Doesn't your second sentance give you the pip? The opposition have figured us out. We've got one trick and that's it. What teams will do now is let Brad get the ball and force him onto his left 'cause he ain't got one.Elite ball use won't cover up for a midfield that can't find space. We have one mid who can get clear, Brad Hill, and every opposition has covered him since the middle of the season.
Langdon can do it, Tucker will be able to do it eventually.
We kick up the line to protect the turnovers, if we are running well then we hit targets in the middle but it takes some nuts to pull the trigger on those kicks. Bennell hit the nearly stationary Fyfe with one. Walters looks for it, Johnson used to but he doesn't anymore.
Logue looks extra lost at times when the ball is peppering defence, I would have preferred he took the role of negating Rance's impact as a defensive forward but the amount of times Taberner had the paddock open up in front of him with a kick about to come in and went back to shove Rance instead of leading to the space would have meant we were two forwards down keeping Rance quiet.
Sean Darcy is working his guts out, he looks like he would get out bodied by a 60kg girlfriend rushing to the bathroom first. Not because he isn't strong, but because he has over worked his strength. He can stand and use his bulk but moving players aside has slipped out of his game. He will be so much better for his efforts this season, a strong preseason and he will be ready to win the rising star next year.
Fyfe is a gun. His efforts, and the scoreboard result, in the first quarter was all the first half of 2015 again. He keeps us in it.
If we could land a mature contested ball bull in the draft or free agency to pair up with him it would be great, we get smashed in the middle when he isn't rescuing us.
Mundy could do it but we are faced with the same result, if the ball isn't tapped where we are moving to then we get caught out of position and Neale's groin soreness is still there our players don't have the agility to counter. That isn't uncommon in the AFL, but I'd like to try a drill where the player on the other side of the circle is your opponent, not the one beside you to see if they can watch the tap and be moving to the contest or already breaking out if the ball is in hand. Hit outs to advantage are no good if the player was flat footed.
If we win the contested ball everything else is actually alright, not great, but alright. We could do with a contested mark forward and a bit more composure to hit the right spots when we have the chance.
Fast ball movement from defense dried up the last month and so has our scoring. The personnel is the same we are just not able to hit the free target in the middle anymore. Opposition identify that as our tactic and countered it, not such a big deal. We can outwork them with our power runners in the side which aren't there at the moment.
This just sums up so much of Ross. We're going to try really, really hard and that should do it along with our one trick. 2015 was the same, Fyfe will dominate and we'll let everyone else follow. Fyfe stops dominating. .. game over. 2016, no Fyfe, no game. 2017 we'll get some outside run, that gets figured out, we're done. Ross just seems so one dimensional. Although he did mention in his presser we need skill and effort which is a big step for him.