We have been pathetic all year in ground ball gets. Especially in our forward line. I’m not sure if this is correlated with the poor form of Tmac and Weid but also the poor quality small forwards we have but something has to drastically change. 

Apart from defensive structures, this has to be a top priority that the FD has to address.

6 hours ago, At the break of Gawn said:

We have been pathetic all year in ground ball gets. Especially in our forward line. I’m not sure if this is correlated with the poor form of Tmac and Weid but also the poor quality small forwards we have but something has to drastically change. 

Apart from defensive structures, this has to be a top priority that the FD has to address.

Our small (small - medium) forwards are a shadow of most other clubs ABG.  We have no weapons here at present including any pace to burn off opponents and guys that know where the goals are and can dob a few in traffic.  It allows the opp to easily defend, sending an extra number or two to the drop of our umpteen long bombs every time, without fear of the ground ball damage to the scoreboard usually taken by most clubs when the ball is in dispute.

Apart from an ageing Jeffy (if he gets on the park and going) and Melksham having a rareish day out, the cupboard is pretty bare right now.  Looking ahead, Lockhart's a maybe but not going to have much of an impact in 2019.

Edited April 21, 20196 yr by Rusty Nails

I was often astounded to see just how few players we actually had at the fall of the ball. We seemed to be outnumbered everywhere. Not being at the ground it's hard to see where they are, but I suspect they're generally caught in no mans land between contests. This is down to both workrate but poor structure and positioning.

Good observation!

We are nowhere when the ball hits the deck, which is often btw

Even when we are there, the opposition have a simple ring set up around the contest and we inevitably have zero players on the attacking side of the contest allowing an easy handball chain out

You'd think if our game plan is to bomb it in long then we'd at least be organised around the fall of the ball... or does that require speed/fitness to get to the contest??

Jeff is the only quality small forward we've had in the last decade and he has been out of form since 2017.

We have instead relied on a group of medium forwards playing small.  They all play "taller" than they are (pretty good jumps and marks) and all have a bit of pace, but none are true crumbers and they get caught out of position in crumbing situations. They also have a tendency to all go up instead of staying down.

This group has included the following players at times since 2017:

-Melksham, Petracca and Spargo (still there)

-Harmes and Fritsch (playing other positions)

-Garlett, vandenBerg, Hannan and ANB (injured or dropped)

-Bugg, Watts and Kent (all moved to other clubs).

 

With talls in Weid, Tmac and Preuss (last year Hogan), we've needed three of these medium/small guys at any one time. 

The combined 7 players that either left the club or are injured/dropped leave a big hole in our options, especially with Harmes and Fritsch playing mid/back. We couldn't expect that we'd have these issues with the players we retained. 

Not many options to juggle right now!

 

 

I think this also compounds with having 4 of our preferred ~8 defenders out (May, Lever, Lewis, Smith) plus a 5th (OMac) out of form. 

 

Finally, we have not had a tall player as a "winner" except maybe Preuss. Gawn, TMac, Weid, OMac, have all been out of form, dropping marks etc.

*edit: which means that "crumbing" players definitely aren't on the right position because they expect thur contest to be different. 

 

Edited April 21, 20196 yr by deanox
Explain relevance of last paragraph

3 hours ago, deanox said:

Jeff is the only quality small forward we've had in the last decade and he has been out of form since 2017.

We have instead relied on a group of medium forwards playing small.  They all play "taller" than they are (pretty good jumps and marks) and all have a bit of pace, but none are true crumbers and they get caught out of position in crumbing situations. They also have a tendency to all go up instead of staying down.

This group has included the following players at times since 2017:

-Melksham, Petracca and Spargo (still there)

-Harmes and Fritsch (playing other positions)

-Garlett, vandenBerg, Hannan and ANB (injured or dropped)

-Bugg, Watts and Kent (all moved to other clubs).

 

With talls in Weid, Tmac and Preuss (last year Hogan), we've needed three of these medium/small guys at any one time. 

The combined 7 players that either left the club or are injured/dropped leave a big hole in our options, especially with Harmes and Fritsch playing mid/back. We couldn't expect that we'd have these issues with the players we retained. 

Not many options to juggle right now!

 

 

I think this also compounds with having 4 of our preferred ~8 defenders out (May, Lever, Lewis, Smith) plus a 5th (OMac) out of form. 

 

Finally, we have not had a tall player as a "winner" except maybe Preuss. Gawn, TMac, Weid, OMac, have all been out of form, dropping marks etc.

 

Yep...  Murphy's Law at the moment.

 

Like Whispering... Its time to study the Nab U-18's kids, for what we lack.

 

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