AFL Autopsy RND 19: Essington Rides Again

[Happyskeret]

We blame the forwards but the reality is we lost clearances -21

I was blaming the mids. Bonts, Smith and Libba tore us apart.

 

[bombreys]

2 actually and lost to Port with a kick after the siren and had Collingwood run over the top of us with minutes left in the game. It is not as bleak as some people like to make out.

My bad, I thought it was only the one.

Dees and who was the other?

 

[DERO]

My bad, I thought it was only the one.

Dees and who was the other?

GWS and now Carlton as well.

 

[bombreys]

GWS and now Carlton as well.

Yeah okay - neither of them were in the 8 at the time, but anyway

 

[DERO]

Yeah okay - neither of them were in the 8 at the time, but anyway

Those goal posts appear to have moved!

 

[Old man fletch]

Some damning behind the goals footage (15 minute mark) of our ability to run with the opposition and terrible awareness. Our gut running/fitness continues to let us down. Questions need to be asked of our fitness staff.

This has not improved since Rutten by the look of this footage. We will never be competitive consistently if this is not addressed.

Behind goal footage vs Bulldogs

Noticed the same thing straight away in the second quarter. They were outworking us. Seemed to have more men around the ball in the midfield, and again when they kicked inside 50. On top of our ball movement strategy being terrible, too many of our players were jogging behind their man which lead to a chunk of goals

 

[Old man fletch]

Those goal posts appear to have moved!

The worse we get the better we get?

 

[MiguelM]

Noticed the same thing straight away in the second quarter. They were outworking us. Seemed to have more men around the ball in the midfield, and again when they kicked inside 50. On top of our ball movement strategy being terrible, too many of our players were jogging behind their man which lead to a chunk of goals

For me the Bont one was the worst. 4 players close by just let him run through unchecked. They were almost just walking.

It was like they had zero awareness. That there is why we are easy to play against.

Hopefully Scott highlights this during the week. He has a big task to get players to commit to the contest, it has been symptomatic for years.

I really fear the players have checked out for the year, hope I am wrong. Not about making finals now, it is about the drive in the players.

 

[fairbump_playon]

For me the Bont one was the worst. 4 players close by just let him run through unchecked. They were almost just walking.

It was like they had zero awareness. That there is why we are easy to play against.

Hopefully Scott highlights this during the week. He has a big task to get players to commit to the contest, it has been symptomatic for years.

I really fear the players have checked out for the year, hope I am wrong. Not about making finals now, it is about the drive in the players.

Yep, that Adelaide win meant it was a decent season. Everyone decided that was good enough.. time to pack up early and beat the traffic.

 

[citizen-erased]

For me the Bont one was the worst. 4 players close by just let him run through unchecked. They were almost just walking.

It was like they had zero awareness. That there is why we are easy to play against.

Hopefully Scott highlights this during the week. He has a big task to get players to commit to the contest, it has been symptomatic for years.

I really fear the players have checked out for the year, hope I am wrong. Not about making finals now, it is about the drive in the players.

But if one of them picks him up, they have to be accountable for him

This way, they can look at each other puzzled

 

[jdstorm]

Yeah but we weren’t Good enough to win those games. You don’t get to say ‘what if’. Otherwise you could say North and Richmond deserved to beat us, and we’d be 16th

Game 1 vs Port:

Game turned when Ridley was taken out via a cheap shot

Game 2 vs Port: unlucky after the siren

Game vs Pies: game turned when someone got injured and Langford/setterfield were tried at HB

So both of those games got turned on their head due to an inability to cover injury aka lack of depth.

Some of it could be considered a selection issue but mostly it’s that Essendon’s Development/VFL program hasn’t been good enough in the past and the team doesn’t have enough viable AFL players on the list to cover expected levels of injury during the season

 

[EnolaGay]

I’ll probably get flamed for suggesting this but I can’t understand why you would want to miss finals. A few people have mentioned it and it is a bit of a cliché. We have been in every game bar Geelong, Brisbane up there and the bulldogs. The last couple of losses are hard to swallow but we have shown that we can match it against good sides.

We have the ability to win a final when we put it all together I think. I haven’t thought this since we were on the TB4 (allegedly).

My post is probably due to my PTSD of making and losing finals


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Vincent Hanna]

I always find Marvel far colder than the MCG.

Maybe it’s because it has no soul.

Deadset, it's an ice box. Like the old Waverley Park in mid July!

 

[supportyourteam]

No complaints about Marvel temperature. Half time entertainment. Leave your seat. Annoying. Saturday night, Sydney do your best.

 

[bombreys]

Those goal posts appear to have moved!

Lol, who’s moving the goal posts?

You think we can win a final this year, I think we’re a few years away, most would for any 11th placed team.

Do you think Freo and Hawthorn can win one? They’ve won a couple against top 8 sides too.

 

[DERO]

Lol, who’s moving the goal posts?

You think we can win a final this year, I think we’re a few years away, most would for any 11th placed team.

Do you think Freo and Hawthorn can win one? They’ve won a couple against top 8 sides too.

Who cares?

 

[bombreys]

Game 1 vs Port:

Game turned when Ridley was taken out via a cheap shot

Game 2 vs Port: unlucky after the siren

Game vs Pies: game turned when someone got injured and Langford/setterfield were tried at HB

So both of those games got turned on their head due to an inability to cover injury aka lack of depth.

Some of it could be considered a selection issue but mostly it’s that Essendon’s Development/VFL program hasn’t been good enough in the past and the team doesn’t have enough viable AFL players on the list to cover expected levels of injury during the season

I don’t believe any team is lucky or unlucky in a 24-round season, everything averages out in a season this long.

You can create a narrative to make any win or loss sound lucky or unlucky.

In that first game against Port, they won 12.20 to 13.9. Some would say they were unlucky - if they kicked straight, they’d have won by 8 goals. But they didn’t and that’s part of footy.

 

[Keystone agony]

The reason ive struggled to put my finger on exaclty where the clubs at until last weekend is that weve responded after every bad loss this year. This time we didnt and it was important to do so

Weve improved, but not by heaps. We have struggled all year to defend transition still which has been our issue in the past

Our best game of the year by far imo was the 2nd Port game, but they did come off the bye

It still doesnt take much to step up a level, Port finished 11th last year

Were super young so it could be argued our improvement would be in a phase where it should be more rapid than other sides. Lets see in 12 months time

 

[owen87]

The reason ive struggled to put my finger on exaclty where the clubs at until last weekend is that weve responded after every bad loss this year. This time we didnt and it was important to do so

Weve improved, but not by heaps. We have struggled all year to defend transition still which has been our issue in the past

Our best game of the year by far imo was the 2nd Port game, but they did come off the bye

It still doesnt take much to step up a level, Port finished 11th last year

Were super young so it could be argued our improvement would be in a phase where it should be more rapid than other sides. Lets see in 12 months time

I don't think it's overly confusing.

We're a side that's on the younger and less experienced side, that has some good-elite players in their prime and hasn't gutted their list which has stopped the bottom falling out.

When we play a Top-4 side it becomes apparent that we're more than 1 good FA and another pre-season away from having the gears to really go with them reliably.

We're a few years off the real window for this current list profile, and that relies on staying the course and a number of our draftees coming good.

We were outperforming our list profile for a while there, partly because some of the other sides that should have been in the 8 (e.g. Carlton, Richmond, Sydney) had been rubbish, and partly because we'd simply played with good pressure and hadn't s**t the bed in games too many times.

The gap between sides is generally not that large, that on any given day most sides can beat another side, but across a season it's the reliability of doing it week-in-week-out that shows the difference in the levels, and we don't have that.

 

[Keystone agony]

Weve been pretty good vs the top 4 sides tbf

Smashed Melbourne
Lost by a kick to Port
Lost by a kick after the siren Port (A game we dominated for most of it)
5 goals up at 3/4 vs pies

But yeh agree

 

[Stopher]

2 actually and lost to Port with a kick after the siren and had Collingwood run over the top of us with minutes left in the game. It is not as bleak as some people like to make out.

And saying 'top 8 teams' this year is a bit misleading. If you go back in the annals of history, ie 2 weeks ago, were we a scalp for whoever had beaten us while we sat in 5th? But now we're not a scalp, sitting 11th? Is that how it works?

It's why I hate the 'Essington' bullshit. Jokingly or not (I suspect more not), it's subtley heaping the mistakes of the last 2 decades upon this relatively young group. And if you think that won't have a negative impact on the playing group, you're kidding yourself.

 

[jdstorm]

I don’t believe any team is lucky or unlucky in a 24-round season, everything averages out in a season this long.

You can create a narrative to make any win or loss sound lucky or unlucky.

In that first game against Port, they won 12.20 to 13.9. Some would say they were unlucky - if they kicked straight, they’d have won by 8 goals. But they didn’t and that’s part of footy.

Depends what your definition of lucky is.
To me it’s being on the positive side of unlikely statistical outcomes beyond what would be considered reasonable variance.

I absolutely think that luck exists and you can measure it.

(Although what I did in my previous post was more vent then reasoned opinion)

 

[bombreys]

I don't think it's overly confusing.

We're a side that's on the younger and less experienced side, that has some good-elite players in their prime and hasn't gutted their list which has stopped the bottom falling out.

When we play a Top-4 side it becomes apparent that we're more than 1 good FA and another pre-season away from having the gears to really go with them reliably.

We're a few years off the real window for this current list profile, and that relies on staying the course and a number of our draftees coming good.

We were outperforming our list profile for a while there, partly because some of the other sides that should have been in the 8 (e.g. Carlton, Richmond, Sydney) had been rubbish, and partly because we'd simply played with good pressure and hadn't s**t the bed in games too many times.

The gap between sides is generally not that large, that on any given day most sides can beat another side, but across a season it's the reliability of doing it week-in-week-out that shows the difference in the levels, and we don't have that.

Also a positive this year (so far), which feels like hasn't happened for ages, is that we're actually beating most of the sides we're 'supposed' to beat. Freo was probably our first time you could really say we were poor/lost a game we should have won, which was in Round 15. Even then, that was over there, and every team in the comp is poor ~3 games a year (Brisbane lost to Hawthorn a few weeks ago). We weren't great against Geelong or Brisbane, but they're probably two of the top four sides in the comp.

 

[bombreys]

Depends what your definition of lucky is.
To me it’s being on the positive side of unlikely statistical outcomes beyond what would be considered reasonable variance.

I absolutely think that luck exists and you can measure it.

(Although what I did in my previous post was more vent then reasoned opinion)

I agree that luck exists, absolutely - I just think that over a 24-round season, it all evens out.

We were lucky the first time against Port - then unlucky the second time.

If you look at the ladder right now, I'd suggest almost every team is exactly where they should be. If you were ranking all teams from best to worst, it'd be pretty close to how it's set out now - and will be even more accurate by season's end (to state the obvious).

 

[Kong]

And saying 'top 8 teams' this year is a bit misleading. If you go back in the annals of history, ie 2 weeks ago, were we a scalp for whoever had beaten us while we sat in 5th? But now we're not a scalp, sitting 11th? Is that how it works?

It's why I hate the 'Essington' bullshit. Jokingly or not (I suspect more not), it's subtley heaping the mistakes of the last 2 decades upon this relatively young group. And if you think that won't have a negative impact on the playing group, you're kidding yourself.

I get what you mean, but I do tongue in cheek believe it.

It's cultural. I don't know when it started exactly, but I do know that Jobe refused to defend as captain, and got away with it because the likes of Hocking and Howlett covered for him.

Heppell learnt from Jobe. Merrett and Parish learnt from Heppell and Goddard. Perkins is learning from them.

Over time, people absolutely do observe and often replicate the behaviours and standards of their colleagues.

Sure, you have some individuals that are driven enough to do what they believe is right (eg Hobbs, and Merrett finally this year), but culture is infectious, and sadly our leaders have been some of the biggest offenders for a long time now.

Essington is just the funny way to label it.