Training Training 14/12/16

[Rorzza]

Adams seems to get better every year, the team really misses him when injured. Turning into a ripper trade IMO, for both parties which is good! Still It was a shame that Shaw had to go based on my own sentimental feelings.

 

[Mkcaptain]

Given the lack of comprehension in the post above yours and the context of the one you quoted I think this discussion might be best left for another day

Agreed. Its better not further detract from Stoods' fantastic report.

 

[Quicky]

Hey guys, so myself and Matt headed down to training today, was overall a nice day apart from standing right where about 50 flies were i reckon! got a bit warm but luckily i brought sunscreen because i burn easy!

Anyway to the point!

Players in Attendance: (order of arrival) Howe, Blair, Ramsay, Fasolo, Mackie, Sidebottom, Maynard, Crocker, Lynch, Daicos, Smith, Pendlebury, Thomas, Broomhead, Adams, Keeffe, Crisp, Oxley, White, McLarty, Wills, Dunn, Mayne, Elliot, Aish, Treloar, Brown, Cox, Goldsack, Sinclair, WHE, Scharenberg, Schade, Varcoe, Greenwood, De Goey, Phillips, Kirby, Grundy, McCarthy, Moore, Sier, Wells.

Absent:Reid, Langdon

Limited Participation: Wells, Sier, McCarthy, Treloar, Elliot, Pendles, Goldsack, Oxley, Aish

As McLarty arrived he came over and had a chat, one of the nicest blokes in footy i have met, seriously an absolute gentleman, introduced himself to us. I did have to repeat a few things to him so the hearing is definitely effected but a top bloke.

They started by coming out and just doing short kick to kicks with each other just to free the legs up.

They then all got called in and then proceeded to do the warm up. This consisted of different stretches and different run throughs. At this stage Wells, Sier, McCarthy were the only ones doing walk/jog laps. Treloar joined them after the warm up was complete.

The rest of the group all spread throughout the whole oval and just did a lot of random running and kicking with a few applying pressure, i still think this was part of the warm up.

They then went to a drill where the focus was to hit the leading player leading inside 50 which i was happy to see because if i recall correctly our inside 50 entry % was quite poor this year. Skills were pretty decent apart from a couple stuff ups.

The next drill was called 'outnumber to trans'. This is where Pendles, Greenwood, Oxley, Elliot and Goldsack came off and started doing laps. A drill where they were divided in half and it was basically like a game to be honest, with the focus on getting numbers to the contest and spreading well. There was no goal kicking in this drill though. Sinclair appeared to hurt his hand and came over to get it looked at, I later found out by asking him that Adams stepped on his forearm/Wrist area and it hit a nerve and his arm went numb for a bit, it must of come good though because he was ok for the rest of the session.

Next was 'Core development 1'. This drill there was 4 sepeart groups.

- rucks and some mids were in one working on the centre bounces and clearances, blair and adams were the 2 main mids for most of the time doing it with Grundy, Cox, White, Lynch and Moore each taking turns in the ruck.

- Another was a goal kicking group with the forwards which is self explanatory.

- 1v1 core work, some of the exercises included having 1 on 1 marking contests, 1 on 1 ground ball contests and also an exercise where 2 players were lying on their stomachs looking at each other with ball in the middle with both players hands on the ball and they had to see who would win the ball.

- last group looked like a defensive structure drill where they had to work the ball through and out of defence.

At this stage Tom Langdon did make an appearance but he was in fully casual clothes which tells me he is still a fair while away. I overhead someone ask him how he is feeling and he said not great and pointed and said got some back issues now. So thats frustrating!

Next was 'core development 2'. Wells left the field here, asked how his injury was coming along and he said its coming along good. Pendles, Treloar, Greenwood and Aish were over the far side doing a bit of sprint work. This exercise had 3 groups:

- Bucks kicking to leading forwards (he has still got amazing skills) they would come out and take the mark then swing back around and bucks would do a high kick onto the speccie bag and they would take a speccie. Hoskin-Elliot the stand out, he can get up!

- Another group was all about clearing the ball out of conjestion and getting it into space.

- The last group was 1 on 1 def v fwd and a player was standing outside the 50 and delivering it to the fwd with the defender obviously trying to stop it.

They then had a drink break and went into some Goal Kicking. Again self explanatory!

A lot of players then left and the ones that stayed were: Ramsay, Sidebottom, Howe, Kirby, Fasolo, Thomas, Keeffe, WHE, Sinclair, Blair, Phillips, Dunn, White, Varcoe, Smith, Crisp.
They all were stuck doing running now. A lot of run throughs which consisted of a mixture of sprinting, striding and jogging.

After this was done Keeffe and Thomas both left and then the rest were stuck with doing pure sprints, Sinclair was leading the way with the sprints with Ramsay just behind him, Kirby is also quite quick!

After that it was the end of training, players came and signed autographs, took photos and went down into the rooms.

Stand outs from what i noticed (keep in mind it is hard to watch them all!)

Adams: looks really solid and really fit, won a lot of the ball in those drills where they were split up. Was using the ball a lot better than what i have seen in the past as well.

Ramsay:Its just good to see Ramma out there again, and he completed full training as well! Looking fit and uses the ball well, i wasnt aware he was as quick as what i saw! Was only just losing to Sinclair in the sprints and i mean just. If he has an uninterrupted pre season i reckon he will be in round 1.

Mayne:This is from what i saw in the goal kicking drills, he is a dead eye, very nice technique and was splitting the middle with most of his kicks, i am very bullish that under a less defensive focused game plan like we all know Ross Lyon is about Mayne can kick 30-40 goals! He also lead well in the drills and is pretty quick off the mark.

Thanks for reading guys, as i said its hard at times to look at everything, there is a lot going on but here is what i got. Will definitely be back for another session in the new year as i want to get the new jumpers they have in the store! They look great! Cheers guys

Bummed about the Langdon news. I hope he is right for the new year. There is a bit of competition in the team for that third tall half back type role. How did Shaz look?

 

[WalterBlaknWhte]

This thread has really gone pear shaped!

Misunderstandings are so easy to have

 

[TradeDraft]

Don't be a smartarse Dave, because that was exactly what you said. If you want a civil discussion, then cut the crap. You used a good training session report to say, and I quote (spelling corrected):
"That is why people should not make their mind up too quickly when we get a new player/prospect."

That might have been a reasonable comment in April if Mayne was playing good footy, but not off the back of a couple of solid preseason training sessions.

Please don't pretend you meant something else. I'm not stupid, and neither is anyone else here who called you out on that comment.

So you calling me an Idiot Then?

This is why I hate Forums.

I post something and I find NO ONE gets what I mean

 

[BoxMatrix]

So now that training would be over, it's really late at night in Melbourne, being 14 December.

So does this thread turn into a pumpkin in just under two hours.

Will the players train on 15 December?

Guesss so...

9.2 Other Leave Periods

(a) Players shall receive two weeks Leave over Christmas and New Year (Christmas Leave) and may not be required to resume training prior to 4 January in any year.

(b) Each Club shall provide Players two breaks of three days each during the period between 4 January and the first match of the Pre-Season Competition. For the avoidance of doubt, Clubs are not required to provide a mid-week day off in a week in which there is a three-day break.

(c) During the Premiership Season, each Club shall provide Players a break of four days in any week in which the Club is not scheduled to play. For the avoidance of doubt, Clubs are not required to provide a mid-week day off in a week in which there is a four-day break.

Shouldn't finish training until ~21st of December.

 

[Jasper84]

So you calling me an Idiot Then?

This is why I hate Forums.

I post something and I find NO ONE gets what I mean

Does anyone else see the beautiful paradox in this comment?

 

[wednesdaywarrior]

Not really. Crisp was a former rookie who had been promoted and who's form was moving on an upward trend when he was traded. Varcoe had been plagued by injury through 2012/13 but his 2014 was very good and many Cats fans were disappointed to lose him just as he was seemingly past his shoulder issues.
Howe was a consistent top 10 player in a poor side.
All players had their question marks and detractors, but the one thing they didn't have in common with Mayne was the consistent downward trend in form that he's had over the past few years.

From memory Crisp and Varcoe had more than question marks and detractors. The board went into an almost Fukushima-like state over having to release Beams for 'some useless rookie' 'bag of chips' etc. etc. can't remember ever seeing a young player that essentially most people knew nothing about, get such a caning. Varcoe was roundly accused of being soft, useless, flaky, on the way out. I can't actually remember what the response was to Howe because I had sort of stopped paying that much attention to Big Footy reactions to the trade period by then.

A couple of things - I think a lot of people's anger at that time was probably based off our poor track record at acquiring speculative duds like Lynch and Russell that gave everyone the impression we were going nowhere when in reality those guys were just stop gaps while the 'real' list was in development.

Secondly, people sometimes under appreciate the concept of role playing in modern footy. Some players are hand picked specifically for a role that a club can see them slotting in to which could be a different fit from their last club and when it works it can transform their career. Sydney have been masters of this for years. I didn't realise for example that Varcoe was as capable defensively as what we've seen or that Howe could play the sweeper role (admittedly this happened by accident but the point is still valid).

Finally, optimistically, not sure whether our recruiting team has changed focus or personnel but I think we're getting better at targeting the right players. I agree we used to be crap. But years of watching Hawthorn and Sydney cherry pick the right 'apparent duds' or has beens and turn them into premiership players made us become really aware of the importance of pure role players.

So I think Mayne, who is yet another totally un-sexy trade decision and Wells - have been targeted based entirely on specific roles and could end up being success stories. Here's hoping.

 

[Pendles!]

Does anyone else see the beautiful paradox in this comment?

Whats the point in this? Everyone knows he has some intellectual difficulties so why is it always the same people getting sucked in by it and/or making fun of it? Just leave him be. He's easily the most passionate supporter on here and the board wouldn't be the same without him.

 

[Buckley is my hero]

From memory Crisp and Varcoe had more than question marks and detractors. The board went into an almost Fukushima-like state over having to release Beams for 'some useless rookie' 'bag of chips' etc. etc. can't remember ever seeing a young player that essentially most people knew nothing about, get such a caning. Varcoe was roundly accused of being soft, useless, flaky, on the way out. I can't actually remember what the response was to Howe because I had sort of stopped paying that much attention to Big Footy reactions to the trade period by then.

A couple of things - I think a lot of people's anger at that time was probably based off our poor track record at acquiring speculative duds like Lynch and Russell that gave everyone the impression we were going nowhere when in reality those guys were just stop gaps while the 'real' list was in development.

Secondly, people sometimes under appreciate the concept of role playing in modern footy. Some players are hand picked specifically for a role that a club can see them slotting in to which could be a different fit from their last club and when it works it can transform their career. Sydney have been masters of this for years. I didn't realise for example that Varcoe was as capable defensively as what we've seen or that Howe could play the sweeper role (admittedly this happened by accident but the point is still valid).

Finally, optimistically, not sure whether our recruiting team has changed focus or personnel but I think we're getting better at targeting the right players. I agree we used to be crap. But years of watching Hawthorn and Sydney cherry pick the right 'apparent duds' or has beens and turn them into premiership players made us become really aware of the importance of pure role players.

So I think Mayne, who is yet another totally un-sexy trade decision and Wells - have been targeted based entirely on specific roles and could end up being success stories. Here's hoping.

You're defending the indefensible, namely poor recruitment of players in Hudson, Young, Armstrong, Lynch and Russell, on the basis of them filling a role. You can use the same argument for any experienced player we pick up who plays few games only. Oh, they may not have played any games for us, but they filled a short term gap for us and played their role in the team. Hang on. They didn't play any games for us (or few games). Our team continued sliding down the ladder and those players took the place of a younger player who may have made a better long term contribution.
For the record, Varcoe and Crisp were much better pickups for the club. Both will play plenty of games for Collingwood. Wells won't play a lot of games for us but adds a silky finish to our midfield. Mayne has plenty of football left in him and Dunn patches us a weakness in our defence. While recruiting these players we have invested in youth through the draft and so got our mix of youth and experience about right. Thankfully we didn't get Minson who would have taken us back to the mistakes of the past.

 

[Kirby]

He's standing right next to you.

 

[Buckley is my hero]

Whats the point in this? Everyone knows he has some intellectual difficulties so why is it always the same people getting sucked in by it and/or making fun of it? Just leave him be. He's easily the most passionate supporter on here and the board wouldn't be the same without him.

Just for the record ASD encompasses both low functioning and high functioning intellectual capabilities and shouldn't be confused with an intellectual disability. However we should have a bit of sympathy for passionate supporters, as you say without making fun of them, just because they may have a problem with the way they express themselves.

 

[Cousin of Daicos]

I really hope Mayne works out for us.

Outside the last year or so, he always seemed like a decent player to me. I'm just glad that just about all our forwards are generally accurate kicks for goal now.

The number of games we've lost over the years through nothing more than bad kicking has been nothing short of infuriating.

 

[Hagla]

Very Well Said Magpie Girl.

Better being Going Well then Poorly

Na, we don't want him going well then poorly, that'd be very disappointing

 

[doodles98]

Moore is listed as 200cm, so if he's grown 2cm he'd be 202.

Collingwood measuring tapes strike again!

 

[wednesdaywarrior]

You're defending the indefensible, namely poor recruitment of players in Hudson, Young, Armstrong, Lynch and Russell, on the basis of them filling a role. You can use the same argument for any experienced player we pick up who plays few games only. Oh, they may not have played any games for us, but they filled a short term gap for us and played their role in the team. Hang on. They didn't play any games for us (or few games). Our team continued sliding down the ladder and those players took the place of a younger player who may have made a better long term contribution.
For the record, Varcoe and Crisp were much better pickups for the club. Both will play plenty of games for Collingwood. Wells won't play a lot of games for us but adds a silky finish to our midfield. Mayne has plenty of football left in him and Dunn patches us a weakness in our defence. While recruiting these players we have invested in youth through the draft and so got our mix of youth and experience about right. Thankfully we didn't get Minson who would have taken us back to the mistakes of the past.

Firstly, I acknowledged in my comment that Russell and Lynch were duds and I made no mention of any of the other players you listed. Obviously I would agree with you that it's selective to 'just' focus on the players we trade in that succeed and ignore the ones who were duds. It's also narrow to ignore the successes. The point is, the bulldogs are the only club in recent AFl history to win a flag through largely going to the draft and in some respects they were lucky with last years odd finals dynamic. Hawthorn and Sydney have shown you have to find the right mix of young maturing stars and mature role players. This involves a level of experimentation and trading of mature players to get the mix right. I would argue our track record has been mixed in the past - largely crap other than the famous decision to trade Ball and Jolley in 2010. But is getting better and has had some recent successes. If you want to have a list where you never take any risks and never open the door to any transitioning older players you won't win a flag. You can't just keep every list spot open for young players. This is why Carlton fought to keep Gibbs when logic says they should have let him go.

Anyway. I don't think it's worth having a typical big Footy brawl over. Anything to do with this topic just draws out the same polarised views on our list management and really the only thing that will tell the story in my view is whether we make the 8 or not next season. For what it's worth, if we get a good run with injuries, I think we will.

 

[wednesdaywarrior]

PS Sorry for drifting off topic of the original thread and thanks to the OP for a great training report. I really enjoy these and appreciate the efforts people go to.

 

[doodles98]

This threads a funny read. Not being involved in it, the arguing of the positivity/negativity divide semantics in this thread has been a giggle. Good work guys.

 

[Kirby]

Collingwood measuring tapes strike again!

 

[AdamsFamily]

Fantastic write up, really look forward to more of these! I am in WA and am an avid fantasy football coach - I really like what you said about TayTay (he's fast becoming my number one draft pick ahead of Mr Pendlebury)

God I'd love to come to Melbourne for a weekend and meet some of the lads.

 

[jonbe54]

Whats the point in this? Everyone knows he has some intellectual difficulties so why is it always the same people getting sucked in by it and/or making fun of it? Just leave him be. He's easily the most passionate supporter on here and the board wouldn't be the same without him.

Total agreement, my son suffers from Aspbergers yet is a section cheif for a major North American software company. Too many people love taking cheap shots at those they consider themselves superior to.

 

[Jasper84]

Whats the point in this? Everyone knows he has some intellectual difficulties so why is it always the same people getting sucked in by it and/or making fun of it? Just leave him be. He's easily the most passionate supporter on here and the board wouldn't be the same without him.

For what it's worth, I would have made the same observation if anyone else had posted the comment and I wasn't picking on the poster himself, more referencing the infinite thought loop it created like a written Esher's staircase. That's all probably irrelevant now as you saw something in it that you didn't like and have been offended on someone else's behalf.

 

[Stoods]

Fantastic write up, really look forward to more of these! I am in WA and am an avid fantasy football coach - I really like what you said about TayTay (he's fast becoming my number one draft pick ahead of Mr Pendlebury)

God I'd love to come to Melbourne for a weekend and meet some of the lads.

Given Adams' defender status i would say he is a lock and throw away the key type

 

[Mkcaptain]

Given Adams' defender status i would say he is a lock and throw away the key type

Yeah he was the first player I picked when the team picker came out. Shaz and Keeffe don't look terrible selections either

 

[Stoods]

Yeah he was the first player I picked when the team picker came out. Shaz and Keeffe don't look terrible selections either

What team picker site are you using? Official prices havent been released yet i thought? I know the team picker on fan footy give a rough estimate but it isnt 100%.

Essendons official pricing got released a couple days ago and i think Brisbane had theirs released today