Review Semi final vs Hawthorn - Ugly, Historically Embarrassing and Pathetic

[TheLeftFist8]

Rachele's two last quarter goals and his pass to Fog in the 3rd the only highlights of the game

Rankine's absence further highlights the complete lack of elite skill under pressure.

We have to draft blokes with skill...I'm afraid Draper not the answer in this area either.

 

[TRP1996]

Kinda remarkable that Taylor in his, what, quarter and a bit in the midfield managed to outperform most of our starting midfield.

 

[dean33]

Bad luck Crows, sometimes you have to go through a bit of pain before it starts to click. I saw my tigers get beaten in 3 consecutive elimination finals, then slump to 13th after a 100pt final Rd loss. You have the nucleus of a very good side and you dont finish 1st by accident. Good luck for next season.

 

[Rotayjay]

I'm convinced the illness was a factor - lots of players off the pace.

 

[Crow_68]

Because Taylor is a proper footballer with brains and clean hands. Better than the other try hards.

And yet we prefer Murphy and Jay Boyle running through the SANFL midfield.

 

[dani_giuls]

This sums up how I feel right now after this season

 

[CrowBloke]

Out of all the players who absolutely stunk it up in finals, im most disappointed in Dawson. He’s our Captain, he’s supposed to lead from the front, and he put in two of the most limp efforts I’ve ever seen from a leader.

Disagree; that's way too harsh.
Plenty of our blokes played poorly in 2 Finals but tonight Dawson was one of our best (out of not many):
17K, 4HB, 6 marks, 6 tackles

Not to mention the numerous occasions he selfishly burnt teammates trying to kick 60m goals.

OK, you're angry and upset; me too, but that's just not the case.
He had one shot for goal from about 55m out.

This stink is gonna last a while.

Yes, but it's a stench of Nicks' creation, not Dawson's.

 

[BigLefty]

Nick's is so out of ideas, well correction for that to work you have to have an idea on the first place. Nick's benefited from a soft draw and minimal injuries. Only reason we ended up top.

That's not entirely fair.

His ideas got us to top spot

For some reason he forgot them the last 2 weeks.

 

[Crow till I die]

Bad luck Crows, sometimes you have to go through a bit of pain before it starts to click. I saw my tigers get beaten in 3 consecutive elimination finals, then slump to 13th after a 100pt final Rd loss. You have the nucleus of a very good side and you dont finish 1st by accident. Good luck for next season.

Yeah, after last week i was hoping we would at least win a fnal this year just to get that feeling into the side as confidence for next year. Lots of deficiencies in the side and nick got caught with his pants down tonight...hopeless

 

[andidas]

And yet we prefer Murphy and Jay Boyle running through the SANFL midfield.

You forgot chayce jones, Schoenberg. All of which are known quantities, while unknown quantities get pushed into other roles to accommodate for these guys

 

[Crowman32]

Peatling was agood recruit for us but he fell off the cliff towards the end of the season.

 

[1990crow]

Where's Neil Balme in all this? Surely writing a recommendation for Nicks to be sacked tonight and Buckley to take over.

 

[Bay62]

Predictably pathetic as soon as he got his money.

And now the ruck rules are changing so they have to jump not wrestle. No wonder we’re chasing Draper

 

[CrowBloke]

the game was so bad we probably up our offer for draper now to really rub it in

Wait, what?
If we're chasing Draper why did we extend RoB for 3 years?

 

[Redline]

Players that should be depth next year;
Taylor
Keyes
Berry
Hinge
Peatling
Cumming

We could probably carry one or 2 but not half the side

I'd add ANB to that list. He gets too many free passes around here. I think he will eventually drop out of of the side.

 

[TheLeftFist8]

And now the ruck rules are changing so they have to jump not wrestle. No wonder we’re chasing Draper

At this point we will take anyone who can drop a footy onto their feet without tripping over

 

[40porpoise]

Yea actually hated watching us play the last 6 weeks tbh. It’s like we were a completely different team with a different game plan

And because we went away from the fast style of play, I think it also took away our ferociousness in the contest.

We actually played with the intensity of a pre season game in both finals

I agree. Almost like we wanted it kicked to our defenders so we could intercept. We had no hunger to hunt the ball and attack

 

[Scorpus]

I am convinced that our midfielders get worse the longer they are coached to be midfielders.

The only players that ever look competent in there are fresh hires briefly, before they slowly devolve and get worse. We get a bump when we make a positional change but if that change sticks, form erodes

 

[Burtonsgottago]

We went from a high scoring, shootout exciting young team early in the season, into a defensive heavy team. We completely changed our gameplan and structure, to be all defense. While that earned us the minor prem, our transiton game became the worst in the league. And set ourselves for finals failure.

Felt like we never really wanted to get our hands on the ball first, lacked finals aggression. We were by far the worst team in this final series. Fremantle, GWS and Lions played much better football, even though they lost.

Only ones that can say that did something:
Milera - Won his one on ones
Curtain - some nice contested marks, and contested posessions
Worrel / Max / Laird - decent, but given how soundly we got beat in defense. Nothing to be proud of
Riley - Kick 3 goals, and tried. Poor supporting cast
Rachele - Kicked goals. Should have been there since the first miniute

Pathetic:
Nicks - Doesn't know how to coach. Sadly we'll keep him around, cause he won the minor prem (sheer luck)
Berry - Plodder, that becomes a d-grade mid vs other elite mids and when it matters the most
Tex - hope he retires, for the good of the club. We aint winning the flag with him there, time to rebuild the forward line
Fog - time and time again, loses contest and becomes invisible. Okay as a 3rd tall, but he's just an avg forward
Soglio - Seems never 100%, and becomes liability. Tired of seeing "glimspes" of his best, then being let down.
ROB - Only thing you can bank on, is him shitting the bed against good rucks and teams
Keane - Got torched all night by someone so crafty. Nicks should have switched someone on Guston
Murray - Invisible, didn't do anything
Hinge - Invisible x2
Pedlar - gets a pass for 3 goals last week. But he's just doesn't have the hands to clunk marks, always to seems to be outmarked. Doesn't do enough
Smith - Clearly a liablity now. Just move him on

I'd rather us to play the kids next season. Get experience into Draper, Edwards, Oscar, Dowling, Cook.
No point persisting with exactly the same 23, they are so far from it. Alot of c-graders, that played like b-graders during the regular season. But when the pressure is on, they revert back.

I thought Pedlar was clean tonight

 

[Crow_Magnon]

Wow. Knew early on when I saw the score 35 to 22 that we were gone. Absolutely devastated that we didn't show up again in a final. Glad I'm overseas and not having to face colleagues and one of my idiot brothers who's a Dawks supporter.

 

[moses]

I had a terrible feeling the wheels would fall off when the Rankine stuff blew up and it did.

We did not have the composure or intensity to play finals. Nicks severely out coached in 2 finals (he is not up to it). Club needs to be ruthless and not accept this end of season debacle.

 

[Scorpus]

Mate, call 13 11 14.
They should be able to help.

Don't worry, this guy took the mask off in a DM to me. He was trolling

 

[Crow till I die]

Good.
Milera - held his head up high out there and is absolutely a big part of things going forward as he stoid up in a final.
Worrell - our best player and is just top drawer. Lock him down for the next decade please
Laird. Played a good game tonight
Thilthorpe. Only key forward that even looked close to it tonight. 3 goals a devent effort.
Rachele - quality stands out and his 2nd half was better than most of the sides 8 quarters over 2 fnals.

Bad. Misfiring by foot all night. Overshot our forwards more times than i can remember. Our foot skills needed to be bang on tonight for us to win...we got the exact opposite.

Ugly. Midfeld got thrashed. Got towelled up at the stoppage and out worked all night. Dire.
Nicks - failed tonight when it was onthe line.
van berlo - what is he getting paid for? To have our ruck hit the ball nowhere near our mids then to have our mids stationed where the ball was not going?

Some reputations were burnt badly this finals series...fog had no impact at all, keane was horrendous, our 3 recruits last year in peatling and cumming made up the numbers and ANB had no impact. We have no ruck..a ruck a ruck, my kingdom for a ruck.

Oh well, onto trade week now

 

[Bay62]

Realistically, this year we over performed. Improved system and decent recruits not only got us into the right but we managed to get to top. The three areas we were working to improve: win the close ones - did much better there; win away games - better; improve the midfield - not so much.

Now we need to get some better pkayers. Soligo and Berry were boys against men in the midfield tonight. And change up the coaching - we were on the boundary in the Eddie Betts pocket and time and time again I watched Newcombe push off Berry, get the ball and dish it off. Berry had NO effect on him. Why was he left on him to get spanked for 10-0 midfield clearances. Not to mention our total inability to get an uncontested possession from a kick in - all year we’ve been kicking to a contest and it comes straight back

 

[CrowBloke]

Nicks was so diluted about this midfield.

Yes, his 'solutions' are weak ...

Not even he can ignore this.

He can.
He will.