AFL Autopsy RND 1: Done by the Hawkes

[Cold Sober]

Argue all you like, OR is a load of crap, as is the stand rule, but idiots know better.
Rugby League is kicking AFL arses through common sense decisions alone.
And they still have a Footy Show.

 

[Cold Sober]

HB is typically an important leadership position. It’s just McGrath is crap at it. However that’s true of most positions

He's been a back pocket specialist since day one.

 

[boncer34]

Anyone else bemused the AFL forced GA members to upgrade tickets last night only for the stadium to not even be 3/4 full?

 

[Blind Turn]

Argue all you like, OR is a load of crap, as is the stand rule, but idiots know better.
Rugby League is kicking AFL arses through common sense decisions alone.
And they still have a Footy Show.

I don’t understand why we aren’t having a serious conversation about introducing a 25m rule for minor indiscretions and new rule changes. Players are being penalised for instinctive ground coverage, gifting the other team goals on the back of confusing nonsense. If they want to introduce a new rule that players won’t deliberately ignore, a 25m rule would be a good compromise. I don’t hear anyone bringing this option up but I can’t see a negative other than giving the umps another subjective decision to make. But saving 50s for clear and obvious late contact or deliberately holding up play etc shouldn't be too hard to prioritise for such critical meterage.

 

[faible]

I don’t understand why we aren’t having a serious conversation about introducing a 25m rule for minor indiscretions and new rule changes. Players are being penalised for instinctive ground coverage, gifting the other team goals on the back of confusing nonsense. If they want to introduce a new rule that players won’t deliberately ignore, a 25m rule would be a good compromise. I don’t hear anyone bringing this option up but I can’t see a negative other than giving the umps another subjective decision to make. But saving 50s for clear and obvious late contact or deliberately holding up play etc shouldn't be too hard to prioritise for such critical meterage.

50m is an absolutely enormous penalty in the modern game. Full ground zone defence is the key thing every (good) team trains, and a 50m penalty basically negates it.

You also don’t want it going the other way where teams just give away a 25m penalty because it’s not meaningful enough either, but some of the 50s paid are pretty massively impactful for some very minor actions.

 

[King Patty]

We aren’t playing finals, but if we are showing this same type of tripe come end of year, Scott has to go.

That's patient.

I'm keen to see how North and Port go today and see if we are a chance next week.

Scott can't do many changes.
Kako should come in which helps.

In VFl Tsatas played well, Robey still weeks away from match fitness.
Gresham sounded like went ok.
Farrow quietish.

After the crows game last year how did we respond, well we played Port at marvel and won.

 

[King Patty]

Langford plays best up forward, he should have taken a shot from the half forward flank in the first half.

Langford had a cracker year on the wing and also played ok in defence until switched forward and kicked 50.

Maybe switch him to defence as third tall defender and distributor until Ridley is back.
(That may also fire him up as a forward when returns)

That also balances out forward line. Move McGrath to midfield, Roberts back to defence (but also rotate them on ball) like sheedy used to do with Mark Johnson and Solomon off half back)


b: Nguyen McKay Langford
hb: Roberts Reid Redman
c: Duursma Parish Fiorini
hf: Durham Caddy Caldwell
f: Wright MAY Kako
r: Blakiston McGrath (c) Merrett
int: El-Achkar Sharp Perkins Prior Johnson

In Kako
Out: Kondo

Emg: Kondo, Tstatas, Vissentini

rotations -
McGrath and Roberts
Parish and Durham
Merrett and Caldwell

with Sharp also coming off the bench midfield relief.
And Huss/ Perkins forward relief.
Prior, Johnson wing / defence relief

 

[jdstorm]

Langford had a cracker year on the wing and also played ok in defence until switched forward and kicked 50.

Maybe switch him to defence as third tall defender and distributor until Ridley is back.
(That may also fire him up as a forward when returns)

That also balances out forward line. Move McGrath to midfield, Roberts back to defence (but also rotate them on ball) like sheets used to do with Mark Johnson and Solomon off half back)


b: Nguyen McKay Langford
hb: Roberts Reid Redman
c: Duursma Parish Fiorini
hf: Durham Caddy Caldwell
f: Wright MAY Kako
r: Blakiston McGrath (c) Merrett
int: El-Achkar Sharp Perkins Prior Johnson

In Kako
Out: Kondo

Emg: Kondo, Tstatas, Vissentini

rotations -
McGrath and Roberts
Parish and Durham
Merrett and Caldwell

with Sharp also coming off the bench midfield relief.
And Huss/ Perkins forward relief.
Prior, Johnson wing / defence relief

Langford was a pretty poor defender and doesn’t have the tank to play wing.

He’s probably elsewhere next season or in the VFL with him and caddy competing for 1 spot.

 

[ant555]

Sure, it’s in their DNA as they say, much like the Swans did for so long. So why don’t we employ a coach who can implement a defensive structure before we spend entire preseasons training a transition gameplan that has no solidity in reacting to turnovers?

We did. Worsfold. Rutten. North where a more defensive than attacking side under Scott.
Hawks got toasted a lot early on under Mitchell working their attacking game plan.

 

[Mr Meeseeks]

View attachment 2550595
View attachment 2550596
View attachment 2550598
View attachment 2550599
View attachment 2550600
View attachment 2550602
View attachment 2550603

Haha that was a tough year. At the end of that year though we got rid of Kosi and Brockman and traded in Massimo, Ginni, Gunston (back), Chol and drafted Wiz.

Next year semi, year after prelim. It can be turned around quickly.

Bad luck lads, I felt for my mates I was at the game with. The club is feeling the effects of the unavoidable quirk that finishing 9-14 year after year is worse than bottoming out. Perhaps Welsh should gave let Rosa go harder for a top 3 pick last year...

 

[Wahooti Fandango]

Haha that was a tough year. At the end of that year though we got rid of Kosi and Brockman and traded in Massimo, Ginni, Gunston (back), Chol and drafted Wiz.

Next year semi, year after prelim. It can be turned around quickly.

Bad luck lads, I felt for my mates I was at the game with. The club is feeling the effects of the unavoidable quirk that finishing 9-14 year after year is worse than bottoming out.

 

[Blind Turn]

We did. Worsfold. Rutten. North where a more defensive than attacking side under Scott.
Hawks got toasted a lot early on under Mitchell working their attacking game plan.

Worsfold and Rutten did not implement a gameplan that worked defensively. We’ve been scored against in easy transitions ever since the saga years. It’s never been addressed properly. We start doing the fast flowing gameplan that, as an example, used Saad and McKenna as dashing half backs, but there was no evidence of a successful defensive strategy that actually worked before hand. It looks to be the same this year. We’ve been using fast ball movement in the preseason match practice but we haven’t seen any success in our defensive set-ups to protect us when the ball inevitably gets turned over.

 

[Call Me Cake]

Haha that was a tough year. At the end of that year though we got rid of Kosi and Brockman and traded in Massimo, Ginni, Gunston (back), Chol and drafted Wiz.

Next year semi, year after prelim. It can be turned around quickly.

Bad luck lads, I felt for my mates I was at the game with. The club is feeling the effects of the unavoidable quirk that finishing 9-14 year after year is worse than bottoming out. Perhaps Welsh should gave let Rosa go harder for a top 3 pick last year...

Every team that's young/developing will suffer the results I showed before they either improve from within or bring in B grade players or a mix of both. The pattern is aways the same over the years, big losses happens up against teams that are mid table or flat track bullies.

Though I actually hope we don't emulate your trajectory and go better. You finished 8th and had to scrape into finals. Your mids won't hack it against the best as the last 2 years have proven and that leads to the same result as being 9th is. Gunston is one seniors card away from a hammy. Perhaps the Hawks could've added to their midfieled last year if they were competent enough but it's okay maybe Henry Whoswaite Is available...

 

[JayJ20]

Adelaide beat Collingwood. There goes the running in quick sand because we didn’t play last week excuse.

Collingwood may have overrun Adelaide if not for the two 50s they received. Geelong overran Fremantle.

They do have an advantage. I'd even back Richmond to have beaten Carlton if they didn't play the week before.

 

[ant555]

Worsfold and Rutten did not implement a gameplan that worked defensively. We’ve been scored against in easy transitions ever since the saga years. It’s never been addressed properly. We start doing the fast flowing gameplan that, as an example, used Saad and McKenna as dashing half backs, but there was no evidence of a successful defensive strategy that actually worked before hand. It looks to be the same this year. We’ve been using fast ball movement in the preseason match practice but we haven’t seen any success in our defensive set-ups to protect us when the ball inevitably gets turned over.

Did not implement of failed trying to implement? every coach we have had going back to Bomber Thompson has said we need to defend better to go forward yet here we are. To say it has never been addressed properly is not 100% right. Rutten did a power of work with defensive game plan. He tried brining over what he set up at Richmond but for a few reasons it failed. Lack of buy in from the players. Lack of ability to sell it as the head coach. Players probably did not respect him as a coach with "aura". The did hours of work on it but some players did not get it. I watched them doing it at training.

We have not been able to defend the footy playing slow and safe either. You mention dashing half backs. Dashing half backs are not really the issue. Our biggest issue has really been midfield and forward half pressure. You could never really say 100% exactly how poor our back 6 have been as 99% of the time they have been under huge pressure from poor defence up the ground.

So, we get to now. They still spend hours on defensive set up. it is not that they just train attacking. There are drills that are continually stopped when the team defence is out of position. You have to work both sides. Playing attacking footy is a must now. We have to try and work them both together to go forward. The sides that have the defensive DNA spent years doing it in a different era. They were able to spend 4 years playing hard defence as there brand. It was not a hinderance to finishing high on the ladder. If you look at Collingwood and Sydney both have had to adapt to playing attacking footy to stay relevant in the last 5 years. Yes, the defensive culture helped with the transition, but you cannot actually spend 3 years working up a defensive game plan as your flag in the ground anymore.

Our recruiting has been an issue. We have never really gone out of our way to recruit two way running midfielders. We have never really looked at leadership as being a top box to tick and leadership in the players is the key to team defence. Have never really focused on endurance running much either. Another trait to a strong team defence.

Scott will get burnt if he keeps playing Merrett and Parish in the midfield at the same time. Not because they are dud players, because neither can actually defend in a consistent way and are 90% offensive players. You cannot carry that so that will be on him.

Friday was a bit of a perfect storm. Did not really have the small forward set up we wanted to play due to the Kako injury. Our ruck situation is what it is, and the Hawks had two good rucks. Lot of skill errors causing turnover that is really hard to defend even for good sides. Still have some senior players who just lack defensive IQ/ability. Young players who make defensive mistakes.

I would guarantee if we just tried to play some sort of ugly defence and spent 3 years changing the side to play a heavily weighted defensive game plan the outrage would be just as bad.

A lot of our issue is the inability to make use of the opportunities created. In general, even last year most games we were in the ballpark for creating inside 50 chances, but we lacked the actual ability to convert them.
Watching the cats yesterday I was looking at what they were doing that was so different to us and it was not a lot. It was more execution and a better-quality forward line. They did not continually miss short handball that halted momentum. They used the ball better allowing them to move the footy inside 50 quicker. it was not that they actually defended a lot differently to what we tried to set up

The question mark as far as defence goes should be why we have continued to not recruit more players who have the leadership and competitiveness to make a team defence work. Melbourne under Jason Taylor had competitor first. Can he play second. Richmond went endurance. Competitor. how well does he play. We have really only gone looks like he can play. Can we find some sort of diamond in the rough. Competitor. Endurance. Leadership has taken a back seat.

Key to team defence. Leadership depth in the playing group.

Maybe we have not had coaches good enough to sell it, but there has been a lot of hours spent working on it in the last 10 years. Combination of players and ability of coaches to make it work is more than likely a percentage of it.

 

[Phone]

Argue all you like, OR is a load of crap, as is the stand rule, but idiots know better.
Rugby League is kicking AFL arses through common sense decisions alone.
And they still have a Footy Show.

that will be news to the NRL fans who hate peter v'landys for all the rule changes they've been doing

 

[Petrify]

Collingwood may have overrun Adelaide if not for the two 50s they received. Geelong overran Fremantle.

They do have an advantage. I'd even back Richmond to have beaten Carlton if they didn't play the week before.

Agree. It's a massive advantage.

It's 9-3.

We still would've lost, but I don't think we would've been belted as hard.

 

[faible]

Did not implement of failed trying to implement? every coach we have had going back to Bomber Thompson has said we need to defend better to go forward yet here we are. To say it has never been addressed properly is not 100% right. Rutten did a power of work with defensive game plan. He tried brining over what he set up at Richmond but for a few reasons it failed. Lack of buy in from the players. Lack of ability to sell it as the head coach. Players probably did not respect him as a coach with "aura". The did hours of work on it but some players did not get it. I watched them doing it at training.

We have not been able to defend the footy playing slow and safe either. You mention dashing half backs. Dashing half backs are not really the issue. Our biggest issue has really been midfield and forward half pressure. You could never really say 100% exactly how poor our back 6 have been as 99% of the time they have been under huge pressure from poor defence up the ground.

So, we get to now. They still spend hours on defensive set up. it is not that they just train attacking. There are drills that are continually stopped when the team defence is out of position. You have to work both sides. Playing attacking footy is a must now. We have to try and work them both together to go forward. The sides that have the defensive DNA spent years doing it in a different era. They were able to spend 4 years playing hard defence as there brand. It was not a hinderance to finishing high on the ladder. If you look at Collingwood and Sydney both have had to adapt to playing attacking footy to stay relevant in the last 5 years. Yes, the defensive culture helped with the transition, but you cannot actually spend 3 years working up a defensive game plan as your flag in the ground anymore.

Our recruiting has been an issue. We have never really gone out of our way to recruit two way running midfielders. We have never really looked at leadership as being a top box to tick and leadership in the players is the key to team defence. Have never really focused on endurance running much either. Another trait to a strong team defence.

Scott will get burnt if he keeps playing Merrett and Parish in the midfield at the same time. Not because they are dud players, because neither can actually defend in a consistent way and are 90% offensive players. You cannot carry that so that will be on him.

Friday was a bit of a perfect storm. Did not really have the small forward set up we wanted to play due to the Kako injury. Our ruck situation is what it is, and the Hawks had two good rucks. Lot of skill errors causing turnover that is really hard to defend even for good sides. Still have some senior players who just lack defensive IQ/ability. Young players who make defensive mistakes.

I would guarantee if we just tried to play some sort of ugly defence and spent 3 years changing the side to play a heavily weighted defensive game plan the outrage would be just as bad.

A lot of our issue is the inability to make use of the opportunities created. In general, even last year most games we were in the ballpark for creating inside 50 chances, but we lacked the actual ability to convert them.
Watching the cats yesterday I was looking at what they were doing that was so different to us and it was not a lot. It was more execution and a better-quality forward line. They did not continually miss short handball that halted momentum. They used the ball better allowing them to move the footy inside 50 quicker. it was not that they actually defended a lot differently to what we tried to set up

The question mark as far as defence goes should be why we have continued to not recruit more players who have the leadership and competitiveness to make a team defence work. Melbourne under Jason Taylor had competitor first. Can he play second. Richmond went endurance. Competitor. how well does he play. We have really only gone looks like he can play. Can we find some sort of diamond in the rough. Competitor. Endurance. Leadership has taken a back seat.

Key to team defence. Leadership depth in the playing group.

Maybe we have not had coaches good enough to sell it, but there has been a lot of hours spent working on it in the last 10 years. Combination of players and ability of coaches to make it work is more than likely a percentage of it.

We’ve gone through how many different head coaches now?

The only constant in the entire time was in the recruitment department.

I always thought Dodoro picked players that individually were decent but not necessarily complementary to one another (Parish the regular example of this) but perhaps I underestimated how many of them were simply not even decent modern footballers.

Rosa might still be a bust, but the recruitment department was the only constant in this entire time that we kept churning through head coaches and coaching panels.

 

[Vindicater]

I still don't understand why they can't just make opening round be played in every city?

Carlton Vs Richmond -Thurs night Melbourne
Hawthorn Vs. GWS - Friday night Sydney
Collingwood vs. West Coast - Sat arvo Perth
North vs. Port - Sat arvo - Adelaide
Essendon vs. Brisbane - Sat night - Brisbane
Geelong vs Sydney - Sat night Sydney
Bulldogs vs Freo - Sunday arvo - Perth
Saints vs. Gold Coast - Sunday arvo - GC
Melbourne vs Adelaide - Sunday arvo - Adelaide

Done. Keep the stupid Carlton/Richmond opening game and then switch up who plays who every year

 

[Blind Turn]

Did not implement of failed trying to implement? every coach we have had going back to Bomber Thompson has said we need to defend better to go forward yet here we are. To say it has never been addressed properly is not 100% right. Rutten did a power of work with defensive game plan. He tried brining over what he set up at Richmond but for a few reasons it failed. Lack of buy in from the players. Lack of ability to sell it as the head coach. Players probably did not respect him as a coach with "aura". The did hours of work on it but some players did not get it. I watched them doing it at training.

We have not been able to defend the footy playing slow and safe either. You mention dashing half backs. Dashing half backs are not really the issue. Our biggest issue has really been midfield and forward half pressure. You could never really say 100% exactly how poor our back 6 have been as 99% of the time they have been under huge pressure from poor defence up the ground.

So, we get to now. They still spend hours on defensive set up. it is not that they just train attacking. There are drills that are continually stopped when the team defence is out of position. You have to work both sides. Playing attacking footy is a must now. We have to try and work them both together to go forward. The sides that have the defensive DNA spent years doing it in a different era. They were able to spend 4 years playing hard defence as there brand. It was not a hinderance to finishing high on the ladder. If you look at Collingwood and Sydney both have had to adapt to playing attacking footy to stay relevant in the last 5 years. Yes, the defensive culture helped with the transition, but you cannot actually spend 3 years working up a defensive game plan as your flag in the ground anymore.

Our recruiting has been an issue. We have never really gone out of our way to recruit two way running midfielders. We have never really looked at leadership as being a top box to tick and leadership in the players is the key to team defence. Have never really focused on endurance running much either. Another trait to a strong team defence.

Scott will get burnt if he keeps playing Merrett and Parish in the midfield at the same time. Not because they are dud players, because neither can actually defend in a consistent way and are 90% offensive players. You cannot carry that so that will be on him.

Friday was a bit of a perfect storm. Did not really have the small forward set up we wanted to play due to the Kako injury. Our ruck situation is what it is, and the Hawks had two good rucks. Lot of skill errors causing turnover that is really hard to defend even for good sides. Still have some senior players who just lack defensive IQ/ability. Young players who make defensive mistakes.

I would guarantee if we just tried to play some sort of ugly defence and spent 3 years changing the side to play a heavily weighted defensive game plan the outrage would be just as bad.

A lot of our issue is the inability to make use of the opportunities created. In general, even last year most games we were in the ballpark for creating inside 50 chances, but we lacked the actual ability to convert them.
Watching the cats yesterday I was looking at what they were doing that was so different to us and it was not a lot. It was more execution and a better-quality forward line. They did not continually miss short handball that halted momentum. They used the ball better allowing them to move the footy inside 50 quicker. it was not that they actually defended a lot differently to what we tried to set up

The question mark as far as defence goes should be why we have continued to not recruit more players who have the leadership and competitiveness to make a team defence work. Melbourne under Jason Taylor had competitor first. Can he play second. Richmond went endurance. Competitor. how well does he play. We have really only gone looks like he can play. Can we find some sort of diamond in the rough. Competitor. Endurance. Leadership has taken a back seat.

Key to team defence. Leadership depth in the playing group.

Maybe we have not had coaches good enough to sell it, but there has been a lot of hours spent working on it in the last 10 years. Combination of players and ability of coaches to make it work is more than likely a percentage of it.

I know what you’re saying. I know we’ve tried to prioritise a defensive gameplan. But we haven’t had one that works. Until that happens you can’t be playing as if you can play transition football toe-to-toe with teams that know how to pick you off. It’s almost like the culture shift we need is like the Bloods culture at Sydney where your first objective is to be hard to beat. That might take years and it won’t please your Caddys or Mays developing in our forward half but it might be what it takes. A total buy-in on absolute commitment to defensive play above all else. Either that or we ensure we have built a team that has elite disposal all over the ground to limit turnovers. The way things are at the moment, with the type of footy being played this year, we will be cut apart more often than not.

 

[ant555]

I know what you’re saying. I know we’ve tried to prioritise a defensive gameplan. But we haven’t had one that works. Until that happens you can’t be playing as if you can play transition football toe-to-toe with teams that know how to pick you off. It’s almost like the culture shift we need is like the Bloods culture at Sydney where your first objective is to be hard to beat. That might take years and it won’t please your Caddys or Mays developing in our forward half but it might be what it takes. A total buy-in on absolute commitment to defensive play above all else. Either that or we ensure we have built a team that has elite disposal all over the ground to limit turnovers. The way things are at the moment, with the type of footy being played this year, we will be cut apart more often than not.

This is a fair comment.
I think the only real fix will be to keep drafting or bringing in competitors and leaders. Until we have players with the mindset it will be hard to shift the culture.
Then it will be on whoever is coaching to move on the players who do not get it.
Thankfully the last 3 drafts have seen us look at players with a competitive streak. Some like Lual did not quite work out but it is really the only way to go.
Again, we wait and see.

 

[gillon]

It really is depressing being an Essendon supporter. We have to be in the worst situation out of every team in the league, besides maybe West Coast who have at least had major success in the last decade. Teams have won premierships and gone through rebuilds while we have remained anywhere from terrible to average.

20 years of incompetence and terrible drafting does this I guess.

 

[Old Campaigner]

20 years of incompetence and terrible drafting does this I guess.

hubris is a hell of a drug

 

[Wahooti Fandango]

Classic Essington. Dumb football.

 

[jctrout]

What bothers me the most is that the senior players just didn’t execute the plan. Can forgive a new player for getting lost at times but this stinks of the senior players checking out of the rebuild and out of the coach