Strategy 2014 game plan improvements

[you pick one]

Well with West gone I hope he's drawn the big target on his back because he'll need it next year.

I agree with that to,especially if he gets first crack at it down back and we lose a game or three,forget our backline's not the huge strength it once was, it will be his fault.

 

[Jimmy Yamazaki]

I rate Hawthorn as a very slow side but they are mostly left footers who quite often get the better of opponents who naturally move to their right whenever a Mitchell, Hodge, Lewis or Smith get hands on the ball.
I wouldn't call Collingwood slow as Swan, Beams, Blair, Thomas (yep gone) are fast while Pendlebury and Ball are the slower mids. Sidebottom has some pace too, kind of like Caddy, deceptive in a way.

In 2007-2011 we had Ablett who was arguably and still is the mot explosive midfielder in the competition alongside Dangerfield.
Since 2007 when we led the league in contested possessions, that stat has risen over the years and we have dropped away going from 1st, 1st, 1st, 3rd, 3rd, 7th, 4th which shows how significant Bartel, Jnr and Ling's impact was in the center of the ground but neither Ling or Bartel were blessed with foot speed so what I have just typed contradicts everything I have said about speed in the midfield.

Personal hatred of Hawks aside, they are more then just a left footed team that beat people that move to the right. They have won 2 premierships now with those players. The core group is slow however, they only injected some pace recently with Smith. This year, they even rotated Mitchell and Hodge off half back and Lewis still going forward and there midfield wasn't as good. But finals they lifted with those guys spending more time in the midfield. They are good at winning the ball with Sewell added as well.

I wouldn't really think of Beams and Swan as quick (although Swan has quick acceleration), more gut running beasts like SJ is for us. Blair and Sidebottom are their quick players, but will probably spend more time forward now that Beams is back and I expect Adams to go mid as well.

 

[Jon Douglas]

Want to be a Premiership side in 2014 - like all teams we need to strengthen our weaknesses.

So that means that either Rivers or Brown becomes an effective 3 rd tall backman.

It means that Caddy becomes a good inside mid.

It means we find another good inside mid - as many hope GHS will become.

That Simpson and / or Hmac become good first ruckmen and give our midfield an edge.

That Vardy plays CHF quite well.

That Hawkins is over his injury.

For me that covers the glaring weaknesses we have. Some may still argue that we need another backman to take the opposition small forward who at times cut us up this season. So that maybe an area we also look at - but happy to use Guthrie in that role at present and see what transpires.

Fix the midfield and we fix 75 % of our issues IMO. The game plan may need some small adjustments but get the personnel right and it will work just fine most of the time.

 

[geelong_crazy26]

do you think our lack of speed through midfield contributed?
I know some believe speed is exaggerated in the modern game but Corey, Bartel, Johnson, Stokes and Kelly aren't exactly quick and this poses a dilemma with Horlin-Smith and Schroder expected to get more games in 2014 but they too are a little slow.

Probably why our match committee like to keep Blicavs around stoppages and why Murdoch and Smedts spent more time in VFL playing midfield because we do need to get some explosive types around the footy.

Varcoe and Poodle are obviously much maligned in recent times but we sure would benefit considerably if they returned to their best.

I don't think it was pace that was a problem at all this year, I think pace is very overrated in AFL. How you read the play and position yourself in accordance with a pre season trained plan is what's important. We obviously had a game plan worked on all pre season with heavy positioning in close around the contests mostly to pressure, it's very very hard I think once the season starts to make too many changes to your game palm, you can tinker a little bit and fine tune, but I don't think you can go too far off the main track. It's something they practice at for months over the off season, to just change things during the HA season doesn't just click, it takes time for a game plan to become successful. I remember malt house saying it took collingwood years to fully develop and teach their 2010 premiership game plan

 

[geelong_crazy26]

just alot of thought on the ross lyon game plan, the way he has fremantle playing. I think a lot needs to be modified about the way we do two things in particular after much more thought, and that is how we enter our forward line, as well as how we move in and out to create space and scoring opportunities in our forward half. and secondly, how we ease the pressure on our ball carriers, and reverse the incoming pressure back onto the opposition for quality and fluent ball passages

i have two ideas that i would love to see us implement in the coming years to overcome the manic congestion and frontal pressure/flooding.

1- the "in and out" forward set up. When moving the ball into our forward fifty, if it is flooded with opposition players, then we push all of our players out of the forward fifty, leave it completely empty. two things can happen if we do this, first of all, the opposition decides to keep lots of players back inside their defensive fifty, in which case you either work the ball up towards fifty in large numbers or through precise chip passes and bomb it from around the 50m arc, just the way we used to do it in 07 to counter the original sydney flood. or secondly, if they push numbers up the ground to follow our players, then have the players double back into the vacant spots, chip kicks over the top 45-35m out, long leads to the pocket. teach the players how to double back, and spread across the fifty quickly and out of each others way to give the most options. Either scenario creates a great scoring threat.

to execute this, i think we would need to push our defenders up the ground when they judge the situation to need relieving, to run off their opponents and come up the ground so we can have a free marking option to relieve the pressure.

2- reverse pressure: alot of people won't like the idea of this one at all, could potentially turn out to go quite wrong, but if implemented and executed perfectly, i think it could almost kill off the frontal pressure and congestion "aka ross lyon footy". when opposition are hunting our players down with the ball placing manic intensity on them, reverse the pressure on them! bump/Sheppard within the letter of the law, make opposition players feel pressure every moment of the game, pressure when they are possessing the ball, and pressure when they are chasing the ball carrier! let them know that both scenarios will end up with them in the turf. this would free up our ball movement significantly if we were able to implement it properly

I think the bump is a largely underdeveloped skill of our game, it is rarely or never before been greatly used to much of an art before. it is a skill just the same as kicking and marking, that can be entirely perfected and put to great advantage

it would take a very good solid pre season of practice, detailed consultations with the umpires and rules committee to establish entirely what is the perfectly legal bump to execute, and then practice it

i think mick malthouse in 2010-2011 start to bring in sheparding and the bump/block, for those who remember it.

It would take a lot of heavy numbers and positioning around the ball to implement.

just imagine the level of intensity we would take AFL football to.

first 30 minutes of the game, mitchel, lake, hodge, roughhead, all put on their arse 6 times each with the play on call everytime, for geelong goals

i wonder how long the rule committee would let something like this work for anyway before intervening

 

[Turbocat]

Start with getting the ball more often from centre bounces. The probelm with the turnover game is relies on an opponent committing an error. The best sides usually commit few if any. Win the take aways against Freo and we win by 6 goals.

 

[geelong_crazy26]

Start with getting the ball more often from centre bounces. The probelm with the turnover game is relies on an opponent committing an error. The best sides usually commit few if any. Win the take aways against Freo and we win by 6 goals.

they slowed us down, they choked us, they flooded very heavily and had a turn over haven down back with us bombing it in

at their best a ross lyon side is just generally extremely intense and hard to score against, even if you break even in the turnovers you will still be expecting a low scoring hitout more often than not

 

[Turbocat]

they slowed us down, they choked us, they flooded very heavily and had a turn over haven down back with us bombing it in

at their best a ross lyon side is just generally extremely intense and hard to score against, even if you break even in the turnovers you will still be expecting a low scoring hitout more often than not

One: They start with a huge advantage of knowing they will win more than their fair share due to the ruck dominance
Two: Lyon is a master of training players to play the close down. Gets more from less , sign of a good coach. (good for teh game in general is another question)
so I agree bombing in will not work etc

But with every weakness there is a strength , with every strength a weakness

If we have a ruck that beat theirs , if we clear the ball from cb before the zone back and kill space and if we have good delivery from the on ballers , hitting the right forward. All forwards must move and cut , play zone offense , isolate a forward to our advantage etc.

Playing the bomb in with a power forward who was basically wheelchair bound and onabller division given little help from our rucks.... recipe for a Purple Reign

 

[you pick one]

One: They start with a huge advantage of knowing they will win more than their fair share due to the ruck dominance
Two: Lyon is a master of training players to play the close down. Gets more from less , sign of a good coach. (good for teh game in general is another question)
so I agree bombing in will not work etc

But with every weakness there is a strength , with every strength a weakness

If we have a ruck that beat theirs , if we clear the ball from cb before the zone back and kill space and if we have good delivery from the on ballers , hitting the right forward. All forwards must move and cut , play zone offense , isolate a forward to our advantage etc.

Playing the bomb in with a power forward who was basically wheelchair bound and onabller division given little help from our rucks.... recipe for a Purple Reign

Even harder if he's sitting in the stand

 

[geelong_crazy26]

One: They start with a huge advantage of knowing they will win more than their fair share due to the ruck dominance
Two: Lyon is a master of training players to play the close down. Gets more from less , sign of a good coach. (good for teh game in general is another question)
so I agree bombing in will not work etc

But with every weakness there is a strength , with every strength a weakness

If we have a ruck that beat theirs , if we clear the ball from cb before the zone back and kill space and if we have good delivery from the on ballers , hitting the right forward. All forwards must move and cut , play zone offense , isolate a forward to our advantage etc.

Playing the bomb in with a power forward who was basically wheelchair bound and onabller division given little help from our rucks.... recipe for a Purple Reign

I also think further more what your saying in regards to the clearance work, can come back to us being figured out a little in the second half of the season

We had a clearance structure around the ball with heavy clustered numbers ready to apply pressure and get a turnover. What I think happened, and this makes perfect sense with Nigel lappins comments about us getting figured out for having too many numbers around the contests. It worked perfectly fine when teams weren't anticipating it so much, but once sides began to scrutinise us more, one thing I believe they found out was that they would win the hard ball or clearance the majority of time, and to avoid a turn over, what they began doing was spreading their players into position even earlier then usual in anticipation of winning the ball, making it harder for us to pressure. If you noticed our intensity in general declining, I think this is one of the reasons why it happened, teams adjusted the timing of how they spread against us around the ball to counter act it.

 

[Turbocat]

I also think further more what your saying in regards to the clearance work, can come back to us being figured out a little in the second half of the season

We had a clearance structure around the ball with heavy clustered numbers ready to apply pressure and get a turnover. What I think happened, and this makes perfect sense with Nigel lappins comments about us getting figured out for having too many numbers around the contests. It worked perfectly fine when teams weren't anticipating it so much, but once sides began to scrutinise us more, one thing I believe they found out was that they would win the hard ball or clearance the majority of time, and to avoid a turn over, what they began doing was spreading their players into position even earlier then usual in anticipation of winning the ball, making it harder for us to pressure. If you noticed our intensity in general declining, I think this is one of the reasons why it happened, teams adjusted the timing of how they spread against us around the ball to counter act it.

Bloody David King and his big mouth. Just so much media study now.

It shows that you need to have multiple versions of winning , the same tactic employed every week has a life span of about 8 weeks , and certainly will not be anything of a surprise by finals. However , I do believe that relying on the other sides mistakes is more fragile than taking it yourself when the ball is a 50/50. The issue is we created this plan from need. It would work better if we had a dominant ruck and could win playing that style as well.

 

[you pick one]

Hawkins,and one of either Simpson or H.Mc we win.I reckon it was personal not game plan that cost us that final.

 

[Vdubs]

Hawkins, Enright and one of either Simpson or H.Mc we win.I reckon it was personal not game plan that cost us that final.

Anyway.................
We are only a month or so away from "kickoff".

 

[Turbocat]

Hawkins,and one of either Simpson or H.Mc we win.I reckon it was personal not game plan that cost us that final.

I always find it personal when beaten in a final , not a great loser when I think we are good enough. Then losing to Hawthorn after being ahead for so much of the game. If anything screamed era over it was this loss , so much different than any other loss in the previous 6 or so years. Geelong was 18 (or so) up how deep into the last....

Ohh sorry misread it. Yes personnel also had a huge influence on outcome. But how much of this was just bad luck , or how much was a reflection of how close to the tipping point we were. We last an AA CHB in 07 in R22 , then won 2 of the three finals by over a 100 points.

So yes I do agree a fit Simpson and Hawkins would have made a huge difference , I feel the core issue is our midfield strength was average to poor. Too reliant on Selwood. Bundy had a poor finals and we lacked inside strength. Kelly and Bartel not what they were. And again your right if Hunt and Varcoe had been 100% it would have helped a bit , but I think we struggled because we really have not replaced the match winning ability of a 22-28 year old Kelly/Bartel/Ling/Rooke/Chapman.

When we have 8-12 quality types in the 22-28 age range again (with 75 games plus) ..watch out. The mission should be to continue to push quality youth into the midfield. The first obvious addition should be Guthrie. At 21 and 40 games he is precisely what I want more off. Caddy is another. Bundy is only 22 with 57 games We really lack in this age/game/inside mid type. By the end of 2015 we must have that fixed.

We need to add the best of the players who have showed they are close.Sort the keepers out.
GHS , Smedts , Stringer , Cowan. Then blood more youth. Thurlow, Bews, Schroder ..maybe even Jansen. (Perhaps its a lot to ask but if we could pump 50 into him , with his frame , by 2016 he would be primed).

So a fit Simpson and Hawkins would have perhaps got us over the line , add more mid strength and we get by with and ordinary ruck and forward ( as we have done before )

 

[you pick one]

I always find it personal when beaten in a final , not a great loser when I think we are good enough. Then losing to Hawthorn after being ahead for so much of the game. If anything screamed era over it was this loss , so much different than any other loss in the previous 6 or so years. Geelong was 18 (or so) up how deep into the last....

Ohh sorry misread it. Yes personnel also had a huge influence on outcome. But how much of this was just bad luck , or how much was a reflection of how close to the tipping point we were. We last an AA CHB in 07 in R22 , then won 2 of the three finals by over a 100 points.

So yes I do agree a fit Simpson and Hawkins would have made a huge difference , I feel the core issue is our midfield strength was average to poor. Too reliant on Selwood. Bundy had a poor finals and we lacked inside strength. Kelly and Bartel not what they were. And again your right if Hunt and Varcoe had been 100% it would have helped a bit , but I think we struggled because we really have not replaced the match winning ability of a 22-28 year old Kelly/Bartel/Ling/Rooke/Chapman.

When we have 8-12 quality types in the 22-28 age range again (with 75 games plus) ..watch out. The mission should be to continue to push quality youth into the midfield. The first obvious addition should be Guthrie. At 21 and 40 games he is precisely what I want more off. Caddy is another. Bundy is only 22 with 57 games We really lack in this age/game/inside mid type. By the end of 2015 we must have that fixed.

We need to add the best of the players who have showed they are close.Sort the keepers out.
GHS , Smedts , Stringer , Cowan. Then blood more youth. Thurlow, Bews, Schroder ..maybe even Jansen. (Perhaps its a lot to ask but if we could pump 50 into him , with his frame , by 2016 he would be primed).

So a fit Simpson and Hawkins would have perhaps got us over the line , add more mid strength and we get by with and ordinary ruck and forward ( as we have done before )

We are a victim of our own success,I guess the reward for on going excellence is handy caping much like horse racing I suppose.While mediocrity and failure gets rewarded.

 

[Turbocat]

We are a victim of our own success,I guess the reward for on going excellence is handy caping much like horse racing I suppose.While mediocrity and failure gets rewarded.

True , the socialism of the AFL does exactly that , makes the horse race a handicap. Sooner or later the weight probably becomes to hard to overcome..at least in theory. Can we rise again , without falling out of contention , without a good couple of Father Sons , with out an early pick or two..? If we can , the proletariat will be displeased. It will confirm the class system is alive and well.

 

[Jon Douglas]

I agree personal cost us a GF berth. Add in Simpson, Enright and Chappy - and we probably would have beaten Hawks. Add a fit Hawkins and I would be confident of winning the GF !

But that does not mean we have a good midfield. We need to fix this area and not rely so much on turn overs and we will be a gun side again.

In other words had we had a better midfield in the finals we could be holding another Cup right now - regardless of the injuries. Every side has those. Sure Simpson was a huge loss - as he could have influenced the midfield battle.

 

[Vdubs]

I agree personal cost us a GF berth. Add in Simpson, Enright and Chappy - and we probably would have beaten Hawks. Add a fit Hawkins and I would be confident of winning the GF !

But that does not mean we have a good midfield. We need to fix this area and not rely so much on turn overs and we will be a gun side again.

In other words had we had a better midfield in the finals we could be holding another Cup right now - regardless of the injuries. Every side has those. Sure Simpson was a huge loss - as he could have influenced the midfield battle.

Just for the record, as it's becoming used a bit this thread, PERSONNEL? Nothing personal here.

 

[The rabbi]

Hawkins,and one of either Simpson or H.Mc we win.I reckon it was personal not game plan that cost us that final.

I think that you may mean "personnel" here. And if so I agree.

Man the Poms are falling over like drunk men.

 

[you pick one]

Just for the record, as it's becoming used a bit this thread, PERSONNEL? Nothing personal here.

I think that you may mean "personnel" here. And if so I agree.

Man the Poms are falling over like drunk men.

7 for 97 their thrown in the towel.
Personnel
Personnel
Personnel
Personnel
I'm on it thanks heaps, till next time

 

[The rabbi]

7 for 97 their thrown in the towel.
Personnel
Personnel
Personnel
Personnel
I'm on it thanks heaps, till next time

Yep, I wasn't extracting urine YPO.

 

[geelong_crazy26]

Bloody David King and his big mouth. Just so much media study now.

It shows that you need to have multiple versions of winning , the same tactic employed every week has a life span of about 8 weeks , and certainly will not be anything of a surprise by finals. However , I do believe that relying on the other sides mistakes is more fragile than taking it yourself when the ball is a 50/50. The issue is we created this plan from need. It would work better if we had a dominant ruck and could win playing that style as well.

i think coaches were well aware of what geelong was doing much much earlier than david king pointing it out in his article. the problem was they most likely weren't sure of how to exactly beat it, i think collingwood showed how to, then brisbane followed etc and so on

if you look back on the season, i think two things that opposition sides began to do with more ease will be apparent

1- they got more fluent movement away from stoppages and clearances
2- they were able to spot up numbers inside their forward line

when sides began spreading earlier in anticipation of winning the hard ball, they started spreading earlier, already preparing themselves to get and go before they even had fully won it. Once they had dished the ball out, it made it much more difficult for us to pressure and create a turn over, and in effect it became much easier for sides to hit up options going forward, just remember how many times brisbane and adelaide hit up easy targets inside their forward fifty almost pressure less.

 

[Jon Douglas]

Just re-read my post and yes glaring error - Personnel should have been used.

 

[Zouz Kitty]

cant see anything even remotely looking like this on the board, so figure i will start one up

2013 i thought we had a very good game plan, at least the concept framework and idea was exceptional, only that it requires some tuning and altering to go the next step and win a premiership, too many occasions this year it showed up to have slight flaws and deficiencies, nothing drastic, thought the personnel loss accumulated and made it look way worse than it was such as losing simpson and hawkins back primarily

some of the big key deficiencies i thought our game plan had that really cost us were

1- our spread was not varied enough, it was very good i thought, but towards the middle of the year i think it began to get worked out, we would spread in large numbers very much in straight direction, we would rarely spread out wide or move diagonal, this began to make it easier to plan creating turn overs. I really did like the way we spread, the timing and the way they worked in groups was a huge improvement in 2012, just think they need to take it another level and add more tricks to the way we spread as a team, assess the situations ahead and become less predictable moving in waves from handball 1 2 3 to 4 or 5.

2- we got slaughtered on the rebound across HF! i think this is a continuation of number 1, too many times this year we would turn the ball over by hand, having been run down across our HF line, you only need to watch the brisbane and collingwood games to see how much this killed us, and teams followed suit for the rest of the year. almost every single game we lost it was an opposition HB flanker that was given BOG or got 30+ touches.. rich, mitchel, obrien. I think its happening for two reasons, first we are too predictable with our spread by hand, teams are able to pre empt well where we would be going to move it and pressure accordingly across HF, and secondly, we would over commit our players going forward in waves, opening us up on the counter attack

I think we should make it an aim in 2014 to retain possession of the ball across HF, we need a plan B moving into our forward half, that if our players are not open streaming forward, that we re evaluate and hit up a man either wider backwards or on a lead, don't take the game on around half forward and risk a turnover, i liked the way we did move it this year, but at times we really overcooked it. I would rather have someone mark the ball 70M out and evaluate the situation either moving it on quickly or slowing it down if nothing is on, AVOID a turn over at all costs here!!

i could go on with more but i will leave it at that now

Fantastic thread geelong_crazy26!

Have to agree, we were really in groove with Simpson, having limped along for so long without a ruck and when he went down I think it showed many just how glaringly our game needed a good ruck! (Yet CS still managed for the team to do well without one.)

For me not having speed was a bit of a killer, Varcoe being out; and with StevieJ playing in the midfield we were hurting without a good small forward like StevieJ or Chappy. There are so many areas where we either were missing players or the regulars were injured!

There were times when we'd have all our players running back and when we did get possession there was no one forward to kick goals. Opposing teams seem to preempt our game and that's where we need to shake it up! I think CS will do that because he said last year he rates versatile players! Remember Taylor kicking goals?

I think Selwood needs to take his game to another level this year! His goal kicking practise proved what a versatile player he is, if I had to niggle about him, I'd say he needs to find away to shake a tag. I think he was exposed by some taggers last season.

But what the game plan also did is to expose Lonergans inability to get back.
There was no Scarlett back there to help provide backup.

They have got to fix it. And I bet they are.
It might be as simple as getting another preseason into the kids AND getting decent ruck stocks so that we're saving some of that endurance by not having to win the ball back 70% of the time.

I'm not sure I agree with that about Lonergan, VC - although he always has the worst stats, he is still good one-on-one with the full forwards - continued to keep the Buddies etc to two goals.

Obviously, I do agree with you that Scarlett was a loss! But how did you rate Guthrie's first year in the back line?

Jon Douglas says it perfectly - "Imagine the game plan we had this year with a fit Hawkins, Simpson and Menzel ! Reckon that would have made a difference."

I rate him a better coach that Thompson, would trade back for Thompson if I had the choice now, I think he is a much better tactician, in ways I think he is a excellent developer Thompson, but I'm not sold on him as a tactician, he got out coached by Lyonmalthouse and clarkson

Are you saying Chris Scott was out coached by Lyon, Malthouse and Clarkson? Not Malthouse! 2011 GF? + Clarkson only in one game!

When leading matches @ 3 quarter time don't loose !

This happened against Brisbane,Magpies,Hawks

+ please, will someone explain the rose-coloured glasses version that Geelong missed the GF by five points? We gave up a 20 point lead at 3/4 time FFS!!! + yes, I'm still devo about it!

have to agree on this.

Bartel's a gem but he gave up some horrendous goals during the finals. When he coffed up a goal, he would look around to blame someone else which was even worse as I'm not sure he was learning from those mistakes.
He simply doesn't have fast enough reactions, this became evident with Josh Hunt in his final year and he had trouble reacting and Jimmy, for whatever reason, just doesn't seem to get the ball to hand or foot fast enough when down in defense.
He's got no problem marking them though, still one of the best overhead marks in the comp but I think he's a more valuable commodity up forward.

Agree Footscore! The only thing I'd add is that with no Scarlett, there were times when Bartel just appeared in exactly the spot we needed him and you'd see a collective sigh of all our backs!

CS has been saying for two years that he wants versatile players - if anything we should be prepared to see how he shakes it up again this season!

 

[vinum coupe]

I'm not sure I agree with that about Lonergan, VC - although he always has the worst stats, he is still good one-on-one with the full forwards - continued to keep the Buddies etc to two goals.

Obviously, I do agree with you that Scarlett was a loss! But how did you rate Guthrie's first year in the back line?

Good to see you back kitty.
In my opinion Lonergans lack of ability to get back (combined with poor stoppage work) cut us open.

And I thought Guthries LAST year as a backman was A+