Coaching Staff Former Coach Ben "Truck" Rutten - Sacked for real this time - 21/8

[yodellinhank]

This seems to me like we're feeling our way into a new system, and being the first season of it on top of being horribly interrupted, I'm prepared to accept this season for what it is and look past any and all Essington games. Positive vibes.

I'm in two minds. On one hand the players are still adjusting to a plan that is the vision of our future coach, who has experienced recent success, and much of this plan is probably based on what has proven to work in the current football environment. Players have had bugger all of a pre season and interrupted run of 3 games to come to grips with what is expected. You'd probably have to be a fool to think everything was going to click straight off the bat. The players available on our list to play games right now probably weren't even assembled with this plan in mind and as such the future of our club is still in its infancy. This year is a bit of a token season and who knows if it'll even make it to the end. Might even turn out to be effectively an extended run of practice games and we can *shudder* learn a bit and go into next season primed to build on a bit of foundation.

On the other hand sacking a bloke before he even steps into the role would really satiate my thirst for a spill. You can't sack any harder than that.

Trouble is who replaces Worsfold's replacement? Can you even appoint someone or do they still have to sit it out for longer while John continues to hog the chair to wow us all in the press conference (Haha they said he'd step away, the fools.) How long do you give the replacement coach to be? He's on borrowed time if you think of his predecessor...

 

[Albertross]

This seems to me like we're feeling our way into a new system, and being the first season of it on top of being horribly interrupted, I'm prepared to accept this season for what it is and look past any and all Essington games. Positive vibes.

Unfortunately, we have spent the last 4 years hearing the same message from the coach. New game plan the players need to adapt to and learnings. All about the learnings.

So how many years do we give Rutten with the same message/excuses to the fans?

By the time we "learn" Richmond's game style that won them 2 out of 3 flags, the game has moved on.

Spent my early years in the 70's, watching us stink it up most weeks. Then Sheedy brought us success in the 80"s onwards. We have stunk it up again for nearly 20 years. In that time we have watched teams rise, fall and rise again. We are stuck in the land of mediocrity.

I hope Rutten is the answer, but, he is only part of it. We don't have the cattle to take us to a flag currently and we seem to have a problem with developing players. Look at what Geelong/Hawthorne are capable of without bottoming out.

I miss the glory days, when supporters hated us because we were a successful club. Now we are laughed at because, Essington!

The only positive from the weekend is that we nearly pinched it in the last minute, that is all.

Rant over. Peace, love and mungbeans!

 

[yodellinhank]

Unfortunately, we have spent the last 4 years hearing the same message from the coach. New game plan the players need to adapt to and learnings. All about the learnings.

So how many years do we give Rutten with the same message/excuses to the fans?

By the time we "learn" Richmond's game style that won them 2 out of 3 flags, the game has moved on.

In fairness to Worsfold I think he played the ASADA card for 2 years before claiming year 3 was effectively his first then the learnings began.

Spent my early years in the 70's, watching us stink it up most weeks. Then Sheedy brought us success in the 80"s onwards. We have stunk it up again for nearly 20 years. In that time we have watched teams rise, fall and rise again. We are stuck in the land of mediocrity.

I hope Rutten is the answer, but, he is only part of it. We don't have the cattle to take us to a flag currently and we seem to have a problem with developing players. Look at what Geelong/Hawthorne are capable of without bottoming out.

I miss the glory days, when supporters hated us because we were a successful club. Now we are laughed at because, Essington!

The only positive from the weekend is that we nearly pinched it in the last minute, that is all.

Rant over. Peace, love and mungbeans!

The cycles might just take longer than you think. You say sides have risen and fallen to rise again, but when we were at the top who else was there? I'd say North, Port and Brisbane all won flags/were up the top around us. We played the Dees in the granny. The Blues? Have any of those sides rebuilt and risen again?

 

[Lore]

Geelong and Hawthorn were the last two clubs to be successful before all of the s**t clubs had their access to high draft picks reduced through new team concessions at GC and GWS. The picks we did get in that timeframe were also taken away from us.

I’d say that has impacted on North, Port, Brisbane and Melbourne just as much, though Brisbane is rising now and we were doing things in 12/13 before the rug got pulled out from under us. All five of the teams in question were fringe finalists for a period there though.

Collingwood is probably the interesting one to study.

 

[Swerving Irv]

How? none of them are A grade contested marking forwards to start with. Second there has actually not been a lot of chances to play Hooker forward recently due to injury(Ambrose) of BZT being suspended. Maybe we wait a few more rounds and see who can play before judging on 2 games. If it goes on for 4 or 5 weeks then yes start to jump up and down. I would certainly be looking at Hooker forward and Ambrose or BZT in this week.

Lol, Hooker is probably the best contested mark in the comp.

 

[Swerving Irv]

In my humble opinion, it all comes down to how you want to win a game. Is it through strangling the absolute shite out of a team Fremantle (Ross the Boss) style, or playing attacking football with a strong defensive set up? I would argue that playing Hooker forward (despite his iffy kicking) would have a far greater impact on our fortunes than playing him in defence. Ambrose or Zero Thatcher can easily replace him in defence and intercept marking duties can be shared between Francis and Ridley.

Hooker straightens us up and gives us a proper target to kick to. Not only that, he'd take the number 1 defender making McKernan's task that much easier. And allows Stringer to play on a third tall which allows him to get off the leash and hopefully gives plenty of crumbs for Tippa, Fantasia, Smith and Snelling to feed off. Our current set-up is the worst in the league.

 

[ant555]

Lol, Hooker is probably the best contested mark in the comp.

Yes and he plays on the last line of defense. LOL maybe you need to read the whole conversation

 

[Swerving Irv]

Yes and he plays on the last line of defense. LOL maybe you need to read the whole conversation

Apologies, I was reading too fast. I think we can afford to take him away from defence now, as it's hardly robbing Peter to pay Paul. We've got ample coverage behind the footy and he's clearly our best mark. He's also our only player (bar Daniher) to have kicked 40+ goals in a season since Matthew Lloyd. Don't know if that's a testament to how good a footballer the bloke is, or how piss poor our attempts at drafting capable key forwards have been.

 

[ant555]

Apologies, I was reading too fast. I think we can afford to take him away from defence now, as it's hardly robbing Peter to pay Paul. We've got ample coverage behind the footy and he's clearly our best mark. He's also our only player (bar Daniher) to have kicked 40+ goals in a season since Matthew Lloyd. Don't know if that's a testament to how good a footballer the bloke is, or how piss poor our attempts at drafting capable key forwards have been.

So do I.

 

[Lore]

Seem to be onto something here, so far.

 

[Yoda_]

I may be on my own here but if he is running the show and we are dishing up this s**t then we may be in a bit of strife as it is.

Not entirely sold on Truck but guess I cant write him off before he's taken over fully

 

[Schnitzengruben]

Don't understand what the rush was to sign him long term. Questionable, just like Woosha's extension.

 

[yodellinhank]

I may be on my own here but if he is running the show and we are dishing up this sh*t then we may be in a bit of strife as it is.

Not entirely sold on Truck but guess I cant write him off before he's taken over fully

Yep, I'm far from convinced. And the few times I've heard him speak he wouldn't have been out of place with a chiko roll and a Dare iced coffee.

But we probably have to give it some time, we seemingly recruited guys at the draft to go along with some sort of plan where there is elements of attack and defence and it all sort of comes together.

 

[Bunk Moreland]

I may be on my own here but if he is running the show and we are dishing up this sh*t then we may be in a bit of strife as it is.

Not entirely sold on Truck but guess I cant write him off before he's taken over fully

He’s coached 10 games. Probably a touch early to be too concerned.

 

[Lore]

He’s coached 10 games. Probably a touch early to be too concerned.

Most of the things that have been said by Woosha/Rutten/players across various interviews lately seem to imply that we are treating this season as a chance to bed down a system with a consistent game style, attitude and brand (whether or not Woosha is prepared to articulate what that is in a media conference). I don't think that was necessarily always the case, but the theme of the last few weeks emphasises "playing the way we want to play regardless of the scoreboard or the clock", which is definitely a more long-term approach than 'win this game at all costs'.

I watched a Richmond game probably a week or so ago when Jack Riewoldt kicked a couple of goals after not really doing a whole lot for a few weeks, and I remember him saying something in the post-match interview along the lines of 'everyone plays their role every week, and each week different players get an opportunity to [be the star?] and it was nice that it was him that got to star that night but that it was everyone else playing their role that enabled him to do it'? I think that's pretty much the point we're trying to get to, where some will shine each week if the rest of the system is working.

I don't think that necessarily precludes strategy and tactical stuff, but I don't think a lot of that is being communicated to the team generally, with a preference for keeping the message simple and sticking to the system, such as reminding them to apply pressure or whatever aspect that they might be forgetting that is pertinent against a particular opponent.

Hawkins and Dangerfield's post-match pressers last night were interesting both for how similar Hawkins' was to Riewoldt's about the team doing what they had to do enabled him to play to his strengths, and for the level of strategy/tactical insight that Dangerfield in particular could give. The impression I got (and potentially it was something a talking head mentioned after the interviews) was that the system they have going is strong enough that they are able to focus on tactics and strategies moreso than we can while learning our system, so they really are able to 'take away the oppositions' strengths every week'.

I don't think we're anything like that with our strategy and tactics atm, not because the coaches aren't thinking that way, but I don't think the players are hearing much about it. During games the biggest things have been Shiel switching to a wing role to let Zaka off the chain, and Andy McGrath playing forward, taking their defender and killing their rebound (both in response to being tagged). It's not a lot, but they do at least appear to be more creative changes earlier in the game than what we're used to seeing previously, and would have been planned in advance as a contingency. The line coaches seem to be more worried about individual performances by comparison, e.g. James Kelly coaching Guelfi on playing as a small defender at half-time.


Iirc, the whole thing was we wanted Caracella but Cara and Truck come as a team and Caracella doesn't want to be a head coach, so Rutten becomes the front-man for the two of them while Caracella is the game plan guy?

 

[yodellinhank]

Iirc, the whole thing was we wanted Caracella but Cara and Truck come as a team and Caracella doesn't want to be a head coach, so Rutten becomes the front-man for the two of them while Caracella is the game plan guy?

Worsfold isn't the real coach because Rutten is the coach but Rutten isn't really the coach because Caracella is the coach. Essendoing it at the next level.

 

[CBombers17]

Worsfold isn't the real coach because Rutten is the coach but Rutten isn't really the coach because Caracella is the coach. Essendoing it at the next level.

Two proxy coaches! Plus the 'first' season of the second proxy coach is really his third in charge of the game plan.

It's unreal. Could revolutionise coaching transitions. It's like magic hands that takes years! and everyone gets cover - Clear air!

 

[TheWeapon]

Todays game could be a coach killer. Robbing attack too much to protect the defense allows teams far too much time and space against us. Caracella should be senior coach, Rutten defensive line coach

 

[Ambrosia]

Our team defence is so bad. Players just trudging back to the backline

 

[Mercurialbomber]

Matthew ******* Knights had a better game plan than this utter tripe

 

[andleanback]

Our team Defence is terrible, Leak goals like they are going out of fashion and we don’t even have an offensive style. Questions have to start being asked.

 

[Lore]

Our team Defence is terrible, Leak goals like they are going out of fashion and we don’t even have an offensive style. Questions have to start being asked.

You don't think having half the first choice defence rested this week might have something to do with it? Or all of the first choice forward line injured, bar Walla?

 

[andleanback]

You don't think having half the first choice defence rested this week might have something to do with it? Or all of the first choice forward line injured, bar Walla?

We always leak goals, not talking about just this game. It’s been a constant theme for the past 4 years. What ever way they are trying to play it’s not working. When you have merrett getting the ball in the middle then kicking wide to the boundary on the wing, there is something wrong.

 

[Lore]

We always leak goals, not talking about just this game. It’s been a constant theme for the past 4 years. What ever way they are trying to play it’s not working. When you have merrett getting the ball in the middle then kicking wide to the boundary on the wing, there is something wrong.

Every club concedes goals. We've conceded less than most over the last 3 years.

 

[andleanback]

Every club concedes goals. We've conceded less than most over the last 3 years.

Obviously. Look how easily a team moves the ball from defence to the f50 against us, happens over and over again.