Preview No Changes vs Saints

[TheLeftFist8]

While we're at at…despite his rebound Shaw is a disaster waiting to happen by foot which offsets all his positives as a defender. Has height, pace, athleticism, penetrating yet inaccurate kick. Best position going forward could be wing or lead up 3rd tall forward.

Jenkins looks far more useful pushing up the ground to provide an option on the wing (similar to Lynch). We desperately need this and I'd keep him pushing further from goal.

McKernan is the opposite. Looks far better deep forward or in ruck, a true 2R/forward option unlike Jenkins.

Petrenko…please let's finally end this rubbish. It's an embarrassment to the selectors. Back to SANFL on the HBF/BP and if you cannot become the new Stiffy then forget it.

 

[TheLeftFist8]

Right now, Siggins is still a long way off AFL.

I understand 12 months is a long time in football development but he needs longer than that.

I have only seen him at training and not in a match but he looks like he gained a good >5kg over the pre-season. Another 5kg next year, along with a role on the 'smallest of the talls' (Hartigan/Talia take the big guys) then he should be fine physically. Would easily have the best skills of the 3 talls.

 

[1970crow]

Well, I don't know. All I know at the moment is; Rutten won't get dropped (and nether should he) and our forward line right now isn't very effective. In fact, it sucks. We need a change.

We still have 19 games to go, so thinking about next year is irrelevant at this stage.

If he plays the next 5 games at CHF before Tex comes back and looks good, we can keep there and team him with the big Texan. If not, we have lost nothing as we are losing right now. It's not like we are winning.

Trying something different when you are losing won't hurt.

That will also give Hartigan 5 or 6 games at CHB to establish himself as Rutten needs to be replaced sooner than latter and it's more than likely going to be next year.

We can then send Talia back to FB next year with Tex and JJ/smack/Johnson teaming up as a forward line if it doesn't work.

There's just something about moving our best tall defender to the forward line that doesn't sit right. Especially if it's to nurse truck through what appears to be his last year. If we don't need 3 tall defenders then hartigan or truck misses, but Talia is the first picked down there. I think we'd be better off making the tough call on truck if we and he haven't improved in 3 or so weeks.

 

[alex_is_on_fire]

I have only seen him at training and not in a match but he looks like he gained a good >5kg over the pre-season. Another 5kg next year, along with a role on the 'smallest of the talls' (Hartigan/Talia take the big guys) then he should be fine physically. Would easily have the best skills of the 3 talls.

You are right, he has added some muscle to his frame. I didn't really notice it the first trial game but did today.

If he can add another 5 kgs by this tine next year, he will have the size.

My concern about him was his inability to read the play and was lead to the ball by his opponent today. He needs to pick up the pace of the game and read the play better before he can play AFL.

Keep in mind, today was his first SANFL game. So all is not lost.

 

[Elite Crow]

Shaw played up forward a bit in the last after stinking it up in defence. Took a good mark and kicked it straight from about 40.

 

[alex_is_on_fire]

There's just something about moving our best tall defender to the forward line that doesn't sit right. Especially if it's to nurse truck through what appears to be his last year. If we don't need 3 tall defenders then hartigan or truck misses, but Talia is the first picked down there. I think we'd be better off making the tough call on truck if we and he haven't improved in 3 or so weeks.

Look, what you say us correct and make sense. I just think it's easier to find a gun CHB than it us to find a gun CHF.

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

Ins
Mckernan
Lyons
Cey

Outs
Pets
Thompson inj
Grigg inj

 

[WaynesWorld19]

Petrenko has been given unlimited chances and he just keeps playing like shit. Don't reckon Thommo should play if he isn't going to give a meaningful contribution.

I like Petrenko & what he brings to the table ...BUT, he hasn't improved on his base contribution over last 3 years and that's not enough to get a consistent AFL game.

He had to improve & take his game to another level ....something IMO he's capable of but hasn't done

 

[Wright Away]

I'm on Earth. But people predicted a month ago that St kilda would be wooden spooners and now after the back of a few wins against melbourne and gws they are an extreme danger. lol

At least they have won 2 games, the Crows are the second shittest team in the AFL, only Melbourne are worse.

The Crows are 0-3 with a percentage of 59.2. The Crows have shown nothing on field to indicate that they are doing anything about the poor start to the year. No improvement, zero, zip, zilch. In fact the Crows are getting worse with each game.

It will be 0-4, then 0-5, then 0-6 and then maybe we might get a win to go 1-6 heading into the bye.

Sydney were in shit form heading into yesterdays game, and the Crows couldn't even muster more than 15 minutes of actual decent footy over the 4 quarters.

CROWS ARE SHITHOUSE!

 

[WaynesWorld19]

Right now, Siggins is still a long way off AFL.

I understand 12 months is a long time in football development but he needs longer than that.

Think we'll see Siggins in his 4th year ....season after next

Body strength still a long way off what's required at AFL level .....was always a long term project at that draft number .....but there's talent there for sure

 

[TheLeftFist8]

Our forward line is reasonably slow and stagnant. Last week we were also short.

Not only that, our awful gameplan/execution means that whenever anyone gets the ball and looks up we've often got nothing to kick at.

Sure it's partly personnel and Walker will help but it's also structure.

I reckon a decent structure is 2 deeper targets, 2 smalls, and crucially 2 lead-up, agile, marking options ('forwards' who are really tall link men) that our rebounders such as Jaensch, Smith, Hartigan can look upfield and see someone making position.

For this structure options we have are:

Deep targets: Walker, McKernan, Podsiadly, Otten, Dangerfield (when resting), Johnston, Jenkins

Smalls: Betts, Grigg, resting mids such as Kerridge, Wright, Douglas, Sloane

Lead-up: Lynch, Otten, Shaw, Jenkins

Obviously at any one time one of the talls will be resting, plus one of the lead up options is 'defence capable' in case of injuries down back during the game.


Therefore, with injuries accounted for this week we have McKernan, Pods, Betts, resting mids, Shaw, Jenkins (Shaw can play as a flanker).

Looks tall but let's be honest, the short Crows set-up lacks the pace and skill that successful short forward set-ups require. When you've got passengers like Petrenko, it's a disaster.

Looks a bit cumbersome but the structure is there. Shaw and Jenkins cover plenty of ground and will be high half forwards so it's only really the twin talls deep. Bloody obvious but we need to kick a winning score to win!! We need targets for the mids to aim at. As good as Pods was last week he needs help!

Look at the Bombers tonight…tall, agile, marking options across HF so they always have an avenue to goal.

 

[GROTTO]

Jenkins looks far more useful pushing up the ground to provide an option on the wing (similar to Lynch). We desperately need this and I'd keep him pushing further from goal.

Correct, this Jenkins best role is to play up the ground in an attacking position. Ideally I want this guy one on one out.

 

[GROTTO]

We need speed this week, the Saints will slaughter us on the rebound they have a young and fast team.

I do think Pods will play really well this week, showed signs of ripping the game open.

Maybe the year begins for us in R4 onwards and we can build some momentum.

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

Ins
Mckernan
Lyons
Cey

Outs
Pets
Thompson inj
Grigg inj

Midfield - Sloane needs to return mainly to a wing, along with Smith & Mackay to give us plenty of outside midfield options... including gut-running to help out in defence. Let Lyons, Kerridge & Wright do much of the inside grunt work. "Rest" Danger up forward for sizeable times as he carrying an injury.

Basic forward structure - play both Pods & JJ across half forward - leading up, so we have 2 targets most of the time. Leave McKernan closer to the goal square & Betts around him to crumb.

B: Brown, Rutten, Hartigan
HB: Jaensch, Talia, Laird
C: Smith, Dangerfield, Sloane
HF: Douglas, Podsiadly, Jenkins
F: Betts, McKernan, Wright
R: Jacobs, Kerridge, Lyons
I: Reilly, Mackay, Ellis-Yolmen, M Crouch (sub)

 

[Schulzycrow]

Sorry long post / rant ahead.

If we keep turning it over and putting the cue in the rack at 3 quarter time it won't matter who has a ripping game. Stop turning the ball over coming out of defence and at our HF line and we might have a chance. That means fast movement to give our forwards a chance one on one.

The Sydney game was supposed to be a statement on turning things around. Sando pretty much said the same things he did against the Power. We are going to fade out if we are constantly chasing jumpers because we can't execute skills that AFL standard footballers should be able to do in their sleep. If nothing changes this week and we dish up a repeat performance Sando can't glibly say pushing the panic button. We need some leadership and direction and some fight and pride in the jumper...you got to ask the question is why has this all turned into a shite sandwich so quickly after what looked like a good preseason.

I put our start down to a number of factors.
1. Fitness. We've overtrained trying to beat the rotations cap, not enough sprints for power and chasing. Whatever it is we can't run out a game.

2. Gameplan. Not working, needs major tweaking, skills not up to implementing it. Needed to stay with the 2012 plan and chuck the overuse of handball.

3. Injuries. Walker, Lynch, Crouch, VB, Hendo, Otten, now Thompson and possibly Grigg and Kerridge. Not having first 22 players means that the structure of how we wanted to play this year has been majorily compromised. We've hit the injury curse again and our depth just isn't up to the task. Which leads to the next point.

4. Coaching. Haven't dealt with the loss of players very well, haven't made changes quick enough in game. Sando has put too much faith in the leaders of the club to deal with on ground things and they are not standing up under the pressure. The message in the box is already. We are leaking goals over the back and yet we still can't get a lose man in defence to cover this. Rutten is too slow to do this and it comes back to injures.
What has happened over the preseason that our players can't execute skills under pressure or even when there is none? Has to come back to coaching. Sando gets some of this blame, but the line coaches have to come in for some intense scrutiny as well. Apparently evident in the 2s as well today. Our forward line is a joke and our delivery into it is comical at best. But this has been a problem for a long time. We haven't got tall forwards who can take a pack mark or even crash the pack to let Eddie crumb some goals. Getting Tex back ain't going to be a cure all either.

5. Not playing as a team. Sloane is trying to do everything and will injure himself if he keeps it up. Danger is trying, but getting smashed and not getting any help from his fellow midfielders. We are too nice and not flying the flag for our team mates, making blocks, opening space for others, getting into the opposition taggers. Too much is being left to too few. We are too scared to take the game on by foot and still get too sucked in at the stoppages. Not enough talk and voice, not enough working for your mates and learning from past mistakes. Too fragile and not enough grit and fight. Too nice.

6. The club hasn't dealt with the death of Dean Bailey very well and it is affecting the playing and coaching staff more than is being let on. Everyone grieves differently and with so many young men who obviously held Dean in very high regard there has to be some fallout. Sando and the other coaches worked so closely with him, it has to be affecting their states of mind and their decisions.

7a. The Muppet saga is going to hurt the club for the next 5 years. We should have at least 3 first round picks running around and 3 more second round picks running around. To say we dodged a bullet with Crouch and Brown is fantasy and spin of the highest order. The picks we had might turn out to be great ones, but who knows what we could have done at the trade table if those picks had been available?
7b. That S Trigg is still our CEO and presiding over a management and PR team that is cringeworthy at best and incapable of seeing that they have squandered the head start they had over the Power. Now having to face up to the fact that they now have to actually work to keep majority share is making the supporters out there who love the club, but want to see people learning from their mistakes and doing something about them.

The AFC has prided itself in never bottoming out or rebuilding. I used to think that was great, but now see other teams buoyed by early picks for playing shite for seasons breezing past us laughing as they do it saying "suckers". We are too nice and have not been ruthless both on and off the field.

I hope I'm wrong, but unless something miraculous happens this week and we suddenly remember how to play four quarters of football in the weeks ahead. We will have to play so much better against the Saints, Giants and Doggies. I see 0-6 on the horizon coming to round 7 against the Dees looking at a fight for bottom spot on the ladder.

Thus ended the rant.

 

[mcday]

I have been a career supporter of Rutten even early when no-one knew a position the forward may play and called him slow

However, even though the last few years he has been a slow started ...he really looks to be laboring over the ground \\

Other clubs have identified that and are playing thru trucks opponents ......he may not last the season out

He has always been slow, even when he was younger. He can't and won't play on the super mobile guys, and thankfully we have an elite defensive player to make up for this. Despite this he is still a remarkably intelligent and effective defender. He knows exactly where to position himself, and is an expert at the (generally) subtle little holds and pushes to outmark/spoil his opponent. I wouldn't be surprised if this was his last season, but he still has plenty to offer us up until Hartigan takes over his position permanently. Talia and Hartigan can still learn plenty from him.

Rutten is still getting the better of his opponent most weeks, to say that our opponents are playing through his matchup is, quite simply, incorrect. There's nothing any of our defenders can do if we're giving them easy fast break chances with our disposal, there just isn't enough time to get back.

 

[mcday]

Midfield - Sloane needs to return mainly to a wing, along with Smith & Mackay to give us plenty of outside midfield options... including gut-running to help out in defence. Let Lyons, Kerridge & Wright do much of the inside grunt work. "Rest" Danger up forward for sizeable times as he carrying an injury.

Basic forward structure - play both Pods & JJ across half forward - leading up, so we have 2 targets most of the time. Leave McKernan closer to the goal square & Betts around him to crumb.

B: Brown, Rutten, Hartigan
HB: Jaensch, Talia, Laird
C: Smith, Dangerfield, Sloane
HF: Douglas, Podsiadly, Jenkins
F: Betts, McKernan, Wright
R: Jacobs, Kerridge, Lyons
I: Reilly, Mackay, Ellis-Yolmen, M Crouch (sub)

Not a fan of Grigg? Or just assuming that he's injured?

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

Not a fan of Grigg? Or just assuming that he's injured?

That would be the "inj" I had next to his name ... as apparently out for best part of a month.

 

[King Elvis]

There's just something about moving our best tall defender to the forward line that doesn't sit right. Especially if it's to nurse truck through what appears to be his last year. If we don't need 3 tall defenders then hartigan or truck misses, but Talia is the first picked down there. I think we'd be better off making the tough call on truck if we and he haven't improved in 3 or so weeks.

Move Truck forward.

If we want to bomb it onto someones head, then let's put our strongest unit down there and play him out of the goal square.

 

[King Elvis]

Our forward line is reasonably slow and stagnant. Last week we were also short.

Not only that, our awful gameplan/execution means that whenever anyone gets the ball and looks up we've often got nothing to kick at.

Sure it's partly personnel and Walker will help but it's also structure.

I reckon a decent structure is 2 deeper targets, 2 smalls, and crucially 2 lead-up, agile, marking options ('forwards' who are really tall link men) that our rebounders such as Jaensch, Smith, Hartigan can look upfield and see someone making position.

For this structure options we have are:

Deep targets: Walker, McKernan, Podsiadly, Otten, Dangerfield (when resting), Johnston, Jenkins

Smalls: Betts, Grigg, resting mids such as Kerridge, Wright, Douglas, Sloane

Lead-up: Lynch, Otten, Shaw, Jenkins

Obviously at any one time one of the talls will be resting, plus one of the lead up options is 'defence capable' in case of injuries down back during the game.


Therefore, with injuries accounted for this week we have McKernan, Pods, Betts, resting mids, Shaw, Jenkins (Shaw can play as a flanker).

Looks tall but let's be honest, the short Crows set-up lacks the pace and skill that successful short forward set-ups require. When you've got passengers like Petrenko, it's a disaster.

Looks a bit cumbersome but the structure is there. Shaw and Jenkins cover plenty of ground and will be high half forwards so it's only really the twin talls deep. Bloody obvious but we need to kick a winning score to win!! We need targets for the mids to aim at. As good as Pods was last week he needs help!

Look at the Bombers tonight…tall, agile, marking options across HF so they always have an avenue to goal.

I think LJ has potential as that 'link' man as well.

Like your structure though, and agree. Throw Jacobs potentially drifting down there to unsettle things a bit.

At present though, people expecting Tex to be our silver bullet are going to be sorely disappointed - we have so many issues, all over the field, at present; Tex will make us better because he's just that good, but if we keep playing like this, with a structure like this, selections like this, and with our fitness looking pathetic, it won't matter.

 

[TheLeftFist8]

In: Shaw, McKernan, CEY, Lyons
Out: Thompson, Reilly, Grigg, Petrenko

(Reilly survives if Kerridge doesn't come up and we reshuffle CEY)

 

[King Elvis]

Midfield - Sloane needs to return mainly to a wing, along with Smith & Mackay to give us plenty of outside midfield options... including gut-running to help out in defence. Let Lyons, Kerridge & Wright do much of the inside grunt work. "Rest" Danger up forward for sizeable times as he carrying an injury.

Basic forward structure - play both Pods & JJ across half forward - leading up, so we have 2 targets most of the time. Leave McKernan closer to the goal square & Betts around him to crumb.

B: Brown, Rutten, Hartigan
HB: Jaensch, Talia, Laird
C: Smith, Dangerfield, Sloane
HF: Douglas, Podsiadly, Jenkins
F: Betts, McKernan, Wright
R: Jacobs, Kerridge, Lyons
I: Reilly, Mackay, Ellis-Yolmen, M Crouch (sub)

This is correct, and it should be obvious.

We have inside mids who are capable of playing as outside mids (primarily Danger & Sloane).

We have an abundance of inside mids.
We have a lack of outside mids.

It's bloody obvious - get Lyons in, have him, Crouch, Kerridge, Wright, Thommo do the inside grunt work, and instruct the others to sit outside of the contest.

Get Mackay, Smith, Sloane & Danger on the outside, all of a sudden, we have some dangerous and quick outside run.

 

[TheLeftFist8]

I think LJ has potential as that 'link' man as well.

I agree, but i just fear his work ethic won't be that of Lynch, Otten, Jenkins in that he would need to continually present up the ground and make genuine contests when there is no space to be found.

I still hold out hope that he can turn it around. Imagine Walker looking upfield and seeing Johnston with ball in hand…he would actually have confidence to lead (unlike the deplorable foot skills of most of the other options).

C'mon LJ pull your finger out!!!

 

[TheLeftFist8]

This is correct, and it should be obvious.

We have inside mids who are capable of playing as outside mids (primarily Danger & Sloane).

We have an abundance of inside mids.
We have a lack of outside mids.

It's bloody obvious - get Lyons in, have him, Crouch, Kerridge, Wright, Thommo do the inside grunt work, and instruct the others to sit outside of the contest.

Get Mackay, Smith, Sloane & Danger on the outside, all of a sudden, we have some dangerous and quick outside run.

Way too complex

 

[Tex200]

I agree, but i just fear his work ethic won't be that of Lynch, Otten, Jenkins in that he would need to continually present up the ground and make genuine contests when there is no space to be found.

I still hold out hope that he can turn it around. Imagine Walker looking upfield and seeing Johnston with ball in hand…he would actually have confidence to lead (unlike the deplorable foot skills of most of the other options).

C'mon LJ pull your finger out!!!

I think we have def missed lynch as the gut running lead up player. He's become an important piece of the puzzle. On Sat both Pods and Jenkins at various times did ok in that role, only to leave us exposed further up the field with no contesting talls - especially when Jenkins was in ruck


Ideally we have Lynch/Otten leading up with 2 talls stationed deeper.

I think we will see McKernan return this week and either Pods or Jenkins given the lead up role with the other stationed deep.

We won't lose Jenkins to ruck duties with McKernan back.

No one seems to want to raise it too much but geez injuries can mess with your structure - not just the injured player but the flow on effects

Edit - my changes

Out - Grigg inj, Petrenko
In - CEY, McKernan

Lyons in if Thommo does not come up