Analysis Rick's Analysis (The Shinboner)

[Themanbun]

Thank you King for saving me from stoppage reviews this week, now I can just kick back and enjoy the replay.

 

[Passmore]

Thank you King for saving me from stoppage reviews this week, now I can just kick back and enjoy the replay.

Like hell. Get to work.

Sent from my SM-A908B using Tapatalk

 

[Rick18]

Rick, RE. pressure pt's, i see that for us, WilPhil was listed as 2nd with 46 in 56% ToG, behind only LDU with 56 in 87% ToG, what is your take on this ?

I hope this doesn't come across as damning with faint praise like I think it will, but it shows that he's doing his job.

Cause he's the last in the midfield pecking order, those spots down the bottom of the rotation normally get the 'dirty' jobs, for lack of a better term. Bits and pieces, defensive work, complementing the guys who have more responsibilities, that sort of stuff.

And he's doing that well! Interested to see how the roles reshuffle when Wardlaw is ready to come back.

 

[Rick18]

Adelaide post is up:

The never-ending streak: Round 3, 2025 v Adelaide

A week after an impressive win at Marvel Stadium, there were more positive signs for North Melbourne at Adelaide Oval.

theshinboner.com

The two main topics are on the ball use out of the back half, and an interesting team defence setup that caught my eye. Then the usual odds and ends to finish off.

 

[Rick18]

Righto, a long one today. Sydney post is up:

A big step backwards: Round 4, 2025 v Sydney

The title sums today’s post up. It isn’t a game where plenty of positives can be found.

theshinboner.com

No videos or pictures today, just a lot of words. Wanted to touch on three things:

1) Providing a bit of context to set the scene for what happened
2) North Melbourne on offence and the big picture issues with what the style currently is
3) North Melbourne on defence and the related issues to the offensive style

There's a few callbacks to what we've seen so far this season, which mainly serves to shorten the post so it only ended at about 1700 words instead of double that amount.

 

[Devington]

North currently rank first for total handballs – and dead last for average metres gained per handball.

How horrifying.

Thanks for the review Rick, must have been a task almost as painful as watching the game itself.

 

[Midas]

Who do you put back?

Powell - get user, too slow.

Simpkin - quick, poor user.

Sheezel - need his influence forward?

Kerch - sooks up, no defensive intent.

It’s a quandary.

 

[north_lad]

How horrifying.

Thanks for the review Rick, must have been a task almost as painful as watching the game itself.

Thought we actually looked most dangerous in the first half when we were trying to make aggressive forward handballs. Wasn't always pretty but seemed to be the only way we could get through

 

[amaz199]

We looked most dangerous when we spread away from the ball carrier and hit up a short lead into the corridor.

It looks amazing when it works, but an option needs to gut run towards the ball carrier, and the blokes running away forward need to run into that space left behind. Then, when the lead up target is hit, the blokes running forward need to coordinate one option to double back lead. You'll get a very easy set shot on goal this way because the opposition have no time to setup or block the space. It's what we've been sorely missing since the Brad Scott days.

Our forward line, refuses to work cohesively or do enough gut running.

 

[Supreme_Chancellor]

Old mate Rick should've honestly saved his talent and time and just use something like this to summarise the game:

 

[amaz199]

Tucker gathers the ball from a stoppage, gives and gut runs forward receiving the ball back from Larkey and sees options running forward.

He doesn't see LDU wide open, but whether LDU's urgency was suffficient for Tucker to realise is another discussion.

Tucker elects to kick long and completely stuffs the kick forcing Zurhaar to infringe.



It's one of the poorer pieces of play that need to be replayed. Someone running forward needs to come at him as a lead up target. Just so he doesn't need to kick long but can kick a short 20m pass that would be much easier to hit. What's more puzzling is no one is ahead of their opponent, so I'm not sure what Tucker was trying to achieve. Either give the handball to LDU and he keeps running forward or a target in front of him leads back towards him.

Ugh, we're our own worst enemy. This would be bread and butter for guys like Boomer, Wells and co. We wouldn't be having this discussion.

 

[nicko74]

Rick, may I ask a question? Your analysis is awesome and goes way beyond my understanding of the game and how the modern game plays out. But would our current coaching regime be aware of the issues you highlight and by any chance have a potential answer on how to rectify said issues?

 

[ferball]

View attachment 2274992
Tucker gathers the ball from a stoppage, gives and gut runs forward receiving the ball back from Larkey and sees options running forward.

He doesn't see LDU wide open, but whether LDU's urgency was suffficient for Tucker to realise is another discussion.

Tucker elects to kick long and completely stuffs the kick forcing Zurhaar to infringe.

View attachment 2274994

It's one of the poorer pieces of play that need to be replayed. Someone running forward needs to come at him as a lead up target. Just so he doesn't need to kick long but can kick a short 20m pass that would be much easier to hit. What's more puzzling is no one is ahead of their opponent, so I'm not sure what Tucker was trying to achieve. Either give the handball to LDU and he keeps running forward or a target in front of him leads back towards him.

Ugh, we're our own worst enemy. This would be bread and butter for guys like Boomer, Wells and co. We wouldn't be having this discussion.

While that was a shit kick a handball to LDU ain't the option there.

Maybe a chip kick for LDU to run onto tho.

 

[amaz199]

While that was a shit kick a handball to LDU ain't the option there.

Maybe a chip kick for LDU to run onto tho.

Handball to LDU, sucks in Sydney player then pop it over to Zurhaar.

But it would need to be a zinger of a handball so probably not. Forwards dont help our mids tbh.

 

[ferball]

Handball to LDU, sucks in Sydney player then pop it over to Zurhaar.

But it would need to be a zinger of a handball so probably not. Forwards dont help our mids tbh.

Is Tucker left handed when he handballs? Cos LDU would need a lh handball that also got past that Sydney player before either of those two Sydnety players tackle him properly.

Dunno.

 

[amaz199]

Is Tucker left handed when he handballs? Cos LDU would need a lh handball that also got past that Sydney player before either of those two Sydnety players tackle him properly.

Dunno.

Its bad positioning from LDU anyway.

It should've been a short kick into the corridor forcing Sydney defenders to run back, then one of the forwards double back and bang easy set shot.

It's incredible how hard we make the easiest things look and how close we are to doing it.

 

[slider1978]

Podcast is up with Ricky if anyone wants a listen. Or you can watch the youtube show as well

 

[Themanbun]

While that was a shit kick a handball to LDU ain't the option there.

Maybe a chip kick for LDU to run onto tho.

Agreed. Larkey needs to spread wider, and he's the best option there. Darling needs to come at Tucker as the second option. Neither were doing the right thing and I'm not sure why tf LDU was calling for it in that position.

 

[Sticksphat]

While that was a shit kick a handball to LDU ain't the option there.

Maybe a chip kick for LDU to run onto tho.

A kick to a player running away from you is the hardest to judge. If LDU cuts right(?) across Tucker's field of view for the short pass (and he gets it), it gives him a handball option (Bull?) and more time if he turns and goes, compared to a chip kick where the deeper defenders come at him.

My sense is that in front of the ball carrier all our players run directly away from the carrier. I would think a change of angle across the field, either the closer players, or even the deeper players, (or both?) leaves more space to run into ahead of the carrier and may confuse defenders or at least make them have to make commit to a decision.

Sorry if I haven't explained myself clearly.

 

[amaz199]

The reason there are so many turnovers is the forward line just don't lead properly or exploit the space in front of the ball carrier and behind them.

By running back into the 50, you're effectively conceding the space that's supposed to be open for the next receiver.

 

[Rick18]

Okely doke, so the Gold Coast post is up:

The good and the bad: Round 5, 2025 v Gold Coast

There are a lot of videos in today’s post.

theshinboner.com

There are a lot of videos in it. Like, probably too many to be honest, but here we are. The post is divided up into two parts:

1) The good: How the ball use process shifted
2) The bad: All the individual mistakes. So many individual mistakes.

Take a guess which section most of the videos fall in and you'll have the reason for why I'm saying there's probably too many videos.

 

[zoomba23]

What percentage of those goals do you reckon a team like GWS concedes on a standard day, Rick? 50 odd?

 

[Its a Process]

Good teams can be aggressive with their ball movement as they can trust their defenders/system stand up when 1 vs 1.

Our back 7 is our best paid and most experienced line on the field but they are largely poor 1 vs 1 players - it’s a real worry.

 

[TennisPlayerAndy]

What percentage of those goals do you reckon a team like GWS concedes on a standard day, Rick? 50 odd?

Less than that.

They don’t defeat themselves.

 

[Rick18]

What percentage of those goals do you reckon a team like GWS concedes on a standard day, Rick? 50 odd?

Much less, I reckon. Ash doesn't mind a brain fade every so often so he'd probably have given up a couple of those ground level ones. But the ones that would involve Taylor, Buckley, etc; the % there would be closer to zero.