St Kilda Defensive Zone Last Night

[BhimaWylie 18]

Watters and Neeld both left Collingwood for new clubs at the end of 2011. Watters inherited a team which is well drilled defensively and has 3200 games experience. Neeld inherited an offensively minded team which has 2000 games experience. What was clear to me last night was that Watters has taught the Saints how to zone effectively, but they don't have the ability to counterattack to full effect. The Dees have neither against fully fit teams.

It has been a feature of Melbournes disappointing start to the season - both watching live at the game and on television - that when opposition teams are bringing the ball out of defence, Melbourne players leave their direct opponent to position themselves in a rehearsed zone. The disappointing aspect is that the zone is static, with stationary Dees allowing the opposition to work around or over it as they might play a game of checkers.

What interested me last night was St Kildas defensive zone. When Collingwood were coming out of defense, St Kilda players, like the Dess, positioned themselves away from Pies players into a zone position. What was different, however, was that when a Collingwood player ran into space between the St Kilda players, the St Kilda player would man up on him. Rather than having a static zone, they would start in a zone and then man up depending on where the Collingwood players ran. They also positioned Mcevoy down the line so that when Collingwood kicked long around the boundary, St Kilda had an extra tall at many of the contests.

I wondered as I was watching whether or not this is in fact what Neeld wants the Melbourne players to do, or if Neeld is working on a different formula. It was noted on the telecast that although St Kilda were effective in stopping Collingwood from scoring, they were exhausting themselves with their defensive style. They could stop the Pies, but the fitness required to do this left them fatigued when attacking, as was evident in their poor kicking efficiency.

Melbourne looked good against GWS when Bail and Evans were actually running ahead of the play and providing an uncontested target. The bombers are excellent at both defending and then running ahead of the ball.

The struggle for the Demons gameplan is not only getting the defensive zone correct like Saint Kilda did but also running towards goal.

The one thing that gives me hope this week is the improved running capacity of the team selected. Watts, Blease, Rodan, Pedersen, Jamar and Davey are notable for their lack of ability to run hard both ways. Strauss, Nicholson, Viney, Spencer and Kent are runners.

We wont win until we get our defensive zone right. St Kilda showed last night what is possible. They also showed that without supreme fitness (despite Riewoldt), attacking is made all the more difficult with the Malthouse gameplan.

I just want to see us on equal footing physically, to at least give the gameplan a chance.

Edited May 7, 2013 by BhimaWylie

[Binmans PA 26,376]

Interesting post. It'll be interesting to see how we set up tomorrow.

[praha 10,329]

Yep.

Opposition transition out of defense has been pathetic.

Melbourne's zoning is mechanical, lacks flexibility, and the players seem almost unable or afraid to experiment within their determined zone.

It is not rocket science. This team plays predictable football across the middle and teams rip them apart.

Against Brisbane the Lions were slamming them in transition: Melbourne would rush it in fine but if it wasn't a clean delivery than it was a guaranteed inside-50 for the.

Naturally I would have thought that Neeld would get the message out and tell the team to slow it down, keep position, and high-percentage inside-50s only.

Instead, the team played stubborn football and the same issues presented themselves for the entire match. I am bewildered at how anyone thinks that game was good. A team missing its spine in the middle still managed to run riot. Neeld was out coached and the players unable to match the Lions' run. It was frustrating to constantly, over and over again, see Brisbane players get the ball in defense, turn around and have a target straight away. If they keep doing this, then something needs to change. You don't stick to a plan for the sake of education when the team is in a winning position.

Neeld had a hand in that loss because his coaching and structures failed him.

Edited May 4, 2013 by Cudi_420

[dee-luded 2,958]

Watters and Neeld both left Collingwood for new clubs at the start of 2011. Watters inherited a team which is well drilled defensively and has 3200 games experience. Neeld inherited an offensively minded team which has 2000 games experience. What was clear to me last night was that Watters has taught the Saints how to zone effectively, but they don't have the ability to counterattack to full effect. The Dees have neither against fully fit teams.

It has been a feature of Melbourne’s disappointing start to the season - both watching live at the game and on television - that when opposition teams are bringing the ball out of defence, Melbourne players leave their direct opponent to position themselves in a rehearsed zone. The disappointing aspect is that the zone is static, with stationary Dees allowing the opposition to work around or over it as they might play a game of checkers.

What interested me last night was St Kilda’s defensive zone. When Collingwood were coming out of defense, St Kilda players, like the Dess, positioned themselves away from Pies players into a zone position. What was different, however, was that when a Collingwood player ran into space between the St Kilda players, the St Kilda player would man up on him. Rather than having a static zone, they would start in a zone and then man up depending on where the Collingwood players ran. They also positioned Mcevoy down the line so that when Collingwood kicked long around the boundary, St Kilda had an extra tall at many of the contests.

I wondered as I was watching whether or not this is in fact what Neeld wants the Melbourne players to do, or if Neeld is working on a different formula. It was noted on the telecast that although St Kilda were effective in stopping Collingwood from scoring, they were exhausting themselves with their defensive style. They could stop the Pies, but the fitness required to do this left them fatigued when attacking, as was evident in their poor kicking efficiency.

Melbourne looked good against GWS when Bail and Evans were actually running ahead of the play and providing an uncontested target. The bombers are excellent at both defending and then running ahead of the ball.

The struggle for the Demons gameplan is not only getting the defensive zone correct – like Saint Kilda did – but also running towards goal.

The one thing that gives me hope this week is the improved running capacity of the team selected. Watts, Blease, Rodan, Pedersen, Jamar and Davey are notable for their lack of ability to run hard both ways. Strauss, Nicholson, Viney, Spencer and Kent are runners.

We won’t win until we get our defensive zone right. St Kilda showed last night what is possible. They also showed that without supreme fitness (despite Riewoldt), attacking is made all the more difficult with the Malthouse gameplan.

I just want to see us on equal footing physically, to at least give the gameplan a chance.

hmmn, I agree BhimaWylie, & a good pickup I think in the outs... that makes good sense after seeing last weeks game we tired in the last Qtr, as they did trying to break our zone.

But they were cleaner with the ball last week, & they controlled the stoppages with they're defensive stoppage strategies, sitting off us & pressuring us to commit & then we coughed it up, leaving us out of position, & off balance. this is experience & strength.

We got the players, but we've a lot to learn, as I see it.

those outside players have to learn to preserve their energy & their legs. run at speed thats suits the requirement.

I think Rivers is a big loss for our zoning, as his style IMO, suited it.

[BhimaWylie 18]

I thought I'd follow up on my original post on Saturday which was prior to the Dees game.

What was of most interest to me was not that the Dees were playing a zone similar to the Saints, but that they weren't playing a zone at all. For the most part of the game on Sunday the Dees went man on man when the opposition were kicking out of defensive. The coast to coast goals that Carlton kicked were made possible by the lack of zone. But I'm not complaining.

Neeld had flagged in his post match press conference last week that the game was moving back to man on man style, which was possibly his way of justifying the significant change of gameplan that we saw on the weekend.

While the Dees were disappointing on Sunday, for the most part it was shocking disposal and decision making that most contributed to the loss, which is likely due to playing man on man. I have suggested previously that we do not have the fitness to play a zone and then run hard ahread of the ball. I feel moreso now that we don't have the team ethic/appropriate continuity of players to play to do this.

The second quarter on Tuesday was the best of the season from the Dees, in my mind, where we actually raised the intensity of the game and took it up to the Blues.

Neeld was prepared to change the gameplan on the weekend. What else might begin to change, I shall watch on with interest.

[La Dee-vina Comedia 16,511]

I'm not convinced I can see what others see with respect to game style. But having said that, I thought in the first half against WCE we seemed to be playing man-on-man and in the second half we didn't. If I'm right, I wonder whether the change was a deliberate tactic of Neeld, a tactic of Worsfold or just a consequence of a lack of fitness or capability which brought the team undone.

Can anyone advise?

[jazza 1,323]

I'm not convinced I can see what others see with respect to game style. But having said that, I thought in the first half against WCE we seemed to be playing man-on-man and in the second half we didn't. If I'm right, I wonder whether the change was a deliberate tactic of Neeld, a tactic of Worsfold or just a consequence of a lack of fitness or capability which brought the team undone.

Can anyone advise?

not sure , but i think they are trying to get players to adapt on a regular basis so that in time to come they know who can do things and the team can also make an altered game style change in the future, which seems very difficult for the best of teams to do.

this could be a product of not having a good team at this time and using rather than wasting time on building structures for a time when we do have players good enough