I'm not sure if this has already been outlined by someone else..

But like many other supporters, I'm getting extremely frustrated at the way we enter forward 50. But I think (hope) I may have hit the nail on the head as to why we are doing this...

When were moving the ball out of defence, we are quite slow at getting it up the ground, allowing numbers from the opposition to get back and flood our forward 50.

Then we are constantly bombing it long and high into the forward pockets, near to the boundary. As a result of no one being able to take a contested grab usually in a pack of 3 or 4 players, the ball will 85% of the time, spill out of bounds for a throw in.

Why don't we hit the ball up to a more dangerous spot..? Top of the goal square..? hit a man on the lead..? Myself as well as everyone else has been asking these questions!

Neeld has definitely ordered the players to hit the pockets, and i think he wants the ball to go out of bounds.. He wants our forwards to practise again, and again and again.. In REAL match environments to DEFEND and trap the ball inside our forward 50.. like the best teams in the comp can do (West Coast, Collingwood etc) He wants it to eventually become a habitual thing for the players.. At this stage, it looks as though the players are concentrating on that more than grabbing the footy and actually kicking a goal.. They are almost in two minds.. but like most things, If you drill it into their brains and focus on something, practise will make perfect. And once we start locking the ball inside our forward 50 every time it goes down there, we won't have to hit the pockets.. We can drive it 20, 30 meters out, with the confidence that if Clarke, Jurrah or Howe can't take a contested grab.. Our forwards will be ready to pounce and throw their 2nd, 3rd and even 4th efforts at keeping the ball down there, until we SCORE.

Naturally the players have to have the endeavour to apply this.. But i am confident it will come.

West Coast are a good example of how it takes time and practise to get things right. From last on the ladder one year to top 4 the next... What changed? Their forward 50 pressure, the rest just fell into place..

Neeld has definitely ordered the players to hit the pockets, and i think he wants the ball to go out of bounds.. He wants our forwards to practise again, and again and again.. In REAL match environments to DEFEND and trap the ball inside our forward 50.. like the best teams in the comp can do (West Coast, Collingwood etc) He wants it to eventually become a habitual thing for the players.. At this stage, it looks as though the players are concentrating on that more than grabbing the footy and actually kicking a goal.. They are almost in two minds.. but like most things, If you drill it into their brains and focus on something, practise will make perfect. And once we start locking the ball inside our forward 50 every time it goes down there, we won't have to hit the pockets.. We can drive it 20, 30 meters out, with the confidence that if Clarke, Jurrah or Howe can't take a contested grab.. Our forwards will be ready to pounce and throw their 2nd, 3rd and even 4th efforts at keeping the ball down there, until we SCORE.

This was pretty obvious against the bulldogs I thought. In fact it accounted for a lot of the disparity in possessions. The dogs were doing a lot of backwards and sideways ball movement trying to find a way outside 50. It's far from perfect at the moment but it's encouraging. If only we could get som run out of stoppages to allow us to get the ball in there more often. It's bloody exciting to see Mitch Clark throwing himself at the ball. Get Jurrah, Petterd and Sylvia into that forward line and we might just have something.

I'm not sure if this has already been outlined by someone else..

But like many other supporters, I'm getting extremely frustrated at the way we enter forward 50. But I think (hope) I may have hit the nail on the head as to why we are doing this...

When were moving the ball out of defence, we are quite slow at getting it up the ground, allowing numbers from the opposition to get back and flood our forward 50.

Then we are constantly bombing it long and high into the forward pockets, near to the boundary. As a result of no one being able to take a contested grab usually in a pack of 3 or 4 players, the ball will 85% of the time, spill out of bounds for a throw in.

Why don't we hit the ball up to a more dangerous spot..? Top of the goal square..? hit a man on the lead..? Myself as well as everyone else has been asking these questions!

Neeld has definitely ordered the players to hit the pockets, and i think he wants the ball to go out of bounds.. He wants our forwards to practise again, and again and again.. In REAL match environments to DEFEND and trap the ball inside our forward 50.. like the best teams in the comp can do (West Coast, Collingwood etc) He wants it to eventually become a habitual thing for the players.. At this stage, it looks as though the players are concentrating on that more than grabbing the footy and actually kicking a goal.. They are almost in two minds.. but like most things, If you drill it into their brains and focus on something, practise will make perfect. And once we start locking the ball inside our forward 50 every time it goes down there, we won't have to hit the pockets.. We can drive it 20, 30 meters out, with the confidence that if Clarke, Jurrah or Howe can't take a contested grab.. Our forwards will be ready to pounce and throw their 2nd, 3rd and even 4th efforts at keeping the ball down there, until we SCORE.

Naturally the players have to have the endeavour to apply this.. But i am confident it will come.

West Coast are a good example of how it takes time and practise to get things right. From last on the ladder one year to top 4 the next... What changed? Their forward 50 pressure, the rest just fell into place..

this is absolutely spot on. Simplistic but true! Melbourne's attacks with "insurance" . A Neeld Plan. If it turns to crap at lease the ball is not in a danger zone thus still have an opportunity to scrap a goal through.

100% Correct Die Hard Demon. I'm glad someone with logic has posted a reasonable explanation to the current game plan. All we need now is for the players to click and keep the ball locked in our forward line.

Afaict.....it goes like this.

Theres some bloke(s) up the pointy end named HIM.

When any of our guys get it they must kick it to HIM. But they mustnt kick it down the guts they must play pass the parcel along the boundary line .

You wouldnt think it that hard to master... but Im wrong

That's good, because we would hate to have the players trying to kick goals.

That's good, because we would hate to have the players trying to kick goals.

Stupid post.

Great post Die Hard. I definitely believe that we are bringin into the corridor too late and getting sucked in to the pockets too deep in attack, have been saying that for a few weeks.

The couple of times that we attacked the goal face we scored. Frustrating to watch but I believe in time it will be sorted.

Stupid post.

Is it? Matches aren't training drills. They're matches. For points. That members and supporters pay money to watch.

The next step in "the grand plan" will be to kick it to the hot spot: mark my words. It will happen.

After watching the first three quarters of Sundays game again. listening to the commentary and reading this weeks papers, I understand the most vital problem the Dees have.

Clean Hands......The amount of times I watched players fumble the ball was horrendous. This resulted in at least 2 or 3 goals to Footscray, it even resulted in 3 or 4 contentious umpiring decisions, whereas if we had handled the ball cleanly in the first place we would have been away and running.

Secondly due to the lack of CLEAN HANDS at the moment the ball is not being delivered on cue to the runners, therefore resulting in less possessions, how do you develop a game plan when we are not handling the ball properly, players can't time their "receives" to allow for a fumble. Get the ball handling right and the game plan can be developed,

So how do we get over this, The more pressure to deliver under pressure the less sure the handling will be.

My solution would be to take the pressure off them....allow them a bit of freedom, tell them to play on at all costs with little consequence. Practice practice practice.

Once we get the ball handling right the rest will fall into place.

We don't desire the ball any less than other clubs..contrary to some commentators and journos, we're just at the wrong place at the wrong time due to fumbles..

AAHHH Confidence is a wonderful thing.

I'm not sure if this has already been outlined by someone else..

But like many other supporters, I'm getting extremely frustrated at the way we enter forward 50. But I think (hope) I may have hit the nail on the head as to why we are doing this...

When were moving the ball out of defence, we are quite slow at getting it up the ground, allowing numbers from the opposition to get back and flood our forward 50.

Then we are constantly bombing it long and high into the forward pockets, near to the boundary. As a result of no one being able to take a contested grab usually in a pack of 3 or 4 players, the ball will 85% of the time, spill out of bounds for a throw in.

Why don't we hit the ball up to a more dangerous spot..? Top of the goal square..? hit a man on the lead..? Myself as well as everyone else has been asking these questions!

Neeld has definitely ordered the players to hit the pockets, and i think he wants the ball to go out of bounds.. He wants our forwards to practise again, and again and again.. In REAL match environments to DEFEND and trap the ball inside our forward 50.. like the best teams in the comp can do (West Coast, Collingwood etc) He wants it to eventually become a habitual thing for the players.. At this stage, it looks as though the players are concentrating on that more than grabbing the footy and actually kicking a goal.. They are almost in two minds.. but like most things, If you drill it into their brains and focus on something, practise will make perfect. And once we start locking the ball inside our forward 50 every time it goes down there, we won't have to hit the pockets.. We can drive it 20, 30 meters out, with the confidence that if Clarke, Jurrah or Howe can't take a contested grab.. Our forwards will be ready to pounce and throw their 2nd, 3rd and even 4th efforts at keeping the ball down there, until we SCORE.

Naturally the players have to have the endeavour to apply this.. But i am confident it will come.

West Coast are a good example of how it takes time and practise to get things right. From last on the ladder one year to top 4 the next... What changed? Their forward 50 pressure, the rest just fell into place..

Good post. That said, I believe the main function of kicking to the pockets is in fact so you don't leave yourself open to the counter through the corridor. If you kick to the pockets, it's tougher for the opposition to then counter through the middle.

Against the Bulldogs and Tigers we had much bigger forwardlines than our opposition and should have been hitting the top of the square and putting their smaller defenders under more pressure. An example of this is Watts shrugging his opponent off in the goal square to take a contested mark.

Keeping the ball in our forward 50 is essential, but kicking to the pockets isn't always the best option. It depends on who's inside our offensive 50. We have to be able to make better decisions.

You're right though. The press certainly just clicked for West Coast in a season. My concern is the lack of fitness. This year has to be about changing the mindset of the players, so it becomes instinctive.

Once again though, the worry is that the press will become outdated by the time we effectively implement it.

AAHHH Confidence is a wonderful thing.

Fitness breeds confidence of the mind and body. Until our list is up to an accepted fitness level it is too hard to comment on the gameplan of Neeld. At the moment we are only seeing a very small part of it.