North Melbourne at Bellerive Oval

[Buzzasto DaSilva]

North are on track to win their fifth consecutive game down in Hobart, which will make it 14 wins and 4 losses since they've began playing home games down there, including 10 scores of over 100. A very, very good record considering many experts believed they were going to struggle in 17/18/19/20 as they reset their list.

Why do they play the ground so well?

Having never attended, but watched plenty on television, they seem to play the sweeping wind very well. Although they struggle with accuracy, they create plenty opportunities by applying forward pressure better than anybody down there. Opposition teams seem to kick to a contest and not switch very well playing against North, which seems to their advantage as they have a plethora of good marking players and have traditionally been a good contested team. That's the impression I get, but I'd love to hear from others.

It will be interesting to see if they can maintain the advantage and potentially play a fourth or fifth game down their when their contract expires in 2021.

 

[Bluelegs]

Plenty of exposure to those conditions allows them to perfect their style on that ground. Every game I've watched there (On tv, never been) the wind has been insane. It's completely unique to that ground.

 

[Augustine]

In before “they should move there permanently.”

In all seriousness, if and when Tasmania eventually get a team of their own, they will probably have the best home ground advantage in the game going by Hawks and North. Most of their travel will be a quick trip to Victoria too. They’ll be a strong little parochial club. Better than Gold Coast.

 

[Engimal v3]

Weather helps other teams' disposal quality to drop to ours.

 

[Bluelegs]

In before “they should move there permanently.”

In all seriousness, if and when Tasmania eventually get a team of their own, they will probably have the best home ground advantage in the game going by Hawks and North. Most of their travel will be a quick trip to Victoria too. They’ll be a strong little parochial club. Better than Gold Coast.

Depends. If Blundstone was the homeground you would expect the ground would have some heavy renovations. Grandstands are windbreakers and it could completely nullify the conditions that make it so unique.

 

[Chaisa]

Most unique weather conditions in the comp given the wind. The fact that sides rarely go down there means that North know how to handle the conditions better and can formulate a team to win down there. Sides will always find it tough to win down there.

 

[Buzzasto DaSilva]

Do North spend any of their pre-season down there? The familiarity with the unique conditions makes perfect sense, but they only play three games a year there, which I wouldn't have thought would be enough to be completely accustomed to it for their record to be as good as it is.

 

[Roobs321]

Eagles in recent times tend to be soft in wet and cold conditions. The "Windy Hill Massacre" has a literal feel to it for our club.

Well done to the Kangaroos. They've really made Bellerive feel like home, Hobart suits them, after some less successful attempts in places like Manuka and Carrara. Been a decent side all year.

 

[TheKanga]

I love it as i'm guaranteed 3 live wins a year.

 

[Isaac Cumming No 1]

North are on track to win their fifth consecutive game down in Hobart, which will make it 14 wins and 4 losses since they've began playing home games down there, including 10 scores of over 100. A very, very good record considering many experts believed they were going to struggle in 17/18/19/20 as they reset their list.

Why do they play the ground so well?

Having never attended, but watched plenty on television, they seem to play the sweeping wind very well. Although they struggle with accuracy, they create plenty opportunities by applying forward pressure better than anybody down there. Opposition teams seem to kick to a contest and not switch very well playing against North, which seems to their advantage as they have a plethora of good marking players and have traditionally been a good contested team. That's the impression I get, but I'd love to hear from others.

It will be interesting to see if they can maintain the advantage and potentially play a fourth or fifth game down their when their contract expires in 2021.

I went down last year. I was a bit flummoxed sitting in the stands on a glorious day of 23° with a light breeze, while BF posters were talking about the wind. We won by 5 goals and I couldn't see the problem. We drew in Launceston last year as well.

I think the major factor today with the windsock still, was North are a good side with their backs to the wall.

 

[Heaps of fun]

Zero wind today though in the past it has helped. Today we just smashed the Eagles at the contest. Without Nic Nat their midfield is impotent.

 

[BobbyMorri]

Wind is a factor and will always be a factor. Bellerive is next to the river. Any expansions(and that is a big if) will be around the North East Stand near the hill, which won't influence the wind at all when/if they take place. Today had no wind though, so it isn't the only one.

Another factor I think is that teams just don't prepare for it. They try to play the same style of football on a ground unsuited for it due to wind or ground dimensions. A bit like Launny for the Hawks and Geelong in Geelong. I think Bellerive is a skinny oval, (nowhere near as much as Geelong).

One last guess is that North feel very much at home now. The most another team have played here would be 3-4 games, so everything is new to them. The travel, the hotel, the ground and the fans.

 

[Kangaroos4eva]

Weather helps other teams' disposal quality to drop to ours.

It's scary how close to the truth your post is.

 

[Tas]

Do North spend any of their pre-season down there? The familiarity with the unique conditions makes perfect sense, but they only play three games a year there, which I wouldn't have thought would be enough to be completely accustomed to it for their record to be as good as it is.

They play cricket there over the pre-season.

We do have a pre-season camp in Tasmania but I don't think it is any worse than a windy or wet day anywhere else, it just seems the weather is always s**t whenever we play there. I can't remember the last time the sun was out playing a team there where it also wasn't blowing like a hurricane.

At the start we didn't have a great record, we had a few players that haven't played there before and they handled it okay.

 

[Rod Stroker]

they seem to play the sweeping wind very well.

Every game I've watched there (On tv, never been) the wind has been insane. It's completely unique to that ground.

Most unique weather conditions in the comp given the wind. The fact that sides rarely go down there means that North know how to handle the conditions better and can formulate a team to win down there.

Zero wind today.

As I said in the GD thread, the surface is perfect, wind no factor, no rain today, no problem with sun or lights in players eyes.

The ground was not the reason the Eagles lost today.
And they had more free kicks than us in a 40 point loss. Just sayin'

 

[tazaa]

Weather helps other teams' disposal quality to drop to ours.

Pretty much it

 

[Buzzasto DaSilva]

Zero wind today.

As I said in the GD thread, the surface is perfect, wind no factor, no rain today, no problem with sun or lights in players eyes.

The ground was not the reason the Eagles lost today.
And they had more free kicks than us in a 40 point loss. Just sayin'

Sorry if I inferred that it was all a wind thing. I definitely didn't mean to Rod. I had a look earlier and it was 7km/hr wind at Bellerive which would have been very ineffectual. I am not saying North got lucky at all, they were a much better team. I'm more referring to their record over the past six years. 14 wins from 18 games is excellent for a venue that they only visit three times a year.

 

[docko911]

I’ll throw one out there

North are always a tough team, the conditions in tassie are always tougher than anywhere else in Australia. Wet and cold today, the sun tanners didn’t want to go the hard ball.

When Richmond played there two years ago it was cold as * and it seemed like our players just wanted to get under a blanky in front of the fire, North went hard.

 

[Bluelegs]

Zero wind today.

As I said in the GD thread, the surface is perfect, wind no factor, no rain today, no problem with sun or lights in players eyes.

The ground was not the reason the Eagles lost today.
And they had more free kicks than us in a 40 point loss. Just sayin'

Fair enough. Didn't watch the game, just speaking from experience.

 

[DarkPhoenix]

They play cricket there over the pre-season.

We do have a pre-season camp in Tasmania but I don't think it is any worse than a windy or wet day anywhere else, it just seems the weather is always s**t whenever we play there. I can't remember the last time the sun was out playing a team there where it also wasn't blowing like a hurricane.

At the start we didn't have a great record, we had a few players that haven't played there before and they handled it okay.

I think the preseason stuff is done at North Hobart oval on the other side of the river, could be wrong though.

And it's only a handful of players. We don't bring the team down to train to conditions.

 

[Rod Stroker]

Wet and cold today

Cold, yes, but it wasn't wet today. Didn't rain.

 

[TheKanga]

I remember another game we played against the Eagles there.
50km winds made the ball like a boomerang.

 

[Howard Littlejohn]

Do North spend any of their pre-season down there? The familiarity with the unique conditions makes perfect sense, but they only play three games a year there, which I wouldn't have thought would be enough to be completely accustomed to it for their record to be as good as it is.

Make trips to Hobart, but Bellerive is locked up by cricket through the pre-season so presumably don't play or train there in summer.

 

[The King!]

Making a side like west coast travel all the way down and play in the cold heaps

 

[SterlingArcher]

Making a side like west coast travel all the way down and play in the cold heaps

The injustice of having to play in the cold in a winter sport