Strategy What went wrong...what's fixable sooner rather than later?

[shintemaster]

I know it's slightly premature with a final to go but I think it is worthwhile having a look at where we went wrong that we can fix over an off season (rather than stuff that relies on a few years of rebuilding). Win or lose in Adelaide we still need to get to the point of being capable of finishing top 4.

I think the injury impact has been substantial (particularly losing so many players mid game) however I think the next point is the main one.

For what it is worth I think we as a club were horribly unprepared for the impact that further interchange reductions would have on the club. We run with a very heavy inside squad and I think we underestimate just how much of an adaption this was for us. We simply don't run enough inside mids with good endurance and high TOG. Losing an effective Goldstein halfway through the year basically underlined this and ensured we wouldn't recover. We've been using him the last couple of years to cover our lack of run in the middle. Once we lost his run we were terminal. Frustrating that we took so long to realise he needed support like Daw in the team - or even ran a horribly out of form Petrie in there.

Most (good teams) rely on signficant pressure on the carrier now, we have been unable to do so this year and it has hurt us that the guys getting injured are the ones we needed the most for this (Garner, Turner, Waite) while the ones with durability are some of our worst offenders when it comes to, well, to be blunt soft efforts and lack of 1%ers.
NDS a standout here but he has a few mates and unfortunately Boomer is one of them. Don't get me wrong, he's been like that forever so I don't expect miracles but I do expect that our club is professional enough to recognise this and make the hard call a lot earlier. We could probably carry one player like this with other elite attributes (Boom) but any more than that is taking the piss.

Thomas. I know there is a bit of a love / hate relationship with many but I think he has been absolutely crucified by the AFL and media this year - and it is the culmination of several years in that direction. So much so that it has made him question most everything he does. We've just signed him for 2 more years and at his best he is amongst the best in his position in the league. We need to spend some time in the offseason figuring out how to reset this guys brain such that he can have a proper impact again.

 

[Hazey1977]

Good post.

We simply haven't recruited or developed enough bloke who can run through the middle. Pretty much every player with the exception of key forwards needs to be able to run through the mids at different stages. We have hardly even tried anyone outside the starting mids.

Brad Scotts revelation about picking blokes he loves instead of what's best for the club/team was just amazing to hear (not in a good way), has been going on for years and has hurt us.

 

[Dodecahedron]

Injuries.
Slow midfield and one paced.
Too many players stagnated.
Not enough goal kickers.
Won't play guys in different positions.
Forgot "one week at a time" mantra with 12 win sh1t.
That Hawthorn game that got away.

 

[Gasometer]

The last quarter of the * game was where the rot started.

 

[amaz199]

Our inability to balance our offensive game and defensive game is the reason why we are here.

In the first 4-5 games of the season, we played the most exciting football especially against Adelaide. What a game that was...

But when injuries mounted (especially during games), we started to become more and more hesitant to take the game on. Players that usually scored goals for us were either out of form or injured.

Due to our injuries, our game style was severely limited because so many players were playing out of position, weren't working hard enough or shitting themselves when the ball came to them. And to make things worse, our lack of pace and skills made it difficult to become offensive and made it difficult to defend because the opposition moved it with precision and pace once the turnover took place. Happened constantly last night and ultimately decided the game.

Then comes the dumb loopy handballs and absolute complete and utter dumbshit kicks into the middle of our defensive arc gifting the opposition a goal. FFS.

And then there is the midfield setup... lol.

It has been a disaster of a season but we can turn it around in the finals series. Fingers crossed...

Lets hope that the players recover from the disastrous night that occurred 24 hours ago and we give it our all in the finals series.

Need to win at least one game of finals to gain some confidence. It's possible...

 

[apollo_creed]

Sack the cliche spitting imposter of a coach worry about the rest later.

 

[giantroo]

Just our scores against the top 8 teams this year:

107, 61, 65, 74, 84, 67, 72, 47, 57, 76, 63

Other than round 1, the rest are below par.

 

[Moti]

We were kings of clearances. This year not so much and once the ball gets in space we are cactus.

Awesome job just to stay within touch against the best teams, we should have been walloped.

 

[Zebrah]

Brad Scotts revelation about picking blokes he loves instead of what's best for the club/team was just amazing to hear (not in a good way), has been going on for years and has hurt us.

I can see this getting repeated in every thread for the next 12 months, but this interpretation is just wrong.

He said he is competitive and wants to win every game and therefore he will pick the best players if they are on the list (not the players that need the most exposure to AFL). He is saying Petrie, Boomer, Firrito and NDS are holding development back because they are better than the guys coming through and therefore will continue to be picked.

It is correct.

Boomer is better than any other small forward.
Firrito is better than McKenzie/Mullett/Neilson
Dal is better than all our Werribee mid options.
Petrie is better than Daw/Black/Durdin.

 

[Hazey1977]

I can see this getting repeated in every thread for the next 12 months, but this interpretation is just wrong.

He said he is competitive and wants to win every game and therefore he will pick the best players if they are on the list (not the players that need the most exposure to AFL). He is saying Petrie, Boomer, Firrito and NDS are holding development back because they are better than the guys coming through and therefore will continue to be picked.

It is correct.

Boomer is better than any other small forward.
Firrito is better than McKenzie/Mullett/Neilson
Dal is better than all our Werribee mid options.
Petrie is better than Daw/Black/Durdin.

Yeah I can see that we have different interpretations and yours does make more sense in some ways....

But I still got the feeling he was saying if these blokes were on the list he'd play them regardless of their form, which he has done over the last few years. This is what makes me think he won't get us anywhere.

Sent from my SM-G920F using Tapatalk

 

[Thewlis Dish]

Everything comes back to the same point though, which is that we don't develop elite players. Whether that is a drafting and recruitment issue or a coaching issue I don't know, but we don't have the quality of top end midfield talent that the best sides do, or even up and coming sides like St Kilda and the Dogs.

 

[Page8383]

We were kings of clearances. This year not so much and once the ball gets in space we are cactus.

Awesome job just to stay within touch against the best teams, we should have been walloped.

Yeah - We get chopped up with the outside ball like no other team.

On the rebound too - The amount of uncontested ball surrendered in the middle third of the ground is alarming

 

[Gasometer]

Everything comes back to the same point though, which is that we don't develop elite players. Whether that is a drafting and recruitment issue or a coaching issue I don't know, but we don't have the quality of top end midfield talent that the best sides do, or even up and coming sides like St Kilda and the Dogs.

We haven't bottomed out for 2-3 years like these two and picked up high drafts...and them throw in a compromised draft era

 

[Gasometer]

If Footy Classified could read our leading patterns in the early part of the year..well anyone could..

 

[Thewlis Dish]

We haven't bottomed out for 2-3 years like these two and picked up high drafts...and them throw in a compromised draft era

This is a cop out though. Go and look where Fyfe, Sloane, Hannebery, Parker, Neale, Merrett, Beams etc were drafted.

Perhaps you could say footy department spending is a big factor, but Carlton took Cripps at 13, Port took Gray at 55, Brisbane took Rockliff in the PSD and Zorko was unwanted by GC (cost pick 34) etc. Even though he was a high pick, do we honestly think Bontempelli would be the player he is under Scott?

I am convinced we draft vanilla and discourage creative freedom, preferring people who will stick within structures.

 

[Reginald0]

Worst decision was letting Petrie go round again, slowed development of maj and mason
Let alone not dropping him when completely out of form
Same for nds, once it was obvious his hammy was gone he needed to play ressies
The goldy mystery...,
Last nite the dropped mark , the out of bounds....sweet creeping Jesus he is supposed to be aa, just dreaming
Swallow now just a shadow
Wells, just can't get on the park can he
LT just plain unreliable, last nites miss, I know ando is a disappointment but the Petrie and LT goalkicking is sackable

Happy to see a squad with Clarke wood daw
Dumont has to get much much fitter and I don't mind BMac
The nightmare is Garner and Turner again injured

If we can at least put in a reasonable show next week well OK stuff happens but last nite was soft

 

[shintemaster]

This is a cop out though. Go and look where Fyfe, Sloane, Hannebery, Parker, Neale, Merrett, Beams etc were drafted.

Perhaps you could say footy department spending is a big factor, but Carlton took Cripps at 13, Port took Gray at 55, Brisbane took Rockliff in the PSD and Zorko was unwanted by GC (cost pick 34) etc. Even though he was a high pick, do we honestly think Bontempelli would be the player he is under Scott?

I am convinced we draft vanilla and discourage creative freedom, preferring people who will stick within structures.

So? We picked up Goldy a mile down. Wood had plenty of chances to go earlier and looks a cracking pick. Every club has players that come out of nowhere. I'm not sure we have substantially less than any other team.

Not necessarily disagreeing on your last point though or saying we shouldn't be able to do better. Saying that we've had piss all access to the draft for 5 years isn't a cop out - it's the truth. We needed every pick to go right and it didn't.

 

[Thewlis Dish]

Goldstein and Tarrant are the only elite at their position players we have developed in the Scott era.

We've developed a whole heap of good to very good ones, but we don't have the top end talent to properly contend. Can use the GWS/GC excuse if you like but there's a difference between finding good players with second and third rounders and finding genuine guns there.

 

[naturally north]

I can see this getting repeated in every thread for the next 12 months, but this interpretation is just wrong.

He said he is competitive and wants to win every game and therefore he will pick the best players if they are on the list (not the players that need the most exposure to AFL). He is saying Petrie, Boomer, Firrito and NDS are holding development back because they are better than the guys coming through and therefore will continue to be picked.

It is correct.

Boomer is better than any other small forward.
Firrito is better than McKenzie/Mullett/Neilson
Dal is better than all our Werribee mid options.
Petrie is better than Daw/Black/Durdin.

In Brad Scotts opinion.

That is correct and it just leaves me with one question, why did it take them this long to work it out?

 

[Mr. Blonde]

Pace in the midfield for starters. This is where I'd be looking in the draft and during free agency/trading.

 

[Istanbul Roo]

Sack the cliche spitting imposter of a coach worry about the rest later.

profound. thanks ac.

 

[amaz199]

Just our scores against the top 8 teams this year:

107, 61, 65, 74, 84, 67, 72, 47, 57, 76, 63

Other than round 1, the rest are below par.

Interestingly, in most of those games, we were a rotation down on top of the already restricted fielded 22.

I don't even know how we managed to make the eight...

 

[Istanbul Roo]

I can see this getting repeated in every thread for the next 12 months, but this interpretation is just wrong.

He said he is competitive and wants to win every game and therefore he will pick the best players if they are on the list (not the players that need the most exposure to AFL). He is saying Petrie, Boomer, Firrito and NDS are holding development back because they are better than the guys coming through and therefore will continue to be picked.

It is correct.

Boomer is better than any other small forward.
Firrito is better than McKenzie/Mullett/Neilson
Dal is better than all our Werribee mid options.
Petrie is better than Daw/Black/Durdin.

thanks Zebrah, common sense interpretation of what he said, not the self-serving deluded one served up by the BS haters

 

[Zebrah]

In Brad Scotts opinion.

That is correct and it just leaves me with one question, why did it take them this long to work it out?

To work what out?

 

[Only Forwards]

we draft vanilla and discourage creative freedom, preferring people who will stick within structures.

We've become robotic.

This reset they spoke about better include a whole raft of s**t not just old blokes.

Coaching staff, philosophy, selection criteria, and a whole lot of other stuff need to be on the table.

We can get better but it's going to take time and a whole lot of intestinal fortitude.