Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
Congratulations on inventing a story line for likes, so you think playing Viney Brayshaw and Oliver together as inside midfielders will be successful going forward?
Player Watch #13 Clayton Oliver – UNPRECEDENTED 4 x B&F, 3 x AA, 2 x AFLCA Winner and Premiership Player
- Thread starter RandB
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Congratulations on inventing a story line for likes, so you think playing Viney Brayshaw and Oliver together as inside midfielders will be successful going forward?
Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
If you think Oliver's 'killing it' this season then you are basing it on stats and not on actual football
Haha, what the hell? A story line for likes? And here I thought it was merely a joke poking fun at some of the over reactions going on.
Well no, because Harmes is first picked in there, but given none of them are playing particularly well right now, they certainly can't at the moment, but I'm not prepared to get rid of the lot of them because they haven't started the season as well as they finished the last one.
Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
What over reactions?
I read someone say they'd be happy to trade Brayshaw because his defensive running has been poor the other day ... so those sorts of overreactions
Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
That's one guy.
Last year our superstar inside mids produced the 2nd best contested ball diff of all time and the 3rd most inside 50s of all time. Its very likely we can't reproduce those numbers again yet we didn't even finish top 4 in the home and away.
You know what's an overreaction? Stats saying definitively Oliver is the worst kick in the AFL and yet people still saying 'he's a beautiful kick'
Or saying he's killing it when his possessions are rushed all the time.
Why do people think we are playing so badly atm? It's because we waste the most inside 50s of any side ever recorded and with an average of 100 disposals a game our chief culprits are Oliver Viney and Brayshaw.
Our game plan doesn’t help. There is often no space to lead in to with the congestion we create, which leaves all the space behind the last line of defence open for slingshot counter attack which teams score from efficiently.
There are probably multiple reasons why it’s not working as effective as last year.
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There is a difference between being a bad kick and a bad decision maker. Oliver suffers more form bad decisions than being technically a bad kick. He always seems to kick long.
Our biggest issue along with poor decision making/kicking inside 50 is ground ball gets inside 50/forward pressure. Not only do we not win the disputed ball inside 50, we don’t apply enough pressure if the opposition has possession. It allows the opposition to very easily and cleanly transition the ball end to end. Couple with some poor two way running/defending from the mids and our backs don’t stand a chance.
Our biggest issue along with poor decision making/kicking inside 50 is ground ball gets inside 50/forward pressure. Not only do we not win the disputed ball inside 50, we don’t apply enough pressure if the opposition has possession. It allows the opposition to very easily and cleanly transition the ball end to end. Couple with some poor two way running/defending from the mids and our backs don’t stand a chance.
Proper Gander
Owl whisperer and secret agent
FFS settle down.
We have options with this midfield, the best of which you have already pointed out.
Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
I don't think we have options at all, we have one option which is win it contested style.
Proper Gander
Owl whisperer and secret agent
We have theoretical options ala Richmond model - bombing it forward at random could theoretically work if we had a Richmond style small forward crew that will swarm over the ball regardless of the quality of delivery. As you have pointed out, we don’t.
It’s like there is a disconnect between our main coaches, our recruitment and our ‘strategists’ (whatever that is when it’s at home).
We could survive the arse style delivery from our mids if only our forwards were the type to swarm on every ball into the 50 to prevent the turnover and create a forward pressure advantage. Unfortunately we don’t have those players.
Or we could have mids that focus on quality entries to a leading forward finding space. We don’t have that either because the mids aren’t moving the ball forward with any thought or direction, but even if they were * knows who they direct it to since our forwards are basically not providing any good leads whatsoever. So neither the mids or the forwards get a gold star on this one.
Before trading the whole lot of them, which I admit is a tempting option, I would like to know why the coaching crew haven’t addressed either.
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Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
Fair enough agree with that
Proper Gander
Owl whisperer and secret agent
I’m more comfortable when you’re unreasonable and slightly aggressive though.
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Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
What the * is that supposed to mean
Proper Gander
Owl whisperer and secret agent
No kidding, I nearly posted a serious response answering this before I clicked and quickly deleted it.
I’m way too thick for this Bigfooty thing.
Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
Would like to know what he thinks of his efforts this season.
Very disappointing for mine, surgeries and excuses aside he lost all his composure at AFL level and he's too good and too important for us for him not to fix it.
Needs to ask himself he wants to be the leader for taking our midfield forward or if he wants to have another year of seemingly wanting to pass the pressure onto someone else immediately.
Very disappointing for mine, surgeries and excuses aside he lost all his composure at AFL level and he's too good and too important for us for him not to fix it.
Needs to ask himself he wants to be the leader for taking our midfield forward or if he wants to have another year of seemingly wanting to pass the pressure onto someone else immediately.
Reckon he is over coached, guy has gone from the best handballer in the game to a butcher by both hand and foot. For an inside beast he is actually pretty quick, needs to back his pace and run away from congestion instead of blindly hacking it because he thinks he is about to get tackled. He has all the tools but confidence at rock bottom atm.
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Reckon its the flat footed campaigners around him that makes his game look worse. He averages 1 more kick a game than last year and everything else is near on identical including disposal efficiency. I was hating on him earlier this year but then started watching the players around him he doesnt have good enough options to go to hopefully we pick up a few players who are smart enough to know that when oliver is about to get it be on the move outside of 5 ******* metres and he'll hit you which then opens up more space for him to work in which allows him more options whether to burst out himself or kick to a player spreading from the contest 20m away instead of 7/8/9/10 players within a 5m circle ffs making it easy for opposition to blanket us. Thats my take anyway he isnt helped by his team mates at all you put him in any other midfield and he'd still look like a jet. Cant wait to pick up some runners and play them out of defense cause we still want to play viney and brayshaw in the midfield
I love him but totally agree with him passing on the pressure.
He’s so obsessed with using a quick fire handball that I reckon he is one of the reasons we have so many rushed kicks into the forward line.
Johnny Karate
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He was very rushed in his handballing this season. Also, as blitznu pointed out, this was compounded by the lack of spread around him to find a valid target. His kicking is an issue that needs to be sorted out.
Our whole setup was worked out massively this year.
Pretty much what Gerard Healy mentioned yesterday. Melbourne need to get the tape measure out this preseason because all we do is handball into trouble. Oliver is a ball winner but what's the point of getting it if the free player is a metre away and the next is a metre away constantly passing into trouble. I'm going to switch codes look at rugby league how would a team go huddled around the ball making 500cm passes they would be easily stopped and then once the opposition is in possession they throw 3 metre passes and stretching the opposition leaving gaps im defense to score freely. You would think it's a simple fix.
Topkent
Confirmed ITK Drafting King
There have been multiple occasions in almost every game though he's jumped up to receive a tap from Gawn, then before his feet have even hit the ground he's dished off a handball often to a still recovering his balance Max Gawn.
I agree it's a mix of problems but he needs to take more responsibility on himself
I'm not putting any blame on Gawn or Oliver for our season. It's the coach, lack of spread, forward and outside talent that deserve blame. Clarry will be fine
A11dAtP0w3R
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Speaking of s**t Kicking....Seriously tho, the bloke can't kick for s**t, this insistence on trying to use him as pinching hitting/resting forward must stop.
Speaking of s**t Kicking....Seriously tho, the bloke can't kick for s**t, this insistence on trying to use him as pinching hitting/resting forward must stop.
