Signpost Games

[Scorpus]

I don't know what to tell you. The Kangaroos were the form team of the competition in the first 9 or 10 rounds. Sure we copped them eatly before anyone realised but that doesn't matter.

It doesn't stip us saying at any point of the season Gee, when the Kangaroos were playing really good football they were too good for us. I wonder if that carries any meaning for finals?

You're shifting the goal posts here. You're saying that you both can and can't apply retrospective analysis

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

But how did we know that was a 'big' game going into it? We couldn't. Therefore we can't classify it as a big game.

That's right!

But what we want to do is use what happens in those games as guides to what we should do, who we should pick and how we should play in September.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

You're shifting the goal posts here. You're saying that you both can and can't apply retrospective analysis

This isn't complicated.

You pick out the games that were/are the biggest tests and use those games to guide your analysis.

 

[Danger in Texas]

That's right!

But what we want to do is use what happens in those games as guides to what we should do, who we should pick and how we should play in September.

So it's not based off the ladder position of the time like you said then, but rather our opponent's form going into and out of our match against them.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

Beating teams like Hawthorn away is a sign. Beating teams like Richmond at home is not.

Historically that's right but this is 2017.

 

[Scorpus]

This isn't complicated.

You pick out the games that were/are the biggest tests and use those games to guide your analysis.

Well either North in round 1 was a difficult game because at the time they were good, or North in round 1 wasn't a difficult game because they scraped into the 8 and were largely s**t over the year

Which is it?

 

[FR0GGY]

Probably best to do this in the bye week after round 23 (is there still a bye) then we can look at who we beat in the 8 and see if we will win the cup.

 

[TheKev]

Cats away is the 1 that stands out for me, it's been way too long.
I am confident now that our best can beat anyone else's best at AO.

 

[Shaz2012]

2017
Which brings us to 2017. It's difficult to know yet which teams are going to be the front runners this season but I've had a stab at it. Can add/remove games as needed.

Rnd 1 vs GWS (Adelaide Oval) - WIN
Rnd 6 vs Richmond (Adelaide Oval)
Rnd 11 vs Geelong (Kardinia Park)
Rnd 16 vs Western Bulldogs (Adelaide Oval)
Rnd 18 vs Geelong (Adelaide Oval)
Rnd 22 vs Sydney (Adelaide Oval)
Rnd 23 vs West Coast (Subiaco)

I feel that these two games will be our key games of the season. I think we must be able to beat Geelong at KP this season. I don't necessarily think we absolutely must win against WCE at Subi, but we need to make a game of it and go with them in the midfield and contested footy. A win would be a bonus.

Is there a bye week scheduled after R23 this week? Otherwise its pretty tough to have to be the one club that has to play R23 in Perth the week before finals.

 

[pjcrows]

All the minor round is about is winning the most games to best position yourself for the real stuff. The fact that we now, as a collective, see 65 point minor round wins as par for the course, or go in to an away game at the G expecting to win and then winning, shows where we're at as a club.

The time is now.

 

[Moonwatcher]

Who's a top side any more? Not Hawthorn, not sydney, not west coast, not north, not freo, not richmond, maybe cats?

The Cats are the test for us.

 

[Moonwatcher]

I think it is fair to say that the form of our opponents has never been the issue. We didn't lose to the WCE because they were on a roll, we lost because we don't beat West Coast. The same can be said of Geelong who were poor before we played them into form last year. The Hawthorn win was actually pretty big in that context.

Geelong, Bulldogs and the WCE are the tests for adelaide this year. If we lost to Richmond in round 6 you wouldn't dread playing them in a final.

 

[Scorpus]

I think it is fair to say that the form of our opponents has never been the issue. We didn't lose to the WCE because they were on a roll, we lost because we don't beat West Coast. The same can be said of Geelong who were poor before we played them into form last year. The Hawthorn win was actually pretty big in that context.

Geelong, Bulldogs and the WCE are the tests for adelaide this year. If we lost to Richmond in round 6 you wouldn't dread playing them in a final.

If we lost to Richmond in round 6 I'd dread we wouldn't be able to make a grand final

 

[feenix67]

Cats away is the 1 that stands out for me, it's been way too long.
I am confident now that our best can beat anyone else's best at AO.

But according to drugs, if we beat them and then they go on a 10 game losing streak, it becomes meaningless.

You can only beat who you come up against. I get the point of the OP but I think it's simplistic. It's retrospective probability, just like the squiggle, which is only definitive at the end of a season. The squiggle had us as favourites right up until we lost. Then it had GWS until they lost. It's pure 20/20 hindsight.

The premise of the OP is that fans and coaches shouldn't get sucked in by red herring wins as form indicators. So how do we judge the Sydney win last year? There was no indication that we'd struggle against their midfield in a final.

You train how you want to play, you put measures in place to track your performance and you hope that the plan is solid and that the players implement when it matters. There are no certainties in football and trying to predict outcomes based on past performances is fraught with danger.

Our two flags are a testament to that.

 

[Cap]

I see where the OP is coming from, it does feel like we lose those games that would take us from good to great (in a sense).

The WCE match last year was heart breaking, only because I'd thought we finally got over the mental hurdle of expectation.

 

[Moonwatcher]

I see where the OP is coming from, it does feel like we lose those games that would take us from good to great (in a sense).

The WCE match last year was heart breaking, only because I'd thought we finally got over the mental hurdle of expectation.

It's also about the games we win and pat ourselves on the back for. Last year we won the one that Sydney were willing to let slip and lost the one they were determined to win. 2005 was the same with the WCE not giving anything away in the final round whilst the Crows spent everything on a regular season win.

 

[Carmo]

I was going to rip into the OP, but then I thought, no better not, its someone trying to use data and attempt to understand footy better, which I value, so I better just be constructive instead.

The analysis system, especially concluding things from last year, is too basic to be very useful as it stands. The biggest standout is that it assumes (implicitly) a relatively constant performance of teams. We saw the kangaroos did not perform constantly last year. Adelaide itself was another who I think also did not perform constantly, we were in very good form through the middle of the year, ok at the start and poor at the end. If you want to use this system as a prediction tool then how accurate is it going to be?? It could end up misleading you, though I will say, as it stands it still has some merit.

You could add another few layers or dimensions to it to boost it up. One I'd do is look at each of those losses and do an eyeball general assessment of why we won or lost those games. Are some then worth rejecting as being outliers not really representative for use in concluding what we need to do to be successful against good teams. This has the unfortunate effect of turning it from a pure quantitative analysis to a part quant, part qualitative analysis and adds in subjectivity, but in return you gain some nuance. Analyses are always fraught with these tradeoffs. My own analysis is that the Kangaroos game, Hawthorn and Western Bulldogs and second Geelong game are all worthy of being discounted. Kangaroos was a bad selection boo-boo more than anything, you could also say coaching inexperience. Hawthorn and Western Bulldogs were umpire affected. The second Geelong game we came with a gameplan to dismantle geelong's methods against us, that plan was best suited to dry, good conditions. To me it appears that we were willing to lose the battle to win the war, that is we persisted with that particular gameplan, even when the conditions really made it hard to execute, to gain valuable practice at it, even at the cost of losing the game.

You might disagree with the layer I've added here, fine, it wasn't meant to be the be all and end all, just an example, you could add other things, including other pure quantitative stuff if you want.

As I've said elsewhere, our performance at the end of the year was down to injuries and subsequent form of some important players, so what we could have actually done last year was limited. One thing we could have done last year, which is obvious from what I've just said, is played other players and played players in more roles and have more depth. We definitely know that would have helped. It seems the club did learn this already as we've talked it up so far this season and there's evidence its being done/ developed (admittedly partly due to injuries).

What other things could have / did we learn? I think what's coming out of the club shows we already did learn some things for sure. More people being able to roll through the middle (especially notable that WB did that). Getting quicker at adjusting to other teams tactics, note its not just the coaches doing this, the players noted it and have got better at it (Hawthorn/Clarkson are good at this). Improving CP, in these games you mentioned, when we lost the CP balance was often not in our favour. It will be interesting to see how much of this stuff you could pick up on the run during the season.

 

[Simmo28]

I was going to rip into the OP, but then I thought, no better not, its someone trying to use data and attempt to understand footy better, which I value, so I better just be constructive instead.

I was going to rip into you for being an arse and decided I would do just that. The OP was contributing to the forum and had the balls to put his opinions forward. You on the other hand insulted the guy and then elevated yourself to being an expert in the matter.


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[Captain Morgan]

And we got over the mental hurdle only because they're now on the way down, not because we've necessarily made any improvements

You don't think we have improved ? Of course we have.

I would say that beating the Hawks is far far more valuable mentally than richmond who realistically don't scare anyone.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

You don't think we have improved ? Of course we have.

I would say that beating the Hawks is far far more valuable mentally than richmond who realistically don't scare anyone.

Have Gold Coast improved?

 

[Samcro24]

OP is spot on, and this has been our problem for years. With 12 home games, if the club has it s**t reasonably together, then it's easy to bank enough wins for finals. At home youre going to play a fe dud sides, some average, only a couple of really good ones. Then there will be a few duds on the road. 12 + wins, easy.

We are masters at this, and I believe it's why the SA and WA teams often go from s**t to top 6 in the space of a year.

If we consistently lose the tough ones in the HA, then it's no shocker to struggle to win finals past week one. Our record vs top 4 has been s**t.

I'm not getting excited st this stage. It's a promising start, but nothing to suggest we're much better than 6th.

 

[Slippery Pete]

For example, you would have classified West Coast at Subi last year as a signpost. Yet we lose to them in round 23 at home. Isn't that an indicator that late season form is the best indicator?

The value of early season wins is to get you into the best position to grab a double chance and a home final or two. But to me, how you're playing leading into finals is the best indicator of possible finals success.

You're half right.

How you're playing IN finals is the best indicator of possible finals success.

August can be a notoriously deceiving month. I'll let you in on a little secret - a lot of teams who fall over in September play really well in August. And vice versa. Go back and look at the record books.

We can all speculate on what minor round games mean. The bottom line is they mean four-fifths of * all. They're just a qualifying mechanism.

Until you have your hands on the cup, it's all bullshit. NOTHING else matters other than winning your last three games of the year - a qualifying/semi final, a prelim final, and the grand final.

Nothing you do up to that point matters because no matter what happens in the preceding 22 or 23 games (depending on if you have the double chance), you HAVE to win those final three games of the year to hold the trophy.

 

[Slippery Pete]

If we lost to Richmond in round 6 I'd dread we wouldn't be able to make a grand final

Premierships are 100% about timing, not being the best side of the year.

 

[Rory Walkerfield]

Pies at the MCG will be at least equally as "big" as Sydney at AO IMO.

Sydney should have the 6 first 22 currently injured players back when we play them.

 

[Rotayjay]

So what will be our big tests during H&A? At the moment, almost nobody's been convincing except us. We are sitting top for a reason. Look at the current top 6: Crows, Richmond, GWS, Geelong, West Coast and the Bulldogs.

Richmond haven't exactly stamped their authority just yet. Maybe they'll turn out to be a good team. I think we'll beat them, and THEN gradually find out how meaningful it was.

We smashed GWS, but would we beat them at Spotless or the MCG in September? I'm cautiously optimistic. I'll get to Geelong shortly.

West Coast, now that's an interesting one. Last year we beat them at Subiaco off the back of an excellent comeback (NOT off the back of a 4-quarter performance), but then they derailed our season at home. And then they put up a pathetic performance in the EF at Subiaco. So what to make of them this year? If we have to play them at Subiaco in finals, I wouldn't feel 100% confident because we're not the Bulldogs.

Bulldogs. If we beat them at home this year, it'll give us confidence that we can match it against the premiers in September. We did beat them in a final at the MCG in 2015, just. I will be watching how we play against them in the AO game very closely. They are likely finals opponents. Not in scintillating form at the moment but are winning and will play at their best when it counts, Blight-style. A very astute poster on here (was it Drugs?) correctly observed that the Bulldogs 2016 had a Crows 1997 feel to them. Seemed crazy at the time but the prediction was vindicated.

Geelong, Geelong, Geelong. How I hate you. I think that the Cats will Bradbury their way into the top 4 come season's end, meaning that we probably have to get over this bloody hoodoo in order to win a flag. Remember 2005-6 when we were the best side and Sydney were our bunnies but we were West Coast's bunnies? And what happened? One flag for Sydney, one flag for WCE. Diddly squat for us. This year, I think GWS are still our bunnies. Are we still Geelong's bunnies?

We need to beat Geelong. We cannot allow our chances of success to be marred by a particular okay side that has the wood over us. Geelong haven't improved one iota from last season, in which they were pantsed at the prelim final stage.

For the love of Christ, beat Geelong!