I think the thing that can get missed is the on field relationship between Koz and Brown. If BBB isn’t taking the mark, he’s knocking it to where Koz is lurking. Weid and TMac rarely do it. Brown makes Koz better.

 

14 minutes ago, binman said:

I honestly think some people still can't quite get their head around the fact that players can have very low possession numbers, and if a forward limited scoring, and still play great.

This is true in spite of our coach and  players taking about playing the assigned role being the key performance metric all last season. 

And in spite of the fact that goody continues to select players like kozzie, spargo and tmac even after stretches of low possession, no goal games.

You don't need the coach to tell you what the role of such players is - it is obvious; pressure, contest and work rate.

All three of those players did so much up and down the ground running last night it was insane (check out their vision on afl staystpro for evidence of that).

The equivalent player at Port to spargo and kozzie was amon. How often did you see him in our forward half? How many goals did he create though his pressure?

I don't think weed worked as hard as tmac, but that might be confirmation bias on my part.

What he definitely did do was screen and block really well for Max and tmac.

Watch tmac's goal - weed puts a great block on to give him protection to take the mark.

(which by the by is why, seemingly to the frustration of some, our talls so often fly for the same ball - that and having two or three genuine talls fly for a mark in our forward line means if not marked it almost certainly comes to ground)

Applying the role playing logic, it is possible goody was happy with weeds game.

Very good point Binman.

It's almost a given that some  players are relying on the 1%ers and team acts especially pressure ones to keep their spots in the side,

But what you will also notice is that those players have their time in the sun ( or lick of the ice cream if you wish) and will play a pivotal role in our success on occasions.

I posted about a week ago  about our team roles and the old adage of it it ain't broken don't fix it.

I said many Demonlanders want players dropped on pure stats we itbout considering the team role etc AND the fact that there opponent has not had any major effect or damage in the game yo the result.

For instance Hunty had not been our best Back in 2022 but ha has defended grimly and shown enough skill in his play with run ons to keep his place.

I can also say  that Smithy has learnt so much in his 6 games since last year about team snd role playing ( and still had his amazing ability to do about half a dozen "Smithy" skill type acts mostly spectacular ) that separate him from ordinary to X factor! 

Hunty is also a bit like Smithy in that regards and perhaps we can't have both in our defence if we want you be watertight and miserly ie up to Maysie and Rick Levers very high standards. ( No doubt Salem's also but he doesn't get involved) 

The fact of the matter is we have about a Dozen defensive players (Angus now included) who can play AFL and AA standard  and play their role and team play and no real loss of excellence is noticeable in the game. 

Perhaps we should also thank Troy Chaplin for this situation AND never forget Jason Taylor snd Tim Lamb for gathering our defensive stars and teaming them up to be the rock behind our great team since about halfway through 2020.

Bowser Hibbo Riv Tommo say HI!!! and some new recruits like Turner Judd McVee Deakin Smith are only warming up fir their roles in the future when asked to!

And there's a few more defensive type players in the wings ( pun intended ) Langers and Gus when on the wing Kossie Spargs ANB JJ now snd Tommy Sparrow snd heaven forbid Clarry Trac Harmesy Jack V and the rucks Maxy and Dogga that all play their part. 

By the way Angus now refers to the defence as "the Men's Club".  He is right again as all of the above when defending are playing real tough and uncompromising footy which almost resembles trench warfare to our  team.

Long May it continue. 

I don’t get it. People calling for Tomlinson to be dropped?? - our defence held them to less than 40 points (3 of the goals in junk time) and was Tommo ever actually beaten one-on-one? Why change it? 
 

The Weid/TMac question is really difficult. Weid is holding most of his marks (at last!) and is probably the future - but TMac does a hell of a lot of blocking/heavy work. I’ll trust the selectors.

23 minutes ago, —coach— said:

I think the thing that can get missed is the on field relationship between Koz and Brown. If BBB isn’t taking the mark, he’s knocking it to where Koz is lurking. Weid and TMac rarely do it. Brown makes Koz better.

 

Agreed but Kozzie feeds off Tmac as well IMO as do our small forwards off all the talls.  Just that BBB and Kozzie  have a special connection. 

9 hours ago, DeeSpencer said:

The May, Tomlinson, Lever trio seems to work better than going smaller with Smith, but I just feel Tomlinson is a long way off his best and Smith has a chance right now to finally string games.

We need depth in case Hunt or Rivers go down or if Gus has to go to the midfield. 
 

Assuming he’s healthy and gets through some trainings I’d get Smith back in 

I'd argue Smith is not a "smaller" option - yes he is 3 cm shorter but far more capable of high marking and spoiling overhead marks than Tomlinson. He is also considerably faster and more agile than Tomlinson. The benefit with Smith is that he has the capacity to play on a range of opponents from small to tall effectively. Is he perfect - clearly no but he will continue to improve imo if given more game time

Port were chopping off most of our handball strings, this may be what clubs are looking at to stymie our run. We just have to cut out some of the Hollywood handballs.

Think only the one change.

Ben Brown in. Not sure who goes out, but I would rather Weid gets a run of 4-5 games. He's better as no. 2 or 3 key forward rather than the no.1 tall with Tmac running up field. Weid's best has been at the G and we have a run of games there

Perhaps play Tmac off the bench

Edited April 7, 20223 yr by Stiff Arm

I view Tomald and Weed as having as equal a claim to the second forward spot besides BBB. If Weed had he kicked a couple of goals last night, I’d have definitely given him that role.

I still reckon this should be the case although I say so a little more reticently. Tomald seems to have trouble getting off the ground and might benefit from a rest. I’d say he is probably in his last year this year and probably needs to be managed this year so we can get the best out of him when it counts. TMac still has something to offer, but it will likely be in bursts ala Brad Ottens in 2009 and 2011 and Crackers Keating in 2002 and 2003.

I think Weed should be given the opportunity to show his wares ala 2021. From the Carlton game to the Collingwood game at the SCG, he was given a block of matches to state his case. Sure, he wasn’t up to starting 22 caliber but at least we didn’t die wondering. 

Do the same this year. Give him 4 to 5 weeks to make his case. If he can, then great. If not, we stick with McDonald for most of the year while Van Rooyen develops.

47 minutes ago, Ollie fan said:

I don’t get it. People calling for Tomlinson to be dropped?? - our defence held them to less than 40 points (3 of the goals in junk time) and was Tommo ever actually beaten one-on-one? Why change it? 
 

The Weid/TMac question is really difficult. Weid is holding most of his marks (at last!) and is probably the future - but TMac does a hell of a lot of blocking/heavy work. I’ll trust the selectors.

YeH I was wrong Weid held 3 (rather than 1) marks but of course didn't like j a goal.

He now averages 2 a game though, so maybe that will keep him in the team!

TMac is in an awful space but is still miles ahead of Weid.... for now.

He's probably cooked and the clo k is ticking but they could try Van Rooyan first if possible  ..One would hope anyway.

Weid equals depth

Weeds are what you keep around the edges  until you plant something that will flower

 

Edited April 7, 20223 yr by IRW

1 hour ago, old dee said:

If the  task is for a full forward to score zero and have no influence on the game then he stays in.

I'm not defending Weed as I think you could tell by his body language after the game that he feels he has let another opportunity slip. With BB available he will unfortunately find it difficult to retain his spot

However, the way the game was played it was never going to be easy for him to have much influence. Port flooded back and did everything possible to suffocate forward 50 entries, but unlike us they did this by shear weight of numbers (rather than very well executed zone defence). When they did win possession it was followed by a series dinky sideways kicks that achieved nothing and they invariably found they had nothing forward of centre to kick to. It was actually quite comical to watch them fail over and over again. Even the commentators (either Watson or Burgoyne) said that it was a complete waste of time and could never threaten to win the game with approach.

TMac undoubtedly had more influence and impact in the game than Weed so it would be difficult to find a reason to omit him before Sam. 

I'm staggered people are suggesting Pickett should be dropped - you can forget about that happening whilst he continues to deliver the sort of "team first" pressure acts we are seeing from him. 

I was impressed last night to hear from every player interviewed that its a total team first attitude that is the focus. If anyone doesn't want to play that way I suspect they would be out pretty quickly.  

I think Tom McDonald was our most influential forward last night. He got to more contests than Weideman and Fritsch and while he didn't take many marks, he brought the ball to ground when he was in the vicinity. It appeared to me that Port was able to defend more easily when the ball was kicked to any other forward.

We should have kicked at least 15 goals last night. That we didn't was because of poor quality forward entries which was partly due to a propensity to bomb the ball forward, but also because of a lack of movement by the deep forwards which didn't give those bombing the ball better options. McDonald seemed to be the only one prepared to run around.  On that basis, I'd bring back Brown for Weideman.

At the other end, no change is required so even if Smith, Hibberd or Petty are ready, they'll have to cool their jets. When Salem is ready, he'll be an automatic in and should replace Brayshaw who will return to the wing. Who actually goes out will have to wait until Salem is ready.

11 hours ago, titan_uranus said:

Brown returns for one of Weid or TMac. Do the FD go with Weid's brownie points from last week, or TMac's brownie points from ages back?

Smith deserves to come back too. Not sure who he comes in for. Hunt wasn't great so that's an option. Potentially Tomlinson depending on GWS" forward line?

Definitely not Tmac. It highlighted to me watching the game last night how often he uses his big body to crash packs & open the game up for our little half forwards. Weid & BB have their strengths but definitely don’t play the crash & bash footy Tommy does.

2 hours ago, binman said:

I honestly think some people still can't quite get their head around the fact that players can have very low possession numbers, and if a forward limited scoring, and still play great.

This is true in spite of our coach and  players taking about playing the assigned role being the key performance metric all last season. 

And in spite of the fact that goody continues to select players like kozzie, spargo and tmac even after stretches of low possession, no goal games.

You don't need the coach to tell you what the role of such players is - it is obvious; pressure, contest and work rate.

All three of those players did so much up and down the ground running last night it was insane (check out their vision on afl staystpro for evidence of that).

The equivalent player at Port to spargo and kozzie was amon. How often did you see him in our forward half? How many goals did he create though his pressure?

I don't think weed worked as hard as tmac, but that might be confirmation bias on my part.

What he definitely did do was screen and block really well for Max and tmac.

Watch tmac's goal - weed puts a great block on to give him protection to take the mark.

(which by the by is why, seemingly to the frustration of some, our talls so often fly for the same ball - that and having two or three genuine talls fly for a mark in our forward line means if not marked it almost certainly comes to ground)

Applying the role playing logic, it is possible goody was happy with weeds game.

"Applying the role playing logic, it is possible goody was happy with weeds game"?.

Possible, but a key forward MUST kick goals, so let me say that there is no way known BBB Will miss next game so that leaves either T. Mac or Weeds most vulnerable. If Goody was happy with Weeds Role then I thought T.Mac was better and he kicked a goal. So for me its still BBB for Weeds and Smith for Tomlinson who, at this stage is playing well and gaining confidence. Spargo in spite of pressure acts just doesn't hit the scoreboard enough for my liking and would prefer either Chandler or Bedford.

Edited April 7, 20223 yr by picket fence

2 hours ago, Lil_red_fire_engine said:

Not that I can see either getting omitted but Pickett 29 pressure acts and Spargo 10 says to me some may be looking at the wrong one in the gun. 

Agree, Spargo has been average.  I’d drop him before Pickett

7 hours ago, bluey said:

Experts don’t know what the the Weed was tasked with.

Competing well probably would be in the notes.

He didn’t play well, he was not in the right spots and also allowed clean marks from his opponent.

They may keep him in this week but that performance is not going to be rewarded long term.

Brown is a definite in. I would keep Weideman for now and see if we can make that duo work because Tmac is on his last legs IMO. 
 

Smith may come back (we have a long break he will be out of iso with plenty of time to spare), but I can’t see how they make changes to a backline that conceded 1 goal in real play time and 3 in junk time. 

8 minutes ago, rpfc said:

Competing well probably would be in the notes.

He didn’t play well, he was not in the right spots and also allowed clean marks from his opponent.

They may keep him in this week but that performance is not going to be rewarded long term.

If that performance keeps him in, who goes out for BBB? 

Ch7 were going on about our squad and our 'embarrassment of riches" last night, we've moved on from plain embarrassment at least.

Hopefully these selection headaches will keep players on there toes. Without injury hard to see the Dunstan cracking this team for a while.

Will be hard for Smith to get back into the team next week, will be even harder when Petty back.

I like Weid, but think he'll be out next week.

10 hours ago, CYB said:

TMac just understands the game better than Weid. How to position himself where to lead etc.

 

 

Well he has played 150 more games than Weed so you’d expect that. you hear key forwards talk and it takes years to learn this stuff
I reckon Weed needs more experience and regular games to be a solid player. Maybe he’ll end up moving to get that

6 minutes ago, DubDee said:

Well he has played 150 more games than Weed so you’d expect that. you hear key forwards talk and it takes years to learn this stuff
I reckon Weed needs more experience and regular games to be a solid player. Maybe he’ll end up moving to get that

Weideman was really poor last night and has frustrated me for a while, but I think you're right.

He needs a good block of 4 week stretch of games alongside BB to see if he has what it takes. 

He's now in his 7th year in the AFL system so the excuses are running out for Sam.

There's a young bloke by the name of Jacob Van Rooyen who's breathing down his neck if he keeps his VFL form up.

11 hours ago, Nasher said:

That interpretation of it did go through my head too, but at the end of the day, we don't know the real dynamics of the relationship with Max and Joel, or any of the players. It could be hurtful or they could all just laugh about it - who knows.

Gus and Gawny were joking with Bowey on this week's podcast about how they approach dealing with May's grumpiness. Post-game, Lever called May a big dugong, and they've talked before about their stark differences in personality.

In the context of the pact the team made about not needlessly bringing each other down, I really do think the dynamic is just respecting and embracing what each player brings both on-field and as to character, even if done so playfully.

Every interview, our stars constantly cite the contributions of our lesser-lights. Lever said Hunt had been amazing the last few weeks. From the outside, everyone seems really content at the club right now, and I believe that Goody and Max have built a phenomenal culture.

Most of the recently dynastic teams stunk of arrogance or had a brutality about them. We seem to have a fun, more light-hearted temperament (probably as a reflection of our captain). It's noteworthy that we're not yet hated by most opposition fans. 

I think Brown will come in for Weid and I think that Hunt goes out for Joel Smith, who offers us another dimension.

Bit of talk on radio today about the Wines tackle being looked at, not sure if it was ANB. Hopefully no suspensions from the game. 

 

 

2 hours ago, Stiff Arm said:

Think only the one change.

Ben Brown in. Not sure who goes out, but I would rather Weid gets a run of 4-5 games. He's better as no. 2 or 3 key forward rather than the no.1 tall with Tmac running up field. Weid's best has been at the G and we have a run of games there

Perhaps play Tmac off the bench

I'm with you. Notwithstanding the fact that TMac had a (marginally) better game than Wiedeman I hardly think he played a game that means he automatically stays in. Weideman needs to be given 4 games to cement his spot (or otherwise). I don't see how you can play TMac off the bench. You would need to drop a midfielder to accomodate him (all of whom are playing better that him? Who yould you suggest?)

Brayshaw off HBF seems to be working well and in any case I doubt it would be an improvement to bring Smith back in at the expense of Sparrow or Jordan. So maybe Smith for Hunt, Petty for Tomlinson & BBB for TMac. 

Edited April 8, 20223 yr by Sydney_Demon
Typo

In: Ben Brown. Out: someone.

5 hours ago, Lil_red_fire_engine said:

Not that I can see either getting omitted but Pickett 29 pressure acts and Spargo 10 says to me some may be looking at the wrong one in the gun. 

I don’t underestimate what Pickett does but he’s got some glaring issues atm. People refuse to see it. He needs to be pulled aside especially about pushing players in the back and late hits. 

2 effective disposals and 4 Frees against, lucky it wasn’t more.