Clearance Watch

[Lehmo87]

Brisbane players, while physically capable, are lacking the same intensity.

This is probably what disappoints me most at the moment. We show in patches that we are capable of doing well in the clearances but we seem to be only desperate enough to do it in the 2nd half of a game - we rarely seem to come out on the field for the opening bounce ready for the action. It seems as though we have to fall behind before we realise that we have to lift. Maybe there isn't anything really wrong with the plan (or even the players for that matter) it's just executing with the intensity that Voss requires.

 

[Last of the Roys]

For the record, the clearances stats for round 7 against Freo were:
- 41 to them vs. 30 to us;
- Black got 6; Rich and Rischa got 4 each

 

[_hyphy]

Me thinks buchannan cold be a likely inclusion to assist in this area this week. With Brennan out, seems like a likely candidate.

 

[Last of the Roys]

Round 8 vs. Geelong at the GABBA
- Lions 34 clearances to Geelong 37
- Best for us = Black 4, Polkinghorne 4, Rich 4, Power 3, Leuenberger 3

I couldn't be bothered watching the replay, so the following is what I remember from the match:
- Black tried hard all night;
- Other than that, we looked like we turned up with a severe lack of intensity, already assuming a loss was a foregone conclusion;
- Leuenberger did a couple of very good tap outs, but on countless occasions he hit it down perfectly for Geelong players. Although I don't see it happening, if Leuenberger doesn't improve soon then I would drop him once Clark is fit and go back to playing Clark in the ruck most of the time, with the occasional fill-in rucking of Maguire and Staker;
- In the centre I was very surprised given how defensive we usually are that Ablett seemed to be left by himself without a direct opponent in the first quarter;
- Other than Black, our mids (Rich, Rischa, Polks) mostly continue to stand behind their opponents in the centre and then stay flat footed watching the ball;
- Polkinghorne did some good things, he tried hard and got a lot of the ball, but he is yet another player who can be painfully slow at times (along with Rischa and Rich - I watched all three significantly struggle to keep up with opponents when off the ball);
- If anyone thinks we don't have a problem with speed, please watch this game. Geelong are hardly renowned as a speedy team, but they absolutely blew us away in this department (and not just from their far superior disposal);
- Speaking of disposal efficiency- it must have been the biggest gap for one of our games for the year, 65% to 78%. To say we were incredibly woeful in terms of our disposal is a vast understatement.

 

[Gibbo_88]

Round 8 vs. Geelong at the GABBA
- Lions 34 clearances to Geelong 37
- Best for us = Black 4, Polkinghorne 4, Rich 4, Power 3, Leuenberger 3

I couldn't be bothered watching the replay, so the following is what I remember from the match:
- Black tried hard all night;
- Other than that, we looked like we turned up with a severe lack of intensity, already assuming a loss was a foregone conclusion;
- Leuenberger did a couple of very good tap outs, but on countless occasions he hit it down perfectly for Geelong players. Although I don't see it happening, if Leuenberger doesn't improve soon then I would drop him once Clark is fit and go back to playing Clark in the ruck most of the time, with the occasional fill-in rucking of Maguire and Staker;
- In the centre I was very surprised given how defensive we usually are that Ablett seemed to be left by himself without a direct opponent in the first quarter;
- Other than Black, our mids (Rich, Rischa, Polks) mostly continue to stand behind their opponents in the centre and then stay flat footed watching the ball;
- Polkinghorne did some good things, he tried hard and got a lot of the ball, but he is yet another player who can be painfully slow at times (along with Rischa and Rich - I watched all three significantly struggle to keep up with opponents when off the ball);
- If anyone thinks we don't have a problem with speed, please watch this game. Geelong are hardly renowned as a speedy team, but they absolutely blew us away in this department (and not just from their far superior disposal);
- Speaking of disposal efficiency- it must have been the biggest gap for one of our games for the year, 65% to 78%. To say we were incredibly woeful in terms of our disposal is a vast understatement.

The clearance stats just go to prove that if you win the clearance or don't it doesn't really help that much, its what the team does with the clearance, Geelong had players spreading into space whereas we were most of the time going backwards or sideways before going forward. When Leuey wins a clearance he seems to be the only one that wants to bomb or punch it forward as fast as he can and that's what catches teams out.

I painfully watched the first half again and for most of the stoppages we would get first possession and during times of the second quarter we were dominating but kicking to our 2 main targets who can only run at 3/4 pace made our midfielders giving the I50's look very poor. They could kick goals from stoppages whereas we luckily managed a behind a few times

 

[Last of the Roys]

For the hell of it - Round 9 vs. Adelaide:
- Lions 36 clearances vs. Adelaide 44
- Best for us = Rich and Rischa 5 each; Leuenberger 4; Buchannan, McGrath, Staker, Black 3 each;

Interesting points:
- it was 15 to 9 in their favour at quarter time, which was crucial in setting the trend of the game;
- Rich may be slowly getting better;
- Surprisingly we didn't seem to play Polkinghorne in the middle a lot of the time (or did I miss something?);
- Leuenberger started off a lot better this week, and definitely was not one of our worst. We won the hit outs 48 to 31, though I am not sure what the 'to advantage' stats are yet. Still, I just want to see second efforts and some aggression from him in terms of wanting the ball after the hit out. He seriously needs to be shown some tapes of how Jamar has played this year. If we could just transplant Charman into Leuenberger's body.....
- again we seemed to be killed for speed a lot of the game (but especially in that first quarter);
- All over the ground the number of handballs we sent behind players, to their feet, and straight to the opposition was incredible. As was the number of times we fumbled;

 

[_hyphy]

It was like we were watching a different team out there tonight, Clark & Leuey dominated, and those quick kicks from Redden & Rich straight into the f50 were fantastic.

 

[whatboutbob]

It was like we were watching a different team out there tonight, Clark & Leuey dominated, and those quick kicks from Redden & Rich straight into the f50 were fantastic.

Malthouse in his post-match presser described our stoppage work as outstanding and one of the key reasons we got up. He said we were hungrier and cleaner.

We won the clearances 36 to 27.

Rich 7, Black 6, then Buchanan, Power, Redden, Clark and Rischa with 3

Standouts for me were a couple of clearly planned taps from Clark down to Black and Power as they ran around the back of him - they were just poetic.

I also thought Clark was very handy in his short bursts as the tallest midfielder in the league.

 

[lions_den]

Great to see that we're improving in this area.

 

[Tassie4ever]

No secret to how well we did with our clearances Saturday night- we had 2 rucks who each performed well.

I thought Clark was back to approaching his best, and Leuenberger benefitted from this support to play a very good game. With his tackling and support play, Clark is almost a ruck rover, albeit a very tall one.

I don't know what the Q by Q stats show, but I thought we maintained an excellent clearance rate throughout. Again, I don't know what the stats show, but I reckon this was our best and most consistent clearance effort for the season to date.

 

[Lehmo87]

Malthouse in his post-match presser described our stoppage work as outstanding and one of the key reasons we got up. He said we were hungrier and cleaner.

We won the clearances 36 to 27..

It's not always about the raw numbers. I know we only one by a couple of goals, but I think we had much more room to move whenever we won a clearance as compared to Collingwood where we were harassing them as soon as they got possession so they couldn't get many clean I50's from their centre clearances.

 

[Nuggo]

Yer thought our clearance works was ok. We actually ran in waves from the stoppages which appeared to give our outside players that bit more time. Got a bit carried away with the game and didn't notice how Amon went with his work off the ball in providing space for players like Rich.

 

[BuntonRules]

Playing Rich as a midfielder did not hurt. Set the scene.

 

[chopperduck]

Yeah, Rich really did play as an on ball player, and he went guns blazing. His work in tight was very good, and he is starting to get shots on goal from contests when we are within 50m. This is an area we still need more help in. If we get the ball inside 50, we have the targets to mark it, if they don't mark it, you have your crumbers to crumb a goal. If either of these happen, you want to get some tackles inside 50 to lock the ball in, create a ball up and try produce another shot on goal from that. Locking the ball inside 50 and getting these shots from contests is what we have been missing.

Rich is getting better each game and is building from a solid foundation of his first year. His form now is as good, probably better than year 1. What a gem.

 

[whatboutbob]

Bumpity bump.

Rd 7 vs the Suns - the inaugural "Q Clash"

- Clearances 60 (Suns) vs 30 (Lions
- 49 to 19 at 3/4 time.
- The largely unchecked Brennan had 14 alone, Swallow and Rischa 8, Smith 6, Ablett and Harris 5
- Rich (5), Black (4), Power (4), Polks (4) were our "best" numerically, dropping away very quickly to Adcock, Redden, Raines and Banfield all with 2 each. Rockliff had 1
- Seemingly smashed in every facet at stoppages.
- Two years ago our coach was presenting at AFL conferences about clearance secrets
- Will add more once I've seen the game on tele.

 

[Tassie4ever]

Bumpity bump.

Rd 7 vs the Suns - the inaugural "Q Clash"

- Clearances 60 (Suns) vs 30 (Lions
- 49 to 19 at 3/4 time.
- The largely unchecked Brennan had 14 alone, Swallow and Rischa 8, Smith 6, Ablett and Harris 5
- Rich (5), Black (4), Power (4), Polks (4) were our "best" numerically, dropping away very quickly to Adcock, Redden, Raines and Banfield all with 2 each. Rockliff had 1
- Seemingly smashed in every facet at stoppages.
- Two years ago our coach was presenting at AFL conferences about clearance secrets
- Will add more once I've seen the game on tele.

Interesting stuff- again, who the hell is our centre square coach? Whoever, should be sacked.

 

[ZoBlitz]

Other clearance stats for the year:

R1 - Fremantle - 43 vs 42 (Black 9, Leuenberger 5, Rockliff 5, Rich 4)
R2 - Bulldogs - 28 vs 41 (Black 6, Buchanan 6, Rich 4, Rockliff 3)
R3 - Melbourne - 37 vs 48 (Rich 8, Leuenberger 5, Rockliff 5, Black 4)
R5 - St Kilda - 45 vs 41 (McCauley 7, Rich 6, Black 5, Adcock, Polkinghorne, Redden 4)
R6 - Richmond - 40 vs 42 (Black 8, Rockliff 6, Raines 4, Rich 4)

Added up manually from the AFL website so apologies for any mistakes.

 

[Cousin Jed]

I take it our stats are listed first?

 

[whatboutbob]

I take it our stats are listed first?

Yep...

 

[chopperduck]

Pretty easy to read really. When we get smashed, we are losing the cleances, and i bet the hard ball and contested possessions as well. When we do ok, we are breaking even. All the tactics in the world dont' mean much when you simply don't win the ball in the first place.

 

[Jorgo]

Pretty detailed view of clearances and the importance of the 4 players in the middle in this article.

Was interested to see our "best 4" in terms of:

Champion Data knows it is the starting-four collective that produces the outcome, hence it measures the performances of starting-four combinations, measuring each quartet's clearances for and against, ability to create second stoppages, as well as scores for and against.

Here is the list for each team....

Best starting combinations by team

Adelaide: Sam Jacobs, Scott Thompson, Brent Reilly, Richard Douglas
Brisbane Lions: Matthew Leuenberger, Simon Black, Jack Redden, James Polkinghorne
Carlton: Robert Warnock, Chris Judd, Marc Murphy, David Ellard
Collingwood*: Darren Jolly, Dane Swan, Scott Pendlebury, Luke Ball
Essendon*: Tom Bellchambers, Jobe Watson, Sam Lonergan, Heath Hocking
Fremantle*: Aaron Sandilands, David Mundy, Matthew Pavlich, Matt de Boer
Geelong: Brad Ottens, Joel Selwood, Joel Corey, James Kelly
Gold Coast: Zac Smith, David Swallow, Michael Rischitelli, Gary Ablett
Hawthorn: Max Bailey, Brad Sewell, Sam Mitchell, Jordan Lewis
Melbourne*: Mark Jamar, Brent Moloney, Jordan Gysberts, Jordie McKenzie
North Melbourne: Todd Goldstein, Andrew Swallow, Jack Ziebell, Daniel Wells
Port Adelaide: Matthew Lobbe, Travis Boak, Hamish Hartlett, Domenic Cassisi
Richmond: Andrew Browne, Daniel Jackson, Dustin Martin, Trent Cotchin
St Kilda**: Ben McEvoy, David Armitage, Clinton Jones, Jack Steven
Sydney Swans: Shane Mumford, Jude Bolton, Kieren Jack, Jarrad McVeigh
West Coast: Dean Cox, Daniel Kerr, Matt Priddis, Scott Selwood
Western Bulldogs: Ben Hudson, Callan Ward, Matthew Boyd, Ryan Griffen

 

[POBT]

What I find interesting about that stat is that most sides have at least 2, and sometimes 3, bigger midfield bodies in their best combination - eg the Hawks set up is built on nuggets - Lewis, Mitchell, Sewell.

 

[dlanod]

It's very curious to see Polkinghorne in there. I didn't realise he'd been playing that much time in the middle consistently, so either he's having a disproportional impact or he's doing a solid job without being noticed.

 

[blynd_freddie]

It's very curious to see Polkinghorne in there. I didn't realise he'd been playing that much time in the middle consistently, so either he's having a disproportional impact or he's doing a solid job without being noticed.

And Matthew Lobbe after only having played a total 5 career games is also a WT

 

[POBT]

Is it the case that that is the quartet which is most effective when played together? If that is so, I think Polks does a lot of work off the ball in terms of both blocking and tackling to give his other midfielders a crack at the pill or to create a second stoppage.