Autopsy Freo kick more goals than Suns ... but lose anyway. Game review thread here.

[PurpleEyes]

Can confirm the opposite. Something like 4 months older and 10 games more. Very similar spread of experience though. Think it was posted in the preview thread.

GC were the youngest this week, we were third youngest.

In terms of a team's maturity, I like to look at how many players have played 50 or more for that team.
Freo had 5 (Mundy, Fyfe, Walters, Taberner & Tucker. Tucker was playing his 50th), GC had 6.
That is, both teams are very inexperienced in terms of playing with each other.
For comparisons sake, West Coast's 2018 Premiership team had 16 players who had played at least 50 games for them at that time.

 

[Johnny Dalmas]

In terms of a team's maturity, I like to look at how many players have played 50 or more for that team.
Freo had 5 (Mundy, Fyfe, Walters, Taberner & Tucker. Tucker was playing his 50th), GC had 6.
That is, both teams are very inexperienced in terms of playing with each other.
For comparisons sake, West Coast's 2018 Premiership team had 16 players who had played at least 50 games for them at that time.

I get the point you are making, but I really don't think we can consider a team to be immature just because guys like Conca, Colyer, Lobb, and Hogan haven't played much footy together.

 

[Johnny Dalmas]

Hughes played an OK offensive game today but he is pretty bloody ordinary as a defensive player. He is prone to panic, doesn't always position himself well to defend, and coughs up goals.

 

[Fat Nyfe]

A vintage Freo away performance. It really takes you back. We look invincible at home to get everyone’s hopes up and proceed to crush them with a performance so inept it makes you question everything. The players were bad, the coaches were bad. Can’t even blame having a young team, whilst we had a few young players struggle it was the senior players for the most part that failed to lead the way. Port had a far younger team run over the top of Melbourne last week.

Just a classic loss that shouldn’t have happened. How long is this club going to continue putting up with mediocrity. Instead of drawing a line early and saying we aren’t going to put up with efforts like this anymore, Lyon has said in his presser he’s ‘proud of the way we hung in there’. Against the Suns. As long as the club is complacent with s**t like this, it will continue to happen and we’ll go nowhere.

 

[wayToGo_]

Port had a far younger team run over the top of Melbourne last week.

Agree with your sentiments about our away form (and both our players and coaches to blame) but Port were actually much older than Melbourne last week, and a crap load more experienced.

 

[Boppo]

A vintage Freo away performance. It really takes you back. We look invincible at home to get everyone’s hopes up and proceed to crush them with a performance so inept it makes you question everything. The players were bad, the coaches were bad. Can’t even blame having a young team, whilst we had a few young players struggle it was the senior players for the most part that failed to lead the way. Port had a far younger team run over the top of Melbourne last week.

Just a classic loss that shouldn’t have happened. How long is this club going to continue putting up with mediocrity. Instead of drawing a line early and saying we aren’t going to put up with efforts like this anymore, Lyon has said in his presser he’s ‘proud of the way we hung in there’. Against the Suns. As long as the club is complacent with s**t like this, it will continue to happen and we’ll go nowhere.

The Suns are a hard running, super fit looking group and they seems to be gelling nicely now that the superstars have taken their attitude and left. Should have outrun StKilda last week as well. I have no problem with our performance and think the Suns may develop a pretty handy home ground advantage. At least I hope they do with these stupid odds:

 

[Fat Nyfe]

Agree with your sentiments about our away form (and both our players and coaches to blame) but Port were actually much older than Melbourne last week, and a crap load more experienced.

View attachment 646089

Fair enough they had 4 debutants but also plenty in the 150+ bracket. There was probably a better example out there, the point was we shouldn't just use youth as an excuse.

 

[StingBitten]

Watched the replay:

- Our defenders were under enormous pressure and did the best they could. Hughes let through some but stopped many.

- Forwards were starved of scoring opportunities, the few they received they made the most of (McCarthy and Taberner).

- Midfield and Ruck completely destroyed, we are not beating anyone without any hard bodied ball winners. Biggest mistake has been putting Brayshaw on the ball and Cerra at half back. There's no real solutions at this stage beyond Blakely returning, there's no other hard noses left at the club.

 

[Steinfreo]

Watched the replay:

- Our defenders were under enormous pressure and did the best they could. Hughes let through some but stopped many.

- Forwards were starved of scoring opportunities, the few they received they made the most of (McCarthy and Taberner).

- Midfield and Ruck completely destroyed, we are not beating anyone without any hard bodied ball winners. Biggest mistake has been putting Brayshaw on the ball and Cerra at half back. There's no real solutions at this stage beyond Blakely returning, there's no other hard noses left at the club.

If you could make a 6 foot 3 92kg baby combining Cerra and Brayshaw that would be perfect. Brayshaw shits himself a surprising amount for someone in the right spot so often and Cerra isnt in the right spot often enough but has the composer (except that awful kick into the 50 where he picked out the GC player amongst 3 of ours). Brayshaw I thought looked decent size during preseason but hes looking undersized all of a sudden. Cerra looks to be developing a way better physical shape for a modern mid.

 

[Joao]

So much different when you watch at the ground. Disappointed that we didn't get up but was a good experience.

- Cam is ordinary in contested situations but damaging as hell with space
- Hill is much quicker than he looks on TV. Gets separation so fast
- Hogan still looks underdone but is MUCH bigger looking in person
- We got belted around the ball and also at the foot of contests. So often it came to ground and we had no representation
- Our wingers give their man space over the top and I think that is to stop the chip kick lead up. Lead to Ed chasing old mate up the wing on transition a LOT
- We were definitely too slow up forward. Looked to me like Hogan spent the whole 4th quarter in the mids
- Don't reckon the gameplan changed throughout the game - we just executed better/worse at different times. The Suns just applied really good pressure for 4 quarters. They are not as terrible as the media makes out. They also don't rely on any superstars and spread the load well.
- Our defenders dropped way to many easy marks. Pearce especially had a mare.

Gold Coast will beat better teams than us playing like that at Metricon. Considering how sparse the crowd is, they make good noise and get behind them well.

 

[Channels]

Plan A didn't work with the ruck & mids getting belted, so Ross resorted to plan B which is the ugly defensive style. On the plus side, Ross has a plan B when it appears other coaches don't. My biggest concern was stoppages in the Suns forward 50, our biggest benefit was the Suns inaccuracy. Even when exiting the defensive 50, the Suns structure was similar to ours against North the previous week, it was so hard to clear.

When I thought about the squad this year, I always thought the back 6 was good with the potential to be great, forwards will be hard to stop but the weakness was always the midfield. Suns had 20 more contested possessions and more tackles, clearly they wanted it more.

 

[PurpleEyes]

I get the point you are making, but I really don't think we can consider a team to be immature just because guys like Conca, Colyer, Lobb, and Hogan haven't played much footy together.

Actually, it's a very good indicator of team maturity.
Here are the numbers for the previous 10 premiers;
2018 WC 16 players having played at least 50 games for that team.
2017 RI 13
2016 WB 13
2015 HA 20
2014 HA 17
2013 HA 17
2012 SY 17
2011 GE 18
2010 CO 13

It is further evidence that Freo's rebuild still has at least 12 months to go.

 

[Bicco]

Watched the replay:

- Our defenders were under enormous pressure and did the best they could. Hughes let through some but stopped many.

- Forwards were starved of scoring opportunities, the few they received they made the most of (McCarthy and Taberner).

- Midfield and Ruck completely destroyed, we are not beating anyone without any hard bodied ball winners. Biggest mistake has been putting Brayshaw on the ball and Cerra at half back. There's no real solutions at this stage beyond Blakely returning, there's no other hard noses left at the club.

Agree. Neale being replaced by Brayshaw/Hogan is something that is going to take a while to rectify. Neales 40+ possessions in the midfield would have won us the game. And yes, until a ball winning mid like Blakely comes in or the young guys pick up the slack, we're going to struggle in the midfield. Add on that Darcy is a few years away from his 'mans body', the whole thing will take time.
The loss was dissapointing but not totally unexpected.

 

[Taylor]

I was a bit disappointed that the Suns good players were taking dives all game. As soon as they felt a bit of contact they acted it up and fell over, one of them was paid and it was the kick 25 out nearly in front that went for goal.

It makes me wonder if the start of the game had both coaches ask the umpires to leave the whistles in the pocket.

 

[freo1997]

Watched the replay:

- Our defenders were under enormous pressure and did the best they could. Hughes let through some but stopped many.

- Forwards were starved of scoring opportunities, the few they received they made the most of (McCarthy and Taberner).

- Midfield and Ruck completely destroyed, we are not beating anyone without any hard bodied ball winners. Biggest mistake has been putting Brayshaw on the ball and Cerra at half back. There's no real solutions at this stage beyond Blakely returning, there's no other hard noses left at the club.

Get conca off hb and into the midfield. Brayshaw may need to practice his kicking at peel maybe. Too many skill errors.

 

[Scham]

Agree. Neale being replaced by Brayshaw/Hogan is something that is going to take a while to rectify. Neales 40+ possessions in the midfield would have won us the game. And yes, until a ball winning mid like Blakely comes in or the young guys pick up the slack, we're going to struggle in the midfield. Add on that Darcy is a few years away from his 'mans body', the whole thing will take time.
The loss was dissapointing but not totally unexpected.

We all thought Conca would be considered to play Neales role if Blakely was missing. Apparently he's needed at hb.

 

[armpit]

I honestly thought Freo were playing a game within a game, and they thought that whenever they needed to, they were good enough to kick the winning goal. I enjoyed the game from this perspective up until the last few minutes.

Then the gutting loss. The only positive to take from it is that we made all West Coast supporters full of themselves again.

 

[johnthegardener]

It was very noticeable tp me how easily the Suns cleared after a kick-in whereas we were back to the kick it down the line to cause a throw in. Also on a number of occasions I saw us take the kick-in from inside the square instead of utilising the extra run the new rule allows.

 

[blue shark]

Agree. Neale being replaced by Brayshaw/Hogan is something that is going to take a while to rectify. Neales 40+ possessions in the midfield would have won us the game. And yes, until a ball winning mid like Blakely comes in or the young guys pick up the slack, we're going to struggle in the midfield. Add on that Darcy is a few years away from his 'mans body', the whole thing will take time.
The loss was dissapointing but not totally unexpected.

How is this possible? We have big bodies at the club, just not playing midfield or at Peel?
Even WC turned Yeo into a mid, I really thought we had seen the end of Walters playing on ball.
Banfield, Cerra, Conca, and if Blakely can go mid/HB then why not Hughes?

 

[Bicco]

How is this possible? We have big bodies at the club, just not playing midfield or at Peel?
Even WC turned Yeo into a mid, I really thought we had seen the end of Walters playing on ball.
Banfield, Cerra, Conca, and if Blakely can go mid/HB then why not Hughes?

Because it doesn't matter how big you are, it matters how good you are. Its why all of the beep tests, combiness, agility tests etc are f*****g pointless (to a degree) if you can't get your your hands on the ball first or know where/when to run.
It's also why the point made about games played with a club is relevant, as players know game plans and just as importantly each other.
We've got 5 new players on the field. Sometimes things are going to work and sometimes not.
We were right in that game and that is a positive. That we couldn't get it done is dissapointing but until teams have played a few games we won't know how good our oppostion really is/was.
I like @Eshed post because how we change our style is a real litmus test.

 

[Cesoir]

Is it just me or does Sonny rarely win a one on one contest any more? I remember the days when he would put the after burners on and make guys look stupid Buddy Franklin style. Now it seems his entire strategy is to go to ground hoping for a free kick, and if he doesn't get it (which he VERY rarely does) then his man is off to the races and the opposition is of of defensive 50. We are quick to criticise Ballas for going to ground, but I can almost guarantee if he played yesreday the ball would not have rebounded as easily as it did.

I think with Sonny really struggling in the small forward role and Lachie Schultz a fair way off being AFL level (I think he will be good, just not yet) then I think it's imperative we get Switta back in as soon as possible. He has the speed, keeps his feet and gives great defensive pressure. He make some silly errors at Peel on the weekend, but I think that was more about the overall structure of Peel than Switta per se. From what I have seen Matera's forward pressure is nowhere near Switta's or Ballas'.

 

[SiempreFreo]

Re Andy Brayshaw: a brave young bloke who did the right things after the horrible Gaff smashing. But I wouldn't mind betting he's got some fear demons to expunge all the same.
I saw him at close range at Optus and he seemed way more tense than last season. Ditto from the tv footage I saw against Suns. Could take a few more games before he feels and plays better.

 

[PapaJ]

Funnily enough the only other game I remember where the winning team kicked less goals was Freo vs GC where we won, I think 2015.
...

Was curious about this, with the help of 35Daicos in the Stats thread, I've found out that was the first time GC in their short history have scored less goals and won. It's our little gift to them I suppose.

Freo have done it 8 times for the record - and yes, the last time was in 2015 vs GC at Carrera, that time we won of course. 6.17 (53) to 7.4 (46). What goes around comes around ...

... as for the inverse, scoreing more goals and losing like we did against GC, that was only the third time in our history.

 

[PurpleEyes]

How is this possible? We have big bodies at the club, just not playing midfield or at Peel?
Even WC turned Yeo into a mid, I really thought we had seen the end of Walters playing on ball.
Banfield, Cerra, Conca, and if Blakely can go mid/HB then why not Hughes?

Actually, West Coast don't really have any great inside midfielders, just several good inside midfielders;
Yeo, Redden, Shuey and Sheed all averaged 10 or more Contested Possessions in 2018.
Out of those, Sheed was the one from a young age that looked like he could become a very good inside mid and now at 24 years of age is just starting to produce some good stats.
In 2018, Freo had two Elite inside mids in Fyfe & Neale (+15 CPs/game) , then some distance to Mundy who is getting past his prime with just on 10 CPs and then you need to go down to Walters on 8.72 CPs per game.

That is, we severely have a lack of good inside midfielders. I was glad to see Brayshaw get 11 CPs (his Personal Best) in round 1, but he took a step backwards in round 2 ... he has a lot of work to do if/before we can rely on him to provide as a quality inside mid ... and sadly, for now, I would suggest he is probably our most promising option.
Blakely is a ready made inside mid ... when he returns.

 

[Scham]

Conca?