were all talking about how good it was, some prefect-wannabe would walk to head office and get them to give us a relief teacher.

piss funny. I thought Freo supporters were supposed to be a bit different; against the grain and wall... working class... steely... tough.

I know you're suspended and when you're back on here you'll get to reply etc

But tough you aren't

 

[jedi mind tricks]

Blakely is a pretty decent player but geez I reckon he's overrated on here.

He's being played out of position IMO

 

[SoDakDocker]

But how could we know when he's being played in wrong role. He's a natural, ball winning stoppage player. He's not a defender. Even so in the early rounds of last year he was brilliant off half back before he got injured. Now like a lot of our players who get forced into defensive roles (Sutcliffe, Cerra) he's gone back into his shell and seemingly lost a bit of confidence.
We get these players who look wonderful playing natural attacking footy as juniors and turn them into defenders. God I hope they don't do it with Sturt.

This is such a strange phenomenon to me but I'm still relatively new to the sport. The only time I've ever seen players get moved around like that in any sport is our local Catholic high school that has football (gridiron) players playing both offense and defense.

 

[Scham]

I'm surprised he re-signed. He must have been tempted to look elsewhere.

I was too. Must’ve got a good deal and the future from where he sits obviously looks bright, which is a good sign.

 

[apuchar]

I was too. Must’ve got a good deal and the future from where he sits obviously looks bright, which is a good sign.

Let's hope it's based on something tangible, not just a delusional hierarchy.

 

[FreoMonocle]

Maybe he needs to learn some accountability. It’s sure cost us a few times. I’m hoping it’s just fitness but I’m not sure.

Not everyone is an equal and capable learner. That was precisely why he was sent back to Peel a few years ago, to much screaming on this board, after racking up a huge number of disposals (he was supposed to check his opponent, nice that he got a lot of the pill, but offset by his opponent also getting a lot of the pill)

 

[Cesoir]

Wow, this place is unreal. When someone wants to leave it's because they are pissed off with Lyon and the club in general. When someone wants to stay it's because they are probably deluded.

Any chance Connor has a strong relationship with the club and coaches and he knows EXACTLY why he is spending time in defence. Like Pav and Mundy to name a couple who weren't harmed by their time in the backline?

No, let's go with surprise and amazement that he didn't leave...

 

[apuchar]

Wow, this place is unreal. When someone wants to leave it's because they are pi**ed off with Lyon and the club in general. When someone wants to stay it's because they are probably deluded.

Any chance Connor has a strong relationship with the club and coaches and he knows EXACTLY why he is spending time in defence. Like Pav and Mundy to name a couple who weren't harmed by their time in the backline?

No, let's go with surprise and amazement that he didn't leave...

I said I hope it is based on something tangible. He certainly isn't being used in his best position so I hope he has a good reason for staying. If he doesn't improve as a backman, he might lose his spot in the team altogether, in time.
Ross said we would win a premiership in 5 years, no excuses. That may turn out to be delusional. We'll find out next year.

 

[Cesoir]

I said I hope it is based on something tangible. He certainly isn't being used in his best position so I hope he has a good reason for staying. If he doesn't improve as a backman, he might lose his spot in the team altogether, in time.
Ross said we would win a premiership in 5 years, no excuses. That may turn out to be delusional. We'll find out next year.

Not just directed at you Ap, a number of poster are "surprised" that he decided to stay, but all too quick to find reasons when people decide to leave.

I've heard Connor talk several times about how he is happy to develop in multiple positions, as has Cerra.

Trust me, these guys are kept well informed about what they are expected to do / improve. Unfortunately they are people and sometimes these things take time.

 

[FreoMonocle]

This is such a strange phenomenon to me but I'm still relatively new to the sport. The only time I've ever seen players get moved around like that in any sport is our local Catholic high school that has football (gridiron) players playing both offense and defense.

It's a relatively new phenomenon, the league became more professional with sponsorship and broadcast dollars. That let the teams became uber fit coupled with the sports science and nutrition specialists added, instead of merely fit (and even couch potatoes once upon a time, when they were allowed to drink a half a slab of beer a night and had a day job with just a top up salary from the game).

This game might technically be won up forward with the ball going through the sticks. But it's really won and lost in the midfield and the midfielders run 13-16 km for 3 hours in repeated sprints with barely any bench time available (and typically soaked up by young players without a tank). Constant running from one side of the ground to the other, instead of staying in zones as they did back in the couch potato days. So coaches basically try to squeeze extra midfielders into their team with 2-6 of the forward and defender positions actually being used by midfielders as a place of "relative" rest.

It's all the same basic skills anyway, you need to kick/handball/block/tackle in all positions, but as we can see with Blakely, you can be a big bodied and fast midfielder with poor skills at checking your opponent (all mids need to do it, but it can be a specialty midfield role - a tagger), which can be disastrous if the ball is 1 kick from the goals instead of further up the field which may give you a chance to fix a mistake.

 

[FreoMonocle]

Blakely is a ball winning mid. Its just stubborness and stupidity that we persist with players in the wrong position.
Barlow as a HFF FFS, still makes my blood boil thinking about it.

Blakely & Cerra should both be playing as pure midfielders, who cares if they need to learn how to be accountable? Just tell them to go and win the footy.
Yeah yeah I know it doesn't work that way these days, everyone has be accountable yada yada, I'm just having a vent.

Cerra's output would have been the same as any spud that we would want busted down to Peel. He would have been racking up less than 15 disposals as a midfielder - in saying that, it's not that he's a spud, but young, weedy, inexperienced and not developed - he will be a gun midfielder in the future. Andy and Cerra as permanent midfielders for the last 2 years and we would have been totally toast in the midfield and eyeing off the wooden spoon.

Starting to look the goods now, but still need at least another preseason in them to be good midfielders and 3-4 before they start to be great mids.