Analysis Football is stuffed

[Marstermind]

Done effectively it's the best way to beat a team defense. The call to ban backwards kicks always comes up in the media and it's never thought through.

Although it it is done well, there isn't much need to go back and take a kick anyway.

It's not a ban, it's that it wouldn't be paid as mark.

 

[Scallop Industry Thug]

It's not a ban, it's that it wouldn't be paid as mark.

I know, I was watching something and typing.

Footy fans have been a bit slow to delineate between the nothing backwards kicks, and the backwards kicks designed to get the ball into the space where the defense isn't. An issue is we don't have great spreaders, so tend to go from side to side without anything presenting.

 

[SonofSamsquanch]

Look - if we want to extend the 6-6-6 rule and create zones, the answer is obvious. I can imagine the marketing team would be humming themselves as well with the sales targets for bibs...

 

[Souup]

There are 2 totally different things that people bring up regarding the state of footy: The defensive low-scoring footy and over-officiating.

Unpopular opinion: If you have an issue with defensive low-scoring footy then your interest in the sport is surface level and you're likely who the AFL was trying to cater to with AFLX and you don't even know it. You're actually the issue with the game and the reason the AFL is constantly trying to reinvent the rules.

High scoring football is not necessarily good football. People that whinge about defensive footy and that there aren't enough goals have no sense of the depth of strategy or tactics in the game - they're the same people that will cry 'JUST KICK IT LONG' only to whinge when the player does and it's turned over.

Enforcing 6-6-6 set-up is bullshit and all it does is extremely limit the flexibility and strategical/tactical ideas coaches have at their disposal. At the moment the coaches have great freedom in the type of tactics and strategies they apply in a game - limiting it to 6-6-6 will severely reduce the impact a coach can have on game day. The footy this year is extra defensive because the quarters are shortened which results in less fatigue. Though the game has been mostly defensive in the last 10 years, the quality of footy as a whole has been great.

Changing to 16 players on the ground is going to creep closer to AFLX. High scoring, less defensive pressure = boring.

If you're whinging about the state of umpiring - i'll whinge along. If you're complaining about the defensive low-scoring nature of modern day footy I'm not even close to on-board and never will be because I enjoy coaches having an unlimited amount of tactical and strategical options at their disposal. Limit this and the game will be forever vanilla.

 

[DaveyBoy123]

Look - if we want to extend the 6-6-6 rule and create zones, the answer is obvious. I can imagine the marketing team would be humming themselves as well with the sales targets for bibs...

View attachment 924576

STOP THE GAME... We need to go to THE ARC to see if that Wing Defence's foot is over the line!

 

[Scallop Industry Thug]

There are 2 totally different things that people bring up regarding the state of footy: The defensive low-scoring footy and over-officiating.

Unpopular opinion: If you have an issue with defensive low-scoring footy then your interest in the sport is surface level and you're likely who the AFL was trying to cater to with AFLX and you don't even know it.

High scoring football is not necessarily good football. People that whinge about defensive footy and that there aren't enough goals have no sense of the depth of strategy or tactics in the game - they're the same people that will cry 'JUST KICK IT LONG' only to whinge when the player does and it's turned over.


Enforcing 6-6-6 set-up is bullshit and all it does is extremely limit the flexibility and strategical/tactical ideas coaches have at their disposal. At the moment the coaches are great freedom in the type of tactics and strategies they apply in a game - limiting it to 6-6-6 will severely reduce the impact a coach can have on game day. The footy this year is extra defensive because the quarters are shortened which results in less fatigue.

Changing to 16 players on the ground is going to creep closer to AFLX. High scoring, less defensive pressure = boring.

If you're whinging about the state of umpiring - i'll whinge along. If you're complaining about the defensive low-scoring nature of modern day footy I'm not even close to on-board and never will be.

Good post. We all tend to use the term 'low scoring' as a synonym for crap style.

There's heaps of good games from the past that were low scoring. Fast, one on one footy without the roving mauls can be played and still be low scoring.

It's the low scoring games where teams focus on maintaining possession and clogging up the contest with numbers that is the issue.

 

[Colbys Boots]

Yes, you can form a cogent argument that low scoring games can still be entertaining. However, in the context of a season in which teams are scoring historic low scores for their club, even taking account of shortened quarters, and that has to be cause for concern. We can't be far off seeing a game this season where one side fails to kick a goal, and the other manages just one or two goals. The A-League suddenly looks like an attractive alternative.

 

[SonofSamsquanch]

STOP THE GAME... We need to go to THE ARC to see if that Wing Defence's foot is over the line!

That’s pretty close actually isn’t it?

But would the ARC get it right? The AFL put Vaseline on the lenses of them go-pros I reckon. A moto-flip phone from 10 years ago captured better pictures.

And there’s another thing that makes the AFL shyte.

 

[muttley45]

The current state of the game, particularly poor skill execution, low goal scoring etc, can possibly be linked to the way athletes are preferred to natural footballers, to an extent.

 

[CharlieMortdecai]

There are 2 totally different things that people bring up regarding the state of footy: The defensive low-scoring footy and over-officiating.

Unpopular opinion: If you have an issue with defensive low-scoring footy then your interest in the sport is surface level and you're likely who the AFL was trying to cater to with AFLX and you don't even know it. You're actually the issue with the game and the reason the AFL is constantly trying to reinvent the rules.

High scoring football is not necessarily good football. People that whinge about defensive footy and that there aren't enough goals have no sense of the depth of strategy or tactics in the game - they're the same people that will cry 'JUST KICK IT LONG' only to whinge when the player does and it's turned over.

Enforcing 6-6-6 set-up is bullshit and all it does is extremely limit the flexibility and strategical/tactical ideas coaches have at their disposal. At the moment the coaches have great freedom in the type of tactics and strategies they apply in a game - limiting it to 6-6-6 will severely reduce the impact a coach can have on game day. The footy this year is extra defensive because the quarters are shortened which results in less fatigue. Though the game has been mostly defensive in the last 10 years, the quality of footy as a whole has been great.

Changing to 16 players on the ground is going to creep closer to AFLX. High scoring, less defensive pressure = boring.

If you're whinging about the state of umpiring - i'll whinge along. If you're complaining about the defensive low-scoring nature of modern day footy I'm not even close to on-board and never will be because I enjoy coaches having an unlimited amount of tactical and strategical options at their disposal. Limit this and the game will be forever vanilla.

Thumbs up from me too. Refer to the first quarter between Braves and * for boring bruise-free pressure-less football. Game improved immensely when the dogs brought some pressure, even if * downhill skiers couldn't do their bit.

 

[Souup]

Thumbs up from me too. Refer to the first quarter between Braves and * for boring bruise-free pressure-less football. Game improved immensely when the dogs brought some pressure, even if * downhill skiers couldn't do their bit.

The game that sticks in my mind regarding how poor of a spectacle high scoring footy can be and how exciting low-scoring defensive footy can be is the West Coast-Collingwood game played at Subiaco in Round 17 last year. High scoring first half (18 goals between the 2 sides) where West Coast had the 13 point lead at half time. Buckley made some excellent adjustments, slowed down the game and Collingwood ended up winning by 1 point with only 5 goals kicked in the second half.

It was an absolute coaching clinic from Buckley and the second half was easily more intriguing and entertaining than the first.

I remember the commentators raving about how great the first quarter was because it was high scoring, free flowing attacking footy etc. The lack of any sort of defensive pressure and the ease at which both sides were scoring was not half as entertaining as the second half where a coach had clearly figured out what needed to change, made those changes and it was an intense arm-wrestle to the final siren where Collingwood won by 1 point.

 

[hcd199]

The game that sticks in my mind regarding how poor of a spectacle high scoring footy can be and how exciting low-scoring defensive footy can be is the West Coast-Collingwood game played at Subiaco in Round 17 last year. High scoring first half (18 goals between the 2 sides) where West Coast had the 13 point lead at half time. Buckley made some excellent adjustments, slowed down the game and Collingwood ended up winning by 1 point with only 5 goals kicked in the second half.

It was an absolute coaching clinic from Buckley and the second half was easily more intriguing and entertaining than the first.

I remember the commentators raving about how great the first quarter was because it was high scoring, free flowing attacking footy etc. The lack of any sort of defensive pressure and the ease at which both sides were scoring was not half as entertaining as the second half where a coach had clearly figured out what needed to change, made those changes and it was an intense arm-wrestle to the final siren where Collingwood won by 1 point.

This is the exact same game I think of as well: that first quarter was pathetically dull - kick to a loose forward, set shot, rinse and repeat - and the game only got interesting once it actually became a proper contest.

Almost every rule change in the last decade has been based in a misguided, moronic attempt to force teams to play 'dumb' football - think 6-6-6 (preventing teams from starting a man behind the ball, which can help both attack and defence) or the third man up ban (again, limiting options both attacking and defensive), the end result of which is teams play a stodgier lockdown game because it's the only option that remains. The AFL's reactive approach to changes doesn't help, nor does their incompetence (the recent HTB emphasis being both of these), but the "fix the game, go back to the 70s/80s/90s" crowd are exactly the reason why we're in the mess we're in.

 

[Gasometer]

The only thing keeping me watching AFL is North

 

[Bleeeeeeeeep]

Umps will always make mistake, I am all for the rules been applied and shake my head at the “put the whistle away, let them play” thought.
Any one noticed that since they have been applying the rules and paying more free kicks the scoring has been higher?
The rules are there, play by the rules and stop the cheats. Throwing the ball should be the next thing they crack down on.

 

[DrZaius]

I would rather the whistle put away if the umpire is unsure of something, rather than feeling the need to make a decision just because there might have been an infringement.

 

[ferball]

The problem runs deeper than that Merlin.

The coaches, interchanges and contemporary footballer fitness have outgrown the fundamentals of the sport.

However, IMO there is a solution. The game must be slowed down.

Slowing it down won't fix it.

The current AFL admin need to be lined up against the wall and shot. It's not the speed of the game that *s things. It's the obsession with removing contact from contests.

 

[ferball]

When you are rewarded more often than not for being second to the contest/ball you are destroying the fabric of the game.

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This is one of the biggest problems in the game. If not the biggest.

Honestly the speed of the game isn't the issue and either is the fitness. The only reason the 90s teams looked so good is because we played Jim and Phil footy using space and running into it. Breaking up the structures of traditional footy by breaking lines and putting the ball into space or clearing out the 50 for players to run into space.

No surprise that the bloke coaching our kids when Jimmy and Phil were playing incorporated that into our side when he coached his kids as adults.

We all loved it when we seemed like the only ones doing it.

If the umpires stopped waiting for players to set up and just balled up straight away and ignored body contact frees unless they were blatent pushes or holds off the ball instead of picking a free every time players touch then the game would be better.

How many times do you see frees called, everyone stops and play on advantage is called while we are still all wondering wtf the free was payed for?

Meanwhile the team with the ball have a stupid unreasonable advantage and usually take advantage of the confusion to score. If the umps had done nothing the game would have flowed.

I wonder how much feel modern umps have for the game, or more to the point how much feel their bosses and the AFL have for the game.

 

[ferball]

They were supposed to be there to officiate when the contest went too far, not to mitigate the contest altogether.

This is exactly the problem mate.

It's like the umps enforce the AFLs onfield nanny state mentality.

 

[ferball]

The fact people are only picking up on this now makes me laugh.

It all went to sh*t when they introduced the diving on the ball rule. Remember Archer in the earlier days, he was baffled as to why he was penalized for winning the ball. The AFL changed the rule to say, in essence don’t be the first to the ball, be the first to ball standing on your feet.

All they needed to do at the time was to adjudicate the rules we had. If someone dives on top of a player who’s on the ball its a push in the back. This allows the person who won the ball a chance to dispose of it.

And, if a team mate dives in and takes the ball off their team mate Who’s being tackled on the ground then it’s illegal disposal. It shits we how many times you see a team mate pass the ball like they’re playing pass the parcel.

Pay these two frees and all is well.

They introduced the diving rule to decrease the amount of stoppages. Well, it hasn't worked. Just one example of AFL rule changes that have unforeseen results. People that think we can “fix” the game with simple rule changes and simpletons. Arguing that it’s the coaches that have caused it is also certified moronic. Who here was complaining when Pagan introduced the Paddock?? The coaches role is to come up with a game plan that enables your strengths to beat the opposition, with in the rules.

I struggle to find anything to disagree with in this post. Even the font.

 

[ferball]

The game that sticks in my mind regarding how poor of a spectacle high scoring footy can be and how exciting low-scoring defensive footy can be is the West Coast-Collingwood game played at Subiaco in Round 17 last year. High scoring first half (18 goals between the 2 sides) where West Coast had the 13 point lead at half time. Buckley made some excellent adjustments, slowed down the game and Collingwood ended up winning by 1 point with only 5 goals kicked in the second half.

It was an absolute coaching clinic from Buckley and the second half was easily more intriguing and entertaining than the first.

I remember the commentators raving about how great the first quarter was because it was high scoring, free flowing attacking footy etc. The lack of any sort of defensive pressure and the ease at which both sides were scoring was not half as entertaining as the second half where a coach had clearly figured out what needed to change, made those changes and it was an intense arm-wrestle to the final siren where Collingwood won by 1 point.

The thing that makes fast free flowing footy great is when it happens despite the intense defensive pressure the opposition are trying to put on IMO.

It's kind of the exact opposite of that Dogs * game.

Do you remember the 2009 Grannie?

It was hard, tight, really intense pressure footy all day. In the dying minutes of the game the Cats got a lucky break and two of their best players (one on the day, the other of all time) were able to manufacture some fast, scoring footy out of nothing.

That was great.

 

[NMFC49]

The congestion is now starting to make our game look like its being played on a giant pin ball machine. No one is capable anymore of officiating consistency of the rules with the game in this terrible state. And yes Clarkeson is an 'urger'.
As said above, we need to return to 19th and 20th only on the bench and the super humans out on the ground can run their guts out like they had to in the past. That will slow the game down and open it up to once again put the best skills on show.