Preview Round 3: Changes/prematch discussion vs Hawthorn

[Mav]

Yeah okay. I do understand that.

But get over it. Even if its justified its a shit way to behave.

I don’t want us to lose, never have never will. But when we have lost the last two games I haven’t felt the same disappointment as my other 40 years of watching. Losing has become “meh” as I hope there’s a silver lining to the loss.

And I’m pretty sure that’s how most others that you are telling to get over it feel.

 

[King Corey]

I don’t want us to lose, never have never will. But when we have lost the last two games I haven’t felt the same disappointment as my other 40 years of watching. Losing has become “meh” as I hope there’s a silver lining to the loss.

And I’m pretty sure that’s how most others that you are telling to get over it feel.

That's the thing, the apathy growing amongst several hardcore supporters (you don't waste time signing up on here and contributing 1000s of self-indulgent musings if you're note) is a growing trend at the moment. I wouldn't say that has been the predominant feeling in previous years.

For those who are posting somewhat pious judgements of those who criticise the coach and team, I'll pose this - what angle are you taking offence from?

Are you cheerleading? Is your viewpoint is that a supporter should only ever vocally support the coach and team and never dare question whether there's need for change?

Or is it a reasoned judgement? Are you laughing at all the people out of favour with Brad Scott et al because you think they're jumping too early and missing the bright future just around the corner?

There's plenty of binary arguments on here boiling down to "time to go Brad" vs "ffs it's round 2" but I'm not seeing that many reasoned responses from the latter camp.

Am all ears for anyone who can articulate a genuine argument in favour of still seeing Brad Scott as our long term coach and who don't draw any concerns from our results in 2019 thus far.

 

[ferball]

I don’t want us to lose, never have never will. But when we have lost the last two games I haven’t felt the same disappointment as my other 40 years of watching. Losing has become “meh” as I hope there’s a silver lining to the loss.

And I’m pretty sure that’s how most others that you are telling to get over it feel.

Yep. I felt that way too on Sunday.

None the less its still not on.

Everyone saying "BS has killed my passion..." is wrong. The only person who can do that is you.

For him to get the sack things will have to go so badly that some people might not be able to cope. He's not going to be sacked on the back of two lost games with 6 new players playing and another 2 playing with under 10 games between them.

 

[Mav]

That's the thing, the apathy growing amongst several hardcore supporters (you don't waste time signing up on here and contributing 1000s of self-indulgent musings if you're note) is a growing trend at the moment. I wouldn't say that has been the predominant feeling in previous years.

For those who are posting somewhat pious judgements of those who criticise the coach and team, I'll pose this - what angle are you taking offence from?

Are you cheerleading? Is your viewpoint is that a supporter should only ever vocally support the coach and team and never dare question whether there's need for change?

Or is it a reasoned judgement? Are you laughing at all the people out of favour with Brad Scott et al because you think they're jumping too early and missing the bright future just around the corner?

There's plenty of binary arguments on here boiling down to "time to go Brad" vs "ffs it's round 2" but I'm not seeing that many reasoned responses from the latter camp.

Am all ears for anyone who can articulate a genuine argument in favour of still seeing Brad Scott as our long term coach and who don't draw any concerns from our results in 2019 thus far.

But but but...Collingwood

 

[scooby1279]

Bring the pressure, sort the centre clearances and we will win this. We are not that far off getting our shit together.

thats the thing though, we are one of the worst centre clearance team in the afl the past 3 seasons

 

[King Corey]

Yep. I felt that way too on Sunday.

None the less its still not on.

Everyone saying "BS has killed my passion..." is wrong. The only person who can do that is you.

For him to get the sack things will have to go so badly that some people might not be able to cope. He's not going to be sacked on the back of two lost games with 6 new players playing and another 2 playing with under 10 games between them.

Do you think he should be our senior coach until the end of his contract? Disregarding the probability either way of him being sacked.

 

[ferball]

That's the thing, the apathy growing amongst several hardcore supporters (you don't waste time signing up on here and contributing 1000s of self-indulgent musings if you're note) is a growing trend at the moment. I wouldn't say that has been the predominant feeling in previous years.

For those who are posting somewhat pious judgements of those who criticise the coach and team, I'll pose this - what angle are you taking offence from?

Are you cheerleading? Is your viewpoint is that a supporter should only ever vocally support the coach and team and never dare question whether there's need for change?

Or is it a reasoned judgement? Are you laughing at all the people out of favour with Brad Scott et al because you think they're jumping too early and missing the bright future just around the corner?

There's plenty of binary arguments on here boiling down to "time to go Brad" vs "ffs it's round 2" but I'm not seeing that many reasoned responses from the latter camp.

Am all ears for anyone who can articulate a genuine argument in favour of still seeing Brad Scott as our long term coach and who don't draw any concerns from our results in 2019 thus far.

He's copped heaps of shit since I joined.

People like KT, Zondor and others have been relentless in their criticism. (The only one to note a positive was Z btw.) I swear its like we are champing at the bit for shit to go wrong so we can start bagging Scott and its been like that since I got here nearly 4 years ago. So this doesn't seem any different. Its just another excuse to start the same relentlessly negative whinging.

This year we have a shitful pre season with injuries, the ground unavailable at times and one of our favorite players trying to top himself, wholesale list changes over the last 3 seasons (including nine players with less than 10 games for North between them having played already,) and a change of game style. But everyone expected everything perfect from the get go.

And when it wasn't they've started the worst whinging I've heard since I got here. And I don't listen to Brad Scott in the media. Haven't for years so maybe that helps.

To be clear I'm not laughing at anyone. I'm having a go at them.

Harden the **** up. You want your footy team to show a bit of heart then maybe you should try setting them an example.

 

[Snake_Baker]

You're dismissing the round 1 abomination and the centre square issues too easily.

 

[King Corey]

He's copped heaps of shit since I joined.

People like KT, Zondor and others have been relentless in their criticism. (The only one to note a positive was Z btw.) I swear its like we are champing at the bit for shit to go wrong so we can start bagging Scott and its been like that since I got here nearly 4 years ago. So this doesn't seem any different. Its just another excuse to start the same relentlessly negative whinging.

This year we have a shitful pre season with injuries, the ground unavailable at times and one of our favorite players trying to top himself, wholesale list changes over the last 3 seasons (including nine players with less than 10 games for North between them having played already,) and a change of game style. But everyone expected everything perfect from the get go.

And when it wasn't they've started the worst whinging I've heard since I got here. And I don't listen to Brad Scott in the media. Haven't for years so maybe that helps.

To be clear I'm not laughing at anyone. I'm having a go at them.

Harden the **** up. You want your footy team to show a bit of heart then maybe you should try setting them an example.

Those are all opinions you're entitled to but I notice you chose not to answer the question.

Clarkson lost the reigning Brownlow medalist before the season started. Hinkley lost his newly annointed joint captain to some Bonnie Doon incident. Unexpected challenges are thrown at all AFL coaches. All lists undergo constant change. All clubs are coping with the same rule changes.

I'll interpret that essentially you're of the cheerleading philosophy more than pragmatically seeing an untapped upside to the current football program?

 

[ferball]

Do you think he should be our senior coach until the end of his contract? Disregarding the probability either way of him being sacked.

Yes I do right now. We signed a contract.

I don't think he's had a chance to see what he can do with this list and a focus on classy outside players like Polec and Hall. I mentioned in one of the threads after the Freo game that I was giving him until May. So the rest of this month. And I wanted to see improvements in that new playing style and there were on the weekend. The first half in particular showed that we could play a short, precise kicking game that required a bit of composure and thought. There were times in the second half where we went handball happy for a while, realised it didn't work and returned to that different game. Which was unreal I thought cos sometimes I have wondered if the team is capable of that sort of change.

So to me that is an improvement and movement in the direction I wanted to see. After one game, with 2 new players in it.

 

[King Corey]

Yes I do right now. We signed a contract.

I don't think he's had a chance to see what he can do with this list and a focus on classy outside players like Polec and Hall. I mentioned in one of the threads after the Freo game that I was giving him until May. So the rest of this month. And I wanted to see improvements in that new playing style and there were on the weekend. The first half in particular showed that we could play a short, precise kicking game that required a bit of composure and thought. There were times in the second half where we went handball happy for a while, realised it didn't work and returned to that different game. Which was unreal I thought cos sometimes I have wondered if the team is capable of that sort of change.

So to me that is an improvement and movement in the direction I wanted to see. After one game, with 2 new players in it.

Fair points.

 

[benbanjo]

This week all they should do at training is Centre clearance work.

I would like to see Goldy getting more involved when ball hits the ground, at his best he applied good pressure in there with high tackle numbers.
Cunners can’t stand defensive side, he isn't fast enough. also, Higgins and Cunners shouldn’t be in the same CC rotation.
With the 6 6 6 rule JZ should get a run in there too, his banging it on the foot won’t be as much of a liability now with even numbers forward of the ball.
Maybe even through Lmac in there, he is a useless playing in the defensive 50 but has mongrel so shove him in there to see if he has what it takes to be on the list moving forward.

 

[ferball]

You're dismissing the round 1 abomination and the centre square issues too easily.

Maybe the round one thing - to me that's an understandable situation because we were vulnerable playing to this new plan and the opposition coach targeted it, and we thought Wood could do something he's probably not up to. I know I could be wrong in that assessment but that's how I see it.

The centre square has been an issue for a few years. But we have 2 good mids then our best midfielders are all in their second season. (Jed's in that group cos he only really became a player last year.) If we'd had BJ for the last part of the season our cc issues may have been be less of a problem. But I guess he's gone - how much of those issues were dependent on waiting for him to return instead of going with something different?

 

[Grogg]

5 blokes didn't register a single tackle on the weekend.

Not 1.

38 in total for the whole side.

There's something seriously wrong down there at the moment.

 

[DesertRoo]

5 blokes didn't register a single tackle on the weekend.

Not 1.

38 in total for the whole side.

There's something seriously wrong down there at the moment.

That’s messed up... name and shame please.

 

[Caracas]

Yes I do right now. We signed a contract.

I don't think he's had a chance to see what he can do with this list and a focus on classy outside players like Polec and Hall. I mentioned in one of the threads after the Freo game that I was giving him until May. So the rest of this month. And I wanted to see improvements in that new playing style and there were on the weekend. The first half in particular showed that we could play a short, precise kicking game that required a bit of composure and thought. There were times in the second half where we went handball happy for a while, realised it didn't work and returned to that different game. Which was unreal I thought cos sometimes I have wondered if the team is capable of that sort of change.

So to me that is an improvement and movement in the direction I wanted to see. After one game, with 2 new players in it.

I think I'm on the same page as you with regard to this, Ferball. However, I can understand the misgivings that plenty of people have this season. Rightly or wrongly, we were given the impression that we were going to hit the ground running this year. We've seen our team in action four times now and it appears we are just warming up at this stage. The problem is that it gets harder as time goes on and losing form is hard to shake. Having said that, there appear to be plenty of "green shoots" (I can't believe I wrote that) on show - Hall, Polec, LDU, McKay, Bailey, Tarryn (I saw him in a coffe shop on Monday, looking resplendent in his North colours), Cunnington rampant, Higgins getting going again, Tarrant and Thommo back, etc. A victory over Hawthorn would really help to stem the bleeding.

 

[ferball]

However, I can understand the misgivings that plenty of people have this season. Rightly or wrongly, we were given the impression that we were going to hit the ground running this year. We've seen our team in action four times now and it appears we are just warming up at this stage. The problem is that it gets harder as time goes on and losing form is hard to shake. Having said that, there appear to be plenty of "green shoots" (I can't believe I wrote that) on show - Hall, Polec, LDU, McKay, Bailey, Tarryn (I saw him in a coffe shop on Monday, looking resplendent in his North colours), Cunnington rampant, Higgins getting going again, Tarrant and Thommo back, etc. A victory over Hawthorn would really help to stem the bleeding.

So can I.



I dunno where that other impression came from tho. After so many injuries over summer/off season, so many new players and what happened with Maj, (which like it or not is gonna effect everyone involved with the club possibly in ways we don't know for ages,) I don't get why people thought things would all be fine come the first game. That's an unrealistic expectation and while we all had it going in to the game against Freo(like every game I unrealistically expect to win even if my more rational side has a better clue) we should have known that even without Scotts' Round 1 history our first game for this season would be a struggle.

 

[FlyHigh18]

The footage that was "on the couch" where Higgo and the rest of our midfield getting constantly sucked into the ball carrier and leaving ****loads of space for the opposition to handball over the top or sideways to get a clearance was awful

As if we haven't fixed this yet? Brad has come out and recognised that we are being smashed around the clearances but it seems like we have not adapted at all. How hard is it to have the midfield stay on their man? bit more defensive pressure but make sure you're also not allowing space by having 4 midfielders go at the ball

Seeing a veteran like Higgins kind of cost us late goals in the 4th quarter really shows where we are at. We have the cattle and i think we have a great midfield but there is lack or organisation and cohesion ATM (which is understandable with the new players)

BRING Ahern in FFS. We are itching for some elite ball users by foot. How we wasting him in praccy matches blows my mind. I would like to see Murphy in for a maybe Lmac but he will never be dropped ever

Not confident in this game. We will lead and show good signs only to have drift off in the second half

I agree we're lacking serious cohesion in the mid, the video footage is damning. It is what ultimately led to our 4th Q downfall last week and Freo's dominance in the mid.

But throwing in a player who's only played 11 games into the mix isn't going to do much to fix the cohesion/geling issue. And neither is taking out an elite ball user to use elsewhere on the field.

We're f***ed in the middle until these guys learn to talk. I see Jed's return making more of a difference than Paul's. But only if he has FULLY recovered.

 

[Mixed Results]

The Brad Scott, Todd Goldstein, Shaun Higgins and Ben Cunnington combination has proven itself over the last three years to be completely ineffective at winning a centre clearance. Brad Scott has no idea how to have his players set up, Ben Cunnington is physically incapable of sticking with an opponent, Shaun Higgins runs off his man at every opportunity and Todd Goldstein has been a below average ruck for three years now.

We're consistently one of the worst sides in the competition, so it goes against all logic that this will change while those four blokes remain together. We even had Jed for 21 games last year and still managed to be the worst clearance team in the entire competition. Even with Jacobs in the side we are still statistically a below average centre clearance team.

From what I've seen this season with the new rule changes, it's only going to get worse. Not only are we more reliant on the four players who start in the centre, we can no longer load up our back line for when the ball inevitably comes straight in.

Unless Brad has a major epiphany, it's going to be a very long year. The only reason we have a chance of winning this week is because Hawthorn are also a terrible centre clearance side, however they mitigate this by setting themselves up for intercepts, as opposed to us blindly assuming we'll win every stoppage.

 

[Kimbo]

That's the thing, the apathy growing amongst several hardcore supporters (you don't waste time signing up on here and contributing 1000s of self-indulgent musings if you're note) is a growing trend at the moment. I wouldn't say that has been the predominant feeling in previous years.

Yes, it seems as if the tide has turned. (That or I have unignored a lot of previously ignored posters and this is the result.)

For those who are posting somewhat pious judgements of those who criticise the coach and team, I'll pose this - what angle are you taking offence from?

I haven't criticicsd Brad nor posted pious judgements of those who have. However, I do find the volume of negative rants to be a form of negative bandwagonning and disturbingly binary, churlish and pervasive in tone. In other words, the views seem to be 'Brad has never done anything good for this club, he's shit, always been shit etc.' I get the frustration, but as usual BF tops itself in topping itself.

Are you cheerleading? Is your viewpoint is that a supporter should only ever vocally support the coach and team and never dare question whether there's need for change?

Or is it a reasoned judgement? Are you laughing at all the people out of favour with Brad Scott et al because you think they're jumping too early and missing the bright future just around the corner?

There's plenty of binary arguments on here boiling down to "time to go Brad" vs "ffs it's round 2" but I'm not seeing that many reasoned responses from the latter camp.

Am all ears for anyone who can articulate a genuine argument in favour of still seeing Brad Scott as our long term coach and who don't draw any concerns from our results in 2019 thus far.

Very magnanimous of you KC. Comments from the former camp seem less than reasoned when they are so black and white in their condemnation of Brad, his ancestory and his overall legacy at the club.

For me, I am now, finally inclined to think he's had enough time and doesn't seem capable of eliciting the major shift required to have this team perform at a top four level consistently through the H&A. I suspect if he could, he'd do okay in the finals where I think he's had the team perform beyond expectations. (On a side but related note, I'd love it if we had a genuine home ground - crowd - advantage and you can see the impact this can have in terms of our Hobart record.)

That said, I'm holding back until a bit later in the season to see if there is a glimmer of hope with this team. I cut him some slack with injuries (Daw, Jacobs and Anderson in particular) and also the need to gel the team with a significant number of newbies, from the draft and other clubs. Part of this is a symbiosis/synergy issue, some of it is working out the best mix. I'm also prepared to cut him some slack re underdone players. I'm less inclined to forgive him for not being more ruthless in selections.

I do agree, however, that he seems slow to adapt and, given he was on the rules committee, that's especially unacceptable with respect to the 6-6-6 rule. (It may also be a recruitment issue that we don't have many players who have initial burst speed.) I'm also heartily sick of the poor round 1 record. Like Jordan Lewis said re Melbourne's record against us, at some point you have to acknowledge a pattern for what it is, and not dismiss it as irrelevant. It's not just 1 of 22 games.

So, disillusioned, disappointed but with a glimmer of belief.

 

[Snake_Baker]

The Brad Scott, Todd Goldstein, Shaun Higgins and Ben Cunnington combination has proven itself over the last three years to be completely ineffective at winning a centre clearance.

Bit harsh mate.

2018 - 6th
2017 - 6th
2016 - 5th

Of course, so far this year, is a different matter.

 

[Bigeasy]

Yeah okay. I do understand that.

But get over it. Even if its justified its a shit way to behave.

How else will change happen with all back slapping that goes on down at the club? They're all happy with themselves except the members and with little influence the only way is to vote with your feet.

This club is in strife and I'm sick of sitting idle hoping things will change so if that means losses to expedite change then so be it.

 

[Horizons_00]

We are in the bottom 4 for total tackles in 2019. Too many players with 0 tackles last weekend

Where is the pressure? Especially in the middle where we are getting smashed in clearances

Bring that and watch everything else fall into place

 

[FlyHigh18]

Just scrolling through these Change threads reminds me of the amount of geniuses we have at BigFooty:

Out: Shit defender, shit defender, shit forward
In: Midfielder, Midfielder, Midfielder

Yeah that'll fix it

 

[Mixed Results]

Bit harsh mate.

2018 - 6th
2017 - 6th
2016 - 5th

Of course, so far this year, is a different matter.

Total centre clearances is incredibly misleading, as it's influenced by the amount of stoppages a team has.

I just ran the numbers for percentage of clearances won (centre clearances won/(centre clearances won+centre clearances conceded)) and we were dead last for 2018.

EDIT: I've ran 2017 now and we were third last.

By three years I was including 2019, which I'll admit is misleading. It looks like we were ok in 2016, but with Swallow, Wells and Ziebell it's a completely different midfield.