Review Round 6, 2025 - Brisbane Lions vs. Collingwood

[Grasshopper17]

Probably our worst game in the last 12 months. After 10 wins in a row this felt like the loss we needed to have.

Last year after this game we were 0-3. This year we’re 5-1. We all know how last year ended.

Interesting to note that after 6 rounds our % is 105.7.

After 6 rounds last year, despite being 2-4, it was 105.0.

Food for thought.

 

[Big Sauce 21]

Interesting to note that after 6 rounds our % is 105.7.

After 6 rounds last year, despite being 2-4, it was 105.0.

Food for thought.

Do you have our score for differences ?

 

[Grasshopper17]

Do you have our score for differences ?

Last year we were 458-436.

This year we're 539-510.

The eye test certainly supports that: we've definitely been able to score more heavily through the first 6 rounds but we've also conceded some above-average totals.

 

[Grasshopper17]

The worry is more that others will go to work on the way the Pies stifled our mark, kick game in the same way they did to Geelong in 2023 after they won the flag. Ross Lyon will be all over it for next week.

Last year during the finals we had a couple of modes, so I’m happy to move past this one so long as we learn our lessons and adapt.

What a great outcome to get this sort of heads up in mid-April rather than mid-August.

I'm pretty glass half full about Thursday's result, and the fact that our next FIVE matches are either against premiership coaches, VERY highly regarded coaches, or both. They will absolutely go to town on what Collingwood did on Thursday night, and this in turn will give us a great opportunity to either work out what we need to improve on, whether it's game plan, personnel or in-game application/execution.

If we're still seeing the same things in a month as we saw on Thursday night, THEN I think we'll have some cause for concern.

 

[martinson]

What a great outcome to get this sort of heads up in mid-April rather than mid-August.

I'm pretty glass half full about Thursday's result, and the fact that our next FIVE matches are either against premiership coaches, VERY highly regarded coaches, or both. They will absolutely go to town on what Collingwood did on Thursday night, and this in turn will give us a great opportunity to either work out what we need to improve on, whether it's game plan, personnel or in-game application/execution.

If we're still seeing the same things in a month as we saw on Thursday night, THEN I think we'll have some cause for concern.

If we can't roll the Saints next week off the 8 day break whatever tactics they use we've got problems.

Payne and Andrews should have a picnic.

 

[Grasshopper17]

Not our night.
If you’re going to do the push and shove stuff - you best chase and tackle and compete. Or you’ll be made to look foolish and we were for most of the night.

Umpiring, what can you do.. wasn’t the difference but if you give a 78m penalty by mistake that results in a goal. I’d hope that umpire would be given a spell and a stern talking to. We can (begrudgingly) live with interpretations and errors in contests. 78m penalty. Nah.

I was equally grumpy with the free kick McStay got on the goal line in the 2nd quarter. I was down that end and that whole passage of play was simply brilliant defence by pretty much everyone on the team.

So many times it looked like Collingwood were going to get a look at goal yet every time another one of our guys showed up to pressure or tackle. It was simply outstanding, some of the best defending I've ever seen from our team and so unfortunate to eventually concede a goal anyway for some indiscretion I didn't see at the time or on the replay!?

 

[pod17]

What a great outcome to get this sort of heads up in mid-April rather than mid-August.

I'm pretty glass half full about Thursday's result, and the fact that our next FIVE matches are either against premiership coaches, VERY highly regarded coaches, or both. They will absolutely go to town on what Collingwood did on Thursday night, and this in turn will give us a great opportunity to either work out what we need to improve on, whether it's game plan, personnel or in-game application/execution.

If we're still seeing the same things in a month as we saw on Thursday night, THEN I think we'll have some cause for concern.

Well put, I like that way of looking at it.

 

[Grasshopper17]

Daicos’ running ability is sublime and we just let him have free run except in the 3rd. There was one clearance where Ashcroft lined up on him and just didn’t bother chasing when Daicos ran for the ball.

I thought Jimmy Tunstill did pretty well.
The mids didn’t turn up.
We seemed to be out of balance as well. Fletch wasn’t bad but was on the receiving end of a mismatch in a couple of marking contests.
Hipwood played with plenty of intent which I liked.

Worried Morris will have a holiday. He shouldn’t but the precedent has (wrongly) been set.

5 day break coming off a pretty decent work load due to heat etc. probably didn’t help.

The umps won the game for the pies early and we let them by losing all focus on winning the game. We were well beaten but how bad the umps were cannot be forgotten. A BS 50 was bad enough, it being 77m is borderline cheating.

Interesting your comments about Daicos.

To me it was a classic case of scoreboard pressure, and the importance of having the lead.

We're down by 19 points at half time and with Daicos basically off the chain, we felt the need to make a move.

But guess what, ignore all the carry on about clearances and the inside 50 count (we'd had 21 which is not many for a half but they had only had 25 themselves). We'd had 13 shots to 12, 100% of our scores were from set shots, which actually suggests we were looking pretty dangerous when we DID go forward. 10 set shots at goal and 13 shots from 21 entries is an excellent conversion rate, against any defence, let alone a good one.

And expected score backed that up: it depends which measure you use but WheeloRatings has us ahead 44-41 at half time.

Now imagine if that WAS the half time score. Do you think we'd have been so keen to make a move on Daicos?

We had one bad quarter, the 3rd, which if I recall correctly (I don't have the quarter-by-quarter stats for individuals) was also Daicos' quietest.

So what does that tell you?

To me it suggests that on this occasion, Berry going to Daicos actually hurt OUR setup more than it hurt Collingwood. I imagine we went into the game with our plans, which didn't seem to be working given Daicos' own output, but maybe it actually wasn't working out too badly across the whole field? So when we went away from our own plans, it actually upset US more than THEM.

At the end of the day, we lose on expected score 75-90. Far more competitive than the whitewash on the scoreboard, and similar to our match against the Giants in Round 7 last year. Take out that third quarter, and we actually win on expected score 65-58.

So Thursday night's result comes down to 2 things:

1. The importance of starting well. Playing the game from in front. You take the lead, you force the opposition to change things, and you get to find out whether THEY have a plan B. We got pantsed 4-12 in clearances in the first quarter. After that it was pretty even really, so going forward it's really important for our midfield to start well and set the tone for the game.

2. Conversion. Conversion. Conversion. We've been pretty good this season up until Thursday night. Hopefully this serves as a reminder we need to be on song in this regard all the time.

An aside on the crowd. Being there on Thursday night it was evident we were well and truly gee'd up for the game, and as soon as some of those 50/50 or even 60/40 umpiring calls went against us, we absolutely piled in and for a good hour there in the middle of the game the Gabba was a pretty hostile place to be.

I have often wondered, and did so again on Thursday night, if sometimes this affects our guys out on the field, allowing ourselves to get sucked in to similar shenanigans and losing our discipline as a result. Which of course just has an ever-escalating feedback loop with the crowd.

Our players have of course been through the wringer of 6 consecutive finals series, 16 finals, 4 prelims and 2 granny's, so you would think the emotional intelligence/strength would be there to keep your cool in these types of situations. But I felt we regressed a bit on Thursday night... It reminded me a bit of that Qualifying Final we played against Richmond in 2019. I thought the effort from our guys was pretty good for much of the night, but we let ourselves down at key moments with a couple of needless free kicks which resulted in opposition goals.

I was pleased we fought the game out. Thought the effort was there right to the end. Just outsmarted in some key moments, and obviously missing some more easy chances in the last quarter cost us. If the 5 day break affected us at all, perhaps it was more mental than physical.

Have to give a lot of credit to Collingwood. They played arguably the perfect game against us and completely took away pretty much everything we wanted to do. We tear our hair out at Bailey running too far and then giving away 50, Zorko getting run down from behind when he had a man loose on the wing, etc. That's our opposition taking away options we've been able to find pretty much every time we've needed to in our last 10 games.

And then that results in other knock on effects, where we see Jack Payne drop a pretty straightforward mark which results in a goal, Berry runs under an uncontested mark on the wing he'd take 9 times out of 10. Another goal. Morris missing that sitter at the start of the last quarter.

Hopefully our coaching group is able to use Thursday night's game as in essence a coaching manual for the rest of the season. We only had to get a couple of those moments right, make a bit more of our chances in front of goal, and we probably win the game, as incredible as that seems.

Keep your chins up folks!

 

[Grasshopper17]

Second half got worse LOL. At least Day kicked a goal.

I thought both our Sam's showed a bit.

 

[Happy_Neale]

I was equally grumpy with the free kick McStay got on the goal line in the 2nd quarter. I was down that end and that whole passage of play was simply brilliant defence by pretty much everyone on the team.

So many times it looked like Collingwood were going to get a look at goal yet every time another one of our guys showed up to pressure or tackle. It was simply outstanding, some of the best defending I've ever seen from our team and so unfortunate to eventually concede a goal anyway for some indiscretion I didn't see at the time or on the replay!?

I was right near this and there was nothing in it, fair hip and shoulder from Andrew’s to prevent McStay getting the ball and kicking a goal, McStay bumps into the post as a result. Unless this is a rule I’m not aware of that’s play on.

 

[braddsey]

Interesting to note that after 6 rounds our % is 105.7.

After 6 rounds last year, despite being 2-4, it was 105.0.

Food for thought.

To paraphrase Browny’s old coach “things are never as bad or good as they seem”.

Percentage is always a good assessment of how a team is going and to the eye we’re going about as well as we were last season - but this year we got close win opening round, vs the close loss.

The consistency for me is in both years we were coming off playing the last game of the season. For me this is where we stand out this year with 5 wins. The other grand finalists from recent years at round-6:

• Sydney 2025: 2-4
• Brisbane 2024: 2-4
• Collingwood 2024: 3-3
• Geelong 2023: 3-3
• Sydney 2023: 3-3
• Melbourne 2022: 6-0
• Bulldogs 2022: 2-4

Aside from Melbourne who were flying after their GF win and then collapsed, the trend is the teams with a shorter pre-season have a slow start (or even a down year). We’re looking good at 5-1 despite a slow start.
The question will be if we can find our consistent form through the middle of the season to come home strong, or we get found out in the 2nd half of the season when our fixture looks noticeably harder. My bet is on the former - though i think it may again come down to ruthlessness at the selection table.

 

[mpal6]

What a great outcome to get this sort of heads up in mid-April rather than mid-August.

I'm pretty glass half full about Thursday's result, and the fact that our next FIVE matches are either against premiership coaches, VERY highly regarded coaches, or both. They will absolutely go to town on what Collingwood did on Thursday night, and this in turn will give us a great opportunity to either work out what we need to improve on, whether it's game plan, personnel or in-game application/execution.

If we're still seeing the same things in a month as we saw on Thursday night, THEN I think we'll have some cause for concern.

So true. Gives us time to work on a plan B/C/D and trial that out against various teams. Coaching staff are not standing still either - Fletcher to defense, Bruce getting wing time etc - there is a fair bit of work going on in our side as well. Another step to consider is giving debut for Gallop and see how Hipwood playing relief ruck works for us.

Our side is finals worthy at this stage, just need to get there first and worry about the rest later.

 

[mpal6]

To paraphrase Browny’s old coach “things are never as bad or good as they seem”.

Percentage is always a good assessment of how a team is going and to the eye we’re going about as well as we were last season - but this year we got close win opening round, vs the close loss.

The consistency for me is in both years we were coming off playing the last game of the season. For me this is where we stand out this year with 5 wins. The other grand finalists from recent years at round-6:

• Sydney 2025: 2-4
• Brisbane 2024: 2-4
• Collingwood 2024: 3-3
• Geelong 2023: 3-3
• Sydney 2023: 3-3
• Melbourne 2022: 6-0
• Bulldogs 2022: 2-4

Aside from Melbourne who were flying after their GF win and then collapsed, the trend is the teams with a shorter pre-season have a slow start (or even a down year). We’re looking good at 5-1 despite a slow start.
The question will be if we can find our consistent form through the middle of the season to come home strong, or we get found out in the 2nd half of the season when our fixture looks noticeably harder. My bet is on the former - though i think it may again come down to ruthlessness at the selection table.

Yep, it was crucial to bag the early wins this year especially. Round 11 onwards the draw is considerably harder for us. If players could get their form going by then, we'll do well overall.

 

[Sunny Land]

To paraphrase Browny’s old coach “things are never as bad or good as they seem”.

Percentage is always a good assessment of how a team is going and to the eye we’re going about as well as we were last season - but this year we got close win opening round, vs the close loss.

The consistency for me is in both years we were coming off playing the last game of the season. For me this is where we stand out this year with 5 wins. The other grand finalists from recent years at round-6:

• Sydney 2025: 2-4
• Brisbane 2024: 2-4
• Collingwood 2024: 3-3
• Geelong 2023: 3-3
• Sydney 2023: 3-3
• Melbourne 2022: 6-0
• Bulldogs 2022: 2-4

Aside from Melbourne who were flying after their GF win and then collapsed, the trend is the teams with a shorter pre-season have a slow start (or even a down year). We’re looking good at 5-1 despite a slow start.
The question will be if we can find our consistent form through the middle of the season to come home strong, or we get found out in the 2nd half of the season when our fixture looks noticeably harder. My bet is on the former - though i think it may again come down to ruthlessness at the selection table.

I really dont mind if they play inconsistent footy all year as long as they start to put it all together in finals like 2024. Their best 4 quarter effort was the big one. What a great gift that gave us all.

 

[Grasshopper17]

Name any other player that has ever put himself in danger purposely.

Basically every single player who drops at the knees attempting to draw a high contact free.

Jack Ginnivan, Nick Watson, we can go on, and on, and on...

 

[Grasshopper17]

Fox on the 50–77-meter penalty.
They were correct but i would have thought the (experts) discussion should have been also about the penalty that was not really there in the first place.
The AFL brought in a new rule starting in the 2023 season.
The incident happened right below me in the stands and it should not have been a 50-meter penalty.

A 50m penalty will no longer be paid if a player fakes a handball while behind the mark, drawing their opponent off their position.

No 50m penalties for fake handballs among rule tweaks

The AFL has made tweaks to three rule interpretations ahead of the 2023 season

www.afl.com.au

‘Huge error’: Absurd 77m blunder stuns fans as Daicos cashes in on continued AFL problem

‘Huge error’: Absurd 77m blunder stuns fans as Daicos cashes in on continued AFL problem

www.foxsports.com.au

Yeah but in the umpire's defence on that one, I don't think Bailey ever "stood" on the mark, not even for an instant, even after being told to stand. I thought it was clearly a 50m penalty, which was a huge disappointment after he'd already been penalised for running well and truly more than 15m (I even called it from the grandstand before the umpire did).

Obviously the 77m aspect of the penalty tho was an absolute disgrace.

 

[Grasshopper17]

It's amateur hour. I watched some of the 3 games so far. Our games, lots of not 15 m, North mostly called not 15 m and seemed not to worry about it much in the Eagles game.

I swear umpires in WA do not get the memo's the umpires here in the east get. I remember the week around the bye last year the AFL announced its crackdown on holding the ball. Every game suddenly looked like a game of hot potato, which was sensational.

Except the West Coast game vs St Kilda in Perth which was even more dreary and boring than it appeared on paper at the time. Ball up after ball up after ball up

 

[Grasshopper17]

I don't think the umpires are biased at this point. I think they're just genuinely bad at their jobs. If the AFL wants to protect umpires from abuse (which i will never condone), they need to do a lot better than this, because I can't remember the last time there was so much animosity towards the umps. I can live if they make 1 or 2 bad decisions, but the game is becoming unwatchable because of them.

The absolute very best thing that AFL can do for the umpires, and the umpiring profession in general, is to change the rules to eliminate any subjectivity.

"Prior opportunity"
"Genuine attempt"
"Insufficient intent"
"Reasonable time"

You can interpret each of these differently to how I might, as can Nathan Williamson to Robert Findlay or whoever. It's a massive problem. Umpiring is hard enough, in any sport, without this kind of hoohah.

Then we also need to better leverage technology which already exists, to be able to more accurately measure 15m (for bounces and marks) and 50m. The AFL has quietly shelved its chips-in-the-ball technology after a couple of spectacular failures in the AFLW over summer. As someone who works in tech, these early failures were as predictable as they were unfortunate, and they should not have daunted the AFL in moving forward with this.

However, there appears to be a real lack of backbone or leadership from anyone at head office in any aspect of the game right now. So I certainly won't be holding my breath on any of the above improving any time soon.

And as for the umpires becoming full time professional, which to me it's embarrassing that they are not, well this is a pipe dream at the moment. They don't even have reasonable training facilities at the moment I'm led to believe.

You pay peanuts you get monkeys.

 

[OldLion]

How do you rate ND Dlanod ?

I hate Collingwood but I don't think I've seen anyone as good as him for some time. Sure he has to build up a bigger body of work but he's getting better.

As you say I don't think a comparison with Ashcroft is fair at this stage . In fact I don't think it's fair to compare anyone with ND.

Judd.

 

[twhowler]

Yep, it was crucial to bag the early wins this year especially. Round 11 onwards the draw is considerably harder for us. If players could get their form going by then, we'll do well overall.

We have used up our WCE and Richmond games.

We have a deadset horror run in the lead-up to the bye! including another 5 day break before our only easy game against the bombers. Adelaide, Geeelong and hawks away!

The plus side is IF the ladder is taking shape, we have an okay run from here in terms of balance of top 8 / bottom 10.

8 games vs bottom 10, 9 vs top 8. i guess that is a bit skewed by us being in the 8, but it makes the draw less daunting to me at least

 

[braddsey]

Yeah but in the umpire's defence on that one, I don't think Bailey ever "stood" on the mark, not even for an instant, even after being told to stand. I thought it was clearly a 50m penalty, which was a huge disappointment after he'd already been penalised for running well and truly more than 15m (I even called it from the grandstand before the umpire did).

Obviously the 77m aspect of the penalty tho was an absolute disgrace.

I’m inclined to agree with martinson on rewatch, i don’t think it was a 50. Daicos suckered Bailey with the fake “thinking about hand-balling” which caused Bailey to bounce, and then even called out that Bailey moved on the mark after doing so. If Bailey knows the rule he can rightly feel a little hard done by. Unfortunately it is another of the many rules that causing the frustration due inconsistent application because they’re too technical.

Having said that, the 77-meter penalty is clearly the bigger issue.

 

[GenericUsername202]

Like last year, you may have to wait for the grand final.

Technically, it was a 3 quarter performance. By the 4th, half the players were in the stands already celebrating.

 

[beatnik]

Last year we were 458-436.

This year we're 539-510.

The eye test certainly supports that: we've definitely been able to score more heavily through the first 6 rounds but we've also conceded some above-average totals.

Is that the Starce effect?

 

[Grasshopper17]

Is that the Starce effect?

It's a good question. That would be a concerning over-reliance on one player instead of our "system" if so.

To me, scoring levels are determined by 5 things:

1. How often you get the ball (ie possession chains: clearance wins + intercepts + behinds conceded)
2. How often you convert these possession chains into an inside 50
3. How often you are able to convert these entries into a shot at goal (ie scoring efficiency)
4. The quality of shots you are able to take (ie expected score per shot)
5. How accurate you are (ie actual score vs expected score)

I might do a bit of a breakdown this week on these 5 factors to see where the differences lie between this year and this time last year. If Starce is indeed the difference you would expect us to be falling down in the #3 and/or #4 areas.

 

[twhowler]

It's a good question. That would be a concerning over-reliance on one player instead of our "system" if so.

To me, scoring levels are determined by 5 things:

1. How often you get the ball (ie possession chains: clearance wins + intercepts + behinds conceded)
2. How often you convert these possession chains into an inside 50
3. How often you are able to convert these entries into a shot at goal (ie scoring efficiency)
4. The quality of shots you are able to take (ie expected score per shot)
5. How accurate you are (ie actual score vs expected score)

I might do a bit of a breakdown this week on these 5 factors to see where the differences lie between this year and this time last year. If Starce is indeed the difference you would expect us to be falling down in the #3 and/or #4 areas.

Will be interested in this

The worst evidence of all, anecdotal, says to me Starce is so good at reading the play. I assume he averages high intercept possessions? When he gets one he is so clean whether it be ground or air. And an attack is totally nullified. He also takes their best small / mid. Now it's Noah. Who usually gets their second. Who gets their second? Jaspa? He is a good attacking half back but doesn't strike me as lockdown

Not sure who else to play there, Brain would be the one i would give another go as he is good in the air like starce but i don't watch 2s. Brain to hb / fletcher wing.

I know Brain had a couple of bad moments in our losses, but his debut was awesome vs the crows and he looked really good back there overall, seems weird he hasn't been given another shot