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Are we a soft team?

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If talking Mongrel...

have mongrel down back - Maynard
and in the middle - Adams

Have lacked a bit of mongrel up front since the Leigh Brown days

If talking competitiveness...

the loss against Melb last year was probably the softest I saw Collingwood in 2020

The year before it was the loss against North Melbourne

But overall I think we are consistently spirited and competitive. Game plan and selections more the issue
 
Not many teams have "enforcers" any more. But we have Maynard, Adams, JDG, and Greenwood. All pretty tough blokes who don't take any backwards steps. Even our quieter guys like Grundy and Pendles are plenty physical when they need to be
 
We don't lack courage or 'hardness', we lack size. We need some bulls around the footy.

Adams is tough and brave, but lightweight.
Pendles is tall, and is not soft, but is rangy and doesn't intimidate anyone.
Treloar was light.
Steele is an outside player and is neither big nor powerful.
Greenwood is the right idea but doesn't play on ball other than the occasional tag.

For ages our midfield has been talented but often struggled in the contest.

Jordy in midfield is a step in the right direction.
 
Last edited:
Boris the Contradiction said:
We don't lack courage or 'hardness', we lack size. We need some bulls around the footy.

Adams is tough and brave, but lightweight.
Pendles is tall, and is not soft, but is rangy and doesn't intimidate anyone.
Treloar was light.
Steele is an outside player and is neither big nor powerful.
Greenwood is the right idea but doesn't play on ball other than the occasional tag.

For ages our midfield has been talented not often struggled in the contest.

Jordy in midfield is a step in the right direction.
Click to expand...
Williams was our last “fly the flag” player.
 
magpie_marty said:
Just wondering everyone's thoughts ?
Who are our enforcers players that worry the opposition?
Click to expand...
I think we had too many soft players in the team last year. Phillips, Stephenson, WHE, Cox (when he couldn’t see) and Pendles. The loss of Stephenson and Phillips was music to my ears, Cox is back to his best and is definitely one that relishes a bit of the argy bargy so I’ll take him out of the soft category for now. Pendles and WHE are the cream on the top of the cake...Pendles is irreplaceable and WHE is worth his weight in gold when he’s on, we really lack skill and speed through the middle.

I think we try to stay on the right side of the law too much (going by the positive free kick ledger, we don’t have many suspensions either). I’d like to see a more uncompromising style, similar to that of the premiership Hawks sides and even Richmond more recently. But that doesn’t mean our players are soft, it means they are well coached and disciplined which is a great outcome, but perhaps Bucks needs to turn up the dial and give players more freedom to ‘express’ themselves. Players like Grundy, Adams, Cox, Maynard, Greenwood, Degoey really relish that sort of stuff, let them have it!
 
From an oppos point of view I never worry about playing collingwood in terms of it being a bruising game, or a game that's going to be intense. I worry about playing the pies for other reasons. I don't really see much mongrel in the way you play, but I'm not an authority on the pies game clearly.
 

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The club has been poorly led and hasn't faced up to certain realities, so yeah, that is the definition of soft, cowardly even. There are signs of improvement with Lou Costello having being escorted off his lousy stand up set, now we need the coach to take a good hard look and let the boys play with dare.
 
Someone mentioned we lack size, that is absolutely true. Adams has aggression but he’s a lightweight, Greenwood too.
Maynard gives being hard a nudge, however he got ironed out by Liam Ryan. Millane or Craig Kelly would haven ridden that bump far better.
We aren’t hard.
 
Thought Grundy had a bit of mongrel but since he slammed Ben Brown has gone extremely soft. Be lucky now to knock the froth of his morning cappuccino.
 
Not at all. No one has the “enforcers” of the past because that has been stamped out of the game. I loved the old tough stuff. I think of Tuddy, Magro, Kink, Worthington etc for us and Lethal, Dermie, Big Carl, Balme, Lockett etc and so many others

Still that was often about belting someone and taking it when your turn came. Lethal’s ethos of “Never complain never explain” summed it up. Still the were a lot more short steps in those days also

I marvel at the modern footballers eyes only for the ball efforts. They go now where you should fear to tread more than in the past and that’s really tough

On that proviso I think Collingwood have always tended to be hard at the ball and rarely turn it up. We are amongst the best still. Our problems lie much more with lacking a little class compared to application
 

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I don’t think so, I certainly haven’t gone home many times questioning our effort courage or physicality.

Our issues seem more system based (over possession in midfield, slow ball movement) and skill based (kicking extremely poorly to forwards)
 
These are the guys who have an aura (in my opinion) of being lightweights, lacking competitive spirit or who are genuinely intimated by the contest -

- Treloar. I still can't get the image out of my head of him rolling into a ball on the floor when Cotchin tried to rough him up in 2017. How he didn't get up and defend himself against that weak sniper is beyond me.
- WHE. Looks soft and sometimes doesn't hit the contest as hard as he could for a guy with his aerial skills. Having said that, he's played games for us with a pretty banged up body.
- Stephenson. Can't really say much more here. Last year was catastrophic.
- Brown. Should be on my other list but lacks physical presence. Gets flung around like a rag doll. It *feels* like he doesn't impact the contest with his pressure. I must be wrong as they keep playing him in pressure roles.
- Daicos. See Brown. His saving grace is that he has infinitely better skills than Brown and has a different role
- Howe. Great player but has no physical presence relies on brilliance elsewhere
- Pendles. Great player has no physical presence relies on brilliance elsewhere
- Sidebottom. Great skills, no physical presence, gets suspended every time he tries to be hard at the contest because he doesn't put his head over the ball.
- Howe. Great player has no physical presence
- Roughead. Good size. No aggression
- Moore. Great player but has no physical presence (fine tuned Ferrari not a Hummer) relies on brilliance elsewhere
- Grundy. Has pulled back his physical aggression. Doesn't know how to do it properly and gives away free kicks.
- Sier. Good size, no aggression and doesn't understand what it means to be a top level competitor.
- Thomas. Opportunistic player with good goal sense when on. Nice guy. No physical presence or aggression

Players who I think possess the most aggression and/or physicality and/or fierce competitive spirit in our team (in order) -

- Adams
- Maynard
- Greenwood
- Quaynor
- Cox
- Crisp
- Checkers
- Elliot
- Degoey
 
I don't think we are soft, but as others gave stated we lack size and physicality. As a team we match up small against all clubs. Our midfielders and talls lack body size. As a team we can't hold a tackle, nor break a tackle. Leigh Matthews, Dermie, Dipper, Byron Pickett, Jackovich, Buckley etc had physicality and were great tacklers. When they tackled the opposition went down in the tackle, which enhanced their reputation as enforcers. Our players have arms like fairy floss when tackling and bodies of jelly when tackled

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