Autopsy Round 13... cats 16.4 def Dogs 5.13

[darthbards]

I don't think so, we under estimate how tough last weeks game was. Look at Port as flat as us.

Good points,last week was a very intense game.

 

[go you pups]

Agree with the Bailey Williams love. Kids a ******* jet. His agility through traffic is only rivalled by Murph IMO, gets past players with ease! Great boot on him too and when his body catches up he wont get pushed off the ball and will more than hold his own in the contest. Very complete player, how does Dal keep doing this?! Were people even talking about him as a late pick last year? Cant remember his name mentioned once.

Holds his spot when Wood and JJ come back IMO. Just slots straight in to the position Murph had round 1-3 when we fitted em all in.

It would be robbing Peter to pay Paul that

Who goes out? A tall like Redpath/BTC or a midfield/forward rotation type?

Suckling would have to play wing also

Love the kid but we can't fit him in yet unless Biggs makes way at the bare minimum

 

[Dogs_r_barking]

I think we are forgetting a really important point. Geelong played 11 players who had over 100 games, we played three.

Bont is 6 years younger than Selwood and 8 years younger than Danger. There is much more development to come for us, and our future looks very good. Geelong have recruited for now, which is a bit of a gamble which could be a major win if they pinch a flag or a massive loss as they have traded out future draft picks.

 

[yornup]

The one thing I hope the players take home from last night is that they have to bring Dahlhaus' energy and aggression from the very first bounce. Dahl may not be the silkiest or smoothest of players but what he lacks in that department he more than makes up for by relentlessly hunting and harassing around the football. It is these qualities that make him elite, and is a constant reminder that you can make it as an AFL footballer even if you lack the polish of a first round draft pick. I've always just taken Dahl for granted, but last night proved to me just how integral to this team he really is. Our other mids could learn a thing or two from him.

 

[Optimistic Dog]

57 point margin was over the top if we taken our chances but we were comprehensively beaten. To have chance to bridge the gap we need to

obviously take our chances kicking for goal

Get JJ, Wood, Dahl, Koby, Toby, Clay and Boyd in the team. We need run and carry from these changes and JJ and DAHL can do this.

We need to study Danger's game to curb his influence yes he is going to get possessions but must limit his run and carry.

Not sure if we can have more numbers on the ball have nothing to kick forward when we go forward.

One other observation I reckon Jack Macrae would look to give the ball off from the goal. He would have ambled into goal and kicked the first one if he not tried to look for someone to give off to. He does this all the time coaches must instruct him to take the goals on.

Having said this it is a big margin to bridge the gap and the cats are legit favourites at this stage.

 

[Werewolf]

I was looking forward to this game, unfortunately it was one of those nights where nothing went right. It started with Macrae missing a gettable shot, then the Redpath turnover lead to a Cats goal. It seemed like there was a loss of confidence all round. FWIW this was posted on the Cats board:

 

[TiAn_]

1.10 in 3 quarters of football is diabolical. The forward line is extremely dysfunctional against very good defences.

 

[VogonProsthetnic]

How many years have we been watching Enright, Mackie, Taylor, Bartel, Lonergan waltz around taking uncontested marks against us? Surely someone could please work out how to it happening.

 

[Super Hans]

1.10 in 3 quarters of football is diabolical. The forward line is extremely dysfunctional against very good defences.

Yesterday was a carbon copy of the Norf game. Kick it long, Thompson/Tarrant or Taylor/Henderson mark it, they kick a goal. Was the exact opposite of a week earlier where everyone was leading and getting lace out passes.

 

[Werewolf]

It continually shits me when our forward 50 is empty. There should be at least one forward there at all times!

 

[Dogs Rule]

It's very embarrassing for Geelong fans to come and wish us luck and people just to put on the whole 'you dont know what its like being a bulldogs fan!' s**t. Makes us all look like we're full of bitchy excuses.

It's a pity if it came across that way.

I would defy any of us to say we're not sick of the pats on the head and the 'you'll be a great side in a few years'.

Are we taken seriously as a side? Not yet. If we were we wouldn't get these patronising pats on the head.

It's great that they're coming over here wishing us luck, but I want them fear us and to hate us in the same way I hate Geelong and only finals success will do that.

Do I wish Geelong luck? Not a chance and I make no apologies for that.

 

[CD__]

Hey guys, sorry for the intrusion...came looking to see if you had a preview thread up yet for round 15. Anyway, which players do you expect to return from injury? We'll have Richards and Papley available but neither of them stood out in the 2s today. Fair chance to be unchanged I'd say.

 

[The Inbetweener]

Anyone watch the preview for Giants v bombers? Had a graphic focusing on the age and experience of the Giants compared to the other top 8 sides to show that they aren't that inexperienced. Dogs were at the bottom by a long way, on average 1.5 years younger and 20-30 games less than anyone else in the 8. Kind of puts last night in perceptive IMO

 

[Dawn2Dark]

Do I wish Geelong luck? Not a chance and I make no apologies for that.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ your well wishes aren't something that we'd want, need or expect.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Dogs Rule]

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ your well wishes aren't something that we'd want, need or expect.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Sweet. Now that's what I'm talking about.

Do I like Geelong? Of course not. Do you really like us - doubt it.
Some of my worst footy memories involve Geelong, so if I was to wish your club luck it would be totally insincere.

Anyway, we move on.

 

[bresker]

It continually shits me when our forward 50 is empty. There should be at least one forward there at all times!

I love seeing Stringer jet through the middle. If only he could clone himself and have another Stringer to kick it too.


If we are going to put everyone in the middle we may as well keep handballing and running as far as we can. Makes more sense than kicking it blindly long; or grinding to a stop in midfield allowing a vastly experienced defence to set themselves.

Run & carry until we're stopped

 

[House_of_Dahl]

yep that sucked but not going to get too upset on one game with a lot of best 22 coming back after the bye. Bit of a reality check is probably a positive thing at this stage - how quick and extreme have our expectations moved in a season or two?!! This season isn't our last ditch effort, it's our unexpectedly early challenge with 5+ years of challenging with a really good list ahead of us.

Williams looked really promising - stood out on a tough night. Good on Jongy too, definitely one of our better players on the night.

There was a point in the 3rd when a couple of straight kicks would have had us back in the game, which was quite remarkable because we didn't deserved to be.

Found myself thinking I wish TBoyd was sitting in the forward line a few times.

 

[grassman75]

Some of the pain of last night has been eased in the knowledge that the best young list couldn't even manage 40pts today......

 

[Dogs Rule]

Some of the pain of last night has been eased in the knowledge that the best young list couldn't even manage 40pts today......

If Essendon gets across the line over the AFL's love child today, it will be just beautiful.

 

[Mr. Walker]

I don't understand some peoples comments about not getting carried away after one bad loss. We have now played four teams above us on the ladder this year and lost ALL FOUR. to me it is looking obvious that something has to change and that thing is more class in the side. I criticised Biggs recently over his lack of class and skill and called for Webb to be brought in in the hope he would be good enough to hold his spot and improve the skill quotient of the side. I got some flak (thats ok on a discussion forum) that he has played well this year and is in our best 22. I agree with booth those points, my point is that he would not be in a premiership sides best 22 and thats what we should be aiming for.

The difference in the skill level was so obvious last night and if we dont make changes soon 2017 will have come and gone before Webb and maybe Dale get the number of games they need to be effective come September 2017.

Likewise i criticised Redpath and was told to go and become a rice farmer. Last week apart our modis operandi for forward 50 entirs is to bomb it in long. Redpath is a good leading forward and an excellent straight kick, but he cannot mark overhead to save himself. Neither can Stringer or anyone else in our forward line except the resting ruckmen. (That is not code for drop Stinger. He is our best forward, explosive and game changing and must be in the side. When i say he cannot mark over his head that is exactly and only what i mean). The way our forward entries are we need a big marking forward.

 

[doggies ftw]

GWS have got on top now but only because Essendon cant kick to save themselves, should have lost today. Puts our loss in perspective, good teams have off days.

 

[compact72]

And to 6th we fall too

 

[Dogs_r_barking]

I don't understand some peoples comments about not getting carried away after one bad loss. We have now played four teams above us on the ladder this year and lost ALL FOUR. to me it is looking obvious that something has to change and that thing is more class in the side. I criticised Biggs recently over his lack of class and skill and called for Webb to be brought in in the hope he would be good enough to hold his spot and improve the skill quotient of the side. I got some flak (thats ok on a discussion forum) that he has played well this year and is in our best 22. I agree with booth those points, my point is that he would not be in a premiership sides best 22 and thats what we should be aiming for.

The difference in the skill level was so obvious last night and if we dont make changes soon 2017 will have come and gone before Webb and maybe Dale get the number of games they need to be effective come September 2017.

Likewise i criticised Redpath and was told to go and become a rice farmer. Last week apart our modis operandi for forward 50 entirs is to bomb it in long. Redpath is a good leading forward and an excellent straight kick, but he cannot mark overhead to save himself. Neither can Stringer or anyone else in our forward line except the resting ruckmen. (That is not code for drop Stinger. He is our best forward, explosive and game changing and must be in the side. When i say he cannot mark over his head that is exactly and only what i mean). The way our forward entries are we need a big marking forward.

Yeah but we did beat Crows and Eagles, and early in the season when everyone was fresh pushed the Hawks to three points.

We have had no consistency because of injuries, hopefully that will change.

 

[perro_loco]

The thing that was most disappointing for me was that for a team that was much shorter, we weren't smarter.

Without JJ and co in the team, we lack a bit of pace. For example Geelong at times play 5 or 6 blokes over 190cm tall in their defence, but we can't exploit it whatsoever. I can't fault him because he played a good game, but like Jong seemed unwilling to use his pace at times as well.

Makes me wonder as soon as we had a few injuries, whether we're better off just matching teams for height rather than playing the same way but with worse players who can't exploit the fact that they're shorter but therefore theoretically more skilled and faster. Given that blokes like Dickson and Honeychurch were ineffective against taller defenders, we may as well just played Boyd and gone taller in defence.

This was most evident in one of the goals in the first quarter. They went backwards and switched and Henderson was streaming through the middle of the ground, being chased by Honeyhcurch - and Honeychurch couldn't keep up. When a 176cm bloke is being outsprinted by a bloke 20cm taller and better in the air, what's the point of, structurally, picking that 176cm bloke in the first place? Like I'm not picking on Honeychurch specifically here saying he shouldn't play cause he did play a good game last week, but I'm saying tactically we should have attempted to find a way to exploit the fact that they have a tall defence better.

North did the same thing to us. Other teams have found a way to beat us - stick a third tall as a loose man behind the ball and use him as an overlap run. We possess the ball and go backwards and sideways more than any other team in the league, and a strength of that is that you can deliver the ball in quality ways or you can starve the other team of opportunities. Geelong and North in both our games have been the smartest teams in defending that and structure well with loose men behind the ball to minimise the impact of our nature of over-possessing the ball and being indirect with our avenues to goal.

The sort of good thing in a way is that with games against North and Geelong to come again in this season we get to see how Bev adjusts. Part of it is some very much direct-to-goal players in Johannisen, Stevens and Wood would come back into the team but I'm interested to see if Bev can find a way to adjust in the second half of the year to make us a more direct-to-goal, use-less-possession-to-get-the-ball-forward type team. We certainly need to be able to do that if we want to beat Geelong and North later in the year and in finals.

Your assessment of Bev having to adjust to the coaching style of Geelong and North is a very good point. It tests the quality of Bevo's ability to coach and I think that he can and will deliver on that. Remember he is still a 'relatively inexperienced' coach (c.f. Buckley and Scott bros). What I don't seem to see in the thread is that the Dogs are still a very young and immature team in many respects. At times many of the 'kids' looked overwhelmed and appeared in awe of Geelong's experience out on the ground. One of the reasons for the poor performance yesterday I feel was tiredness, and lack of experience. I also think the win against Port was energy sapping, but not an excuse for playing so poor. Young teams tend to deliver poor performances, but they also deliver games like last week and don't be surprised if we beat Sydney in Sydney. I think we might. Keep up the spirit and no point in bagging our players. They are too young for that, at this stage of their development. They need to lose games like Geelong to learn their trade. The season is still young and for mine 9 out of 4 is not a bad effort for a young side, in a very, very even competition. Prefer to lose to Geelong (I hate their guts) than to lose to the Pie and Blue flogs. At least Geelong are a good side with very good talent. We will get them. Just like we will get Hawthorn, and we will get them… The season is still only half way, and many surprises will happen. Keep the optimism up!

 

[fronkalicious]

And to 6th we fall too

That's where this team should be imo.