Women's Footy AFLW Fremantle - 2020 #1 Team - Season Cancelled

Nov 8, 2000
33,295
21,790
South of the river
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
Peel Thunder
I think the point I'm making is that they were great to watch. It was an all WA team that was improving, coached by a female. Maybe we should have just given Cowan more support and let us just enjoy watching an improving all female footy WA team. It was unique, different from the men's team.

But she kept losing.

The whole point is winning.
 
May 13, 2007
4,016
4,035
Radelaide
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
East Fremantle, Glasgow Warriors
But she kept losing.

The whole point is winning.

It wasn’t the lack of winning that was the real concern as much as the lack of clear system in my view. Weird strategy of trying to make dangerous cross ground passes and then getting caught out of position over and over. I’m ****ed if I could understand it...
 

jatz14

Brownlow Medallist
Dec 13, 2011
11,368
16,074
WA
AFL Club
West Coast
Other Teams
Perth Glory W-League
It wasn’t the lack of winning that was the real concern as much as the lack of clear system in my view. Weird strategy of trying to make dangerous cross ground passes and then getting caught out of position over and over. I’m ****** if I could understand it...
I am not sure that was strategy, or players just doing dumb things.
 

apuchar

Brownlow Medallist
Sep 21, 2010
17,133
12,260
Perth
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
Perth Football Club
But she kept losing.

The whole point is winning.
They did better this year than last. That shows improvement. Ross Lyon has been given 5 years to rebuild, and seems to be going nowhere. She was given 2 years to build a team from scratch, improved the team from last year and got pushed aside. From what I can gather the players really liked her. I think the whole point is being competitive, improving and consolidating Women's footy in WA. I enjoyed watching it as it was going. I didn't expect them to win a premiership in 5 minutes.
 

apuchar

Brownlow Medallist
Sep 21, 2010
17,133
12,260
Perth
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
Perth Football Club
If she hadn't of lost most of her marquees and better players to injury, who knows how much better we would have done. Even bringing Gibson?? in late in the season made us look better. Not being able to bring big names in, was even more reason to give local talent some time to improve as a team and give WA players a pathway to stay home and play, if they wanted to.
 
Webb showed how just one elite runner can improve a side. She is a massive loss to the team this season.

The competition is so lacking in elite talent that one star can turn the whole game, every game.

A burst speed, agility machine with clean hands would look like Nathan Fyfe, especially against this congested contested style that it has turned into.
 

apuchar

Brownlow Medallist
Sep 21, 2010
17,133
12,260
Perth
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
Perth Football Club
Webb showed how just one elite runner can improve a side. She is a massive loss to the team this season.

The competition is so lacking in elite talent that one star can turn the whole game, every game.

A burst speed, agility machine with clean hands would look like Nathan Fyfe, especially against this congested contested style that it has turned into.
Yeah true, she is a big loss. Let's hope we can grab a couple of good players in the draft. Thank God we didn't lose Dana as well.
 

wayToGo_

Brownlow Medallist
Oct 24, 2015
16,071
50,928
AFL Club
Fremantle
A burst speed, agility machine with clean hands would look like Nathan Fyfe, especially against this congested contested style that it has turned into.
*cough* Chloe Metcalf *cough*

https://www.iaaf.org/athletes/australia/chloe-metcalf-342543

She's 18 and kicked 21 goals in 8 games so far this year (for West Perth).

edit - pretty sure this photo indicates she's a Freo supporter. That's from 2014 btw...

10296378_1516495485238697_3825835852663596335_o.jpg
 

jatz14

Brownlow Medallist
Dec 13, 2011
11,368
16,074
WA
AFL Club
West Coast
Other Teams
Perth Glory W-League
But she kept losing.

The whole point is winning.
She, or the team?
For mine very few players that are basically amateurs like the girls are at the moment would switch play like that deep in defence unless it was a specific instruction from the coach.
My experience with amateurs is that instructions from the coach are in force until the players run onto the field, then they do what they normally do. Those that slam it on the boot, slam it on the boot and what the coach wants never even enters the equation.

The players I saw as most guilty of those errors make those same errors in the WAWFL imop. They just do not get punished the same way at the WAWFL

I saw an interview with Daisy Pearce after an exhibition game that summed it up. She mentioned an occasion where a player at a ball up deep in defence (possibly Paxman from memory) completely ignored her direct opponent (Bowers), who roved the pack, snapped the goal

Daisies comment was, she ignored her direct opponent in a situation in high level footy where you shouldn't because thats what she would have done at Darebin, and at Darebin she probably would have got away with it, and if she didn't, there wouldn't be any vision, and nothing would be said about it. At a higher level, these mistakes are more likely to be punished, and you are going to have your errors pointed out to you in a way you wouldn't at state league level.

They have had 14 games of footy, its not enough to unlearn previous habits. The mistakes they make are the same mistakes they make in the WAWFL, but in the WAWFL, with less structure, they are not as often punished, and no one not at the ground even knows.

The switching in the backline seemed to come from Davidson, Haynes, Cain etc, but not Bresland. Davidson is a skilled player, but holds the ball, and tries to hit cute precision kicks. She doesn't tend to just kick it long, she looks for a player which is good, but if that player is lateral, thats were she kicks it, and her cute precision kicks have an error rate that sees turnover. Bresland rarely goes for little lateral kicks, she is a much more straight ahead type defender, but this is how they both play in the WAWFL and the AFLW. I have no doubt instruction was for Davidson to be a play maker from the backline, but I doubt some of the choices she made had the coach happy, or fit in with any game plan.

14 games is not enough to fix the flaws (whole mens careers are not enough), so you take the strengths each player brings, and live with the deficiencies.

I think Cowan has been tarred by the collective deficiencies of her players.

I expect Freo to improve, and that improvement will be seen as a justification for Cowan leaving, but I suspect the improvement would have happened anyway.
 

rgauci

Brownlow Medallist
Jul 16, 2004
11,188
11,507
Fremantle
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
DOCKERS
Webb showed how just one elite runner can improve a side. She is a massive loss to the team this season.

The competition is so lacking in elite talent that one star can turn the whole game, every game.

A burst speed, agility machine with clean hands would look like Nathan Fyfe, especially against this congested contested style that it has turned into.

I can’t remember, did Webb injure herself or retire?
 

freo1997

Norm Smith Medallist
Jul 6, 2011
8,750
10,279
munster
AFL Club
Fremantle
Anything on Caulfield yet? Heard on the grapevine she was thinking of leaving/retiring.

Not sure if discussed yet but Cowan wasn’t a popular coach with the players. It’s hard to play for a coach you don’t see eye to eye. I’ll leave it at that.
 

ImperialPurple

Matthew Pavlich Medallist
May 26, 2003
24,238
18,050
South Freo
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
SFFC, Aussie Women's Cricket, HNK
Are these decisions made by Lloyd and co same as Men’s do we know? Interesting that list management decisions are being made with no coach there...
Fellow by the name of Wade Spilcker looks after all the decisions regarding the women's team I believe.

I can’t remember, did Webb injure herself or retire?
Someone mentioned before she's taking time off for family reasons. No idea if that means she'll be back for the 2020 season - she's already 34.
 

jatz14

Brownlow Medallist
Dec 13, 2011
11,368
16,074
WA
AFL Club
West Coast
Other Teams
Perth Glory W-League
I can’t remember, did Webb injure herself or retire?
She stood aside from AFLW for family reasons. My understanding is that it is not out of the question she returns later in the year, and gets redrafted.

So, its a retirement, but possibly a short one.
 
I can’t remember, did Webb injure herself or retire?
I'm hoping the family reasons are having a child but the AFL have been talking with Freo about keeping her on the list in some non official fashion that will allow her to be straight back onto it when she can return.
 

Fyfster

Club Legend
Nov 6, 2017
2,501
3,866
Perth
AFL Club
Fremantle
Other Teams
Claremont
I'm hoping the family reasons are having a child but the AFL have been talking with Freo about keeping her on the list in some non official fashion that will allow her to be straight back onto it when she can return.
That would make sense , If a player was having a child you would assume the club would be able to bring her straight back in when ready, And also be able to replace that player on the list for whatever the period of absence would be .
 

jatz14

Brownlow Medallist
Dec 13, 2011
11,368
16,074
WA
AFL Club
West Coast
Other Teams
Perth Glory W-League
Question for Jatz14 in the know, would Bec Goddard be a good get as coach?
Don't know if she is gettable. Has moved to Canberra as part of her Federal police career. Staying at the Crows was going to take a significant full time position to justify her leaving the Feds, where she has a pretty senior position.

Also, it's hard to tell if she is better than Cowan after 14 regular season games. She did have a fit Phillips and Randall season 1, which might paper over a few cracks.

Did see a good discussion piece on Roar asking the question, did the Crows direct simple game plan come about because Goddard read the standard of the comp better, and formulated a plan that best suited it, or was it because she came out of lower level footy, and a simple game plan is all she has?

If it's the latter, she may be outdated quite quick.

Sent from my XT1068 using Tapatalk
 
Back