If you take the GWS game in isolation (and also the Geelong game 2 weeks ago), Buckley has had 2 pretty good coaching weeks. He had a shocker last week against Carlton....completely unwilling to try anything different to mix up the game.
We ultimately had GWS' measure. Yes they had a few short, but we did our biggest damage early in the game when both sides were fresh and 1 rotation less wouldn't have made a difference. The fact is we set about a game-plan that worked. And it held up most of the game apart from maybe a poorer 2nd quarter.
The game was lost due to execution and panic under pressure. It's hard to say whether that's due to poor coaching, poor recruitment or that the players are fully to blame, but the fact is that we've lost a lot of close ones in the last 2 years and clearly we panic under pressure.
For me, my problem is that the club needs leadership here and we need to set a direction for the rest of the year. At 2-6, I'd say the season is gone. We'd have to win 10 of the last 14, and that may only be enough to scrape into 8th.
The AFL is not set up to reward teams for coming 5th to 12th. You either want to make top 4 or finish bottom 4. Everything else in between in just no mans land.
We need to take something out of the rest of this year. And it clearly has to be developing the talent on our list. Scharenberg needs games, and it's an opportunity to pump some games into Daicos and McLarty. We can also find out about Aish, Wills, Phillips, Broomhead and Mason Cox. Also need to find out about Lachie Keeffe and Josh Thomas because at their age they shouldn't just be VFL depth.
We'll probably land a top 3 pick, which we can use to finally recruit the gun KPF we need.
Going with this current course, we'll probably win 8 games and come around 12th again. It's just useless. An executive decision needs to be made about the season.
The issue with going about things the way I suggest is whether Buckley can survive by coming bottom 4. The answer is probably No. We'd be better off having a new coach or an interim coach who would have a licence to play kids and experiment. I think we could cop that as a supporter group. At least we'd know our direction this year. Right now, we seem to just be treading water. We're losing, but we're losing with the same team and we're not finding out enough about our depth. Guys like Aish and Cox are in and out, and we're not seeing Scharenberg.
I just wonder how much longer we can keep having these 'honourable losses' before we concede this season is over. The optimist in me says we can still turn this year around, and I still think Bucks can coach. I just don't think the situation is tenable anymore.