Geelong: why are they just not good enough?

[Vassp]

I was replying to the bloke blaming our woes on the likes of Duncan who was injured a quarter into our finals campaign

All good.

 

[QuietB]

B grade overrated footballer and always has been.
Guthrie is another step below.

This is a major reason why Geelong do sweet fu*k all in September.

Blicavs, Duncan, Tuohy, Stanley, Henderson, Guthrie, Murdoch, Motlop, S.Selwood, Menegola, lol and you honestly wonder why we are just not good enough!

Has Blicavs ever played in defence - his best position - in September?

 

[PetterdHoisted]

Yes yes I’m delusional because one of our most reliable players is somehow being blamed for our finals shortcomings and another recruit was allegedly hired purely on the whim of the captain

sorry I wasn't specific enough, the rumour is that Joel pushed Josh out so that Scott could get more minutes in his preferred position.

Josh went on to be an incredible contributor to 2 flags at another club (defeating Geelong in both those final series), while Scott barely played again anyway.

The assymetry in that trade outcome came to an absolute crescendo last week, but it seems to have been largely forgotten.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Should be why aren’t the 17 clubs who don’t win the flag good enough


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No other club has been labeled “flag favorite” throughout so many seasons end on end in home and away games, for zero result when the real stuff starts.

 

[guruisatiger]

Geelong should get a brand new bus

 

[Catters 070911]

Now 3-8 in finals since the 2011 flag.

For a club who's constantly up there and has had 4x top 4 finishes in those 6 years (a great achievement), it's a sobering record. No grand finals.

What is going on there? Are they simply marking time and middling: not good enough to truly challenge and not regenerating either?

Do they need a change in philosophy?

Funny, coming from a supporter of a team who haven't won a finals game since 2005.

We have won three premierships in that time.

 

[gingernuts]

Has Blicavs ever played in defence - his best position - in September?

nope, ruck, wing, wing what a fooking joke of a coach the cats have

 

[Ricky Vaughn]

Blicavs by position
Defender - elite (or close to)
Tagger - OK
Inside mid - below average
Ruckman - average, unless against an A Grader, then he’s terrible.
Wingman - terrible.

At least if we miss Finals in 2020, I don’t need to see him on a wing.

 

[Ancient Tiger]

Funny, coming from a supporter of a team who haven't won a finals game since 2005.

We have won three premierships in that time.

Does this mean he can’t make a comment? Pretty sure Bunk is well aware of his own club’s deficiencies but that shouldn’t mean he can’t comment on others.

 

[SunshineBoy]

Was a weird passage of play, esp Danger taking 25 sec to kick a goal from the goal square. Guess he was rubbing it in to the Tigers faces, poked the bear perhaps, dunno. No evidence that there is much good feeling between the clubs at the best of times.

it was a look at me moment

 

[Catters 070911]

Does this mean he can’t make a comment? Pretty sure Bunk is well aware of his own club’s deficiencies but that shouldn’t mean he can’t comment on others.

Maybe he shouldn't write posts that mock another team, when his own team has been worse in finals in recent times.

Why are you defending him? What, are you his boyfriend or something?

 

[CatFan79]

Has Blicavs ever played in defence - his best position - in September?

If you're implying our coach is a moron... You'd be right.

 

[Ancient Tiger]

Maybe he shouldn't write posts that mock another team, when his own team has been worse in finals in recent times.

Why are you defending him? What, are you his boyfriend or something?

Mate, just pull your head in. Look at the title of this thread. You’re the one going off topic here with your insults. We are discussing Geelong, not Essendon or any other team. Plenty of other threads discussing other teams if you wish to comment on them.

 

[Catters 070911]

If you're implying our coach is a moron... You'd be right.

So Blicavs should only ever play in defence?

What if Blicavs played defence, and Lynch still kicked five on him? Should we move him, since that would mean not playing him in defence.

The Blicavs move isn't the reason we lost.

 

[Catters 070911]

Mate, just pull your head in. Look at the title of this thread. You’re the one going off topic here with your insults. We are discussing Geelong, not Essendon or any other team. Plenty of other threads discussing other teams if you wish to comment on them.

Ancient Tiger and OP, sitting in a tree.....

 

[Ancient Tiger]

Ancient Tiger and OP, sitting in a tree.....

School holidays are over. Make sure mum’s packed your lunch.

 

[MC Extra Dollop]

sorry I wasn't specific enough, the rumour is that Joel pushed Josh out so that Scott could get more minutes in his preferred position.

Josh went on to be an incredible contributor to 2 flags at another club (defeating Geelong in both those final series), while Scott barely played again anyway.

The assymetry in that trade outcome came to an absolute crescendo last week, but it seems to have been largely forgotten.

Caddy had more than enough chances at Geelong. Like Varcoe to Collingwood, McCarthy to Brisbane, Vardy to West Coast, it was time to move on. He'd been an up and down cameo player for four years and he was middle aged by AFL standards. Fair to assume that he wasn't going to go to the next level at Geelong for whatever reason. We got Parfitt for him too, who has been a valuable contributor.

Not shying away from the poor finals record (mainly that we haven't converted five MCG qualifying finals into even a grand final appearance since 2011), but I think the recent finals series shows that simply pointing to finals wins and losses is a bit flawed. If you just look at that, West Coast had a better 2019 finals series than we did, on the back of thumping eighth placed Essendon at home.

 

[Lsta062]

If you want to be a top of the ladder team, then you simply need to maintain your good start throughout the season. All Minor Premiers since Fremantle 2015 except for Sydney 2016 had this problem. If you’re middling after the halfway point of the season, then you’re just not the best side anymore.

The problem with Geelong though is that I don’t believe they play a style of footy that holds up in finals. Pressure goes up in finals and their gameplan is not one that caters for opposition pressure all that well. They need to change that up.

 

[Partridge]

No he didn't.
It was a ludicrous recruitment.
He was in rehab when Geelong came a knocking.

When he was fit, short period of time mind you, he was bloody terrible. Arguably the worst user of the football Geelong has had since David Clarke Jnr.
Supposedly a terrific tagger but he was shown up in most of them. He had to play though, Geelong didn't want to look like fools if he sat out and played VFL as he should have from the beginning.

Once more, you delusion over everything Geelong Cats is coming to the forefront.

You should tell me how good of a draft coup it was to snag Hamish McIntosh.

And if you dared suggest he wasn't worth his spot you were immediately informed about what an elite player he was. The fact that West Coast dropped him during a finals tilt - while they were winning - shows you how much they needed these mythical capabilities.

I don't blame the player. He gave absolutely 100% all the time. But it was clear injuries had caught up with him, and as I've said before, if not for his surname I doubt he would have even been on the list. Instead he was in our leadership group.

 

[Partridge]

Has Blicavs ever played in defence - his best position - in September?

Last year against Melbourne. Didn't have the best game. But at least he was played there.

 

[Partridge]

sorry I wasn't specific enough, the rumour is that Joel pushed Josh out so that Scott could get more minutes in his preferred position.

Josh went on to be an incredible contributor to 2 flags at another club (defeating Geelong in both those final series), while Scott barely played again anyway.

The assymetry in that trade outcome came to an absolute crescendo last week, but it seems to have been largely forgotten.

The weird thing is, Joel publicly stated on the Monday that Caddy was a required player at Geelong. There was no equivocation. Three days later he was gone. I'm not sure whether it was to give Scott Selwood midfield time, he was already there.

It's certainly not true that Caddy was a superstar at Geelong; but he wasn't crap either. He played some good footy and was in our best team. More importantly, he was under contract for another year. Why they decided seemingly on a whim to get rid of him is still mystifying. He looked to be struggling early this season but managed to reinvent himself.

He and Richmond have done very well from that deal, there's no escaping that.

 

[SunshineBoy]

The weird thing is, Joel publicly stated on the Monday that Caddy was a required player at Geelong. There was no equivocation. Three days later he was gone. I'm not sure whether it was to give Scott Selwood midfield time, he was already there.

It's certainly not true that Caddy was a superstar at Geelong; but he wasn't crap either. He played some good footy and was in our best team. More importantly, he was under contract for another year. Why they decided seemingly on a whim to get rid of him is still mystifying. He looked to be struggling early this season but managed to reinvent himself.

He and Richmond have done very well from that deal, there's no escaping that.

publicaly every one toes the company line, just like tim Kelly, in his presser in Perth, next minute transfer requestt

 

[Elton Johns Wig]

I'm not sure it's one thing. I think there's a few factors at play.

The age of some of the quality.

Gaz was on fire early but did taper off. There is talk of managing him through next season, that makes sense. 36 next year.

Selwood (absolute favourite, warrior, love him) be 32/33? Ditto Hawkins (was great this year)

Taylor is interesting. Not sure whether he'll be as effective next year. 34.


Having such superb top end talent, I reckon their bottom 3-4 aren't as strong as some others, and at the pointy end, that's where that gets exposed as well IMO. Maybe with time the bottom end elevates in quality.

Also the bye situation. It must be mental, it has to be. Having a bye at season end doesn't help them. Also, if they do manage to win the QF, they have a bye again. Not ideal until they can get the bye scenario sorted out. Maybe Scott admitting they have an issue would be a start?

Lastly, GMHBA. It's a great HGA for them, it almost ensures they qualify for finals, and will continue to do so. Such a one sided (interstate style) crowd is a huge boost. As is the shape of the ground. I think though that being used to setting up defending a narrow ground means that it doesn't always transfer to bigger grounds (not just MCG). Add in the fact I mentioned before that it's better teams at that time of year and any deficiencies are magnified.

I know they want all 11 home games there, as they'd play finals every year almost with that set up. But you want to WIN finals. In this scenario, I'm wondering whether they shouldn't keep the current arrangement, and maybe ask for an extra away game or two at MCG. More games on that ground conditions them. Maybe even ask that 2 of their last 3 away games and their last home game are at the G?

 

[QuietB]

So Blicavs should only ever play in defence?

What if Blicavs played defence, and Lynch still kicked five on him? Should we move him, since that would mean not playing him in defence.

The Blicavs move isn't the reason we lost.

If Blicavs played on Lynch and Lynch still kicked six you could have swapped Blicavs to Reiwodlt and he would still be in defence

Geelong went 11 and 1 at the start of the year with a settled defence built around Blicavs. Blicavs was a lock for AA full back at the mid season break.

Your genius coach decided that you rucks are s**t - which is probably a fair observation - and took Blicavs out of defence to play ruck at times for the second half of the season. Compounding the stupidity of this decision is the fact that Blicavs is not even a good ruck Geelong subsequently went 5 and 5 or whatever it was.

But that is not even the problem. Scott tried something, it didn't work, that is ok. The problem is he persisted with it in the final against Collingwood and was rightly criticised for it.

But even that is not the problem. After refusing to admit he was wrong, and after further refusing he screwed up again in the Collingwood final, he put Blicavs on a wing out of pure pigheadedness instead of putting him back in defence.

That is the problem. Scott refuses to accept ever that he might have made a mistake. And every single he gets accursed of screwing up he blames everyone but himself - "we have a whole coaching team, it was a joint decision", "players didn't execute", "why can't we play at Kardinia" - or he doubles down and either repeats the mistake or worse compounds it by making another one (Blicavs to the wing).

His pigheadedness is hurting Geelong.

 

[Partridge]

But that is not even the problem. Scott tried something, it didn't work, that is ok. The problem is he persisted with it in the final against Collingwood and was rightly criticised for it.

But even that is not the problem. After refusing to admit he was wrong, and after further refusing he screwed up again in the Collingwood final, he put Blicavs on a wing out of pure pigheadedness instead of putting him back in defence.

That is the problem. Scott refuses to accept ever that he might have made a mistake. And every single he gets accursed of screwing up he blames everyone but himself - "we have a whole coaching team, it was a joint decision", "players didn't execute", "why can't we play at Kardinia" - or he doubles down and either repeats the mistake or worse compounds it by making another one (Blicavs to the wing).

His pigheadedness is hurting Geelong.

It's worse than that. Much worse. It would be one thing if he had decided to try those things in this finals series. Bad couple of games tactically, but perhaps an aberration. What makes it infinitely worse is that Scott had tried the same things - with the same player - in finals before and should have learned his lesson.

Two glaring examples that still make you shake your head come to mind. The first - and by far the worst* - was the 2013 Qualifying Final against Fremantle. Scott decided a ruck combination of Blicavs and Nathan Vardy was sufficient to overcome Aaron Sandilands. Accordingly he dropped the only premiership ruckman still on the list then in Trent West (who had been more than competitive against Brisbane the previous week). Blicavs and Vardy copped a brutal and decisive reaming. We narrowly lost a game we could and should have won.

The second is one a Hawthorn fan will remember. The 2014 Qualifying Final, and this time, Scott decides Blicavs is just the man to play on Brad Hill on a wing. Who is half the weight, half the size, and twice the speed. He got cut up easily. You were a better team and may have won anyway, but it was an idiotic decision.

This comes to the main problems. One you've addressed - Scott doesn't accept that he may make mistakes, he certainly will never acknowledge them, and he'll certainly never take responsibility for them. Another massive problem in finals is his insane Blicavs fixation. He seems to believe he is some kind of prototype Uber-footballer that can be plugged in anywhere, anytime and it will work. In finals it virtually always doesn't with disastrous results. This finals series he reverted to playing Blicavs as first ruck. Grundy tore us up, we lose. Next week, he brings Stanley back (but naturally never acknowledges it might have been a mistake), and puts Blicavs on a wing. Despite Andrew Gaff shredding him there, we managed to win. But he wasn't done yet. Against Richmond, with Tom Lynch killing us, he not only avoids putting Blicavs in defence (by far his best position), he puts him on a wing to have no impact at all except to play Lambert into form.

(* - this year's Qualifying Final is coming a very close second I would think now.)