Our weaknesses

[Lockyer24]

What do you believe are our weaknesses and how can we/will we address them?

My thoughts:

1. Get smashed in the ruck and clearances for large patches in games

The 2009 Prelim would be a good example, we held our ground for a while but the 2nd half was an absolute training drill for the cats as they ran rings around us. Bulldogs also seem to get the upper hand on his here. Hawthorn do aswell but moreso through physicality.

Jolly gives us that big body to both win hit outs, clog up space and protect midfielders. I think he will make a big difference for us. Luke Ball tackles like a madman and wins first possesion despite his limitations so I think he will be an equally positive influence in this area of the ground for us.

2. Countering zones

Obviously against Hawthorn we struggle most, as they seem able to pin us deep into our backline as we chip the ball around. This sucks players up the ground like a vaccum, and when the turnover occurs it allows the opposition acres of space to kick to their forwards and catch us out on the counter attack.

I'm hoping Buckley has a big say in our tactics in this area. At training last year we finally started to focus on handballing drills (like Geelong) but we struggled to kick our old habits and at times we seemed to sit back and play too defensively - see the Carlton game which we won easily however couldn't put them away in the 3rd quarter due playing too carefully.

Again it looks very positive that we are focusing big time on handballing and run and carry drills at training, lets hope we see it transition onto the playing field on game day. We also have a larger and high quality group of midfielders/flankers in the side now, we seem to bat very deep in this area.

3. Forward line disfunction

At times last year, especially when Cloke or Anthony were quiet or injured, we totally struggled to kick goals. Neither are overly prolific consistent goal scorers and tend to have their good days and bad. In a way our forward line problems are related to our inability to beat zones, slow ball movement allows teams to flood back and block space. Contested Marks just don't happen anymore, so it makes life impossible for forwards.

I obviously hope a more direct and run and carry gameplan helps give our forwards more opportunities, rather than them being strangled to death when we play the better defensive teams.
I'd also like to see a Plan B - perhaps someone like Nathan Brown developed to be a makeshift forward like Carlton used to do with Steve Silvagni. If we are winning games easily, perhaps we can throw him forward even when we don't have to, just to round out his game. A more obvious choice I think who should play deep forward is Daisy. Keep developing him in midfield, but throw him forward at times, he is a tough matchup near goal with his skillset.

Any others? Thoughts?

 

[knightwheelrqr]

Weakness will be different in season 2010 obviously. Jolly will help in the ruck and Ball around stoppages so I think relatively speaking they will be strengths.

1. Ability to contain key position forwards. (Franklin and Fevola can kick 8 goals on us pretty easily. So hopefully the development of Brown/ Reid will help, otherwise we will have to get someone else to play some help defence and come off their opponent. My hope is Brown becomes our no.1 KPD in 2010 and takes the oppositions no.1 KPF)

2. Run through the middle. I still see us using the flanks and still not looking into the centre enough to stream the ball through there. We have players such as Dale Thomas and Leon Davis who could stream the ball through the centre and set up play for the forwards. If you play through the centre you can kick to forwards on the left, right or centre. But if you play along a flank you can only get one side and the centre open for a clear pass and even then it is allot easier for the opposition to protect. With Rusling who should break into the side I don't see him as a player who will lead straight down the middle but instead more along the flanks Chris Tarrant style which is why I would look to use the centre more and then we have many more ways to find the open player inside 50.

3. Our forwardline in general. We have some nice options such as JA (When kicking straight), Medhurst (If he gets back to his 2008 form), Cloke (If he gets back to his 2007 form) and perhaps Leon and Didak if they go forward can be handy. But this year I see our problem being in our forwardline and Buckley will have to work hard to make Cloke dominant, make JA dominant, get Merhust back to AA form. I see our midfield being able to compete with the best now with Jolly, Ball and the further development of our young midfield group, our backline is clearly a strength now with the development of Shaw, Harry O, Maxwell, Presti and Toovey all exceeding expectation in 2009. But our forwardline seems to have gone backward in 2009 after probably being our greatest strength in 2008. Add Fraser into the forwardline rotations will be handy, and if Rusling can be fit and healthy for the season will be handy, but because we don't have a "gun" forward we need all forwards to be playing their career best footy and be playing to those levels consistantly if we want a flag in 2010. I suggest Didak and Leon will have to play pretty significant minutes up forward this season because our forwardline needs much more help than our midfield and I would argue that both players have bigger impacts up forward and for Dale Thomas to be the ignighter in the midfield who can rest up forward in a pretty high rotation midfield/ forward system.

 

[Old Spice]

The zone is still the big issue for me. Given Adelaide are now using it, we really need to overcome it. Overcoming the zone requires disposal accuracy and confidence - matters which are often intertwined.

More handballs over the top of opposition heads with the run is surely doable. I don't know if our kick to handball ratio is still high, and obviously kicking gets it in quicker, but for those players not gifted with kicking accuracy, surely we'll see more handballs to running players who can quick well.

 

[twaters]

weaknesses = youth of the group
remedy = patience & 'horses for courses' for one more year, while developing new roles and specialisms for some personnel (eg Wellers, Shaw, Fraser) and finding a new run with/ tagger (eg Caff?, Buckley?, Tooves? Barham??).

positives = any team with a starting centre square group of Jolly, Pendles, Swan and Ball, can't be doing too badly; especially if the defensive 'relief' group then includes Fraser, Beams, Davis, O'Bree (with extra rotations from eg. Didak, Thomas, Medders, Sidey, Shaw, Wellers).

There's a lot of plug in and play anywhere in this young team.

 

[danielnajdek]

We are Collingwood we have no weaknesses
Being serious probably the forward line is our weakest part of the ground. But overall I'm pretty happy with where we are at.

 

[Quicky]

On your points Lockyer24:

1 - Totally agree with you. Jolly and Ball will help out a lot. I think the extra year development in Sidebottom and Beams will help too. McCarthy may be able to step up and push for selection. Wellingham is looking good for a big year. Pendlebury should continue to improve. There is enormous upside in our midfield this year and the extra maturity and experience should really help.

2 - I think the most important thing we need to learn about attacking zones is to create more drive off the HBF. We can't rely solely on Shaw to provide this for us as if he is stopped the zone really strangles us. I think Simon Buckley will help out enormously against zoning teams - as will anyone who can provide run and carry out of the backline. Players like Shaw, Buckley, O'Brien, Thomas, Wellingham and Macaffer will be really important against zoning teams. I think our mids, but particularly our flankers, will really need to work their arses off to provide targets up the ground for any breaking defenders. We need to take more risks running and carrying the ball out of the back half.

3 - I'm not quite sure what needs to be done to fix our forward line. Realistically I think we played our best potential line up last year and it still failed. Big worry. Dick is already a big loss, we can only hope the rumours on Cloke are overplayed. I think we need our midfielders with more damaging disposal be responsible for the majority of our F50 entries. We need to have guys like Pendles, Davis, Didak, Sidebottom, Lockyer and Macaffer pushing to be top 5 in the I50 stats at the club next year. We need to have quicker transitions from midfield to our forward line to give our forwards the best chance. Hopefully our improved midfield will help. Other than that we need to pray for good seasons from Medhurst, Cloke and Anthony and hope for a speedy recovery from Dick. Didak needs to spend more time forward, Cloke I think should be played deeper at a true CHF position. Rusling is the only player we didn't have available last year who I can see having an impact this year. How we fit him in our forward structure is another question though.

 

[spartan-magpie]

What do you believe are our weaknesses and how can we/will we address them?


I'd also like to see a Plan B - perhaps someone like Nathan Brown developed to be a makeshift forward like Carlton used to do with Steve Silvagni. If we are winning games easily, perhaps we can throw him forward even when we don't have to, just to round out his game. A more obvious choice I think who should play deep forward is Daisy. Keep developing him in midfield, but throw him forward at times, he is a tough matchup near goal with his skillset.

Any others? Thoughts?

your op is spot on.. as for the n.brown silvagni idea.. i love it.. would add another dimension to our teams flexibility and browny would be a great match up on any full back.. quick, big and strong.

 

[mattys123]

I could pick apart our list and best 22 and say which players are our "weak spots", but basically I believe our game style is a weakness, and I'm not talking about using the corridor more.

What I am saying is that we seem to rely on "great patches" during games to beat sides, rather then 4 quarters of consistent strong football.

If you watch just about any Collingwood game over the past 3 years, we have won most of these games in a "spurt" of football usually only consisting of a quarter or so.

This "weakness" can also become a strength, but I believe against the top sides we need to concentrate on playing good football for longer periods, and actually burying the "poor" sides of the competition as "practice" for when we face the top sides.

Our forward line is also starting to look a little "weak" in areas, mainly due to injuries and fitness concerns (Medhurst, Cloke, Fraser, Rusling, Dick all had interrupted pre seasons).

 

[DoubleO7]

Game plan.

 

[Optimax]

Game plan.

The only difference between ours and the saints is zone defence, and the zone still didn't beat Geelong.

 

[lozza63]

Our defence is sound and settled.

Our midfield has been strengthened appreciably.

We have some pace issues!

Our forward line as has been pointed out is a drama. Pebs presence has been missed, somehow our rucks need to fill this role while Dawesome gets himself up to standard. i don't believe that this group can emulate the 1990 model with Daics and Rowdy really standing up Starcevich was handy but they were the key. I've seen enough finals where that polish has not evidenced itself from our current group of smalls - Sidey should help also.
The key to this entire season is Trav - that '07 prelim especially has me convinced that he can perform the role but needs a little confidence and help!

 

[Hva sher a]

Cloke's kicking for goals

 

[TradeDraft]

We have some pace issues!

Agree we have some fast players who can Run and Carry in Shaw,Thomas,Wellingham and S Buckley.

But we don't have any Explosiveness Quick players like the Davey's.


Though we did Draft some players like that in the Draft in Hunter and Sinclair

 

[twaters]

Pace issues!?

Barham, Rounds, Blight, Sinclair, even Reed all cut it but are still to come on. Thomas, Dick, Davis and Didak are not without their short nippiness.

Run and carry type of pace: Shaw, Wellers, Buckley.

Get the ball quickly to a teammate type of pace on the ball: McCarthy (fast and low kicks to the chest); Caffa not far behind; Dids, Medders when on song.

Blinding forward pace that might take two defenders to protect against - one in front and behind (and thus free up space and some third-ups on our main goalkicker) - Rusling.

There is more relative pace around this group than I've seen since 1966 GF. Let's not talk it down.

 

[magpiewarrior]

This squad (in terms of ability and depth) reminds me greatly of the 1990 squad. Before you all (in particular the negative posters out there) jump in and ask where are the Marquee players like we had in 1990, preseason and up until about the midway mark of '90, people were saying (asking) the same thing when I and other fanatical pie supporters were talking up our chances. It was only late in the season that people (and the media) started refering to our list as being formidable. Don't get me wrong I don't think our players on our list are anywhere near their peak but I do think they are good enough to win this years flag. If our list stays together and develops to anything like it's potential we could be looking to emulate the invincibles for early last century.

 

[magpiewarrior]

Pace issues!?

Barham, Rounds, Blight, Sinclair, even Reed all cut it but are still to come on. Thomas, Dick, Davis and Didak are not without their short nippiness.

Run and carry type of pace: Shaw, Wellers, Buckley.

Get the ball quickly to a teammate type of pace on the ball: McCarthy (fast and low kicks to the chest); Caffa not far behind; Dids, Medders when on song.

Blinding forward pace that might take two defenders to protect against - one in front and behind (and thus free up space and some third-ups on our main goalkicker) - Rusling.

There is more relative pace around this group than I've seen since 1966 GF. Let's not talk it down.

It sounds as though you see what I see, soon many others will also see it. How long before they all start to claim to have seen it coming?
The bookies and TAB can see it, just look at our prices not just for the flag but all the combo bets too.

 

[Sloth]

Got to start going down the guts. Teams all know we stick to the wings and are prepared for it.

 

[Pie eyed]

Our single biggest weakness over the last 3-4 years has been our dependence on other clubs and our performance against them to quantify our own performance.

Time for Collingwood to have other clubs measure themselves against our side.

That may sound a bit farcical, but it is a major mental step for the individual players and the side as a group.

 

[TradeDraft]

Our single biggest weakness over the last 3-4 years has been our dependence on other clubs and our performance against them to quantify our own performance.

Time for Collingwood to have other clubs measure themselves against our side.

That may sound a bit farcical, but it is a major mental step for the individual players and the side as a group.

Agree with that but they would be the same for Most Side Accept for Saints,Hawks and Cats.

Would be great to be a team that other teams are measured by as it says you are a Top Team

 

[Dawson]

Fickle supporters

 

[Dawson]

Got to start going down the guts. Teams all know we stick to the wings and are prepared for it.

And so do 6 of the other 8 finalists.

That's how they got to play finals.

St Kilda's game play is exactly the same as ours

No club has the number of champions as Geelong has on every line, that's why they can play any style they want to.

 

[Cousin of Daicos]

OP pretty much nailed the biggest issues.

You could add things like:

- Not enough genuine class in the side
- Not enough pace
- Poor game plan