Game Day West Coast vs Essendon - The game all scarf wavers look forward to.

[Tom_Thumb]

There will be no good news for us for 4 weeks, the time is now to see if Brander and Allen will make it. We know the last crop of tall forwards won't cut it, so if we have no plan B for Darling and Kennedy being out try them both.

 

[big bootaaaaah]

There will be no good news for us for 4 weeks, the time is now to see if Brander and Allen will make it. We know the last crop of tall forwards won't cut it, so if we have no plan B for Darling and Kennedy being out try them both.

Any thoughts why they dropped Brander this week? bazaar imo unless they expected rain last night maybe?
Surely they didn’t judge him on his performance at the SCG when it’s a known CHF killer ground due to its shortness. Stupid Ground to Debut him on then dropped him for a home game when both Kennedy and Darling are out, I don’t get it.

 

[FKASC]

Sometimes football doesn't like you - tonight was just one of those nights.

+14 Inside forward 50s
+2 shots at goal

Lose by 28 points.


But the reality is this was coming. I half expected this to happen and am ruing changing my tip at the last moment earlier today.

The signs were there to see last week against Sydney:

• the missed tackles
• the marked drop in being able to hit targets
• how vulnerable we looked against the rebound off opposition half-back
• the lack of support at the stoppages for Yeo
• Lycett being easily beaten by Sinclair
• Ryan and Shuey looking like they should still be on the injury list
• Cripps and Lecras reverting to selfish ways
• Waterman and Rioli looking like they're getting cooked and in need of a rest
• McGovern being unable to exercise intercept marks if he has to take the first forward
• the terrible lack of cohesion up forward leading to terrible conversion of shots

And so it proved again tonight.

I'm completely lost as to what our forward setup is trying to do at the moment:

• McInnes barely made a decent lead all night
• Waterman spent most of the match outside of the forward arc up the ground so had no forward impact
• Rioli likewise; looked like he was struggling to get to contests up forward as a ground-level player due to getting gassed by running up the ground
  
• Ryan, Lecras and Cripps all played for the mark first rather than trying to get front and centre for the ground ball

So then it's no surprise that we bomb it long due to lack of options and watch Hurley and Hooker get 20 marks between them.

Darling are Kennedy are now both out for a month at least during the toughest part of our fixture this season.

We need to come up with a legitimate Plan B for offence (that does not involve throwing McGovern forward).

• Get the starting positions of the smalls correct so they can affect the marking crumb
• With the above in mind, there should always be at least two players at ground level on the defensive side of attacking marking contests to prevent the opposition getting an easy rebound should we not win the forward contest
• Lower the eyes; if you have ground-level players occupying natural defensive positions with respect to the key forward leads, it means they should be available for the short kick option going forward.
• If there is a ruckman "resting" up forward, keep them in the square. Indeed, at every opportunity the best defender of the opposition should be dragged to the goalsquare or deep pocket and kept well away from negating any shorter forward entry options.
• Always play a position that is behind the opposition defence (i.e. offering as the fast break outlet or cherrypick) and rotate it exclusively with exceptionally quick players only. At the very least it forces the opponent to sacrifice a defender with pace to mark them, causing their rebound to be impacted.

It's not like we don't have any quality because two players are missing. We just need to correct our structure and recapture the happy mojo we had at the start of the season.

We also need to get a whole lot more aggressive. People say "what would Clarko do during this game to change it" etc. I'm pretty confident I know what he would do - by the ten minute mark of the first quarter Saad would have been completely cleaned up by someone. Not in a dirty, sniping way. But more than enough to let it be known that nobody is going to get it easy trying to run through us. The opposition needs to be afraid that we are hunting for them and that they will be hurt in the process. Instead, we did nothing; rolled the red carpet out for the Bombers in the corridor and let their confidence skyrocket playing some of the softest football that I have seen from this club in some time. It then became Groundhog Day from last season's Round 9 match, and was over by quarter time.

This loss is terrible. This loss could cost us from having a realistic shot at the premiership this season.

All because we were soft, under-prepared, structurally naive and couldn't take our chances.

Nailed it

 

[squashface]

What I don’t get is how players are looking tired and in need of a rest.

We just had a bloody bye.

 

[FKASC]

What I don’t get is how players are looking tired and in need of a rest.

We just had a bloody bye.

I’m wondering if something happened over the bye that has messed with peoples heads.

Maybe they know Gaff/Gov is leaving or something?

Maybe there’s some internal tension?

They looked absolutely cooked last night - there was a genuine aversion to getting the footy, no one looked like they wanted to be out there at all.

Maybe they’re all a bit scared of what will happen in finals. Now that finals are on the cards, they’re all starting to get nervous about being on the big stage and failing, and they’re shitting themselves already.

Maybe we can get those psychologists from the Crows

 

[Bort Cummings]

Watching that felt more like the 2016 Elimination Final than the 2015 GF for mine, in that instead of being taken apart by one of the best teams of all time, we got spanked by a team who wanted it more than us while we looked like we'd been heavily sedated and were actively trying to set an AFL record for boneheaded decisions in a game. I think it actually could have been a lot worse if some of those umpiring decisions our way didn't stem the bleeding in the second quarter.

Not having three key players from our spine didn't help, but I think what we really missed was JD/JK's ability to put in second efforts and create contests at ground level. You could see the lift Essendon got when Saad stepped through three of our guys and went straight up the corridor, and it showed him, McKenna etc. they didn't have to respect us or our defensive pressure. The contrast was night and day from the second half of the Richmond game, where they knew they were being hunted, and even Dusty was going to get ground into the turf if he held onto it too long.

I think the game showed reverting to the bad old days of recycling the same found-out role players through the side isn't going to yield good results. This might be getting a little bit too hypothetical, but it would be interesting to see how the first quarter would have played out if Saad had a skinny Italian fella who runs a 2.8 second 20m on his hammer instead of Cripps, Le Cras etc.

For Adelaide, would ideally like to see Petch and Venables back in the team (Venables probably pending fitness). We need teams to know that if they're going to try to run it out of defence/take the risky option into the corridor, we have the speed to hurt them the other way. I know he only had about five touches for the game, but one of my favourite moments of the season was Petch absolutely torching Johnson and taking three bounces to seal the Derby. Likewise Venables has shown he has the balls/ability to take a bounce at pace and break away from a clearance. Last night it seemed like a lot of our guys were gun-shy about taking on a tackler and being the one to have a flying shot at goal, and I'd like to see us go back to backing in the young guys like we did earlier in the year. After a couple of flat games (and a quarter against the Saints), I would hope adding some speed and flair might jolt us out of our current funk.

 

[DanWCE]

I’m wondering if something happened over the bye that has messed with peoples heads.

Maybe they know Gaff/Gov is leaving or something?

Maybe there’s some internal tension?

They looked absolutely cooked last night - there was a genuine aversion to getting the footy, no one looked like they wanted to be out there at all.

Maybe they’re all a bit scared of what will happen in finals. Now that finals are on the cards, they’re all starting to get nervous about being on the big stage and failing, and they’re shitting themselves already.

Maybe we can get those psychologists from the Crows

Maybe rumours of Smitch leaving are true and he told the players? I touched on this elsewhere but Shueys body language has been noticeably different / poor. For a VC in a 10-1 side with a pregnant fiancee you'd think life is peachy.

 

[Eagleboy68]

What I don’t get is how players are looking tired and in need of a rest.

We just had a bloody bye.

Was listening to jakovich yesterday.
He tipped Essendon by 15 points based on the fact he'd seen the players the day before and said they were sore and tired.

How they can be tired is beyond me.

 

[Royals]

Maybe rumours of Smitch leaving are true and he told the players? I touched on this elsewhere but Shueys body language has been noticeably different / poor. For a VC in a 10-1 side with a pregnant fiancee you'd think life is peachy.

Surely they are not sulking .. they are supposed to be professional athletes FFS

 

[wirra44]

Anyone else feel like your missus has cheated on you , geez i felt flat today. I think its worse that it was a thursday game , because now we have to watch the rest of the weekend of footy.

 

[FKASC]

Anyone else feel like your missus has cheated on you , geez i felt flat today. I think its worse that it was a thursday game , because now we have to watch the rest of the weekend of footy.

Yeah it’s real s**t.

 

[Lions Flag 2020]

Will Schofield video to Sam Skinner pure class. Check out @samskinner21

 

[FKASC]

Watching that felt more like the 2016 Elimination Final than the 2015 GF for mine, in that instead of being taken apart by one of the best teams of all time, we got spanked by a team who wanted it more than us while we looked like we'd been heavily sedated and were actively trying to set an AFL record for boneheaded decisions in a game..

Yep it reminded me a lot of 2016.

Problem is the youngsters and the depth that we thought we could blame last night on weren’t present in 2016.

So what are the common factors?

The coach and the senior players. Which is to blame?

Every time we’ve had an almighty let down like this we’ve consoled ourselves with the thought that maybe it’ll be the kick up the ass we needed, but it keeps happening again and again

 

[Priddis Is Done]

Yep it reminded me a lot of 2016.

Problem is the youngsters and the depth that we thought we could blame last night on weren’t present in 2016.

So what are the common factors?

The coach and the senior players. Which is to blame?

Every time we’ve had an almighty let down like this we’ve consoled ourselves with the thought that maybe it’ll be the kick up the ass we needed, but it keeps happening again and again

Very well put.

And yet we keep hoping that this time it's different and this time we have learned.

It stems from not adresssing the GF debacle. IMO.

Anyway, appranetly the airwaves were alight today. Claims of purposefully throwing the game.

 

[DanWCE]

Anyone else feel like your missus has cheated on you , geez i felt flat today. I think its worse that it was a thursday game , because now we have to watch the rest of the weekend of footy.

I felt hungover.

 

[Figure09]

Embarrassed

On [device_name] using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[Tom_Thumb]

Its mental, the players all know that without Darling and Kennedy they can't kick a winning score. We are flat track bully's - nobody can deny now.

 

[matt_bas]

Sometimes football doesn't like you - tonight was just one of those nights.

+14 Inside forward 50s
+2 shots at goal

Lose by 28 points.


But the reality is this was coming. I half expected this to happen and am ruing changing my tip at the last moment earlier today.

The signs were there to see last week against Sydney:

• the missed tackles
• the marked drop in being able to hit targets
• how vulnerable we looked against the rebound off opposition half-back
• the lack of support at the stoppages for Yeo
• Lycett being easily beaten by Sinclair
• Ryan and Shuey looking like they should still be on the injury list
• Cripps and Lecras reverting to selfish ways
• Waterman and Rioli looking like they're getting cooked and in need of a rest
• McGovern being unable to exercise intercept marks if he has to take the first forward
• the terrible lack of cohesion up forward leading to terrible conversion of shots

And so it proved again tonight.

I'm completely lost as to what our forward setup is trying to do at the moment:

• McInnes barely made a decent lead all night
• Waterman spent most of the match outside of the forward arc up the ground so had no forward impact
• Rioli likewise; looked like he was struggling to get to contests up forward as a ground-level player due to getting gassed by running up the ground
  
• Ryan, Lecras and Cripps all played for the mark first rather than trying to get front and centre for the ground ball

So then it's no surprise that we bomb it long due to lack of options and watch Hurley and Hooker get 20 marks between them.

Darling are Kennedy are now both out for a month at least during the toughest part of our fixture this season.

We need to come up with a legitimate Plan B for offence (that does not involve throwing McGovern forward).

• Get the starting positions of the smalls correct so they can affect the marking crumb
• With the above in mind, there should always be at least two players at ground level on the defensive side of attacking marking contests to prevent the opposition getting an easy rebound should we not win the forward contest
• Lower the eyes; if you have ground-level players occupying natural defensive positions with respect to the key forward leads, it means they should be available for the short kick option going forward.
• If there is a ruckman "resting" up forward, keep them in the square. Indeed, at every opportunity the best defender of the opposition should be dragged to the goalsquare or deep pocket and kept well away from negating any shorter forward entry options.
• Always play a position that is behind the opposition defence (i.e. offering as the fast break outlet or cherrypick) and rotate it exclusively with exceptionally quick players only. At the very least it forces the opponent to sacrifice a defender with pace to mark them, causing their rebound to be impacted.

It's not like we don't have any quality because two players are missing. We just need to correct our structure and recapture the happy mojo we had at the start of the season.

We also need to get a whole lot more aggressive. People say "what would Clarko do during this game to change it" etc. I'm pretty confident I know what he would do - by the ten minute mark of the first quarter Saad would have been completely cleaned up by someone. Not in a dirty, sniping way. But more than enough to let it be known that nobody is going to get it easy trying to run through us. The opposition needs to be afraid that we are hunting for them and that they will be hurt in the process. Instead, we did nothing; rolled the red carpet out for the Bombers in the corridor and let their confidence skyrocket playing some of the softest football that I have seen from this club in some time. It then became Groundhog Day from last season's Round 9 match, and was over by quarter time.

This loss is terrible. This loss could cost us from having a realistic shot at the premiership this season.

All because we were soft, under-prepared, structurally naive and couldn't take our chances.

Brilliant. Just brilliant. Can we hire you?

 

[matt_bas]

I’m wondering if something happened over the bye that has messed with peoples heads.

Maybe they know Gaff/Gov is leaving or something?

Maybe there’s some internal tension?

They looked absolutely cooked last night - there was a genuine aversion to getting the footy, no one looked like they wanted to be out there at all.

Maybe they’re all a bit scared of what will happen in finals. Now that finals are on the cards, they’re all starting to get nervous about being on the big stage and failing, and they’re shitting themselves already.

Maybe we can get those psychologists from the Crows

I don't think they looked tried, more like they just rocked up and thought they would win for just showing up.

 

[kranky al]

You can pot players for i50’s and bombing it - but when theres no decent leads what do you do

 

[Figure09]

Something in the water bottles 3qt against st Kilda

On [device_name] using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[Eagleboy68]

Yep it reminded me a lot of 2016.

Problem is the youngsters and the depth that we thought we could blame last night on weren’t present in 2016.

So what are the common factors?

The coach and the senior players. Which is to blame?

Every time we’ve had an almighty let down like this we’ve consoled ourselves with the thought that maybe it’ll be the kick up the ass we needed, but it keeps happening again and again

Yeah I wonder what the common denominator is.

 

[KERRPOW]

It stems from not adresssing the GF debacle. IMO.
.

We did try to address it, they identified some defieciencies and recruited Jetta and redden.

Unfortunately jetta hasnt worked out. Redden im not sure on.

 

[Cuzz09]

Something in the water bottles 3qt against st Kilda

On [device_name] using BigFooty.com mobile app

Yeah I feel like since Darling went down our heads have dropped

On [device_name] using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[WCE Wizard]

Watching that felt more like the 2016 Elimination Final than the 2015 GF for mine, in that instead of being taken apart by one of the best teams of all time, we got spanked by a team who wanted it more than us while we looked like we'd been heavily sedated and were actively trying to set an AFL record for boneheaded decisions in a game. I think it actually could have been a lot worse if some of those umpiring decisions our way didn't stem the bleeding in the second quarter.

Not having three key players from our spine didn't help, but I think what we really missed was JD/JK's ability to put in second efforts and create contests at ground level. You could see the lift Essendon got when Saad stepped through three of our guys and went straight up the corridor, and it showed him, McKenna etc. they didn't have to respect us or our defensive pressure. The contrast was night and day from the second half of the Richmond game, where they knew they were being hunted, and even Dusty was going to get ground into the turf if he held onto it too long.

I think the game showed reverting to the bad old days of recycling the same found-out role players through the side isn't going to yield good results. This might be getting a little bit too hypothetical, but it would be interesting to see how the first quarter would have played out if Saad had a skinny Italian fella who runs a 2.8 second 20m on his hammer instead of Cripps, Le Cras etc.

For Adelaide, would ideally like to see Petch and Venables back in the team (Venables probably pending fitness). We need teams to know that if they're going to try to run it out of defence/take the risky option into the corridor, we have the speed to hurt them the other way. I know he only had about five touches for the game, but one of my favourite moments of the season was Petch absolutely torching Johnson and taking three bounces to seal the Derby. Likewise Venables has shown he has the balls/ability to take a bounce at pace and break away from a clearance. Last night it seemed like a lot of our guys were gun-shy about taking on a tackler and being the one to have a flying shot at goal, and I'd like to see us go back to backing in the young guys like we did earlier in the year. After a couple of flat games (and a quarter against the Saints), I would hope adding some speed and flair might jolt us out of our current funk.

Yep you hit the nail on the head Petch may get 10 touches but he has the ability to burst away at break speed and can harras and chase.