Burgo, the EPL & Shorter Quarters

[Adam The God 30,271]

1 hour ago, Grr-owl said:

After I left Aus I paid zero attention to footy for fourteen years. Then I discovered the watch AFL app at the time of the final series of 2015 and thought I’d give the kids some Aussie culture. Well, I was blown away by the change in game style. It felt as if at some point, while my back was turned, a team of scientists had been brought in to work out how to play the game. 

I think it started earlier. I think modern zoning and defensive philosophy from the international sporting domain was first imported when Paul Roos returned from the US in 2002 and became an assistant coach at Sydney under Rodney Eade. When Eade was sacked, Roos was appointed, despite the Swans courting Terry Wallace for much of the year.

Almost as soon as Roos took over the reigns, he transformed the team and the culture and by 2004, his old mate Ross Lyon had joined him as midfield coach from Carlton, having worked under Parkin and Pagan (the latter being more innovative than most in the 1990s). With Lyon's help, Roos revolutionised the sport with his defensive flooding, which lead to low scoring and was widely panned, even by then AFL boss Andrew Demetriou. However, the Swans' style became the vogue for 2005-2006 and saw them make consecutive grand finals. 

The interesting crossover between this period was a young midfield coach at Port Adelaide, who oversaw Mark Williams' premiership-winning midfield in 2004 and was appointed by Hawthorn the next year as head coach, in Alastair Clarkson. Throughout the 2005 season, he was tasked with 'rebuilding' the Hawthorn list, something he went hard at across 2005-2007.

Meanwhile, by 2007, Sydney had played in two consecutive grand finals, winning one and losing the second in 2006. And by the start of 2007, Roos' philosophy had migrated to St Kilda when his former midfield coach Ross Lyon took the reigns of St Kilda. The Lyon gameplan very much focused on the contest and heavy flooding, perhaps even more so than Roos' side at Sydney.

In that same year, Clarkson first implemented his cluster and by 2008, it had won him a flag at Hawthorn. Yes, they got lucky against Geelong in that grand final, but teams really struggled to break down the cluster.

Over the next 5 years, between 2009-2013, the top teams played three major styles. The run and gun of Geelong, best emulated at times by Collingwood under Malthouse. The possession game of Hawthorn. The flooding game of Lyon at St Kilda and then Fremantle. 

I could go on, but I reckon you're right in that the AFL's press and zoning has changed a lot, in a very short period of time. Perhaps my statement that it's nowhere near as technical as soccer is incorrect? I'm always fascinated by trends in the AFL and it'll be fascinating to see where the game takes us over the next 5 years. I hope our club is at the forefront of it, because with innovation, usually comes success.

Edited July 29, 2020 by A F

[whatwhat say what 22,780]

ric charlesworth has had a lot to do with the modern style of aussie rules

[Sir Why You Little 37,046]

2 hours ago, bing181 said:

FWIW:

And that is playing every 2-3 days over a possible 4 weeks...

[At Least I Saw a Flag 5,249]

21 hours ago, chook fowler said:

Gee Burgo is impressive. A great get. Also cudos again to Ben who does a good job with Talking Points. He is well prepared, asks intelligent questions and is respectful without being too obviously PR driven.

Is Ben the work experience kid at the Club?

[chook fowler 19,459]

3 minutes ago, bingers said:

Is Ben the work experience kid at the Club?

I doubt he is on work experience - more like an internship or first job post graduation. Whatever, he’s doing a good job. 

[Adam The God 30,271]

I think Ben is just head of the video content now. Unusual in that just about every industry in this country, you have to be 55+ to get a leg up, whereas it's the complete opposite in the US or Europe.

[Tony Tea 2,809]

5 hours ago, A F said:

I think it started earlier. I think modern zoning and defensive philosophy from the international sporting domain was first imported when Paul Roos returned from the US in 2002 and became an assistant coach at Sydney under Rodney Eade. When Eade was sacked, Roos was appointed, despite the Swans courting Terry Wallace for much of the year.

Almost as soon as Roos took over the reigns, he transformed the team and the culture and by 2004, his old mate Ross Lyon had joined him as midfield coach from Carlton, having worked under Parkin and Pagan (the latter being more innovative than most in the 1990s). With Lyon's help, Roos revolutionised the sport with his defensive flooding, which lead to low scoring and was widely panned, even by then AFL boss Andrew Demetriou. However, the Swans' style became the vogue for 2005-2006 and saw them make consecutive grand finals. 

The interesting crossover between this period was a young midfield coach at Port Adelaide, who oversaw Mark Williams' premiership-winning midfield in 2004 and was appointed by Hawthorn the next year as head coach, in Alastair Clarkson. Throughout the 2005 season, he was tasked with 'rebuilding' the Hawthorn list, something he went hard at across 2005-2007.

Meanwhile, by 2007, Sydney had played in two consecutive grand finals, winning one and losing the second in 2006. And by the start of 2007, Roos' philosophy had migrated to St Kilda when his former midfield coach Ross Lyon took the reigns of St Kilda. The Lyon gameplan very much focused on the contest and heavy flooding, perhaps even more so than Roos' side at Sydney.

In that same year, Clarkson first implemented his cluster and by 2008, it had won him a flag at Hawthorn. Yes, they got lucky against Geelong in that grand final, but teams really struggled to break down the cluster.

Over the next 5 years, between 2009-2013, the top teams played three major styles. The run and gun of Geelong, best emulated at times by Collingwood under Malthouse. The possession game of Hawthorn. The flooding game of Lyon at St Kilda and then Fremantle. 

I could go on, but I reckon you're right in that the AFL's press and zoning has changed a lot, in a very short period of time. Perhaps my statement that it's nowhere near as technical as soccer is incorrect? I'm always fascinated by trends in the AFL and it'll be fascinating to see where the game takes us over the next 5 years. I hope our club is at the forefront of it, because with innovation, usually comes success.

Dean Bailey brought those ideas to us, and were on display from his first game, but he lacked the players and ultimately club support.

[Adam The God 30,271]

8 minutes ago, Tony Tea said:

Dean Bailey brought those ideas to us, and were on display from his first game, but he lacked the players and ultimately club support.

Which ideas? The run and gun?

I don't think we ever had the defensive transition or set ups that Geelong had. We were one way runners.

[bobby1554 1,244]

On 7/29/2020 at 2:32 PM, Engorged Onion said:

Sounds good bobby - out of interest, what's the metric for you to assess whether the approach was appropriate or not?

Rather than looking at a W/L record, I'll be looking for how players compete in the final quarter. I'm not quite sure how to best measure it beyond optics on the tv, as we don't have access to km run per quarter and at what speed per player (unless someone can guide me to those details).

Let's chat in 21 days

No need to chat in 21 days mate.......4 day break between last game and geez we are going really well aren’t we. Cue in the rack boys, cue in the rack!

[Engorged Onion 10,216]

7 minutes ago, bobby1554 said:

No need to chat in 21 days mate.......4 day break between last game and geez we are going really well aren’t we. Cue in the rack boys, cue in the rack!

I'm too emotional to disagree with you right now

Edited July 30, 2020 by Engorged Onion

[Engorged Onion 10,216]

On 7/29/2020 at 2:32 PM, Engorged Onion said:

Rather than looking at a W/L record, I'll be looking for how players compete in the final quarter. I'm not quite sure how to best measure it beyond optics on the tv, as we don't have access to km run per quarter and at what speed per player (unless someone can guide me to those details).

 

@A F @bobby1554 - yes it's only 12/13 days and not 21 - what's your take thus far?

 

Edited August 10, 2020 by Engorged Onion

[Adam The God 30,271]

On 7/28/2020 at 10:24 PM, Engorged Onion said:

https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2020/jul/28/premier-league-2019-20-what-we-learned-tactically-klopp-liverpool-guardiola-manchester-city?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

ive just read through this article and cannot help see some similarities as to what Goodwin is trying to do at the Dees... even if you’re not that interested in soccer, this is a great piece on how tactics fit into soccer more generally, and how certain elements fit into our game. Particularly the high press.

timely with this new EPL thread

I probably should have asked you more specifically what you meant by comparing Liverpool's press with what Goodwin's trying to do. What did you mean there?

[Adam The God 30,271]

1 hour ago, Engorged Onion said:

@A F @bobby1554 - yes it's only 12/13 days and not 21 - what's your take thus far?

 

Given he said he'd link how our defence stood up over four quarters, I think it's fair to say we strangled the opposition the longer the games went on, despite the opposition being ordinary.

It's clear our fitness is an asset. Let's see how we go against Collingwood too.

[Hellaintabadplacetobe 4,294]

8 minutes ago, A F said:

Given he said he'd link how our defence stood up over four quarters, I think it's fair to say we strangled the opposition the longer the games went on, despite the opposition being ordinary.

It's clear our fitness is an asset. Let's see how we go against Collingwood too.

We've quietly become final quarter specialists. The only 2 we have lost were against Carlton who smashed us in that qtr, and Port by 5 points. 

I think that is a great sign that we are fit and should give the players and certainly us fans plenty of confidence that we will run games out. 

From memory (it's not great lol) the last few years we had great 3rd qtrs but fell away in the last, correct me if I'm wrong!? 

 

[Adam The God 30,271]

2 minutes ago, Hell Bent said:

We've quietly become final quarter specialists. The only 2 we have lost were against Carlton who smashed us in that qtr, and Port by 5 points. 

I think that is a great sign that we are fit and should give the players and certainly us fans plenty of confidence that we will run games out. 

From memory (it's not great lol) the last few years we had great 3rd qtrs but fell away in the last, correct me if I'm wrong!? 

 

I think in 2018, third quarters were our strength, yeah.

[bobby1554 1,244]

3 hours ago, Engorged Onion said:

@A F @bobby1554 - yes it's only 12/13 days and not 21 - what's your take thus far?

 

Well it is looking like I may have been wrong Engorged....but I will reserve the final judgement until we have played some half decent teams. Plus we have been rotating players, when the original comment from Goodwin was that we would not.

[Skuit 10,031]

The below was cookied in my text-box following the Port debacle. Maybe I got it wrong. My stance was clear at the time but I haven't reflected since the past match. The FD said they would review and maybe they got it right this time as to mid-week workloads etc. But the third para stands and in my opinion still much of the first (we should be an absolute shoe-in vs Collingwood and I will be highly stroppy if we cough it up). 

.....................................................................................................................................................................................................

Goodwin and Burgo got it wrong. And possibly our administration. I like that my club gets on with things without much fuss because that’s what I like in people and entities I associate with. But four-day breaks aren’t on.

The AFL in its desperation for cash (which I understand) is compromising its primary commodity and putting the livelihoods of the players at risk. We absolutely should have kicked up a fuss. Maybe we did. But one of the aggravating factors – probably for Barlett – is the apparent confidence we went into the game with re. fitness. 

It’s all good to call up mates in the EPL and NBA – and it’s great that they did – but those sports aren’t football. There’s no major team sport as demanding as football: the combination of aerobic, endurance, physicality, difficult skills’ execution, both aerial and ground play, and decision-making – while constantly getting smashed from every direction. 

[binman 43,059]

 

3 hours ago, A F said:

I probably should have asked you more specifically what you meant by comparing Liverpool's press with what Goodwin's trying to do. What did you mean there?

I see a really strong connection, actually, in both our model and that of pies.

Also see some simiarties in the AFL between the two tactical philophsies discussed in that article

I am going to use that lens to look at our game against the pies on the tactics thread.

[Adam The God 30,271]

1 hour ago, binman said:

I see a really strong connection, actually, in both our model and that of pies.

Also see some simiarties in the AFL between the two tactical philophsies discussed in that article

I am going to use that lens to look at our game against the pies on the tactics thread.

There are definitely some similarities. We don't press as highly in the forward 50 as the Liverpool style, but that's because they're different games - Liverpool would press right up to the box. We tend to zone across half forward and then press hard between half forward and the wing if the opposition tries to run and carry the ball out of our offensive zone. Usually teams are out if they get through that forward press, but this year we've tweaked our zone, so we play a double wall in effect. One zone across half forward and then another zone set 20m or so back from that. It's that second zone that provides the press between wing and half forward.

One of the interesting things is that teams seem to try to play quite narrow in order to get through our first forward  zone at their half back. There is usually enough width to our zone to enable one or two defenders to get back and cover if both zones are pierced, and then the likes of Langdon get back to sweep as well.

They also talk about getting delay on the footy. Melksham mentioned this in the post game interview on the website. This is obviously so that it gives our zone time to set itself and cover any opposition transition. In this respect, the AFL is quite different from soccer, in that there's a lot more space that a zone needs to cover, so holding up the opposition is akin to taking a yellow card and bringing a runner down when a side is on the counter in soccer. Our version of getting delay on the footy is tackling, corralling and zoning.

There is a similarity between the way Guardiola plays and the way we are best served. Guardiola's teams pass the ball around midfield and the wings in a similar way to Klopp's team, but Guardiola's try to use pace to get in behind the defence once the zone is spread thin, whereas Klopp's innovation has seen an evolution of that - the backs playing as wingers and ensuring the wingers can provide those crosses or an extra outlet to get overlap and pierce the defensive zone. Man City do it a bit too, but the system isn't second nature to them, because they've relied on pace to get in behind traditionally.

I think in comparison to the Guardiola and Klopp examples of attack above, we prefer the Guardiola version, IMO, where we move the ball quickly inside 50, via the corridor or around the wings (essentially getting in behind the opposition), but with devastating efficiency of disposal. So 3 or 4 40m kicks from half back result in our team walking in a goal or getting to a good position in front of goal.

Where we've struggled is when teams have denied us 'getting in behind' as it were and we've had to work our way forward slowly from centre wing onwards. This requires us to hit up those little leads and use the width of the ground where possible in order to either get it to an inside 50 target or take a shot from just outside 50. My sense is we'd prefer to hit someone up closer to goal and get a higher percentage shot than taking aim from outside 50. I think we need to have a mixture of both approaches. 

Edited August 11, 2020 by A F

[Pates 9,660]

Hard to use the combo of Adelaide and North without pointing out the in Adelaides case they are a young side and younger teams are prone to fade outs (boy we are experienced in watching that!), while North were down almost one fit player on the bench in the last quarter. I also recall Adelaide went down a player early from Nibblers tackle. 

I’m not saying we shouldn’t be pleased with the fitness side of things we’ve seen, and we’ve finished with a flurry twice against top teams but just couldn’t get over the line. If we’re looking at a true fitness test/advantage than this week vs the Pies should be the time to press it. They have the shorter break and bigger injury list, even if Pendles gets up for it he will surely be underdone. While we should have a rested Viney and Gawn returning. 

A rev up from Burgess reminding them of everything they’ve done would be timely given the finish of the condensed rounds. 

Edited August 11, 2020 by Pates

[binman 43,059]

35 minutes ago, A F said:

There are definitely some similarities. We don't press as highly in the forward 50 as the Liverpool style, but that's because they're different games - Liverpool would press right up to the box. We tend to zone across half forward and then press hard between half forward and the wing if the opposition tries to run and carry the ball out of our offensive zone. Usually teams are out if they get through that forward press, but this year we've tweaked our zone, so we play a double wall in effect. One zone across half forward and then another zone set 20m or so back of that. It's that second zone that provides the press between wing and half forward.

One of the interesting things is that teams seem try to play quite narrow in order to get through our first forward press zone at their half back. There is usually enough width to our zone to enable one or two defenders to get back and cover if both zones are pierced, and then the likes of Langdon get back to sweep as well.

They talk about getting delay on the footy. Melksham mentioned this in the post game interview on the website. This is obviously so that it gives our zone time to set itself and cover any opposition transition. In this respect, the AFL is quite different from soccer, in that there's a lot more space that a zone needs to cover, so holding up the opposition is akin to taking a yellow card and bringing a runner down when a side is on the counter in soccer. Our version of getting delay on the footy is tackling, corralling and zoning.

There is a similarity between the way Guardiola plays and the way we are best served. Guardiola's teams pass the ball around midfield and the wings in a similar way to Klopp's team, but Guardiola's try to use pass to get in behind the defence once the zone is spread thin, whereas Klopp's innovation has seen an evolution of that - the backs playing as wingers and ensuring the wingers can provide those crosses or an extra outlet to get overlap and pierce the defensive zone. Man City do it a bit too, but the system isn't second nature to them, because they've relied on pace to get in behind traditionally.

I think in comparison to the Guardiola and Klopp examples of attack above, we prefer the Guardiola version, IMO, where we move the ball quickly inside 50, via the corridor or around the wings (essentially getting in behind the opposition), but with devastating efficiency of disposal. So 3 or 4 40m kicks from half back result in our team walking in a goal or getting to a good position in front of goal.

Where we've struggled is when teams have denied us 'getting in behind' as it were and we've had to work our way forward slowly from centre wing onwards. This requires us to hit up those little leads and use the width of the ground where possible in order to either get it to an inside 50 target or take a shot from just outside 50. My sense is we'd prefer to hit someone up closer to goal and get a higher percentage shot than taking aim from outside 50. I think we need to have a mixture of both approaches. 

Terrific analysis AF. i'm not sue how to quote across thread. Could i ask you to pot this on the tactics thread, perhaps with the link to the guardian article.

The thing that jumps out for me is the  concept of set plays in attacks triggered by agreed to antecedents as opposed to allowing forwards (and others) freedom to go with the moment as take shots as the opportunities arise 

[Adam The God 30,271]

13 minutes ago, binman said:

Terrific analysis AF. i'm not sue how to quote across thread. Could i ask you to pot this on the tactics thread, perhaps with the link to the guardian article.

The thing that jumps out for me is the  concept of set plays in attacks triggered by agreed to antecedents as opposed to allowing forwards (and others) freedom to go with the moment as take shots as the opportunities arise 

I think we know when to rush in behind, because these are the times when we have best mid to forward connection and our forwards really spread the width of the ground to open up even more space in behind them. It's quite marked IMO.

[Engorged Onion 10,216]

3 hours ago, bobby1554 said:

Well it is looking like I may have been wrong Engorged....but I will reserve the final judgement until we have played some half decent teams. Plus we have been rotating players, when the original comment from Goodwin was that we would not.

Sorry, @bobby1554 that wasn't an attempt to let you know 'how wrong you were'... merely getting some feedback from someone with a different take. I do take the same approach about the half decent teams of course. 

[Rodney (Balls) Grinter 10,841]

Regardless of our players being fit enough to handle it and Burgo's enhanced knowledge to prepare the players off short breaks, I'm not convinced that aiming to play the same 22 over these compressed periods is the right strategy.

1.  As good as Burgo's preparation techniques might be, intuitively playing guys that are completely fresh has got to provide some edge in sharpness over guys that are playing off a 4 day break;

2. While we have a healthy list all around if the frindge players are not getting enough match fittness and genuine match practice and development due to the lack of a reserves comp, then I think we need to keep them sharp, confident and in sync with our game plan by playing them periodically;

3. It's still a long season and if we are going to have a genuine crack at a flag, then we want to get to finals without our guns being fatigued and carrying injuries.  In years gone by clubs with the depth like Geelong and WC in 2018 gave them selves a genuine crack at September by strategicly resting players throughout the season.

 

I think we actually achieved a bit of all of the above against North.

Edited August 11, 2020 by Rodney (Balls) Grinter

[bobby1554 1,244]

2 hours ago, Engorged Onion said:

Sorry, @bobby1554 that wasn't an attempt to let you know 'how wrong you were'... merely getting some feedback from someone with a different take. I do take the same approach about the half decent teams of course. 

No need to be sorry, I didn’t take it that way! Good thing about forums is that we can voice different opinions and discuss.