AFL Autopsy RND 19: Beaten by the Giants

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I just think we are mentally drained. 3 weeks ago looking forward to a string of home games, then bang, back in the hub, while other teams stay in Melb who were supposed to be away.

It is well known that Tippa struggled big time last year & looks flat as ever, but we haven't be "on" for 3 weeks. No dare, no dash.

If we play flat next week, Swans will have a big win.

This has been the case every year for the past 15 years. No other side in the competition stops playing in July like we have historically.
 
I wondered about this too... whether they were happy to concede a lot of uncontested marks (because why else is it happening) but a lot of those chains are ending in marks inside 50. That can’t be the plan.
Agree. We looked better early in the season when the defensive effort was much more concerted at each line. It seems to have been commensurate with Parish's rise... maybe something attitudinal in terms of being reliant on him and Merrett? Worse now that Parish is having to work through a tag.
 
Second week in a row that teams have played keepings off with us, not tight enough with our defensive zone
No one on whitfield who is key to their drive was a constant problem

After half time got pantsed in the centre, some young tiring players shown up in the contest. Draper has athletic ability but is still needing a proper footy education

Need to build depth in the squad for players to come up and take the spots of zaharakis, cutler, smith, hooker, stewart
Our unwillingness to tag a player again was telling. Ham might have had the tank to run with him. If the zone defence is rolling and only one player is tagging Whitfield, I don't understand what the issue is. If it helps you get the W on the day...
 

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Forget the result, because it didn’t surprise me as we’d been ordinary for weeks against poor opposition…

But what sort of example is truck setting to the playing group by giving Zaka who was not even remotely deserving of a game, ahead of Guelfi who gives unconditional effort & plays his role weekly?? Standards that were lacking in the game of probably 85% of the playing group in the 2nd half!!

What I would’ve given to have him available to go to Whitfield in a negating role in the 2nd half….

As impressed as I’ve been by him this year….poor selection & poor coaching tonight by truck.
 
The coaching and selection have been a head scratcher over the last few weeks.

Zaharakis in for Guelfi was absolutely mind boggling and Jones has been pretty important in his role this year covering a lot of ground to provide a target and we don’t even replace him?

We don’t seem to ever put any time into trying to stop the oppositions play makers either.
 
The coaching and selection have been a head scratcher over the last few weeks.

Zaharakis in for Guelfi was absolutely mind boggling and Jones has been pretty important in his role this year covering a lot of ground to provide a target and we don’t even replace him?

We don’t seem to ever put any time into trying to stop the oppositions play makers either.
Zaharakis plays as a forward and replace Waterman, who also plays forward and has been out of form. They’ve been trading places all year, there isn’t room for both without injuries.

Shiel came in for Guelfi because we’re adjusting back to more mids in the rotation instead of two doing all the heavy lifting with an extra flanker to make up the numbers.

Guelfi is unlucky that it wasn’t Ham or Cutler that was dropped instead. It was out of the three of them. Comparing to Zaka is apples and oranges and a waste of time.
 
Zaharakis plays as a forward and replace Waterman, who also plays forward and has been out of form. They’ve been trading places all year, there isn’t room for both without injuries.

Shiel came in for Guelfi because we’re adjusting back to more mids in the rotation instead of two doing all the heavy lifting with an extra flanker to make up the numbers.

Guelfi is unlucky that it wasn’t Ham or Cutler that was dropped instead. It was out of the three of them. Comparing to Zaka is apples and oranges and a waste of time.

Play Guelfi forward in Zakkas role, not that hard to compare that is it?

Applies a heap more pressure and intensity over 4 quarters, he kicked a goal, had 3 goal assists and 8 score involvements last week, a no brainer for me.
 
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Zaharakis plays as a forward and replace Waterman, who also plays forward and has been out of form. They’ve been trading places all year, there isn’t room for both without injuries.

Shiel came in for Guelfi because we’re adjusting back to more mids in the rotation instead of two doing all the heavy lifting with an extra flanker to make up the numbers.

Guelfi is unlucky that it wasn’t Ham or Cutler that was dropped instead. It was out of the three of them. Comparing to Zaka is apples and oranges and a waste of time.
I would have been happy with either Guelfi or Ham in a run-with role on Whitfield. He may have burnt them off eventually but we should have been able to do enough damage. Inaccuracy killed us too.
 
Play Guelfi forward in Zakkas role, not that hard compare that is it?

Applies a heap more pressure and intensity over 4 quarters, he kicked a goal, had 3 goal assists and 8 score involvements last week, a no brainer for me.

I’d say Zaharakis played more wing yesterday anyway.

Here’s his heat map from yesterday compared to Waterman last week.


E0871FD0-CDBB-4D78-87D9-635DA298E783.png 00181B6C-B8C9-4022-94B6-01B2D79F85E4.png
 
My thoughts:
  1. Young team, who will have their ups and downs. Downs related to points below
  2. Suddenly moved out of Melb to QLD again. Threw them. More experienced and hardened teams adapt to this better. We will in time
  3. I feel like midfield has been going full ball the last 3-4 weeks to cover other poor performing areas. Not surprisingly, they finally had a flat and probably tired night
  4. We don't play that well at Metricon
  5. Have played a lot of away games this year. Even our "home games" in QLD. That's draining
  6. Truck hasn't even had a full year with a list he has really had a chance to shape yet. Look at Hardwick, the year before they won the first flag the Tigers had a shocker and there was questions about his job. By that stage he was what, 5-6 years into the job? Building a system and culture takes time to show on field success
  7. Sean Murphy: like Truck, will take a little time to build up strength and conditioning in this group, so they can push through July. This upcoming pre-season he should hopefully get a really good crack and it and we will start to see some benefits
Overall, if they're playing like this, I'd prefer to see them drop a few more games, slide down the ladder and get a better draft pick. Last thing I want is to limp into the finals and play Lovatt-Murray in the ruck and get smashed in the first week by Carlton. Oh hang on, that's already happened...

But, if this is the way it's heading, I agree with a lot of comments on this board. Bring some younger guys in, not just Perkins/Cox/Jones. Give Guelfi more minutes, let's throw Hird in on a half forward flank one week to see what he can do. Keep Durham in the squad. Mix things up a little bit, if Tippa is just down on form, throw him in the middle for a bit.

Hope is a b***h. It lifts you up, then brings you crashing back down to earth.
 
Agree on some of the selection calls being poor but none of them change the result, we had a really bad day against a game plan our coaches/players couldn't figure out, we couldn't build pressure so we need to point to work rate and structure of the entire team and not 1 or 2 individuals.

GWS' game plan was pretty simple; give it to Whitfield.

We just didn't have anyone go anywhere near him all day. Not sure that's a coaching call as much as an effort call, surely - surely - the coaches aren't instructing our players to give Whitfield as much time and space as he'd like.

Looks like an inexperienced side running out of legs late in the season to me. Some of our experienced players look to be carrying injury like Tipungwuti, others like Shiel have just come back from LTI. Parish is learning what it's like to be tagged, and no one really took up the reins in his absence.

Was a disappointing performance based on having our destiny in our hands in securing a finals berth, but ultimately we're simply not a Top-8 side right now.

People also masssively underrating how good the GWS midfield is; Hopper & Green are seriously elite inside midfielders, would trade for Hopper in a heartbeat if he was gettable.
 
yeh the wall was going to come, its been a tough season of away games for us - so be it.

the main issue i see, especially this week and last week is that we allow the other team to pick off small passes from defence until they are within striking range of their f50 entry. our system of zonal guarding space dosent have enough flexibility to push up to stop the shorts. Ideally, our plan works of we can force them to go long up the line to a contest, then we can swarm and go, but its useless, if they are just allowed to pick off 15m passes up the field unchallenged
 

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GWS' game plan was pretty simple; give it to Whitfield.

We just didn't have anyone go anywhere near him all day. Not sure that's a coaching call as much as an effort call, surely - surely - the coaches aren't instructing our players to give Whitfield as much time and space as he'd like.

Looks like an inexperienced side running out of legs late in the season to me. Some of our experienced players look to be carrying injury like Tipungwuti, others like Shiel have just come back from LTI. Parish is learning what it's like to be tagged, and no one really took up the reins in his absence.

Was a disappointing performance based on having our destiny in our hands in securing a finals berth, but ultimately we're simply not a Top-8 side right now.

People also masssively underrating how good the GWS midfield is; Hopper & Green are seriously elite inside midfielders, would trade for Hopper in a heartbeat if he was gettable.

Yeah our guys just couldn't go with them for long enough, McGrath, Caldwell, Shiel missing so much and then Langford going out was possibly the tipping point, Merrett and Parish have carried a huge load all year with help from Stringer when called upon, after that it was kids and our c graders to fill in the gaps.
 
It would've been nice to see Truck throw the team around a bit, Swap Hooker and Stewart in the last and maybe swap Parish with Heppell, Parish couldn't shake the tag and Heppell knows how to play inside, worth a shot.

Maybe even swapping Tippa and Hind

They tried moving the defence around a bit to get Hind free, but didn't quite work out well. Seems teams are putting more time in to Hind now than they were earlier in the season. Redman also wasn't particularly damaging which doesn't help Hind out. Also tried throwing Parish up forward to change it up a little.

Shiel coming back off a LTI probably didn't help, meant he wasn't really up to taking big minutes through the middle like you'd expect if Parish was getting tagged out.
 
Langford was doing a lot of grunt work too. He was also taking marks. Hopefully back soon.

We let teams play kick to kick too easily. Too many times players 10-20 metres in front of our players. Almost like players are doing the zone 100% but forgetting their opponent.

There has been no flow to our game for the last few weeks. Teams have worked out how to limit Hind's run through the middle.
 
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We need a tagger, all the good teams have one.
You can't let players like Parish, Whitfield or Walsh running around doing their own thing.

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This ******* fan base. Spineless? Just idiotic comments from some on here.

All year we have been expecting performances like this, if not worse. We were expected to be hammered and be the punching bag of the AFL during the weeks when the Roos wanted a rest.

100% it was a poor performance. We just didn’t kick into gear when we needed too. It sucks, but it happens. Every team in the AFL has had a poor game this year. Every team. Geelong lost to Adelaide. Melbourne drew with Adelaide.

It just sucks because I honestly believe some of our own supporters thrive on poor performances like this, which is why so many have jumped on the s**t flinging comments here. Then, once we start gaining momentum, will be “yeah, I’ve always had faith.”
 
Sheil and Zaka in, Essendon Lose, a nice return to 2020. Should have been beaten by way more realistically. We're lucky the backline held up so well.
 
This ******* fan base. Spineless? Just idiotic comments from some on here.

All year we have been expecting performances like this, if not worse. We were expected to be hammered and be the punching bag of the AFL during the weeks when the Roos wanted a rest.

100% it was a poor performance. We just didn’t kick into gear when we needed too. It sucks, but it happens. Every team in the AFL has had a poor game this year. Every team. Geelong lost to Adelaide. Melbourne drew with Adelaide.

It just sucks because I honestly believe some of our own supporters thrive on poor performances like this, which is why so many have jumped on the sh*t flinging comments here. Then, once we start gaining momentum, will be “yeah, I’ve always had faith.”
I reckon a lot of people here are having pragmatic conversations about how we can improve our performance.
 

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