Clearances - Broadbridge's Solution?!

[Belnakor]

Hey,

I was lucky to score a corporate ticket to the Game on the weekend, and after the game Broadbridge came into the function area to chat about the game. Was fairly stock standard until the question was posed: Why were getting thrashed in the clearances. This guy is our midfield coach, so i would have thought he'd have something useful to say, however it basically came down to:
1) Blame Sandilands, Hes too predictable with his taps
2) We need taller midfielders(?!?!)

He basically went on for about 5 minutes about the need for the club to have 6'1, 6'2 midfielders making the clearances, and thats what they would be drafting in coming years.. This frankly sounded a little absurd, the top clearance teams like the Hawks and Eagles certainly don't have huge midfielders, hell Josh Carr is a little nugget... What is he thinking?

Thoughts?

 

[Ripper]

Fremantle dominated the clearances 39-24 against the Hawks and Connolly said he was pleased with the commitment shown around the stoppages.

"It was our No.1 focus today. (Assistant coach) Michael Broadbridge - who runs our midfield - had done a hell of a lot of work with our players. He had extra training sessions and certainly a lot of analysis," he said.

http://fremantlefc.com.au/default.asp?pg=news&spg=display&articleid=286961

Whatever he has been doing it seems to be working.

The Hawks are one of the best teams at clearances.

Interesting to note that Crowley , Pav , Matt Carr & Hase (who would be amongst our taller players) spent a lot of time around the ball at the stoppages.

 

[FreoFury]

Well he's probably right about Sandilands but I think the 2nd point is too simplistic. Hodge, Mitchell, Cousins, Kerr, Fletcher, Crawford , Goodwin, Edwards, Bolton, Kirk etc are all very good at clearances, but not exactly giants. I think its more a case of ability to read the drop of the ball, strength and speed of mind and hand. Not to forget sustained aggression. Attack on the ball is paramount. Height would be nice ala Pav, Hird, Judd etc do well in clearances but it isnt the main criteria I think. We just need natural ball winners IMHO. Having said that, I think our ruckmen on the weekend were among our best at actual clearances. Didnt JLo get 7 or something and Sandi even more ?

 

[theGav56]

Apparently Sandilands is 5th in the league tapping "to advantage".

In terms of tall midfielders we actually do have some. Crowley, M Carr, Peake and Headland are all in the size that he is suggesting. But our clearances are certainly a problem. I wonder how much of the problem is in the detailed coaching?

I really like the way CC coached on Sunday. His use of Pav in the centre clearances, and the way he manouvered our forward line was terrific. Hawk defenders had little idea of who they were matching up on from centre breaks, and there were frequent mismatches in our favour.

 

[Ripper]

The big fella got 8 clearnces himself on the W/E.

http://www.pro-stats.com.au/psw/web/index

Interestingly Crowley had 4 playing on Mitchell (the extractor) who had only 5.

Matt Carr and Hodge had 3 each.

http://www.prowess.com.au/pro-stats/reports/match_report_144.pdf

There is the match report if anyone is interested.

 

[Belnakor]

I think its more a case of ability to read the drop of the ball, strength and speed of mind and hand. Not to forget sustained aggression. Attack on the ball is paramount. Height would be nice ala Pav, Hird, Judd etc do well in clearances but it isnt the main criteria I think. We just need natural ball winners IMHO.

Spot on.

I know we had a good run against hawthorn this weekend, but i think we're heading the road to nowhere if we're thinking about drafting people for their height. We need hard, tough midfielders. One of the big things that helped us on the weekend was Cook running off the line and crunching people.. hes not a big guy, so why talk about having big midfielders? It wreaks of the "athletes over footballers" mentality that some of our coaching staff love. And is a worrying trend.

 

[Belnakor]

The big fella got 8 clearnces himself on the W/E.

He was great this weekend, and has been leading the Clearances for us for the last 4 weeks according to the Record. I think hes getting the blame for stuff that simply isn't his fault. Ball ups are set plays, and sandi just follows what hes told to do.. I think its way too simplistic and a little unfair to be blaming him for "being too predictable" there are so many other factors involved, and coaching would be the biggest.

 

[Ripper]

He was great this weekend, and has been leading the Clearances for us for the last 4 weeks according to the Record. I think hes getting the blame for stuff that simply isn't his fault. Ball ups are set plays, and sandi just follows what hes told to do.. I think its way too simplistic and a little unfair to be blaming him for "being too predictable" there are so many other factors involved, and coaching would be the biggest.

I don't think He was getting blamed, it is pretty obvious that He is trying hard to mix it up a lot more and will get better and better with time.

The taller midfielder theory would be so there is less time from the tap to the recieve and therefore less time to have it sharked.

I don't think we need all taller midfielders but we certainly need one or two in the mix.

Kerr & Cousins would not be as effective without the 190cm Judd in the mix just as Mitchell would not be as effective without Hodge.

Our clearances have improved , most noteably in the fact that the opposition get very few clean clearances these days.

 

[Kenny_01]

Broadbridge is right. I think players like Crowley, Hayden, Mundy and Dodd would be effective at extracting the ball at stoppages. Tall and agile. Also Longmuir is very effective in stoppages.

 

[Polly]

From what I observe the good midfields at centre bounces only really have one player trying to win the possession, to provide a bit of a contest. The remaining players wait around the pack sweating on the players competing for the ball to cause a spillage from the pack, they then have numbers to take possession and a bit of room to handball out to another player on the perimeter. Just my observation of a few Budgy games. They also have the knack of tackling in anticipation of their opponent taking possession and getting away with it. Something that constantly annoys the crap out of me.

 

[dominguez]

Hey,

I was lucky to score a corporate ticket to the Game on the weekend, and after the game Broadbridge came into the function area to chat about the game. Was fairly stock standard until the question was posed: Why were getting thrashed in the clearances. This guy is our midfield coach, so i would have thought he'd have something useful to say, however it basically came down to:
1) Blame Sandilands, Hes too predictable with his taps
2) We need taller midfielders(?!?!)

He basically went on for about 5 minutes about the need for the club to have 6'1, 6'2 midfielders making the clearances, and thats what they would be drafting in coming years.. This frankly sounded a little absurd, the top clearance teams like the Hawks and Eagles certainly don't have huge midfielders, hell Josh Carr is a little nugget... What is he thinking?

Thoughts?

I've been to a function where Broadbridge has spoken in the past and I too came away unimpressed.

 

[theGav56]

I've been to a function where Broadbridge has spoken in the past and I too came away unimpressed.

I don't know him at all, but when he was appointed I hoped that he would become a realistic contender for the top job if/when it became vacant. Has a great opportunity to get the major problem area with our team right to establish credentials.

 

[Burnzy]

Some of my thoughts about clearances vs the Hawks.

4th Quarter (I think), Sandi smashes the ball about 15-20 metres towards our forward 50 from a bounce, and Belly storms away to get on the end of it. Not sure if it resulted in a goal but that tactic really worked well to clear the ball quickly and get our runners into space. Quite a number of times 211 finessed the ball down to a waiting player, and on occasions he used his size to crash packs, clear space and even get the ball out himself.

JLo showed his class, and why he has been so sorely missed. When on the ball he often manages to clear it himself (particularly at throw-ins). Up forward he's a reliable, strong-marking target.

Interesting to note, Crowley topped our team for 'hard ball gets' (hate that expression) you'd expect the inclusions of Josh and DJ to improve that area of our game further.

 

[dockers_bengals]

I agree Polly,a good example is judd and how they get the space for him to run free.Wasnt j carr good at clearances at port?I thought malaxos was the midfield coach so what does he do?

 

[wehavethepassion]

Hey,

I was lucky to score a corporate ticket to the Game on the weekend, and after the game Broadbridge came into the function area to chat about the game. Was fairly stock standard until the question was posed: Why were getting thrashed in the clearances. This guy is our midfield coach, so i would have thought he'd have something useful to say, however it basically came down to:
1) Blame Sandilands, Hes too predictable with his taps
2) We need taller midfielders(?!?!)

He basically went on for about 5 minutes about the need for the club to have 6'1, 6'2 midfielders making the clearances, and thats what they would be drafting in coming years.. This frankly sounded a little absurd, the top clearance teams like the Hawks and Eagles certainly don't have huge midfielders, hell Josh Carr is a little nugget... What is he thinking?

Thoughts?

Watching after his job!!

Waterman did well with our backline but Harvey has taken them to another level. We need a noted midfield coach would has a true understanding of midfield play(has played there with distinction in AFL) - darren creswell, don pyke, brett ratten, brian royal, matthew knights, adrian fletcher