AFL Grand Final Grand Final, 2020: Richmond v Geelong

Who will be premiers?

  • Tigers

    Votes: 20 64.5%
  • Cats

    Votes: 11 35.5%

  • Total voters
    31
Jun 4, 2018
2,665
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St Kilda
Interesting to watch the Tiger's style of play- at every chance, players with the ball look straight to full forward without hesitation and put in that direction without a second thought..it gets the ball deep in the forward line quickly and puts pressure on a backline's ability to set up and run the ball out. We use that style a little, but fiddle around too much in the midfield, and in our case, the forwards are pretty weak defensively, so we can't keep it in there...it killed us against Richmond in the semi final.
I think our style will hold up in finals, we can't try and be the next richmond, we will do it our own way
 
Hardwick has to go down as one of the greatest coaches of all time.

You look at this team on paper, compare it to the Lions, Cats & Hawks eras of the last 20 years. Heck, on paper, this team doesn't stack up to the 09/10 Saints or to 10/11 Magpies.

But Dimma has changed the foundation of the competition with his approach.

Yes he has a system. Yes he has a method. Beyond that though he appears to just 'let them play' and the whole team embraces each other and wills themselves to be better.

Then you add in Martin. The finals GOAT. Never have we see a guy switch it on in big games like he does. It's like Michael Jordan, LeBron James or Tom Brady. Incredible.

Right now it feels like age it the only thing that can stop them. Time catching up on JRoo & Houli, Cotch maybe slows down a step... But that's the beauty of the system. Dimma will pull one cog out of the machine & bolt another one in there like he did with Balta & Rance.

Congratulations Tigers. This was the hardest flag to win since the war era. The logistics and people management alone are staggering.

How does anyone stop this mob in 2021?


You realise their system also hides their quality. Guys like Nank, Broad, Short, Balta, Bolton, Edwards etc are all severely underrated due to their system. Their chaos game relies on manic pressure and effort. They smack the ball forward with out looking up but it only works because of the commitment of every player to create a contest and win it. It's ugly beautiful. The weird thing is Richo was doing it before Richmond, they copied it and improved on it. Possibly due to a better list. Their recruiting is mostly through the draft and is exceptional.
 
I was thinking the same thing last night.

At the end of this season......clubs who have have had prolonged years of success....Haw & Syd have fallen off the cliff....hopefully the Cats next season.

Other clubs are imploding before our eyes.

The other day,a poster summed up the anticipated form of all the teams for next year........it was excellent.

If we can get more things right over the next 5-6 years ...who knows.

They say timing is everything.

It does my head in thinking that a little over 4 years ago....the Tigers were way down the ladder at the end of the 2016 season.

What they have done over the last 4 years is incredible.


Tigers are still pretty young and don't get much poaching happening. Still developing talent like Balta and Bolton too.
 
We weren't a premiership standard team this year. But at the same time, I feel like with a full team and more accurate kicking we definitely could have beaten Richmond. Oh well.


Neither were the Dogs or Tigers in their first GF.
 

Stewart66

Premiership Player
Saints Pledge Contributor
Jul 27, 2014
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I want us to win a premiership so ******* bad it hurts

Dont think we are far away important trade & draft period .

We definitely have a distinct game style , the main issue is still conversion .
Improved significantly this year , but we still can be better .
Speed , Kicking & Pressure skills are the areas we need to develop.

Richmonds style changed significantly from 2016 they moved the ball slowly , chipping the ball
around , the game is all about speed & pressure .

Personally think we are tracking beautifully .
 

FQFjt

Club Legend
Sep 11, 2015
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Richmond's model can't be emulated because it relies on a once in a generation freak as the essential centrepiece of the whole plan.

We need to be aiming for something more like the 2018 Eagles side which had no holes, and an even spread of contributors from player 1 to 22 (so much so that they could win the thing without NicNat and Gaff).
 
Geelong's forward line is trash. It's Hawkins or nothing. Rohan is a non entity in finals, Miers always looks out of his depths. They were crying out for a crumber last night, but they all went up at the ball every single time. Someone like Butler would have been feasting on the crumbs.

If I were Geelong, I'd be playing Steven as a deep forward. He's never again to be fit enough to be the damaging mid he once was, but I often think about his come back game where we played him as a mini Plugger. I imagine he'd still have plenty of burst pace to create leads, he's got good hands and a low centre of gravity to clean up Hawkins' crumbs, and he has excellent goal sense.
 

PostmanBish

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Sep 6, 2019
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Dont think we are far away important trade & draft period .

We definitely have a distinct game style , the main issue is still conversion .
Improved significantly this year , but we still can be better .
Speed , Kicking & Pressure skills are the areas we need to develop.

Richmonds style changed significantly from 2016 they moved the ball slowly , chipping the ball
around , the game is all about speed & pressure .

Personally think we are tracking beautifully .

My take is that if our trade/recruitment period goes well, we basically need:

1) King to learn the lessons of his rookie season
2) Membrey to rediscover his form
3) Our back-6 to keep improving
4) A "plan-B" and "plan-C" gameplan which we can switch to if our normal attack is being stifled
5) Composure in the tight games

We were composure away from a top-4 finish this year, and with so much growth potential across the field, you have to be thinking we'll be a better team in 2021. I'm hoping, much like we were the catalyst for Richmond getting their act in gear when we flogged them in 2017, the way we ran with them in the Semi, before falling short acts as the catalyst for us believing we can run with the big boys next year.
 

PostmanBish

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Sep 6, 2019
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Memo to Ben Long ... get down to Births/Deaths/Marriages NOW and change your name by deed poll to Nat Fyfe or Patrick Dangerfield ... then you can s**tmix without fear ...
 
Oct 18, 2011
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Peeps talking about "restraint of trade" - what I would have loved to have seen was the Saints seeking an injunction against the league to prevent the Elimination Final against Richmond proceeding on the basis thats the Saints were taking the AFL to court over the denial of natural justice to Ben Long by sentencing him on the basis of the "look" of the incident and not considering their own guidelines and precedents established by the AFL Tribunal.

What a joke!!!
 
Sep 27, 2008
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You realise their system also hides their quality. Guys like Nank, Broad, Short, Balta, Bolton, Edwards etc are all severely underrated due to their system. Their chaos game relies on manic pressure and effort. They smack the ball forward with out looking up but it only works because of the commitment of every player to create a contest and win it. It's ugly beautiful. The weird thing is Richo was doing it before Richmond, they copied it and improved on it. Possibly due to a better list. Their recruiting is mostly through the draft and is exceptional.

It's not just Richmond's system with the ball that is so impressive and effective it's their defensive system without the ball as well, they always seem to get an outnumber in their defensive 50 which makes it very hard for opposition forwards.

Richmond just strangled Geelong's forwards in the 2nd half allowing them just 2 goals, what made it even more impressive is that they lost one of their best defenders in Vlastuin early on in the first quarter but their defensive system is so good that they were able to shuffle players around to still shut down Geelong's forward line.

They remind me of our teams under Ross Lyon in 2009 and 2010 when we just strangled opposition forward lines with our defensive system and kept them to scores of 50 points or less. Our current defence isn't that good just yet but they might be in a year or two once they get some more experience playing together, our defence under Lyon was very experienced with guys like Fisher, Blake, Gwilt, Gilbert, Baker etc that had played together for years.

Geelong's forward line is trash. It's Hawkins or nothing. Rohan is a non entity in finals, Miers always looks out of his depths. They were crying out for a crumber last night, but they all went up at the ball every single time. Someone like Butler would have been feasting on the crumbs.

If I were Geelong, I'd be playing Steven as a deep forward. He's never again to be fit enough to be the damaging mid he once was, but I often think about his come back game where we played him as a mini Plugger. I imagine he'd still have plenty of burst pace to create leads, he's got good hands and a low centre of gravity to clean up Hawkins' crumbs, and he has excellent goal sense.

Ablett being injured early on hurt their forward line, he came back on but was basically playing with one arm and wasn't able to be a goal scoring threat, he was one of their few players that had the talent to score against Richmond's defence, they needed 2 or 3 goals out of him to be a chance of winning,

I wouldn't be surprised if Steven plays Ablett's role as a goal kicking half forward next year, I doubt he would get a game for them as a full time mid especially if his fitness is as bad as it was this year. Add Jeremy Cameron into their forward line as well and they will still be a tough team to beat.
 
Sep 27, 2008
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Assessed, nothing to see here, wasn't unreasonable, thrown out.


Not surprising, I don't think Dangerfield should have been suspended for that as it was more of an unlucky accident than an intentional hit but if it was Ben Long he wouldn't be given the benefit of the doubt that a media darling like Dangerfield gets and would cop 3 or 4 weeks.
 
Not surprising, I don't think Dangerfield should have been suspended for that as it was more of an unlucky accident than an intentional hit but if it was Ben Long he wouldn't be given the benefit of the doubt that a media darling like Dangerfield gets and would cop 3 or 4 weeks.

Sure, just the inconsistency highlighting.
 
Oct 18, 2011
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Not surprising, I don't think Dangerfield should have been suspended for that as it was more of an unlucky accident than an intentional hit but if it was Ben Long he wouldn't be given the benefit of the doubt that a media darling like Dangerfield gets and would cop 3 or 4 weeks.
Yep if it was Longy we would have noted the "look", how Vlaustins head "whiplashed", how Longy chose to try and punch the ball knowing the players head was there and there was a "potential" to cause injury, then we would have had a forensic frame by frame analysis that showed that after trying to punch the ball Longy then bent his forearm so his elbow collected with Vlaustins head and then we would have had close ups of the stretcher and then Michael Christian would have donned his black cap and said - off with his head!!

I expected the outcome but the double standards are genuinely laughable.
 
Peeps talking about "restraint of trade" - what I would have loved to have seen was the Saints seeking an injunction against the league to prevent the Elimination Final against Richmond proceeding on the basis thats the Saints were taking the AFL to court over the denial of natural justice to Ben Long by sentencing him on the basis of the "look" of the incident and not considering their own guidelines and precedents established by the AFL Tribunal.

What a joke!!!

Its the Vibe your honor.
 
Longy is going to have to learn how to play smarter, because he is never going to get the benefit of the doubt and, fairly or not, he is becoming a marked man.
 
Longy is going to have to learn how to play smarter, because he is never going to get the benefit of the doubt and, fairly or not, he is becoming a marked man.
Getting suspended for similar incidents in junior football hasn’t helped his case. Marked man for sure unfortunately
 
Yep if it was Longy we would have noted the "look", how Vlaustins head "whiplashed", how Longy chose to try and punch the ball knowing the players head was there and there was a "potential" to cause injury, then we would have had a forensic frame by frame analysis that showed that after trying to punch the ball Longy then bent his forearm so his elbow collected with Vlaustins head and then we would have had close ups of the stretcher and then Michael Christian would have donned his black cap and said - off with his head!!

I expected the outcome but the double standards are genuinely laughable.


I reckon he had the opportunity to turn out of it and chose to go the elbow instead of the shoulder. Could have killed him.
 
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