PREGAME: Rd 11 vs Adelaide

[Bring-Back-Powell 14,709]

20 minutes ago, Redleg said:

We seem to come up against sides that are reasonably close to full strength while we are still losing players each week to injury.

For example,  would we have beaten the Bombers without Shiel, Smith and Stringer, their best 3 against us?

I’ve noticed that too. I can’t recall playing too many sides with multiple injuries to their best 22 aside from say Richmond and Port. Sydney had a few out as well.

Another bug bear of mine is the opposition’s continued amazing accuracy. 6 out of the last 7 weeks the opposition has kicked more goals than behinds. One of the last 6 weeks we’ve kicked more goals than behinds.

Furthermore, our combined opposition score for the season is going at 60% accuracy for the season which is the most accurate in the Comp. In other words we’re letting out opposition kick the most accurate scores which is killing us.

Compare that to Adelaide who’s opposition have gone at a combined 45% which is the least accurate in the Comp.

[Rodney (Balls) Grinter 10,795]

6 minutes ago, Bring-Back-Powell said:

I’ve noticed that too. I can’t recall playing too many sides with multiple injuries to their best 22 aside from say Richmond and Port. Sydney had a few out as well.

Another bug bear of mine is the opposition’s continued amazing accuracy. 6 out of the last 7 weeks the opposition has kicked more goals than behinds. One of the last 6 weeks we’ve kicked more goals than behinds.

Furthermore, our combined opposition score for the season is going at 60% accuracy for the season which is the most accurate in the Comp. In other words we’re letting out opposition kick the most accurate scores which is killing us.

Compare that to Adelaide who’s opposition have gone at a combined 45% which is the least accurate in the Comp.

Part of the opposition accuracy thing could be down to us letting them get the ball in good positions in their forward 50.

Why our players/coaches don't say to hell with the high performance managers and spend more time on getting our goal kicking right astounds me as well.  Though the inverse to the easy shots in good positions logic could be partly true for us as well, I recall far too many goals missed from near on straight in front 20m - 40m range, which should be givemees for AFL footballers.

A bit more time focused on our goal kicking could make us a 4 to 6 goal better side each week, even without any improvement to other parts of our game.

[At the break of Gawn 4,460]

48 minutes ago, Redleg said:

We seem to come up against sides that are reasonably close to full strength while we are still losing players each week to injury.

For example,  would we have beaten the Bombers without Shiel, Smith and Stringer, their best 3 against us?

Also true of Port (although it was round 1 so you’d expect a healthy list) who have been hit by injuries.

And also the Saints who’s injury curse got a lot worse after playing us.

Have not played one team with close to the amount of key outs as us.

[Redleg 40,806]

3 hours ago, At the break of Gawn said:

Also true of Port (although it was round 1 so you’d expect a healthy list) who have been hit by injuries.

And also the Saints who’s injury curse got a lot worse after playing us.

Have not played one team with close to the amount of key outs as us.

I laugh at the experts who say injuries are not an excuse.

Of course they are.

If you lose a close game, with half your side out,  against a side at nearly full strength, of course it is an excuse.

Maybe coaches don't like to use it, as they deal with the "we had 22 and so did they" mantra, but maybe change the word "excuse" to "reason" and it is a good one.

[old dee 23,743]

4 minutes ago, Redleg said:

I laugh at the experts who say injuries are not an excuse.

Of course they are.

If you lose a close game, with half your side out,  against a side at nearly full strength, of course it is an excuse.

Maybe coaches don't like to use it, as they deal with the "we had 22 and so did they" mantra, but maybe change the word "excuse" to "reason" and it is a good one.

You have my vote

[Little Goffy 14,419]

6 hours ago, Rodney (Balls) Grinter said:

I like the positivity and never say die Goofy. 

   No relation.

[Rodney (Balls) Grinter 10,795]

21 minutes ago, Little Goffy said:

   No relation.

Oh, yeah.  Lol!

Sorry about that one old chap.

[Rodney (Balls) Grinter 10,795]

1 hour ago, Redleg said:

I laugh at the experts who say injuries are not an excuse.

Of course they are.

If you lose a close game, with half your side out,  against a side at nearly full strength, of course it is an excuse.

Maybe coaches don't like to use it, as they deal with the "we had 22 and so did they" mantra, but maybe change the word "excuse" to "reason" and it is a good one.

And the inverse is also true.  Many of the great coaches like Leigh Mathews openly acknowledge that to win a premiership, you often need to have a pretty good run with injuries.  Was a big part of Richmond winning the flag a few years back.

Conversely we have been on the back foot injury wise the whole season.  I do wounder if we played injured players we otherwise wouldn't have to try to go as deep as we could last September?  I'm not saying that was nessasrily the wrong strategy, but we gave certainly paid for it this season.  Some warned of it from early preseason, but I have lived in hope until around now that it wouldn't completely stuff our season, but alas.  It seems like we started the season underdone and on the back foot injury wise and just haven't been able to have any run of luck or good injury management to be able to recover from that position.

[Little Goffy 14,419]

Well, I'm going to keepy up the positivity and say, at least we get a look a several young players who might be terrific contributors in future when they have a chance to be the support instead of the core.

And maybe we have also exposed a couple of players to the delisting knife, which helps with list turnaround.