Game plans, tactics and all that jazz

[binman 38,484]

28 minutes ago, Engorged Onion said:

@titan_uranus - what radio station is this presented on?

SEN - Hoyne is on the drive show every Tuesday night.

I have to say, he's really good in the way he uses multiple data points to illustrate a point he is making, as opposed to taking one piece of data and extrapolating some point from it.

A great example of the latter is pundits querying our connection issues and scoring power, and pointing to our raw total scores in the last few weeks as evidence to back that opinion up.

BUT completely ignoring the fact the issue isn't connection, it is accuracy, as evidenced by the fact that our shots on goal has remained relatively steady (and certainly on, or above AFL average in this period).

Or the fact, that taking out the Pies games against the Roos and Eagles (and really scores of 105 and 120 against those two teams is hardly a ringing endorsement of their connection or fire power), the Pies have have struggled with scoring shots (they played the Roos in the same round as we played Freo - and only had 3 more scoring shots! And we lost!).

And after all we only played the pies two games ago and had NINE more scoring shots that them!

Yet OUR scoring power and connection is on Montagna's 'watch list'. Go figure.

On our accuracy, when were AFL# 1 Hoyne warned that we would revert to the mean at some point, so be careful of reading too much into our scoring power (ironic). He has been proven correct.

Edited June 28, 2023 by binman

[SFebes 4,692]

I really wish people would stop comparing 2023 back to 2021. For a lot of obvious reasons.

[Engorged Onion 9,352]

@WheeloRatings @binman

I should update my reality - it has been almost a decade since I listened to SEN, mind you I put it on the other week and had around 4 minutes of ads blasting at me... and promptly turned it off.

Seems though there is some good segments though?

Thanks.

[binman 38,484]

44 minutes ago, Engorged Onion said:

@WheeloRatings @binman

I should update my reality - it has been almost a decade since I listened to SEN, mind you I put it on the other week and had around 4 minutes of ads blasting at me... and promptly turned it off.

Seems though there is some good segments though?

Thanks.

There is only two worth listening to in my opinion - Hoyne on Tuesday drive and Sanderson on Thursday Whatley.

Both are always available on the SEN website under podcasts

[WheeloRatings 939]

2 minutes ago, binman said:

There is only two worth listening to in my opinion - Hoyne on Tuesday drive and Sanderson on Thursday Whatley.

Both are always available on the SEN website under podcasts

@Engorged Onion I also recommend the ESPN Footy Podcast, with Christian from Champion Data. Incidentally, they responded to a question of mine on the podcast this week regarding expected scores for Melbourne's 186 point loss and how it compared to West Coast's loss on the weekend, but unfortunately they only have expected scores since 2013!

[titan_uranus 22,458]

2 hours ago, WheeloRatings said:

SEN. You can listen to it on the SEN Sports day podcast, and specifically the "Full On Footy Analysis with Daniel Hoyne".

In relation to the first point, I have posted the updated "premiership metrics" for 2023. Melbourne currently rank in the top 6 in 18 of 19 of these metrics. The last 11 premiers all ranked in the top 6 in at least 14 of these 19 categories.

 

 

Thanks @WheeloRatings. Your work is exceptional.

Interestingly our numbers this year are similar to our 2021 numbers, with the defensive criteria being stronger than the scoring criteria but across the board, not just top 6 but top 4 in most (and with bounces conceded being no good in both years!).

2 hours ago, SFebes said:

I really wish people would stop comparing 2023 back to 2021. For a lot of obvious reasons.

I agree to an extent, despite my posts today in this thread.

I don't think it's helpful or healthy to keep referring to 2021 and assuming that we're just going to "click" and everything's OK.

The players also have said this year a few times that in 2022 we were guilty of trying to play 2021-style football too much and we've gone away from that this year. I was relieved to hear that.

However, what I do think is interesting to compare is that a lot of what we're doing this year on the numbers is similar to what we were doing in 2021. We've now played every good side in the comp other than Adelaide so the numbers under consideration are statistically significant and give us a good data set.

Again, this doesn't mean I believe that in the next few weeks everything's just going to flip. 

[titan_uranus 22,458]

2 hours ago, Engorged Onion said:

@WheeloRatings @binman

I should update my reality - it has been almost a decade since I listened to SEN, mind you I put it on the other week and had around 4 minutes of ads blasting at me... and promptly turned it off.

Seems though there is some good segments though?

Thanks.

You should do what I do and listen to the programs on delay, as podcasts. The SEN app has them, I'm not sure where else you can find them, but as podcasts aside from an ad at the start they're ad free so you get the entire show/segment without the ads and therefore without the delays as well.

[WheeloRatings 939]

5 minutes ago, titan_uranus said:

Thanks @WheeloRatings. Your work is exceptional.

Interestingly our numbers this year are similar to our 2021 numbers, with the defensive criteria being stronger than the scoring criteria but across the board, not just top 6 but top 4 in most (and with bounces conceded being no good in both years!).

Thanks @titan_uranus. It's a similar profile to 2022 as well - the third tweet in the thread looks at non-premiers with the most premiership metrics and Melbourne ranked top 6 in 18 metrics in 2022. It's not a guarantee of success, but you're unlikely to win the premiership if you have too many holes in these areas of your game.

 

 

[binman 38,484]

40 minutes ago, titan_uranus said:

I don't think it's helpful or healthy to keep referring to 2021 and assuming that we're just going to "click" and everything's OK.

To be clear, TU, i'm not suggesting this of you, but the idea that anyone is suggesting or assuming that we're just going to "click" and everything's OK is a weird false narrative that seems to pop up on DL at this time of the year. 

I don't recall reading a single post, this year, or in previous years making that suggestion. And nor for that matter is Hoyne (not suggesting you are saying is he is).

Everything has to go right, and not much wrong to win a flag.  

It's about giving the team the best possible chance of winning the flag.  

#reject false narratives

Edited June 28, 2023 by binman

[Binmans PA 26,232]

IMV, 2021 is important, because we (and others) will use it as a template to try and emulate. Throw in some lessons/learnings from Geelong's management program last year as well, except unlike Geelong's approach we'll only know the full story of our own 2021 approach.

As a result, I believe that we deliberately tweak our ball movement through the middle of the season. I think we may have landed on it in 2021 as a response to our fatigue in that year or had a very deliberate strategy going into 2021 knowing we'd do this.

As @binman often alludes to, Goody is a coach that plays the percentages and is seemingly a man of data accordingly. I've no doubt our FD would be all over these same CD numbers (and thanks for sharing, @titan_uranus) and more, and be saying we're doing a lot right, we just have to execute better (ie at this stage, we have to take our opportunities in front of goal).

But back to the tweaks to our ball movement during the middle parts of our season, we are happy to deliberately go slower and longer to contests inside 50 if that's the state of that particular play (ie there's not someone free or in plenty of space inside 50).

The other situation we're okay with during the middle parts of the season are finding free players across the 50m arc or wider in the pockets. It means less running and as the opposition tries to cover the more dangerous central areas as they begin to fatigue as well, those situations are more likely to be easier to hit up.

However, slow ball movement to 1v1 contests often result in stoppages and kicks to the pockets/flanks/outside 50m across the arc, result in poor conversion. The reason is obvious. Many of our shots are either coming from tough angles, long distances or from snap shots off stoppages. But the trade off is as we have territory, it means we're essentially protecting our defence up the other end, and making the opposition defend us.

I think if you look back to our 2022 season, we did a similar thing with our ball movement. Because a lot of our guys were playing injured and we often had little continuity in the back 7-8 due to injury ruling out players entirely, we tried to protect the defence by taking territory and trying to lock the ball in. The problem was our ball movement became so predictable that it didn't always result in grinding out a territory win, but often allowed teams to slingshot on us from the ensuing ground ball that would go to a contest. 

But despite this predictable and dour style, it enabled us to be a stingy defence and defence wins flags. Our problem was we never really got our offence going again. The exception being that Brisbane game in Round 23 of 2022. 

Anyway, if you remember back to the last few weeks of the 2022 season, we started to try and take on the corridor more, but it seemed like a bit of a plan on the fly or we simply didn't have the right guys to execute it.

This year, we've set ourselves up more to slingshot and take on the corridor when it's on. It feels like a very deliberate plan. However, this dare has gone out of our game somewhat in the middle part of our season, but with the slingshot method in play, IMV, we're giving ourselves a better chance of creating 1v1s or free numbers ahead of the ball by playing the slingshot method as a key to scoring.

Also, one of the main differences during the middle part of this year in comparison to 2021 and 2022 (2022 in particular) is that when we're going slow and long to a contest inside 50, we're going more centrally. This does have the potential to open us up more as going centrally provides the opposition with more exits, but we're maintaining a really good shape behind the ball, which enables us to almost tempt the opposition to chain out of our A50 and get through us. However, it's a risky move for them, because if we can create a turnover, we should have a decent look going back the other way. And conversely even if the opposition do get through, hopefully we can push them wide, slow them down or win 1v1s behind the ball to halt their attack.

In short, I believe we deliberately tweak our ball movement during this period of the year and part of that sees lower accuracy, but ultimately, I think our turnover game, which has been a greater focus this year, is providing us stronger scoring potential than a pure clearance focus and territory game as per 2021 and 2022. We simply need to be more accurate when we get those chances inside 50.

Edited June 28, 2023 by A F

[titan_uranus 22,458]

12 minutes ago, binman said:

To be clear, TU, i'm not suggesting this of you, but the idea that anyone is suggesting or assuming that we're just going to "click" and everything's OK is a weird false narrative that seems to pop up on DL at this time of the year. 

I don't recall reading a single post, this year, or in previous years making that suggestion. And nor for that matter is Hoyne (not suggesting you are saying is he is).

Everything has to go right, and not much wrong to win a flag.  

It's about giving the team the best possible chance of winning the flag.  

#reject false narratives

Agree, and I wasn't suggesting you were arguing this either.

It's the same as when people (myself included) refer to other clubs' seasons, such as the slow starts Richmond had in their premiership winning seasons. The fact they've happened before doesn't mean they are necessarily (or even probably) going to happen to us, but they are examples of what a season can look like and why our season to date can be considered enough to have us in flag contention.

As you say, there is a lot we have to do to win it from here. I agree that we've given ourselves a good platform to attack the final 9 weeks of the season.

[rpfc 27,511]

17 minutes ago, A F said:

IMV, 2021 is important, because we (and others) will use it as a template to try and emulate. Throw in some lessons/learnings from Geelong's management program last year as well, except unlike Geelong's approach we'll only know the full story of our own 2021 approach.

As a result, I believe that we deliberately tweak our ball movement through the middle of the season. I think we may have landed on it in 2021 as a response to our fatigue in that year or had a very deliberate strategy going into 2021 knowing we'd do this.

As @binman often alludes to, Goody is a coach that plays the percentages and is seemingly a man of data accordingly. I've no doubt our FD would be all over these same CD numbers (and thanks for sharing, @titan_uranus) and more, and be saying we're doing a lot right, we just have to execute better (ie at this stage, we have to take our opportunities in front of goal).

But back to the tweaks to our ball movement during the middle parts of our season, we are happy to deliberately go slower and longer to contests inside 50 if that's the state of that particular play (ie there's not someone free or in plenty of space inside 50).

The other situation we're okay with during the middle parts of the season are finding free players across the 50m arc or wider in the pockets. It means less running and as the opposition tries to cover the more dangerous central areas as they begin to fatigue as well, those situations are more likely to be easier to hit up.

However, slow ball movement to 1v1 contests often result in stoppages and kicks to the pockets/flanks/outside 50m across the arc, result in poor conversion. The reason is obvious. Many of our shots are either coming from tough angles, long distances or from snap shots off stoppages. But the trade off is as we have territory, it means we're essentially protecting our defence up the other end, and making the opposition defend us.

I think if you look back to our 2022 season, we did a similar thing with our ball movement. Because a lot of our guys were playing injured and we often had little continuity in the back 7-8 due to injury ruling out players entirely, we tried to protect the defence by taking territory and trying to lock the ball in. The problem was our ball movement became so predictable that it didn't always result in grinding out a territory win, but often allowed teams to slingshot on us from the ensuing ground ball that would go to a contest. 

But despite this predictable and dour style, it enabled us to be a stingy defence and defence wins flags. Our problem was we never really got our offence going again. The exception being that Brisbane game in Round 23 of 2022. 

Anyway, if you remember back to the last few weeks of the 2022 season, we started to try and take on the corridor more, but it seemed like a bit of a plan on the fly or we simply didn't have the right guys to execute it.

This year, we've set ourselves up more to slingshot and take on the corridor when it's on. It feels like a very deliberate plan. However, this dare has gone out of our game somewhat in the middle part of our season, but with the slingshot method in play, IMV, we're giving ourselves a better chance of creating 1v1s or free numbers ahead of the ball by playing the slingshot method as a key to scoring.

Also, one of the main differences during the middle part of this year in comparison to 2021 and 2022 (2022 in particular) is that when we're going slow and long to a contest inside 50, we're going more centrally. This does have the potential to open us up more as going centrally provides the opposition with more exits, but we're maintaining a really good shape behind the ball, which enables us to almost tempt the opposition to chain out of our A50 and get through us. However, it's a risky move for them, because if we can create a turnover, we should have a decent look going back the other way. And conversely even if the opposition do get through, hopefully we can push them wide, slow them down or win 1v1s behind the ball to halt their attack.

In short, I believe we deliberately tweak our ball movement during this period of the year and part of that sees lower accuracy, but ultimately, I think our turnover game, which has been a greater focus this year, is providing us stronger scoring potential than a pure clearance focus and territory game as per 2021 and 2022. We simply need to be more accurate when we get those chances inside 50.

Well said, AF. I posited last year that our ball movement and entry into the pocket was suspicious in its protection of our defence and curtailing transition. 

I don’t think we are as bad as that right now which is promising, but I think that trust in our ability to cause a contest across half forward has been dealt a blow. Smith has been ignored in 1-1 hit ups since he returned, JVR is so promising but just a kid and rarely have I seen ball movement quick enough for him to get it leading at the carrier inside 65m from goal. Instead we delay for a pack, Gawn to arrive, or just pump to an out on the boundary. Will BBB make a difference? I hope so, will our eyes lower against the teams down the bottom and get us going? Will players allow themselves that extra half second, the inboard or forward hand pass? These are the things that seperate FDs.

[old55 21,356]

The idea that 2021 was somehow a "perfect season" is some of the greatest Demonland revisionism.

We drew with struggling Hawthorn and lost by 20pts to the Dogs at the MCG in late July and plenty on the site were calling for Goodwin's head. 

We smashed GC at the start of August and things rolled from there. Although I had mates writing us off for the season at 3qtr time vs Geelong in the last round.

2021 was stuttering until the finals.

[Slartibartfast 15,814]

16 minutes ago, old55 said:

Although I had mates writing us off for the season at 3qtr time vs Geelong in the last round.

Really!  Wow.

[binman 38,484]

40 minutes ago, old55 said:

The idea that 2021 was somehow a "perfect season" is some of the greatest Demonland revisionism.

We drew with struggling Hawthorn and lost by 20pts to the Dogs at the MCG in late July and plenty on the site were calling for Goodwin's head. 

We smashed GC at the start of August and things rolled from there. Although I had mates writing us off for the season at 3qtr time vs Geelong in the last round.

2021 was stuttering until the finals.

Indeed.

And for much the same reason as our current stutters, i would contend.

Edited June 28, 2023 by binman

[old55 21,356]

1 hour ago, Slartibartfast said:

Really!  Wow.

Givemethenews!

[Jaded No More 58,191]

1 hour ago, old55 said:

The idea that 2021 was somehow a "perfect season" is some of the greatest Demonland revisionism.

We drew with struggling Hawthorn and lost by 20pts to the Dogs at the MCG in late July and plenty on the site were calling for Goodwin's head. 

We smashed GC at the start of August and things rolled from there. Although I had mates writing us off for the season at 3qtr time vs Geelong in the last round.

2021 was stuttering until the finals.

People look at the prelim and grand final in 2021 and somehow think this level of perfection is sustainable or even repeatable. It is not. 

We were never this good during the H&A season and we will probably never be this good again. It was a freak performance that was up there with one of the greatest finals performances of all time. 

The more we expect to see it again, the more disappointed we will be. 

[demon3165 1,944]

5 hours ago, SFebes said:

I really wish people would stop comparing 2023 back to 2021. For a lot of obvious reasons.

Why 21 is the starting point to look at, 22 bundled out straight sets, playing the same way in 23 how else are you meant to compare season on season to see where they have improved or gone backwards.

[demon3165 1,944]

Easily explained over to you Simon

https://www.sen.com.au/news/2023/06/28/the-area-of-melbournes-game-that-will-haunt-them-in-september/

[Wodjathefirst 2,340]

35 minutes ago, Jaded No More said:

People look at the prelim and grand final in 2021 and somehow think this level of perfection is sustainable or even repeatable. It is not. 

We were never this good during the H&A season and we will probably never be this good again. It was a freak performance that was up there with one of the greatest finals performances of all time. 

The more we expect to see it again, the more disappointed we will be. 

I’ll preface my comment by what Daicos said after the Adelaide game- words to the effect ‘the crowd support means a lot to us, it’s like having an extra man on the ground’ (not to forget the influence they can have on umpiring decisions). Home crowd advantage is BIG!

In 2021 the huge crowd support we got in WA was a one off- it too is by and large unrepeatable for us back here. I know it’s only an opinion and everyone has one -I felt  it had an incredible positive impact on both our finals performances over there.

I don’t think it is a coincidence that Goody, the players and even marketing from MFC is trying to get our supporters to go to games and make some noise. 

In terms of trying to compare 2023 with 2021 - I don’t.  To win a premiership you need a good team that is well coached and switched on at the pointy end of the season and luck with injuries. Luck plays a big part.
So in the meantime, those of us that can, turn up to our games and be loud- it can only help our boys….GO DEES!

[titan_uranus 22,458]

8 hours ago, old55 said:

The idea that 2021 was somehow a "perfect season" is some of the greatest Demonland revisionism.

We drew with struggling Hawthorn and lost by 20pts to the Dogs at the MCG in late July and plenty on the site were calling for Goodwin's head. 

We smashed GC at the start of August and things rolled from there. Although I had mates writing us off for the season at 3qtr time vs Geelong in the last round.

2021 was stuttering until the finals.

I agree that it wasn't a perfect season. I also can't stand it when people look at our finals performances and think that is the standard required, or the standard we maintained all year.

But I've argued a number of times that I don't agree that 2021 was "stuttering" until the finals. We had a dip in form mid-season, but our overall record of 17-1-4 made our entire 23-round H&A season dominant on the whole.

Remember that, prior to the bye, we beat GWS (away), Geelong, Sydney, the Dogs (at Marvel) and Brisbane. We were great pre-bye, then were comparatively poorer in Rounds 13-19 (although in the middle of that run we beat Port Adelaide, in Adelaide, by 31 points - they finished 2nd and made a prelim and that was their only loss from Round 14 to the prelim), then nailed the final month and the finals.

[Neil Crompton 4,794]

18 hours ago, Jaded No More said:

People look at the prelim and grand final in 2021 and somehow think this level of perfection is sustainable or even repeatable. It is not. 

We were never this good during the H&A season and we will probably never be this good again. It was a freak performance that was up there with one of the greatest finals performances of all time. 

The more we expect to see it again, the more disappointed we will be. 

Jaded, this is exactly what our football department believe. Our Pres recently stated this, saying something similar to “ their belief is that we are unlikely to see the quality of football we played at the end of ‘21 again in our lifetime”. Disappointing to hear, but certainly doesn’t mean we cannot win another premiership, within this current window, with a less perfect scenario. 

[John Crow Batty 8,258]

Whilst our scoring has now dried up our defence appears on paper performing far better compared to earlier in season. In contrast when we were scoring freely earlier in the season our defence was significantly looser compared to the past few seasons and now. One could say our game was more balanced earlier because we were more likely to outscore the opposition with faster riskier ball movement at the expense of conceding a few extra goals. Now to maintain a strong defence we strangle our forward line. Gawn, JVR or who ever are boxed in by defenders and unable to take marks. Small forwards have no room to move.  A robbing Peter to pay Paul scenario. We really miss BBB and Tmac who could function in a slow forward ball movement environment. 

[FlashInThePan 1,893]

I hesitate to put this out there because I'm advocating pushing out players that perhaps don't deserve it but here goes. I think our forward problems are mostly execution based and not structural. I think we have survived for too long with very decent role players. Further I get the feeling that Goody, on occasion, overvalues these people. So here is how I'd change it up:

1. ANB comes out and Chandler moves to play that role. He is not on ANB's level as a runner but he is pretty damn good and he has x-factor. He will have to work hard to cover the holes that ANB does but I think he can do it.

2. Bowie comes forward and takes Chandler's position. I think his defensive mindset and incredible field kicking would make a significant difference to our forward entries and F50 tackles

3. This one is very speculative: I would look at Smith as potentially taking a more pressure forward role, he has great speed and can defend well. He plays instead of Spargo and we bring in another tall such as BBB if/when ready

I just want to acknowledge that both ANB and Spargo have been great role players, if not always consistent. I just think we need to look at significant personel changes to get a different outcome.

[layzie 28,938]

The finals performances will be burned into people's minds forever. For a lot of people it will be hard to remember anything thay happened the home and away season over that month of footy.