Toast Reasons for Optimism

[Fred Ziffel]

You're so angry at the world - look at the thread you're in.


First game was a write off, taking nothing from it.

Yesterday a lot went right and a lot of players played very well. It's frustrating, but player availability is hurting the team as a whole. Most importantly because we're missing key pillars. Freo had their chances to win yesterday and individual moments cost them, not the game plan.

Any AFL team must play in a way that counters that specific opponent and what their strengths are, so the game plan should change every game. Only against very weak sides would it be clear exactly what the base level game plan is.

I feel that the difference between Freo and some other sides right now has more to do with the contribution from the bottom six than the top six. There's just not enough contribution coming the whole 23.

Anyway, we've lost six in a row, all against top four quality teams, which indicates we're not top four yet. Importantly, Freo have been leading in nearly all of those games. Ergo, not much has to change for them to start winning these games.

I am putting my stake in the ground in the optimism thread that Freo will play finals this year.

Sean Darcy out in all six of those losses
I’m looking ahead to seeing the full impact of Young and O’Driscoll together. I know we had them both in the team in the last couple last year but not with the other keys like Darcy , Treacy and Moose in also.
I think we may be 4 & 2 after Rd 6.

 

[Stinky Lomax]

That is the worst game Shai Bolton will ever play for Fremantle.

 

[MadMundy]

That is the worst game Shai Bolton will ever play for Fremantle.

And I'd arguably say he was one of our better players yesterday, he had good use of the ball and was consistently looking to create opportunities for others.

 

[Fred Ziffel]

I thought Neil Erasmus played a good game yesterday.

 

[MadMundy]

I thought Neil Erasmus played a good game yesterday.

He did, he made a few mistakes, but I also can't remember when he's ever been given a consistent run of full games, I'll be seriously disappointed if Erasmus is dropped this week, it would completely damage his confidence, he needs a good run to show he can hang with the rest of the AFL.

 

[GingerDocker]

I can't find any stats to back it up, but I'm really impressed with Driz so far this year.

He was on my watchlist of players I was keen to see if they improved and he certainly has. His running power, both from the stoppage and in the clear is a huge weapon and his ability to lower the eyes and hit the lead has really improved.

If he can combine his ability to find the ball with some slightly cleaner handling, we are going to have a serious player for the next 7-8 years.

 

[Fred Ziffel]

It would be negligent for a match committee to drop him next week.
I cant recall if Neil Erasmus has ever played a full game for Freo.

 

[Fred Ziffel]

I can't find any stats to back it up, but I'm really impressed with Driz so far this year.

He was on my watchlist of players I was keen to see if they improved and he certainly has. His running power, both from the stoppage and in the clear is a huge weapon and his ability to lower the eyes and hit the lead has really improved.

If he can combine his ability to find the ball with some slightly cleaner handling, we are going to have a serious player for the next 7-8 years.

I have nominated O’Driscoll as our breakout player this year. I had him in our best five yesterday.

 

[Mr Cheese]

I can't find any stats to back it up, but I'm really impressed with Driz so far this year.

He was on my watchlist of players I was keen to see if they improved and he certainly has. His running power, both from the stoppage and in the clear is a huge weapon and his ability to lower the eyes and hit the lead has really improved.

If he can combine his ability to find the ball with some slightly cleaner handling, we are going to have a serious player for the next 7-8 years.

His big issue is disposal. It's horrific. If he can improve this and start hitting a lead frequently, he'll be an A-grade wingman.

On SM-G988U1 using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[Fred Ziffel]

His big issue is disposal. It's horrific. If he can improve this and start hitting a lead frequently, he'll be an A-grade wingman.

On SM-G988U1 using BigFooty.com mobile app

We must have been watching different players. This pre-season and yesterday against Sydney his disposal was fine especially by foot.

 

[GingerDocker]

His big issue is disposal. It's horrific. If he can improve this and start hitting a lead frequently, he'll be an A-grade wingman.

On SM-G988U1 using BigFooty.com mobile app

I thought he actually had some great disposals into our F50?

 

[s_wd6]

one of the few that actually hit targets going i50

 

[ignoramus]

This might sound weird. but i think we are gonna win the premiership this year. the way we are playing reminds me of brisbane early last year.

we haven't overrated our list either.

I think we have a thin midfield. basically we have 4 all australian level midfielders. young, serong, brayshaw and darcy. at any one period of time, darcy is injured, one of the remaining is injured, on the bench or in the forward line. thus at any midfield contest only 2 of the 6 midfielders is actually A grade. our remaining midfielders, fyfe, erasmus, johnson, sharp, odriscoll are b grade at best. thus we essentially lose the talent sweep stakes in the midfield.

for example last year port adelaide rolled in with JHF, rozee, butters, wines, boak,..etc they were actually deaper and more talented than us in the midfield for that final must win game.

for us to win it all. we need darcy back, young back and bolton making frequent cameos. then we'll get on a roll.

weird takeaway from a game. perhaps i'm delusional. but i just have this weird feeling.

Not so weird. I was about to bump an old thread in order to write a post disagreeing with all the handwringing over the “game plan”, but I figured it would be counterproductive as I was wanting a space away from all the anger and doomsaying, and bumping a thread titled “Strategy and Game Plan” would probably just be red rag to a bull.

At any rate, I definitely haven’t written the season off, and I do feel there’ll be a lot of red faces down the track. I agree that having Darcy and Young out has hurt us up to this point, though I’m not sure it’s simply a case of “B grade” versus “A grade" players.

 

[Big Animal]

our list is still chock full of talent, our best players will be back soon, and they are all still young so even if it takes a bit of time to make the appropriate changes in the box, our list shouldn't be wasted. And if we lose this week, this change may happen quicker than we were hoping for.

 

[Sherriff Incorporated]

We must have been watching different players. This pre-season and yesterday against Sydney his disposal was fine especially by foot.

I think he was our best kick of all our mids yesterday.

 

[Rhufus]

We have definately found a player with Murphy Reid. Clever, good kick, high footy IQ, just what Freo needs more of. He should play every game this year if his body is not too tired.
NODs delivery into the forward line was good and given how much footy he has missed this is a good sign he may make it.
Raz also did OK and should be given a good solid set of games to adjust to the tempo.
Dogga was superb, so was Treacy. Moose was heroic.
Johnson has now played two good games in a row and has heaps of upside with some intelligent coaching. This gives us much needed depth.
Bolton looked rusty as hell given his preparation, this is totally understandable but anyone can tell he is going to be rolled gold. That should be his worst game in the purple.
Draper looks very very promising and is holding his spot on merit now.
The rest of the players are playing at 70% rat power/confidence for whatever reason and most of the problems are structural and tactical and could be turned around quickly with a good coaching panel.
I left the ground actually quite happey and confident in our list but for the coaching group, I will leave it there, you will have to go to the vent thread for that.

 

[Ghost Pig]

When Driz is right and we go 5-2, after seven rounds, the pendulum swing on this board is going to be hilarious. Sweet, dear Freo, never change.

 

[CapitalA]

His big issue is disposal. It's horrific. If he can improve this and start hitting a lead frequently, he'll be an A-grade wingman.

On SM-G988U1 using BigFooty.com mobile app

I think his disposal is ok. It looks like it takes him too long to make a decision which is the big issue.

 

[poshman]

When Driz is right and we go 5-2, after seven rounds, the pendulum swing on this board is going to be hilarious. Sweet, dear Freo, never change.

It is going to be a wild ride after that and then when we go on a 6-8 game winning streak. Watch out!

 

[Madas]

This might sound weird. but i think we are gonna win the premiership this year. the way we are playing reminds me of brisbane early last year.

we haven't overrated our list either.

I think we have a thin midfield. basically we have 4 all australian level midfielders. young, serong, brayshaw and darcy. at any one period of time, darcy is injured, one of the remaining is injured, on the bench or in the forward line. thus at any midfield contest only 2 of the 6 midfielders is actually A grade. our remaining midfielders, fyfe, erasmus, johnson, sharp, odriscoll are b grade at best. thus we essentially lose the talent sweep stakes in the midfield.

for example last year port adelaide rolled in with JHF, rozee, butters, wines, boak,..etc they were actually deaper and more talented than us in the midfield for that final must win game.

for us to win it all. we need darcy back, young back and bolton making frequent cameos. then we'll get on a roll.

weird takeaway from a game. perhaps i'm delusional. but i just have this weird feeling.

Mate I love your optimism but other than Treacy and Bolton I would almost say Brisbanes depth forward line is almost better than our firsts

 

[Sully90]

This might sound weird. but i think we are gonna win the premiership this year. the way we are playing reminds me of brisbane early last year.

we haven't overrated our list either.

I think we have a thin midfield. basically we have 4 all australian level midfielders. young, serong, brayshaw and darcy. at any one period of time, darcy is injured, one of the remaining is injured, on the bench or in the forward line. thus at any midfield contest only 2 of the 6 midfielders is actually A grade. our remaining midfielders, fyfe, erasmus, johnson, sharp, odriscoll are b grade at best. thus we essentially lose the talent sweep stakes in the midfield.

for example last year port adelaide rolled in with JHF, rozee, butters, wines, boak,..etc they were actually deaper and more talented than us in the midfield for that final must win game.

for us to win it all. we need darcy back, young back and bolton making frequent cameos. then we'll get on a roll.

weird takeaway from a game. perhaps i'm delusional. but i just have this weird feeling.

Love it, potential Greatest Post of All Time areas. Stay strong dropbear.

 

[summerthebat]

This might the denial phase of grief, but I was thinking this during the first quarter against the Swans.

Getting completely eviscerated by Geelong in round one with a high pressure game, would have given a very clear blueprint for opposing AFL coaches on how to beat us when we have the ball. That was immediately evident with Sydney's gameplan and ultimately it worked, albeit barely.

So, my reason for optimism is, the team is going to have to learn to work through extreme pressure on a consistent basis. It seems reasonable to expect that the team will improve with more exposure to this and we've been beaten this way in our last five losses by hardened finals teams, Geelong x 2, GWS, Port Adelaide and Sydney.

The Essendon game exists in a dimension that the laws of physics and sentient logic is incompatible with.

 

[Dockeroo]

Staying away from all the other threads today, just full of the pessimists who see nothing but the end result.

Fremantle will play finals this season, I have no doubt about it. It is of absolutely no importance that we lost to Geelong and Sydney, two top four sides from last season.

I called for Reidy to go out and Voss to come in but I sit here now and say categorically that Fremantle would have won yesterday if it were not for Pat Voss, who played like he wanted to be the hero. It was the least team oriented performance I can recall. He burns Freddie early in the game, electing to take a set shot from outside 50, does it again in the third quarter, electing to take the long set shot, then proceeds to miss from 30m directly in front for a goal that would put us three scoring shots up, and then turns the ball over trying to go for a hero kick to half forward, he shanks it, Sydney go end to end for a goal. Played with an unearned arrogance.

Freo will play finals, I have no doubt about it. My optimistic prediction is that there will be a long stretch of wins off the back of this difficult start. Darcy and Young will return, resulting in a cascading of players falling into their preferred roles. Bolton and Cox will find their best form, Walters and Fyfe will return and make meaningful contributions.

In a few weeks we will be looking back laughing at the massive overreaction from these two up front losses.

Such an easy target, Pat Voss - the guy on minimum chips probably $110k plus match payments. Yeah he missed a couple of set shots he should have scored and the cross field kick was awful but what about all the others?
What did you think of the following aspects of the game:

• Serong and Brayshaw getting less than 20 touches each while Jordon had 10 clearances
• Amiss being pretty much invisible again
• Frederick doing nothing all game apart from missing a simple set shot literally in front of the goals - is that not a coach killer too?
• Cox embarrassing effort against amartey with the game on the line
• Sharp with his awful game awareness just bombing it long and aimlessly every single match
• the coach playing Serong in the forward line for the second game in a row to no effect while we were getting monstered out of the middle

Sydney missing two AA midfielders to top it all off.

Let’s just ease off a bit on the Voss criticism after one game he’s played this year, and start directing some well overdue scrutiny at guys paid 8 or 10 times his salary. Voss is no world beater and his butchering of the ball was massively frustrating but at least he attacked the ball with intent. Jye Amiss could do a lot worse than showing some similar levels of aggression on the field.

Brennan Cox had looked like a state league player since the day he signed that 6 year extension a couple of years ago. At what point will the optimists start pointing the finger at some of these guys?

 

[Madas]

This might the denial phase of grief, but I was thinking this during the first quarter against the Swans.

Getting completely eviscerated by Geelong in round one with a high pressure game, would have given a very clear blueprint for opposing AFL coaches on how to beat us when we have the ball. That was immediately evident with Sydney's gameplan and ultimately it worked, albeit barely.

So, my reason for optimism is, the team is going to have to learn to work through extreme pressure on a consistent basis. It seems reasonable to expect that the team will improve with more exposure to this and we've been beaten this way in our last five losses by hardened finals teams, Geelong x 2, GWS, Port Adelaide and Sydney.

The Essendon game exists in a dimension that the laws of physics and sentient logic is incompatible with.

You mean it existed in the “ Dockerverse “?
The place where bizarre , never before seen rule interpretations are conjured up for one game then disappear for eternity .

 

[Madas]

Such an easy target, Pat Voss - the guy on minimum chips probably $110k plus match payments. Yeah he missed a couple of set shots he should have scored and the cross field kick was awful but what about all the others?
What did you think of the following aspects of the game:

• Serong and Brayshaw getting less than 20 touches each while Jordon had 10 clearances
• Amiss being pretty much invisible again
• Frederick doing nothing all game apart from missing a simple set shot literally in front of the goals - is that not a coach killer too?
• Cox embarrassing effort against amartey with the game on the line
• Sharp with his awful game awareness just bombing it long and aimlessly every single match
• the coach playing Serong in the forward line for the second game in a row to no effect while we were getting monstered out of the middle

Sydney missing two AA midfielders to top it all off.

Let’s just ease off a bit on the Voss criticism after one game he’s played this year, and start directing some well overdue scrutiny at guys paid 8 or 10 times his salary. Voss is no world beater and his butchering of the ball was massively frustrating but at least he attacked the ball with intent. Jye Amiss could do a lot worse than showing some similar levels of aggression on the field.

Brennan Cox had looked like a state league player since the day he signed that 6 year extension a couple of years ago. At what point will the optimists start pointing the finger at some of these guys?

Agree with most but will rebut a couple

We have every right to be be pissed at Voss , that was an amateur and selfish performance, hopefully he gets better for it but I think if Darcy were available next week he would be out on his ear quicker than you could say spud .


I was watching some of the rotations of the mods into the forward line and thee was a lot more movement than usual . My take on it ( possibly wrong ) was that Bolton wasn’t 100% so needed to be rested and also that Banfield was having a shocker and JL needed to get him off the field

Agree on Amiss
I think once Darcy is back and Dogga can roam the forward line it might free him up to play a bit looser , he can’t play contested , he gets tangled up too easily so needs to work harder on running and presenting