First things First Lets get back to Basics

[birdmanptr]

Its time now more than ever before to get back to basics.

Goal Kicking i was told 2 years ago by a Junior coach down south Hackam [I think] and from time to time they get a Crows player down.This night it was Nick Gill and my mate asked him about goal kicking what he was doing to work on it and could he pass on some tips to the boys.

Nick said i would have thought i would just go out and have endless shots HOWEVER Craigy had him doing every thing but,He had him counting steps counting breaths looking at different things and so on Surely its a case of just having shot after shot after shot

Tackling We dont need a tackling coach we just need to do it at training and do it over and over you would think they know how to tackle just need to perfect it

Its not time for a new coach its time for this one to get new ideas and change some of his ways

 

[exit]

We need to be more spontaneous and not rely too much on structure. Players seem to be second guessing themselves. Their first instinct when they are under pressure is to try and handball their way out of it. I'm sick of yelling kick it long! But even on the odd occasion that they do, they have so many players behind the ball that they are outnumbered because of the stupid zone or structure or whatever the hell you want to call that crap. Teach our young players to play some one on one contested footy. It might hurt short term but we'll be better for it long term. Zoning obviously has it's place in modern football, but we are way too over reliant on it.
And we've always been crap in front of goals. It is just magnified when we're playing bad to boot. It's always been like a disease in this side. One player misses an easy shot and you can be sure it's gonna be that kind of day. It's as obvious as our gameplan. Frustrating as hell to watch.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

Goal Kicking i was told 2 years ago by a Junior coach down south Hackam [I think] and from time to time they get a Crows player down.This night it was Nick Gill and my mate asked him about goal kicking what he was doing to work on it and could he pass on some tips to the boys.

Nick said i would have thought i would just go out and have endless shots HOWEVER Craigy had him doing every thing but,He had him counting steps counting breaths looking at different things and so on Surely its a case of just having shot after shot after shot

It's an interesting story that says plenty about modern coaching trends.

I don't reckon Gary Ablett Snr or Tony Lockett would have known how many breaths they took when they were shooting for goal. We are constantly trying to reinvent the wheel and changing things in the pursuit of being innovative or cutting edge.

Q: I want to get better at kicking.
A: Do lots of kicking then.
Any spud in the stand could come up with that advice. Paid coaches who are the experts in their field feel that they need to come up with something more scientific and in depth, otherwise why are they getting the big $$$?

At schools now they don't teach times tables by getting Year 2/3 kids just to chant them out day after day until they are tattooed on your brain and you never forget them. Now you have to have a deeper understanding of the concepts of multiplication and be able to visualise it. The the old-school methods don't fly... Blah. No, just learn your f___ing time tables. Learn them off by heart so that whenever you need to come up with an answer you can.

 

[Coopers]

So, what you're saying is that the crows need to be better at kicking, handballing, tackling and marking?



I agree.

 

[Allbetsroff]

Get back to basics.

Kick the ****ing football.

Carlton had 50+ more effective kicks than Adelaide, likely because the Crows barely kicked the thing. Mcleod, Vince and Edwards racked up possessions from cheap 1 metre handpasses to players in trouble on the half back line.

 

[Kennyrocks]

Goal kicking is just practice, I'm 6 foot 7 not exactly the type you'd expect to be a good kick (think Jonathon Griffin with slightly more bulk), but give me the footy anywhere in a 140 degree arc within 55m of goals and hand on my heart I'll put it through 8 times out of ten. 9 on a good day

Now, I'm not an AFL footballer, hell I wasn't even a very good footballer before a dodgy left knee relieved the football world of me, but what I did do is grow up with a footy in hand kicking around with mates/family/random strangers and I'd say it's a fair bet that most blokes who makes it to SANFL level or above (with some obvious exceptions) did the same.

So whats the deal? This has been an issue across the competition so far this season, and the crows have been particularly bad. Let's be honest its not that difficult, you repeat the same process over and over and you get the same result. I'd say the problem is upstairs but there's a saying that the only pressure is what you put on yourself.

I'm not asking for 90 or even 80% accuracy but these guys are on money that most of us will never get close to and we're talking about a pretty basic skill here. Something needs to change.

 

[HugeJohnson]

Lol, why on earth would you ask Nick Gill for goal kicking tips?

 

[Kennyrocks]

Lol, why on earth would you ask Nick Gill for goal kicking tips?

My thoughts exactly!

 

[Vader]

When it comes to kicking for goal it all depends on what the problem is. Is the problem technique, or is it mental (is the player panicking)?

For a player like Gill to practice kick after kick it would achieve nothing. He had a shocking technique, so all this would achieve would be to reinforce the original problem. He should have been taught a correct technique and forced to practice that for hours on end until it became instinctive.

For most of the players in our current team though, the problems appear to be mental in nature. They have the skills to kick the ball properly, they just lack confidence or they're panicking or something. Repetitive drills at practice isn't going to overcome this problem - spending time with a sports psychologist might actually be more beneficial.

The exercises described in the OP sounds like a routine designed to take the player's mind off the situation they were in - kicking for goal in front of a large crowd, with all the pressure that entails. By taking their mind off the pressure-filled situation, the player has a better chance of reverting to instinct and succeeding where they might previously have failed.

 

[Crow-mo]

Now, I'm not an AFL footballer, hell I wasn't even a very good footballer before a dodgy left knee relieved the football world of me, but what I did do is grow up with a footy in hand kicking around with mates/family/random strangers and I'd say it's a fair bet that most blokes who makes it to SANFL level or above (with some obvious exceptions) did the same.

Interesting, and I agree with you.

Both Jarman boys have said the reason for their skills was the amount of practise and effort they put in playing with each other growing up.

always playing, always kicking etc. amongst themselves.

Ross Gibbs was an amazingly, naturally skilled player. arrogant little so and so but amazing foot skills. His lad Bryce (lets not go there) also can kick a ball like a dream.

funnily enough I don't believe its just genes, and I certainly don't believe Ross taught his boy to ever count steps or breaths. ever.

 

[albyplus]

Interesting, and I agree with you.

Both Jarman boys have said the reason for their skills was the amount of practise and effort they put in playing with each other growing up.

always playing, always kicking etc. amongst themselves.

Ross Gibbs was an amazingly, naturally skilled player. arrogant little so and so but amazing foot skills. His lad Bryce (lets not go there) also can kick a ball like a dream.

funnily enough I don't believe its just genes, and I certainly don't believe Ross taught his boy to ever count steps or breaths. ever.

WHAT? What is your point? What are you on about? Apart from an old hack from many irrelevant football generations ago - who is Ross Gibbs and who cares? How can he help the Crows?

 

[albyplus]

So, what you're saying is that the crows need to be better at kicking, handballing, tackling and marking?



I agree.

and in coaching
and in administration
and in building a $billion stadium at a ground that is almost defunct
and in fitness & injury rehab
and in jobs for the boys

 

[Kennyrocks]

Interesting, and I agree with you.

Both Jarman boys have said the reason for their skills was the amount of practise and effort they put in playing with each other growing up.

always playing, always kicking etc. amongst themselves.

Ross Gibbs was an amazingly, naturally skilled player. arrogant little so and so but amazing foot skills. His lad Bryce (lets not go there) also can kick a ball like a dream.

funnily enough I don't believe its just genes, and I certainly don't believe Ross taught his boy to ever count steps or breaths. ever.

Exactly, if you're down to this to improve your kicking surely your getting desperate, however once you've got a technique it's hard to change it. I guess the coaching staff do what they can even if its only for small gains.

I tend to subscribe to the can't kick can't play theory. Kicking accurately for goals is as important today as it has ever been, and in today's largely possession based game disposal (by hand and foot) is crucial.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

I remember reading about an experiment they did where they tried to discover what separated athletes that reached the elite level from athletes who reached a good level (eg AFL footballers vs A Grade amateur league footballers).

I forget the sport but I think it was netball and they had to complete a series of tests. All the skill elements were roughly even with little to no difference between the elite and non-elite players.

Where they differed though was when they needed to observe other things happening around them while they were performing a skill. In this particular experiment, they had to complete a series of catching/passing activities and while they were doing it needed to identify a series of coloured lights that were flashing in their peripheral vision.

The elite athletes could take in what was happening around them and continue to perform the skill at a high level. With the non-elite athletes either their skill level suffered or they were unable to accurately identify what was happening around them. They couldn't do both at once.

Drawing a parallel with football, the best players have such perfect control over the skills (picking up the ball, marking it, bouncing it, kicking it) that their subconscious controls that while their conscious mind is free to process what is happening upfield, how much space they have, where their opponent is, who to kick it to, which way the wind is blowing etc.

The shit players have to concentrate 100% on, say, marking the ball because if they don't they will drop it. The best players seem to always have time and space, are impossible to tackle, always seem to be able to find a team mate with their disposal, seem to instinctively know where their team mates and opponents are etc. Others always seem to be caught unawares (Douglas).

Back on the Gill kicking story, it sounds as though they are trying to teach kicking backwards. Overload the brain by counting steps and counting breaths so that your conscious mind is worrying about those things rather than your kicking technique and your subconscious controls the kicking action.

Kicking for goal in a game the brain is overloaded compared to training; you add a man on the mark, crowd noise, scoreboard pressure, television cameras, fear of getting dragged or dropped, state of the game, verbal advice from your opponent, worrying about whether you should pass it off etc. All stuff you don't have at training. The brain gets overloaded and if you have to think about your run up, ball drop, hand position as well, then you stuff it up. The brain can't handle all that at once.

I assume this is why they would be getting Gill to do all that crap. Much easier to just draft guys who can kick though

 

[Crow-mo]

WHAT? What is your point? What are you on about? Apart from an old hack from many irrelevant football generations ago - who is Ross Gibbs and who cares? How can he help the Crows?

I am going to assume that your pet monkey has taken charge of the keyboard whilst you're on the loo.

 

[Kennyrocks]

I assume this is why they would be getting Gill to do all that crap. Much easier to just draft guys who can kick though

Exactly! I tend to think that once you've developed a technique its near impossible to change it. Having some experience with coaching and technique in a few different sports, I fear that doing things like the breathing, counting at steps is at best clutching at straws, at worst doing it for the sake of it.

It's really pretty simple when it boils down to it, you keep everything straight, the kicking leg goes back straight and comes through straight. For consistency, the ball drop is very important, guide it onto your boot to the lowest point you can-the smaller the distance it has to travel from hand to foot, the less opportunity it has to deviate off course. Throw in keeping your head over the ball and you've got yourself a decent technique. Mix with a great deal of practice (read kick to kick, which should come easily to anyone who loves sport enough) and you'll be a good dob of the Sherrin.

 

[mattrowe]

i think they need to practice kicking under pressure
Birdman drilled about 10 straight in the warmup but turned to shit in the game when the pressure was on