Is Ross Lyon averse to risk?

meima

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I always heard that having the senior to guide the young players , who are the senior on last Sunday that provides guidances?
 

Deveraux

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Simple. Fyfe out, Suban and Ballas in plus the regulars, Johnson, Mundy, Spurr, Neale, Sonny etc.

Acting like it was a full team of 1st n 2nd yr players.
 

meima

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For the first time Ross don't even mention a single one of the name above in his presser apart from ballas.
 

Kunna17

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I actually think our youths been managed pretty well. When they come in, they're more ready than they would be if rushed in and also have been given the chance to develop throughout various positions/roles (ie. Blakely's been forward/mid/back, as has weller and tucker.)

Sure Darcy may have learnt a bit from playing AFL, as opposed to Griffin, but he'd have been demolished by Grundy, and Martin would expose him a lot, then Jacobs is an excellent ruckmen and his confidence would be shattered. He'd be back in the 2's and would probably struggle there until he regains confidence.
Allowing him to build in the 2's as the MAIN ruck (Normally shares duties with Griffin) allowed him to be more ready, and come in for a debut that he is able to build off.
 

Bicco

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I believe that he has fundamentals that are very, very good at getting results (wins) for a vast majority of the time. His issue IMO is that he isnt flexible in these fundamentals.
An example is 'I don't get seduced by talent'. So he rewards (picks) players that can perform a role. This goes to so many points others have made about the selection of Mayne /Suban rather than bringing in youth. This will work for a while but soon people at this level will be worked out. There's endless video to analyze weaknesses. A talented youngster being brought into the mix for 2/3 games may give you a level of unortodoxy that gives you the edge to win in a different way. Plus you're putting games into a kid.
Some will scoff at my experience, but managing a large (10 or so) group of youngsters (uni student age) in hospitality, they can become complacent /knowitall/ lazy and a great way to refocus them is to bring in a new staff member. The 2nd half of 2015 we were definitely stale and desperately needed the above to occur.
Bill Lawry opened the batting for Northcote 1sts (Melbourne premier league cricket grade) at 15. Tim Watson played for Essendon at 15. Neither would happen on Lyons watch.
More recently Hawthorn had an incredible losing rate when Sam Mitchell got less than 30 possesions. In the 2013 GF, Clarkson sacrificed him in a methodical and unconventional way for the greater good.
Ive compared Lyon to Alex Ferguson in different posts and how he manages players.
Just sometimes Lyon needs to be unconventional without being forced to in an effort to get the X factor.
I won't be holding my breath.
 

estibador

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More recently Hawthorn had an incredible losing rate when Sam Mitchell got less than 30 possesions. In the 2013 GF, Clarkson sacrificed him in a methodical and unconventional way for the greater good.

You've bought into that fairytale too huh?

History is written by the winners and Hawthorn fans have somehow convinced people Mitchell getting tagged out of the game was actually a masterstroke of Clarkson genius to deliberately sacrifice his best midfielder to keep the dangerous Ryan Crowley out of the play.
 

Bicco

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You've bought into that fairytale too huh?

History is written by the winners and Hawthorn fans have somehow convinced people Mitchell getting tagged out of the game was actually a masterstroke of Clarkson genius to deliberately sacrifice his best midfielder to keep the dangerous Ryan Crowley out of the play.
Clarkson and Mitchell talk about it in the doco on their win.
 

estibador

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Clarkson and Mitchell talk about it in the doco on their win.

Like I said history is written by the winners.

The entire aim of putting Crowley on Mitchell is to keep Mitchell out of the game, yet it's somehow a masterstroke that Clarkson 'deliberately' took him out of the game? It's not like Crowls was a McGovern-esqe marking rebounder that you want to keep the ball away from.

If our players hadn't choked in front of goal you can bet Hawthorn would never have claimed they deliberately took Mitchell out of the play.
 

clivenator26

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Like I said history is written by the winners.

The entire aim of putting Crowley on Mitchell is to keep Mitchell out of the game, yet it's somehow a masterstroke that Clarkson 'deliberately' took him out of the game? It's not like Crowls was a McGovern-esqe marking rebounder that you want to keep the ball away from.

If our players hadn't choked in front of goal you can bet Hawthorn would never have claimed they deliberately took Mitchell out of the play.

Exactly, we kick straight to win and Clarko then gets criticised for not sending Mitchell to half back to break the tag.
 

meima

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To If or Not to if is the big question
 
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Bicco

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Like I said history is written by the winners.

The entire aim of putting Crowley on Mitchell is to keep Mitchell out of the game, yet it's somehow a masterstroke that Clarkson 'deliberately' took him out of the game? It's not like Crowls was a McGovern-esqe marking rebounder that you want to keep the ball away from.

If our players hadn't choked in front of goal you can bet Hawthorn would never have claimed they deliberately took Mitchell out of the play.
I'll explain it to you.
Mitchell is an excellent user of the ball.
His teammates try to get the ball to him as often as they can.
Knowing the best tagger in the comp would likely do a job on Mitchell, Hawthorn stop giving Mitchell the ball and use other players to distribute the ball. If they use the same tactic that got them to the GF (as Lyon would) the Hawks would have had even less scoring chances and we still would have won, even with our poor kicking on goal.
Crowls had 0 tackles for the game. Would he have got 0 tackles if Mitchell was used as the main distributor? No way.
Because the coach changed tactics to suit the game they had an edge we didn't counter. It's not the only reason they won, but its meant to highlight how sometimes what has got you where you are, may not be enough to get you where you want to go.
To my knowledge Lyon has never done this (changed his fundamental game plan) without being forced to. 2015 is a perfect example of this.
 

estibador

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I'll explain it to you.
Mitchell is an excellent user of the ball.
His teammates try to get the ball to him as often as they can.
Knowing the best tagger in the comp would likely do a job on Mitchell, Hawthorn stop giving Mitchell the ball and use other players to distribute the ball.

Yeah, nah, I'm still not buying it.

Mitchell isn't Isaac Smith, he's not a damaging outside user whose effectiveness relies on teammates bringing him into the game. He's the #1 extractor who brings Smith, Hill, etc into the game. He's also their biggest midfield accumulator by a mile. You don't preemptively sacrifice that player as part of a 'master plan'.
 

Kunna17

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Yeah, nah, I'm still not buying it.

Mitchell isn't Isaac Smith, he's not a damaging outside user whose effectiveness relies on teammates bringing him into the game. He's the #1 extractor who brings Smith, Hill, etc into the game. He's also their biggest midfield accumulator by a mile. You don't preemptively sacrifice that player as part of a 'master plan'.
Not saying I'm a believer or not ... but supposebly Mitchell's role around the stoppages also changed. His job became to fill the hole that we normally create for Fyfe, meaning there were now 2 players (1 of them from our team - Crowley) preventing our stoppage structure from working.
 

meima

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Yeah, nah, I'm still not buying it.

Mitchell isn't Isaac Smith, he's not a damaging outside user whose effectiveness relies on teammates bringing him into the game. He's the #1 extractor who brings Smith, Hill, etc into the game. He's also their biggest midfield accumulator by a mile. You don't preemptively sacrifice that player as part of a 'master plan'.
Whether you buy it or not , only b.hill know the true behind it , and maybe hale.
 

estibador

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Not saying I'm a believer or not ... but supposebly Mitchell's role around the stoppages also changed. His job became to fill the hole that we normally create for Fyfe, meaning there were now 2 players (1 of them from our team - Crowley) preventing our stoppage structure from working.

Well then that's another piece of history that's been re-written, because (contrary to popular belief) Fyfe actually had a very good game (when I finally summoned the courage to watch the replay I was particularly impressed with his first half, other than his shots on goal) and Mundy had an absolutely storming second half out of the middle.

So if Hawthorn's plan was to sacrifice their best mid to stop our best mids it didn't work. They won that game purely because we shat ourselves in front of goal in difficult weather conditions on the big stage, it's as simple as that.
 

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Exactly, we kick straight to win and Clarko then gets criticised for not sending Mitchell to half back to break the tag.
This touches on Ross' inability/refusal to evolve with the game, by continually selecting players that can't kick the ball. It has burned us time and time again, everywhere from having guys like Spurr taking kickins, to 5+ years of atrocious accuracy in front of goals. His tacit acceptance isn't going to change. At some point he has to be held accountable for the lack of skill that his teams possess.
 

Kunna17

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Well then that's another piece of history that's been re-written, because (contrary to popular belief) Fyfe actually had a very good game (when I finally summoned the courage to watch the replay I was particularly impressed with his first half, other than his shots on goal) and Mundy had an absolutely storming second half out of the middle.

So if Hawthorn's plan was to sacrifice their best mid to stop our best mids it didn't work. They won that game purely because we shat ourselves in front of goal in difficult weather conditions on the big stage, it's as simple as that.
That's why I refuse to fully believe it. But I do believe it to be foolish to dismiss the possibility of Mitchell playing more of a dummy role and filling holes around the ground that would otherwise be used to attack through on our behalf.
 

kp junior

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We smashed them in the midfield, particularly Fyfe and Mundy. All part of Clarke's plan I'm sure


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malpaso

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I think Ross is studying the game and if I had to put a bet down, I'd say he's conjuring a way to return to defensive glory whilst learning to up tempo when we have the ball.
He will always 'develop' players but he won't play them unless he considers them physically ready to play. I believe and he has said there is a 'duty of care' to players coming into the AFL.
I look at the development of Blakely and Weller this year, they are learning to play defensively yet attack at the same time.

Ye of little faith.
 

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If we're gonna contend for a flag in 3-4yrs time... who knows where the "winning game plans" will have evolved to. Will the current rage on fast, rebound footy still be the go? Will stoppages be back in vogue? Maybe numbers forward will be the way to go. Then god knows what rules the AFL will change between now and then. Wild card rounds for finals qualifications, last touch out of bounds, two in the forward 50, shorter quarters. So much uncertainty that can dictate list management needs depending on evolved game plans and rule changes. The only constant, non-negotiable is players that compete and give effort - and generally Ross the Boss can extract this from his lists. The success of this rebuild rests largely on the recruiters, and then on Ross to get the most out of them. Hope we can get some high end talent through the door for Ross to tinker with. I'll back him to develop kids AND extract the most out of any player that walks through that door.

Maybe in 3-4 yrs we'll all be LOL'ing at AFL and frothing on AFLX. "Who cares about that 2hr marathon, boring game. Gimme 40mins of AFLX".

Just to clarify - I do not support the concept of AFLX. Hope it doesn't take off. Just leave our game alone Gil! Maybe I'm too risk adverse too, but this AFLX concept scares me.
 

estibador

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We smashed them in the midfield, particularly Fyfe and Mundy. All part of Clarke's plan I'm sure

Yeah you can't tell me any of the Lyon critics in here would be happy with him going into a grand final with the plan to sacrifice Fyfe in order to block up a bit of space and take some ball-butcher tagger out of the play, in the hope it turns out ok because the opposition s**t themselves in front of goal. It's preposterous historical revisionism.
 

Grandstan

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Ross Lyon IS clearly averse to risk. His approach to change and man management is slow and methodical.
The bigger question is whether this tendency has harmed the side. There are some main accusations:

Darcy. The OP seems to think it is a lack of courage holding him back until now. Darcy is young. If we are serious about a rebuild we don't want the young guy rucking alone too much too early. The competition is littered with injured young big men. We all know Darcy is exciting. We want Him building, which he is. So I'm relaxed about the current timeline.

2015. The prelim didn't work out, so it's easy to say Lyon should have made changes, but 1. there's no reason to think Weller/Blakely would have made any difference anyway back then, and 2. his clear strategy for a physically strong side to back up an on-fire Fyfe could well have paid off if Fyfe had returned from injury and not broken a leg and Pav, Johnno, Mcpharlin hadn't broken down.

Mayne. I think E Shed is probably right that he needs to rebuild and recreate his game, which Lyon wasn't doing. But then isn't that the stated reason Mayne left? In his last couple years at the club Mayne was clearly tasked a more defensive role - probably cos Lyon and the other coaches had lost faith in his ability to be a creative forward cos he had lost much of his zip. Given that all sides have a defensive forward, I don't see why Mayne shouldn't have been it when his form dropped.

Cattery. If you're going to start claiming Lyon did the wrong thing to slow down the Cats game in the last, I could point to plenty more examples where such a strategy has paid off. Lyon's record at the death is pretty good.
 

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Well then that's another piece of history that's been re-written, because (contrary to popular belief) Fyfe actually had a very good game (when I finally summoned the courage to watch the replay I was particularly impressed with his first half, other than his shots on goal) and Mundy had an absolutely storming second half out of the middle.

So if Hawthorn's plan was to sacrifice their best mid to stop our best mids it didn't work. They won that game purely because we shat ourselves in front of goal in difficult weather conditions on the big stage, it's as simple as that.

The other big factor in losing that GF was continuing to kick it to Pav when he was getting doubled and flogged by Lake and Gibson and that spud Zak Clarke's inability to provide any sort of alternative target


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Bicco

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Yeah you can't tell me any of the Lyon critics in here would be happy with him going into a grand final with the plan to sacrifice Fyfe in order to block up a bit of space and take some ball-butcher tagger out of the play, in the hope it turns out ok because the opposition s**t themselves in front of goal. It's preposterous historical revisionism.
Depends on what you mean by sacrifice. If Lyon went into the GF with Fyfe at full forward and Pav at CHF, playing a 'Pagans Paddock ' style game, I think that most supporters would have been thrilled to see something new. Instead we got exactly what we knew we'd get. See the post above.
2015 prelim, the amount of people on here hoping that Lyon had a rabbit in a hat was huge. He didn't and he doesn't.
 
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