Autopsy vs Carlton - Round 8, 2020

We actually don‘t lay many shepherds these days.....Jed does, not many others do.
Yeah sadly. I recently watched a snippet of whatever game of North from ages ago, resulted in a goal ...... in it there is a flash of M.Pyke clearing someone out of the way so it may have been Winston can have a ping at the sticks. That was my thought as well, we don't bloody do this anymore.
 

Long Live the King

Premiership Player
Feb 24, 2009
3,351
3,129
AFL Club
North Melbourne
Yeah sadly. I recently watched a snippet of whatever game of North from ages ago, resulted in a goal ...... in it there is a flash of M.Pyke clearing someone out of the way so it may have been Winston can have a ping at the sticks. That was my thought as well, we don't bloody do this anymore.
Remember Ishchenko doing a similar thing at the G in the 90's.....beautiful back then..........probably a free now.
 

SonofSamsquanch

Enjoy decent coffee but don't dunk yer biscuits
Mar 31, 2016
19,242
44,932
Victoria
AFL Club
North Melbourne
If you calculated Murphy's pay rate, the time he spent laying on his back with his arms and legs in the air pretending he'd been pushed over earned him about $3,000. Now Twinkletoes could probably do the math, but I don't reckon even Anabell Chong was ever pulling that kind of cash.
 
Cleary played better than we have for a few weeks after quarter time. Good performances from Kyron, Bailey and McKay were positives.
Polec was much better after being taken off Cripps and Jed largely nullified him after that.
Let down in the end by poor delivery going forward and some wtf moments from senior players.
I'm staying positive too. Didn't get too angry during the match, as perhaps I'm now pre-conditioned to losing and looking at draft picks.

Nice to see Bailey continue to build. With the time missing last year, he's practically a first year player. Polec was good. LDU very quiet, but coming off injury and little match practice - just got to get games into him. Larkey showing how invaluable he is, and can only continue to help take pressure off Brown. No major injuries.

Our delivery to unmanned defenders is baffling, but Carlton were just as bad at times. Despite how poor we were, we could have still pinched the game, because of those WTF moments that went against us:
1. JMac handball turnover for a goal
2. Goldy missing a sitter
3. Zurhaar missing a sitter (we should have been 3.0 not 1.2 at this stage).
4. 50m penalty against Higgins (it was there)
5. 100m penalty (still not sure of the 2nd 50m penalty)
6. Pittard costing Polec a shot after the 3/4 time siren.
7. Brilliant collect, and goal from 50m in the wet to seal the game by Carlton.

if any of those things didn't happen, we probably win the game. No luck, injuries, woeful skill execution...
 
Finally admiting l was wrong about McDonald. He has been very good. Mckay is starting to show signs of being a good backman. Larkey was good from the start and can only get better. getting players back is definately helping. While Pittards brain fade did cost us a goal but not necessarily the win and he did keep Doherty quiet, Goldsteins easy miss could have cost us the same win and Zuurhars second 50m penalty while not costing us a goal goes to show that no one is perfect and brain fades happen. Polec on Cripps was the big problem. It should never have happened. It seems that Shaw is trying things rather than have just a plan A like Scott did and he is still learning. Supporters are saying we need to bottom out but to do that we have to lose. When we lose, supporters say we should be winning. Supporters can be fickle. They want their cake and eat it too. Its everyones right to have an opinion and this is mine. As the season goes on and barring injuries we will get better...Bring on 2021.
 
Probably contentious and I do love the way he goes about it when he's on, but I'm of the opinion that Zurhaar hasn't given us as much as I would have expected in the last couple of games.

I'm not sure what it is, but if he's having a quiet patch, he needs to at least impose himself at the contest. I don't expect 30 touches from him, but I just feel his energy has been off a touch.

On SM-A515F using BigFooty.com mobile app
 
People are underestimating how much heavy lifting Cunnington did, outside of Goldy he is the most important player in our team. You can have a lot of injuries and still function well as a side, it highlights how fragile our midfield is and how badly it is conditioned to function a certain way with Cunnington playing too significant a role.

As painful as it is going to be, we need to evolve a much better system because Ben is nearing the end.
 
Apr 20, 2001
3,268
718
Limerick Hotel
AFL Club
North Melbourne
Other Teams
North Melbourne
I have been looking at the voting thread and I fail to see how anyone can give Polec votes. Ok, he had 25 possessions. His disposal efficiency was 52%. The LOWEST of any player in our team. Anderson, who was mentioned a couple of times for his poor disposal, had 19 possessions at 68%. On that basis both players had 13 effective disposals. I know stats aren't be be all and end all but Polec cost us dearly.
 
Probably contentious and I do love the way he goes about it when he's on, but I'm of the opinion that Zurhaar hasn't given us as much as I would have expected in the last couple of games.

I'm not sure what it is, but if he's having a quiet patch, he needs to at least impose himself at the contest. I don't expect 30 touches from him, but I just feel his energy has been off a touch.

On SM-A515F using BigFooty.com mobile app
He's more sizzle than sausage at the moment.

A lot of hype about hardman and hits and tackles.

He is yet to be a consistent footballer.
 
Nov 17, 2011
2,699
9,835
AFL Club
North Melbourne
People are underestimating how much heavy lifting Cunnington did, outside of Goldy he is the most important player in our team. You can have a lot of injuries and still function well as a side, it highlights how fragile our midfield is and how badly it is conditioned to function a certain way with Cunnington playing too significant a role.

As painful as it is going to be, we need to evolve a much better system because Ben is nearing the end.

I think the midfield behind Goldstein and Simpkin hasn't been too bad. This has been the first year in a long time that we've actually been winning our clearances. McDonald has also been a great inclusion when played in the middle.

The issue with this team is mostly ball movement as we're unable to consistently get the ball into our forward line from our defensive half. Our forward half structure is also abysmal and a lot of our starters from last year are either injured or out of form. There's been a huge drop-off with both forward targets and forward pressure. Midfield has been the least of our concerns.

The biggest thing we've lost from Cunnington is his ability to turn matches and be an absolute game winner, but I think that can be replaced by any position on the ground if that makes sense. We're missing the player who can take the game by the throat for five minutes and swing momentum. Cunnington was that player for us, but I don't necessarily think his absence has impacted the midfield too much. It's just highlighted our lack of top-end talent and match winners.
 

7577969923

Norm Smith Medallist
Sep 20, 2018
6,176
16,379
AFL Club
North Melbourne
I have been looking at the voting thread and I fail to see how anyone can give Polec votes. Ok, he had 25 possessions. His disposal efficiency was 52%. The LOWEST of any player in our team. Anderson, who was mentioned a couple of times for his poor disposal, had 19 possessions at 68%. On that basis both players had 13 effective disposals. I know stats aren't be be all and end all but Polec cost us dearly.

Classic example of how stats never tell the full story. Polec takes a lot more on than Anderson with his possessions. I'm not sure how Anderson gets to 69% because by my count in Q1 he had 5 or 6 kicks and butchered all but one of them. If it wasn't for his silly mate Pittard, Polec would have kicked 2 goals out of his 26 possessions.
 
I think the midfield behind Goldstein and Simpkin hasn't been too bad. This has been the first year in a long time that we've actually been winning our clearances. McDonald has also been a great inclusion when played in the middle.

The issue with this team is mostly ball movement as we're unable to consistently get the ball into our forward line from our defensive half. Our forward half structure is also abysmal and a lot of our starters from last year are either injured or out of form. There's been a huge drop-off with both forward targets and forward pressure. Midfield has been the least of our concerns.

The biggest thing we've lost from Cunnington is his ability to turn matches and be an absolute game winner, but I think that can be replaced by any position on the ground if that makes sense. We're missing the player who can take the game by the throat for five minutes and swing momentum. Cunnington was that player for us, but I don't necessarily think his absence has impacted the midfield too much. It's just highlighted our lack of top-end talent and match winners.

We are getting our hands on the ball but we struggle to do much with it, we have too many scrappy users of the ball and sure we are getting plenty of clearances but we are turning most of them over.

Ball retention, or lack thereof, was one of my major gripes about the Scott era, as was our general skill level. We work so hard to get the ball and we then just hand it over to readily through a poor system of ball movement. The conditions didn't help this week but it has been a problem not just this year but year after year.

I just can't believe anyone thinks we are going to win a flag with the way we move the ball out of our defensive 50 or the way we deliver it inside our forward 50. The way we go up the line is us raising the white flag and saying we just plan on hanging in there rather than play to win.
 
Back