Mick Malthouse fires back at critics

[Nardz]

MICK Malthouse has accused the media of banding together to criticise Collingwood's tactic of avoiding the centre corridor.

Following Collingwood's Anzac Day loss to Essendon, pundits, including the Herald Sun's James Hird, have criticised the Pies' game plan because it hugged the boundary line too much.

The Magpie boss fired back today, saying that he was right and the critics were wrong.

"We've been doing that for four years. It hasn't stopped us being competitive for the past three," Malthouse said testily,

"I think we get a bit caught up in one man's voice and then everyone jumping on board because that seems to be the theme. The theme is quite wrong. We are very much in the six or seven clubs who a very similar to us.
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"I think we're better equipped to talk about our game structure than one bloke mentioning it and then all the 'cattle' jumping on board and believing that the the truck to get onto."

Malthouse argued yesterday he didn't have the appropriate personnel to play the corridor more often.

"What you do is you lead into what your strengths are," he said.

We're not going to give the ball away, we're not a great kicking side from the back half at this stage - we're still trying to find a Jimmy Clement replacemant. We haven't had Heath Shaw there for a few weeks, Maxy (Nick Maxwell) has been out for a couple of weeks ...

"When those things change then you might entertain the value of going through the corridor - if in fact there is a position in the corridor or a vacancy in the corridor.

"So let's not get caught up in just kicking it through the corridor and then have the criticism come back that you keep losing the ball through the middle."

The Magpies coach also revealed that Alan Didak would miss two more matches.

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/sport/afl/story/0,26576,25409176-19742,00.html

seriously how stubborn and deluded can somebody possibly be.

if we havent got the cattle after 10 years of his coaching then i guess we havent got the coach either..
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[mattys123]

So what he's saying is that now we have Maxy and Heater back, we will play a straighter, more direct gameplan.

Sure Mick, I believe you, and I believe that pigs fly out of my arse every second Tuesday.

What crap, 2 players do not make that much of a difference, Maxwell isnt that good of a kick, and we cant rely on Heath to have his usual impact after missing so much football.

Good old MM, new excuses every time there's a press conference.

 

[Heater39]

Huh? So he says we lack good footskills off half-back yet he persists with Toovey and Barham while sending Cox back to the twos

 

[buzzbuzz]

And while we've had Big H and Marty Clarke back there the whole time. With Leon Davis loitering around Half Back. And Pendles in the midfield. Malthouse is deluded. He really is. He might be a nice guy but his belief in his flawed gameplan is what will ruin us.

 

[smiddaz123]

Is he trying to say that kicking down the wings doesn't requrie a good field kicking side?

pretty sure we actually have to pin point targets even more in that style...

 

[loki04]

Yet Mick also thinks it's a premiership list and he picks the players each week despite some of them not even making the VFL bests meanwhile others cant buy a game despite their great VFL form.

The guy is a stooge what he is doing is covering his arse to make sure another team takes him on next year, MM: My gameplan is great, I am Great but my players a shit!

10 years at collingwood and he has said the same thing for the entire 10 years, we play the way we do because I don't have the cattle.

Even said it when we had Buckley , Burns and Clement in the side.

Posted this on the main board in this thread also http://www.bigfooty.com/forum/showthread.php?t=569977&page=6.

 

[recon]

Malthouse has lost the plot he has an excuse for everything, I couldn't see the players wanting to play for him when he is constantly putting them down.

 

[smiddaz123]

Also, he blames it on not finding a Clement replacement?

Mick.....we didn't use the corridor when we DID have Clement. Nice try.....

 

[DNine]

Now do we all see. Honestly, that is very average, which is right up Mediocre Micks Alley.

I don't care that we don't use the corridor kicking out from Full Back, and bringing it up the wing the first couple of kicks, but then it needs to come inside, into the centre corridor, to allow our key position forwards, a wider view of the goals, instead of continuing to hug the line, right to the bloody point post.

We don't have the personel in our key positon forwards, is what MM says. So what he is saying, he can't do much more with Cloke, Anthony and Rocca in the last couple of weeks. These guys aren't good enough to trust, instead, we trust a guy hedged up on the boundary having a shot. What about even kick it to the fat side of the ground, instead of straight up it. Isn't it common knowledge that our spine is in better shape than our midfield, that has been left underachieving comparred to the rest of the competition. So know he is saying we having got the key forwards either, god help us were duds all over according to Mick.

He says that we have had the same game plan for three years was it? Don't ya think you should have a couple Mick, or just the one will do. I would of thought a good coach had plans B, C, D, E, F and G ready to go if in trouble in a game, or it doesn't seem successful to one particular side, but Malty says, No the game plan is the same, stick to it boys

He also says that "I think we get a bit caught up in one man's voice and then everyone jumping on board because that seems to be the theme. The theme is quite wrong. We are very much in the six or seven clubs who a very similar to us".

Oh my god, he is worse than I gave him credit for, no wonder our players have slowed to a walk. Whos voice have the club been listening to, I was of the belief it was his. So is he saying HIS theme is quiet wrong?? If he isn't, whos theme or voice are we listening to.

How about we listen to EVERY other voice in history, apart from Whitten, in that we replace a coach after ten years, if they haven't won a flag, or is everyone else wrong with that too Mick.

I wish I can see Mick as the good coach that some see him as, and say thank you for the good times MM, 02 and 03 I am thankful for, the other years, I would of been happy with any coach, as they would of done the same. Malty never inspired any team he talked to after those two years, we seemed to be in maximum 3rd gear in all the other 8 years he was involved. That desn't cut it for me, but it may for some.

 

[FuManchu]

So, MM blames the list for the poor game plan.

Sorry Micky, but the list is your abomination, the recruiters are there on your say so, their choices are because of your fat arse kids edicts and refusal to draft rucks and pacy mids, let alone the fact that you never took into account generational change in the backline.

Stop this deflection, it's the sign of a man under extreme pressure from both within and from the public and media. It is all of your doing.

THAT LIST THAT HAS TO PLAY YOUR STUPID GAME PLAN IS ALL YOURS. YOU DRAFTED IT, YOU COACHED IT.

WE ALL SUFFER BECAUSE OF IT

 

[PieBeast]

Yet Mick also thinks it's a premiership list and he picks the players each week despite some of them not even making the VFL bests meanwhile others cant buy a game despite their great VFL form.

The guy is a stooge what he is doing is covering his arse to make sure another team takes him on next year, MM: My gameplan is great, I am Great but my players a shit!

10 years at collingwood and he has said the same thing for the entire 10 years, we play the way we do because I don't have the cattle.

Even said it when we had Buckley , Burns and Clement in the side.

Posted this on the main board in this thread also http://www.bigfooty.com/forum/showthread.php?t=569977&page=6.

Pretty much what i was going to post . My view on MM is quickly deteriorating . Someone should ask him a question : WHY HAVE YOU BEEN AT THE CLUB FOR TEN YEARS AND YOU STILL DONT HAVE THE CATTLE???

 

[PieBeast]

Spot on , FuManchu , ENOUGH IS ENOUGH .

 

[FuManchu]

My work here is done, I would like to think a number of provocative posts made earlier this year has started a momentum for change. LOL

Only once before in VFL/AFL history IIRC,has a coach been at a club for 10 years without winning a flag and that was Daniher at melb. Hardly something that we want to compare with. I am struggling to remember any coach in the history of the game at the top level that has gone 15 consecutive years without a flag and still keep a senior coaching role.

Surely Eddie is not so blinded by his cosy love fest with Malthouse that he hasn't seen the benchmarks by which all other clubs ( except Melbourne obviously) operate. Surely not Eddie!!

yet he has persisted with a coach that can get a team therabouts but no further. The gap between our best and the premiers of each year widens. We peaked in 2007, we have drifted slowly back since then.

The list is a long way off being close to a real tilt for the flag. Players that we heralded even as late as last years have gone backwards this year. Even last year, barring one game of excellence, we had a comparitively poorer year than 2007.

We are on the slide and it is the wrong time to be sliding, with upcoming drafts being diluted. Whats worse, other clubs are overtaking us even faster than we slide. All this is your fault MM.

Malthouse is a good coach, but he is not the best. But his bigger issues are his recruitment priorities, his inability to trade and his stubborn refusal to move away from a 'safe' game plan, that will win 50% but will not ignite in a finals series. When we get carved up, it is always by the same methods, yet he has not one counter to that. Not ONE.

 

[wicksy]

Just dug his own grave there did Mick......

And by the way Micky.... We are NOT all sheep who read Hirds article and jumped on the bandwagon of you not using the corridor. I didn't even know Hird wrote an article!!!

Basically what you have done is alienate your own supporters by saying we are not smart enough to make up our own minds......

I have respected you up until now but enough is enough!!!



(I realise Mick will not read this but needed to vent anyway....)

 

[camo2572]

as much as I have backed MM all the time. I think this one I cant, the problem isnt so much our game plan, I believe the problem is that we only have 1 game plan, there is no 2nd or 3rd game plan we are a very 1 dimensional team, when the going gets tough or under pressure we cant switch to a different style of play during a game , mix it up Mick, im sure if he told the runner to say to the boys , plan B now the boys could switch mind frames in an instance, its better to have different styles than a predicable one IMO

 

[Frankie23]

MM will have the last word when we win the flag at the end of the year...

 

[TwisTz]

MM is starting to sound like a bitter old man.

 

[DNine]

Just one more thing... the way it was worded, I was sure I was reading a post from in here. It wasn't even better than the ones on here, making excuses for him, and thats saying something. He come across so amaturish, as if someone was taking the piss that it infact came from the words of someone that should have better excuses thought up to fire back. But this is his main arguement. Either he doesn't think about it alot, naive to the fact that the net is circling, or he is just so arrogant, he doesn't care.

Its like he knows what is wrong, and highlighting them ten fold in games this year, comparred to last. Key Forwards were often brought into the game better, than so far this year. We are hugging the boundary line that closely, the player is half worried about kicking it out on the full, or whether he is just about to impeded the line himself. Its like typerope sometimes, it is ridiculous. One positive too it, is the front row of people get to see the stars of our side close up.

I was really looking forward to the emergence of Ben Reid and Chris Dawes, and seeing their key position ability's. In MM's game plan, he will turn them into Tristen Walker and Brent Hall quicker than Ruslings burst off the mark. And of Rusling, all we want to know is what is happening with the bloke, and we have to look through all these smoke and mirrors to find the truth. I can't see the advantage.

I have been involved in a side that had awesome success in doing what Hird is eluding to, play the corridor, long penetrating kicks, to a contest. Front and centre small pocket players, and a couple of sweeping flanks, giving the team more options to goal, than you'd want to poke a stick at. We won by on average of about 80 each week. And yes, this is not a team in the AFL, but the greats of the game, such as Buckley, Hird, Voss and these new blokes on the scene now. They are going to hopefully pull the game back to the way its supposed to be. The first teams to do it, will succeed, and succeed well.

Travis Cloke, Jack Anthony, - Buddy Franklin, Jared Roughhead Thats what level we should expect out of these too guys, but for heavens sake, make up a game plan that doesn't include 100 leads, and none taken, and a boundary line kick is the better option.

 

[loki04]

MM will have the last word when we win the flag at the end of the year...

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA..

I like your style.

 

[FuManchu]

MM is starting to sound like a bitter old man.

He has been a protected species for so long under EM

But I saw the writing on the wall when EM came out and made his 'tilt' statement this year. EM knows that he hasnt produced a flag, he knows that after 10 years with a failing coach, question need to be asked, be it directed at him for not putting more pressure on MM or for proper overview on the footballing dept. EM bung it all back on MM by making that statement and a number of consequent things MM has said makes me feel he is not the protected species any more under EM.

 

[tess]

Just one more thing... the way it was worded, I was sure I was reading a post from in here. It wasn't even better than the ones on here, making excuses for him, and thats saying something.

That could be cause they are coming from the same PR machine.....D9.

 

[FuManchu]

That could be cause they are coming from the same PR machine.....D9.

anything you wish to share with us??

PM if you got the goss

 

[Bay Pie]

He has been a protected species for so long under EM

But I saw the writing on the wall when EM came out and made his 'tilt' statement this year. EM knows that he hasnt produced a flag, he knows that after 10 years with a failing coach, question need to be asked, be it directed at him for not putting more pressure on MM or for proper overview on the footballing dept. EM bung it all back on MM by making that statement and a number of consequent things MM has said makes me feel he is not the protected species any more under EM.

Agree there. I thought the same thing.

Ed wants Bucks badly and only a prelim appearance may save MM.

I have no problem with not using the corridor in attack but don't let the opposition own it when they have the footy.

 

[mdc]

This is the second article where he has tried to defend himself yet throws out blatant falsehoods.

Even if you believe his claim that he believes he doesn't have the personnel, this;

We are very much in the six or seven clubs who a very similar to us.

...is rubbish.

Not impressed that he felt he had to defend himself, and not impressed in the manner that he did it.

 

[Old Spice]

Its a convolution of odd ideas, this whole idea that our players aren't good enough to play any style other than wide. I can accept that our players aren't good enough yet maybe to win a flag, but the idea that his gameplan is easier to execute for young players strikes me as bizzare.

Okay, the kick-outs that are conceded provide some easy kicks and possessions, but that just compounds the problem down the ground when the opposition floods back and actually makes it harder on our young players as they contest in a flood/zone in our forward half.

The difficulty is in Mick's strategic plays which have all been worked out some time ago. The real difficulty for the players is the game-plan. That's what makes life hard for them.