Thoughts On The West Coast Game

[jenny61_99]

What gun forward?



From what I've seen I doubt Rucciuto can ever again be as good as he once was.



Where is this gun forward coming from?

Won't Hentschell be back next year?

And I agree with you on the Roo front.

 

[Asgardian]

That's the question Jenny, will Hentschell return next season, & if he does, will he ever recover sufficiently to be the player he could have become?

I have seen many terrible footy injuries, Hentschell's was a bad one, one that may permanently affect him.

 

[relapse]

That's the question Jenny, will Hentschell return next season, & if he does, will he ever recover sufficiently to be the player he could have become?

I have seen many terrible footy injuries, Hentschell's was a bad one, one that may permanently affect him.

I agree with your points, Welsh is a downhill skiier and is far to inconsistent, the problem with Welsh is that IMO is a forward pocket player that has constantly found himself due to lack of options having to play a key position therefore usually getting the best defender on him.

I do question where are forward line firepower will come from. Bock is okay, but doesnt have a long kick this is why I think sometimes we need to try some younger guys there and see what happens. Gill, Sellar, Tippet etc it cant be any more inept that some of the performances from regular players at times.

The issue for me is that our forward line is made up players that most would rank as a 5 or 6 out of 10 none of them will regularly kick winning scores and we really need one maybe two real finds to use as targets up forward, but we have to roll the dice with our selections to find these types though, but at the moment we are being too far too safe with our selections. We are all praying that Sellar develops and Hentchel can come back come to the benchmark he showed last year.

 

[lunacy]

Shirley and Van Berlo in combination tagged Kerr ....I suspect Shirley took the first half and did a pretty good job ....with Van Berlo taking it in the second half to deal with Kerr's huge engine.

How can you say Shirley did a pretty good job. Kerr had 21 disposals at half time. Shirley may as well not showed up. I'm sick of Shirley trying to get his pathetic 20 disposals when he has a much more important role. Shirley needs to focus on stopping his opponent. He has really dropped the ball as a run with player. He is not an AFL midfielder in his own right. Forget the pill Shirley and stop the absolute dominance of your opponent week in week out.

No Judd, Cousins or Stenglein... If Shirley actually did his job and shut down Kerr WCE would have really done it tougher out there.

Obviously that's not why we lost but it is common sense. It annoys me every week. I can't remember the last time Shirley kept an elite midfielder under 25 possessions. A JOKE!

 

[Embers]

Geez alot of blame is going to your forward line. Your defence was worse yesterday

Seaby 3
C.Jones 3
LeCras 3
Embley 2
Lynch 1

Thats 11 out of our 14 goals which is above normal for us. The defence struggled without Rutten inside the 50m arc. Rest got showed up.

 

[jmorg1]

Nathan Brown, who was down in the dumps and questioning his future at various stages in the last year and a half, looked close to his best against the Saints.

Different injuries, I know, but it gives me confidence that Trent could be the same in 2009.

 

[Asgardian]

I reckon the difference is where there is both a break at the joint, and ligament damage in the one incident.

Matt Robran had a terrible break to his leg, but it was not at a joint, same with Brendon Lade, Nathan Brown, Michael Voss, et al.

Whereas guys like Jason Snell and Peter Marker had the broken bone plus ligament damage all at the same joint, in their case it was the ankle

 

[Cap]

Sell the farm if it brings us a flag.

I don't think losing a couple of picks and players is going to cripple the Club.

Do we go all out for a flag right now, or do we hope that we draft players who turn out to be guns, but could be complete duds?

we are not going to win a flag in the next 2 seasons - so no don't sell the bloody farm , We can all see whats going to happen this season, we will regroup and probably knock off Hawthorn, then lose another game and win a couple more maybe scrap into the finals and get knocked out early. The wonder what we are going to do with pick 9-10 and hope that someone slips through.

I think a bit of realism when assessing our squad is what will be needed, at the seasons end. I'm really not looking forward to watching us come 7th or 8th this season

 

[Jars458]

Disposal and complete lack of forward line structure was the fault

I thought our endeavour was good and that we matched West Coast in all areas other than the above.

Welsh is lazy.

Porps was our only decent forward in the first half and then found himself on the bench or in defence.

Torney and McLeod were terrific.

Craig waited to long to put Stevens up froward. A poor day for Craig

Mattner has no decision making abilitiy and needs to play on the wing or make way for Douglas.

We are seeing why Perrie is so important to our team regardless of his faults.

Roo was very poor. If he was anyone else he would be in the SANFL next week.

Edwards is way below par and is probably playing injured but no excuses when you cross the white line.

 

[conVINCEd]

Thoughts;

Everyone needs to calm the cluck down and think about the game. If we simply hit a few more leading forwards on the chest we would have won. The Eagles are currently better than us, but they are the reigning premier for a reason. This season isn't over for us by any stretch, IMHO.

Why the bagging of Stevens as a defender? He played a fine game and is seriously improving. Always presents well, holds his marks and kicks goals when he goes forward as well.

Porplyzia - gee whiz, he has sensational hands but his delivery by foot into the forward 50 was shizenhousen. Seriously four or five times he simply missed the leading target by a mile.

I thought Torney had a shocker, and I'm a big fan. What was with that attempt at a chest mark deep in our defensive 50 which allowed Seaby to take an uncontested mark? Get your mits up in front of your face or go the punch dude.

Thompson's kicking for goal was atrocious as well, obviously. Why is it that a kid like Hurn can absolutely nail a shot on the run from outside 50, yet Scott 'Future Captain' Thompson misses three shots from closer range?

Nathan van Berlo - stand up and be proud son. He was brilliant yesterday and is on the upward curve as a match-day performer. Whoever said recently that he was stagnating - hang your head in shame. A true leader.

 

[bus24]

Why the bagging of Stevens as a defender? He played a fine game and is seriously improving. Always presents well, holds his marks and kicks goals when he goes forward as well.

Not so much a bagging of his game as it is of him being stationed at a key defensive post.

Once again we saw when matched up on a large forward, he's not strong enough. Get Bock back to CHB.

When he goes forward he usually doesn't look too bad.

 

[macca23]

I thought Torney had a shocker, and I'm a big fan. What was with that attempt at a chest mark deep in our defensive 50 which allowed Seaby to take an uncontested mark? Get your mits up in front of your face or go the punch dude.

An amazing comment.

It would have been a toss-up between Torney and Rutten as to who was our best player on the day..

 

[pjcrows]

Thoughts;

Everyone needs to calm the cluck down and think about the game. If we simply hit a few more leading forwards on the chest we would have won. The Eagles are currently better than us, but they are the reigning premier for a reason. This season isn't over for us by any stretch, IMHO.

Why the bagging of Stevens as a defender? He played a fine game and is seriously improving. Always presents well, holds his marks and kicks goals when he goes forward as well.

Porplyzia - gee whiz, he has sensational hands but his delivery by foot into the forward 50 was shizenhousen. Seriously four or five times he simply missed the leading target by a mile.

I thought Torney had a shocker, and I'm a big fan. What was with that attempt at a chest mark deep in our defensive 50 which allowed Seaby to take an uncontested mark? Get your mits up in front of your face or go the punch dude.

Thompson's kicking for goal was atrocious as well, obviously. Why is it that a kid like Hurn can absolutely nail a shot on the run from outside 50, yet Scott 'Future Captain' Thompson misses three shots from closer range?

Nathan van Berlo - stand up and be proud son. He was brilliant yesterday and is on the upward curve as a match-day performer. Whoever said recently that he was stagnating - hang your head in shame. A true leader.

These comments really annoy me, to be honest. We were way off yesterday. "If we hit some targets we would've won?". I'm sorry, but get your hand off it. Our side is nowhere near it at the moment. I'm not giving up on the season, of course - but we need to make massive improvements if we are going to get anywhere near the Top 4.

 

[jmorg1]

Let's not worry about top 4 for now. To make the finals we need to win 6 of the last 9 remaining games which will be a task in itself based on how we played yesterday. Hopefully, we can get back to playing the way we did against the Kangaroos, probably our most consistent 4-quarter effort for the season.

Also, would be nice if we could finish a game without any injuries for a change.

 

[ShearMagic9]

Geez alot of blame is going to your forward line. Your defence was worse yesterday

Seaby 3
C.Jones 3
LeCras 3
Embley 2
Lynch 1

Thats 11 out of our 14 goals which is above normal for us. The defence struggled without Rutten inside the 50m arc. Rest got showed up.

Chad Jones kicked 3, but Bassett went off and Mattner had to pick him up. Mattner isn't a defender.

Scott Stevens was shown up against a larger opponent.

Lynch's goal was kicked when Scott Stevens was on him.

Our defence was still reasonably good I thought, conceded a few soft goals though.

 

[KUNG FU]

Embers, Bassett was off the ground for most of the game. It wasn't the best game from our defence and in particular Johncock was struggling, but he hasn't been looking 100% since he came back from injury.

 

[Markthirtytwo]

These comments really annoy me, to be honest. We were way off yesterday. "If we hit some targets we would've won?". I'm sorry, but get your hand off it. Our side is nowhere near it at the moment. I'm not giving up on the season, of course - but we need to make massive improvements if we are going to get anywhere near the Top 4.

Quite frankly he's nearly right IMO because we would have made a better game of it. They could have blown us out of the water with their near misses but didn't, if we have had a better return from our passes that went either at the feet or over the heads of our forwards, we were certainly going to be in the contest a bit more..................provided that we had kicked straight.

I will repeat my assessment after the Geelong game.

Skills lacking; (Something our coach said that would be addressed and clearly hasn't-remember the spot on passes during the tempo game against the colliwobbles eary last season)
Outbodied too easily; (Our bodies don't seem to be the same shape as the top clubs any longer)
Kicking to one on two/three contests;
Not holding tackles; (which was one of our strengths)
Missing easy marks;
Going too wide; (Ayres game plan A, B and C)
Zoning coming unstuck; (Other coaches have worked us out and we don't seem to counter their choking abilities and we suffer from wondering what to do next).

We won't make the top 4 and if we do make the finals, only make up the numbers.

We need to start playing our players like Meesen (give Griff a rest) and Maric, Pfeiffer, etc to see what they offer.

 

[bus24]

We need to start playing our players like Meesen (give Griff a rest) and Maric, Pfeiffer, etc to see what they offer.

Of course we do. But will we? NO

The average plodders will keep plodding along (as it's what plodders do) and we'll finish about 7th and get knocked out in an Elimination Final. No development of young guys and it's a year wasted.

 

[Embers]

Yeh Bassett was a loss and made it hard but in all honesty you had a perfectly fine CHB sitting at CHF in Nathan Bock. Didnt think the forward line was THAT bad just thought they were beaten by a very good defence on the day.

 

[KUNG FU]

Yeh Bassett was a loss and made it hard but in all honesty you had a perfectly fine CHB sitting at CHF in Nathan Bock. Didnt think the forward line was THAT bad just thought they were beaten by a very good defence on the day.

I agree. Stevens to forward full-time. Bock to CHB. I know a lot of people are sceptical of whether Stevens could be as effective up forward any more than he is, but he was in our forward lines only for one quarter and he kicked 2 goals. I think its worth having a shot at keeping him up there.

 

[Markthirtytwo]

Yeh Bassett was a loss and made it hard but in all honesty you had a perfectly fine CHB sitting at CHF in Nathan Bock. Didnt think the forward line was THAT bad just thought they were beaten by a very good defence on the day.

Rubbish, we made it easy for them by kicking straight to them.

 

[crowsarethebest]

I agree. Stevens to forward full-time. Bock to CHB. I know a lot of people are sceptical of whether Stevens could be as effective up forward any more than he is, but he was in our forward lines only for one quarter and he kicked 2 goals. I think its worth having a shot at keeping him up there.

I doubt he'd be effective as a permanent forward though. He's like Hunter for the Weagles, when in need for goals he just pops up and delivers.

 

[tribey]

How can you say Shirley did a pretty good job. Kerr had 21 disposals at half time. Shirley may as well not showed up. I'm sick of Shirley trying to get his pathetic 20 disposals when he has a much more important role. Shirley needs to focus on stopping his opponent. He has really dropped the ball as a run with player. He is not an AFL midfielder in his own right. Forget the pill Shirley and stop the absolute dominance of your opponent week in week out.

8 of the 'pathetic' 20 were contested and he lead our tackle count with 5.

No Judd, Cousins or Stenglein... If Shirley actually did his job and shut down Kerr WCE would have really done it tougher out there.

Is Shirley the only midfielder expected to a defensive job on the West Coast midfield?

Keep in mind that last year at Subiaco the renowned worldbeater Michael Braun had 40+ touches and Rowan 'Brownlow' Jones had 30+ touches in Round 2 and in the Subi bath.

The last five times we've played WCE they've had:

346, 385, 435, 391 and 400+ possessions.

Clearly it's just Rob who's not doing his job.

It annoys me every week. I can't remember the last time Shirley kept an elite midfielder under 25 possessions. A JOKE!

I can't remember the last time one of our 'elite' midfielders had more hard ball gets and contested possessions than Rob - but there you go.

 

[relapse]

Let's not worry about top 4 for now. To make the finals we need to win 6 of the last 9 remaining games which will be a task in itself based on how we played yesterday. Hopefully, we can get back to playing the way we did against the Kangaroos, probably our most consistent 4-quarter effort for the season.

Also, would be nice if we could finish a game without any injuries for a change.

Need to win 5 games actually to make the finals, 12 wins and our percentage will get us in the finals if we can win 6-7 5th or 6th is possible.

 

[King Elvis]

These comments really annoy me, to be honest. We were way off yesterday. "If we hit some targets we would've won?". I'm sorry, but get your hand off it. Our side is nowhere near it at the moment. I'm not giving up on the season, of course - but we need to make massive improvements if we are going to get anywhere near the Top 4.

If Bock/McGregor could kick straight from set shots, we would've been close.

If Welsh could kick a banan from eight metres out, we would've been in front.

If Thompson kicked straight running into goal, we would've won.

We looked absolutely terrible, yet we were still in it.

Also, Bock to CHB was a move that should have been made as soon as Bassett went down.