On 09/03/2024 at 07:27, Kent said:

I think that Goodwins' closeness to some payers is a poor look and counter productive Wouldnt be surprised that Max spat the dummy If not we needed a please  explain which wasn't forthcoming

Amazing how fickle people can be on this. We saw the best of them together last year, and we had issues. Max and Brodie were both playing below their best when in the team together. Blame the coaches if need be, blame the list management team who brought him in, but don't blame either of the two guys who obviously tried their best to do something unprecedented and couldn't.

6 hours ago, Nascent said:

Afl website ladder paints a different story, though I'm not sure it makes sense.

Press 'Pos' not 'Pts'

On 08/03/2024 at 21:14, CHF said:

….With Yze gone, who is calling the game from on high with Goody on the boundary? it worked well the last couple of seasons but did not look to have the right level of understanding last night. The coaching group have a lot to work on. not just the team and the tactics, but also their own game time performance.

 

Yep, brought this up earlier. 

Goodwin needs to go back into the box. But he’s very much a creature of habit. Would be genuinely surprised if he did it. 

5 hours ago, bing181 said:

The chance of one becoming available, yet alone being able to get the deal done, are minimal at best. Or to put it another way, how many proven tall forwards have been traded in recent years? Jacob Koschitzke? Mabior Chol?

Brisbane, Collingwood, Essendon, Geelong, GWS, Richmond and until recently Port, Sydney and the Eagles all traded in their #1 KPF.

We have been notoriously lax at the trade table since May and Lever, including the failed attempt to bring in Adam Cerra.

On 09/03/2024 at 15:04, John Crow Batty said:

That said, Fullarton replaced Grundy, let's see how he goes.”

I have less confidence with Fullarron than with Schache as a back up ruckman.  In three seasons, 19 games for 50 hit outs. Is this guy a ruckman? 

Seriously, is there any way that Fullerton could contribute less?

He has been third string at BNE with few opportunities.  

3 hours ago, Willmoy1947 said:

Has anyone mentioned anything about what the absence of Brayshaw would have made in Thursdays game?

i haven't really made the effort to go back 10 or 15 pages to check, but i think he would have made a bit of difference in positioning of some players on both sides, especially in the talks that he had in the centre with the other senior players quite often.

Yes.  Angus’ absence was clear, but, sadly we will have to adapt to this asap.  

Having watched this game again in the calm of my living room I'm surprised there hasn't been much commentary about Jake Lever - imo one of the most mistake riddled games I've ever seen from him.

He certainly needs to lift next week, and I expect he will. 

Considering Brisbane and Collingwood also lost does that make our loss to Sydney any easier to stomach for those who believe it is a major problem and potentially season defining?

3 minutes ago, von said:

Considering Brisbane and Collingwood also lost does that make our loss to Sydney any easier to stomach for those who believe it is a major problem and potentially season defining?

We’ve got some major problems and Bowey’s loss compounds them. 8 weeks means it’s unlikely he’ll find his best till very late in the season.

1 minute ago, Roost it far said:

We’ve got some major problems and Bowey’s loss compounds them. 8 weeks means it’s unlikely he’ll find his best till very late in the season.

Collingwood seem to have major problems too. Out played in a far more dramatic way. 
if we show a lot more at home without the slippery ball will you see things differently at all?

7 minutes ago, von said:

Collingwood seem to have major problems too. Out played in a far more dramatic way. 
if we show a lot more at home without the slippery ball will you see things differently at all?

I think Collingwood will slide to bottom half of the 8, they’ll get found out

On 09/03/2024 at 19:19, Queanbeyan Demon said:

You say we failed @ignition.. Be specific. What did we fail at exactly? Not getting a King? Not getting Curnow? Not getting one of the Footscray guys? What exactly did we fail at?

We failed to acquire a key forward and generate depth. It was all in the thread, perhaps read it. I was all for the targeting of ready-made forwards, but I was ALSO promoting to target ready-made depth such as Tyler Keitel, specifically stating he would be far better than the likes of Schache who is not even VFL ones standard let alone AFL standard, not to mention the ageing Brown and McDonald. I like van Rooyen but he's not even close to his prime (i.e. to match our premiership window with in-prime midfielders and defenders). So what did we see last week.... Schache named who can hardly touch the ball and Brown and McDonald still not ready. The BEST in-prime VFL/SANFL/WAFL key forward (such as Keitel) would have made a far superior option than bloody Schache. Therefore, my point is we FAILED to not only acquire the talent (such as the targeting of Naughton, and fair enough you can't win them all), but also FAILED to generate depth and thus we have the same problems we did last year.

52 minutes ago, Roost it far said:

I think Collingwood will slide to bottom half of the 8, they’ll get found out

Wouldn’t that be nice. Gws look like they’ll cut most teams up.

22 hours ago, Deemania since 56 said:

The more people at selection, the more the variance until a 'tolerated' selection is achieved. We have a balance as a result, based upon individual performances, not credibility; not teamwork combinations and smarts across midlines and flanks. Play-makers and progressions are thus hampered as is the persistency of ad hoc game control, hopeful game planning, game plan execution/alternatives and the depth of player responsibilities/understanding. 

This might always happen if human being were robots, but we have emotions that affect our decisions. Sometimes committees make huge mistakes due to groupthink where the whole committee gets caught up in an idea and once the ball starts rolling down the wrong hill it gathers momentum and can’t be easily stopped by one rational person. 

3 hours ago, Antioch said:

This might always happen if human being were robots, but we have emotions that affect our decisions. Sometimes committees make huge mistakes due to groupthink where the whole committee gets caught up in an idea and once the ball starts rolling down the wrong hill it gathers momentum and can’t be easily stopped by one rational person. 

That is true, Antioch. For the past two seasons, it seems to have negatively affected team selections, newby game experience, recruiting and the loss of key players, senior player integration, team-wide co-ordinations and understandings. The motivators and their motivations seem to have played a second fiddle in such outright confusion.

6 hours ago, Sydee said:

Having watched this game again in the calm of my living room I'm surprised there hasn't been much commentary about Jake Lever - imo one of the most mistake riddled games I've ever seen from him.

He certainly needs to lift next week, and I expect he will. 

Agreed he had a really poor game. Absolute liability with ball in hand and the opposition are starting put a lot of work into him.

However, he’s a gun player in the prime of his career, so I’m expecting another really good season, starting this week.

6 hours ago, Roost it far said:

We’ve got some major problems and Bowey’s loss compounds them. 8 weeks means it’s unlikely he’ll find his best till very late in the season.

Brisbane just lost Kiddy Coleman for the year, Carlton just lost Docherty for the year.

Losing Bowey for 8 weeks is bad, but we're not the only club to exit Opening Round with a worse injury list.

6 hours ago, von said:

Collingwood seem to have major problems too. Out played in a far more dramatic way. 
if we show a lot more at home without the slippery ball will you see things differently at all?

Yes and no.

There are parts of that game where GWS completely dominated.

However, Collingwood ended up with more inside 50s, more scoring shots and had a higher expected score than GWS. I know that sort of description when applied to us triggers a lot of people, but it's evidence to suggest Collingwood weren't as far off it as it might have looked.

Given most think GWS is a flag contender, I'm reserving judgment on Collingwood until I see some more games from them. I'm not sure they'll lose like that much more for the rest of the year.

Agree on the last point though - I'm reserving judgment to a large extent on us until I see us play in non-tropical conditions.

39 minutes ago, titan_uranus said:

Brisbane just lost Kiddy Coleman for the year, Carlton just lost Docherty for the year.

Losing Bowey for 8 weeks is bad, but we're not the only club to exit Opening Round with a worse injury list.

Yes and no.

There are parts of that game where GWS completely dominated.

However, Collingwood ended up with more inside 50s, more scoring shots and had a higher expected score than GWS. I know that sort of description when applied to us triggers a lot of people, but it's evidence to suggest Collingwood weren't as far off it as it might have looked.

Given most think GWS is a flag contender, I'm reserving judgment on Collingwood until I see some more games from them. I'm not sure they'll lose like that much more for the rest of the year.

Agree on the last point though - I'm reserving judgment to a large extent on us until I see us play in non-tropical conditions.

Gws looked far more damaging with their entries and possession chains. Collingwood had a bit of us about them in that possession didn’t necessarily amount to much. Jury is out on us and Collingwood for me. Gws too for that matter as it’s round one and the season is long. I was just interested in the contrast between our reaction generally to our loss and then seeing the reigning premiers get pretty comprehensively beaten and how that relates to their chances this season according to those on here who have written us off already.

watching the game live and then finally seeing the replay there were two things that stood out for me.

 

1. The fumbling was off the charts. Sydney handed the conditions well. We had NFI. Again our poor handling and decision making probably cost us the game. We could have taken a 3/4 goal lead at qtr time instead we had 1 goal. We over handled the ball and it cost us

 

2. Sydney continually switched play to find a loose player before kicking back into the corridor. Our defensive positioning was woeful. When they had the ball we were stagnant  and had 2 or 3 players standing 10m away from their kicker 'guarding grass'. Sydney players would run wider and further allowing the kicker to spot up their players with relative ease. And under no pressure which made them look more sure handling

Similarly when we had the ball we crowded the player with the ball rather than spreading out the ground. Sydney were able to create huge width with their positioning. We simply crammed players together in the middle. You could easily see this when we handballed to a teammate standing 2m away. And then we fumbled by putting ourselves under ridiculous pressure.

Both issues reflect poor coaching and on field leadership.

 

 

For some time now I have been wondering about van R. After Thursday’s game my opinion has been confirmed. I don’t see him as more than being occasionally useful. He is not an A grade player. We are desperately short of KPF’s which is no secret, we have no choice but to keep playing him but IMO he is far from the answer. 

6 minutes ago, old dee said:

For some time now I have been wondering about van R. After Thursday’s game my opinion has been confirmed. I don’t see him as more than being occasionally useful. He is not an A grade player. We are desperately short of KPF’s which is no secret, we have no choice but to keep playing him but IMO he is far from the answer. 

I tend to agree that he's not the answer but he's young, physical and competitive so he'll be more than useful. He needs a companion in Petty, then with Fritsch, Pickett, Petracca and ANB we have a solid forward half. We just need to get it in a bit quicker. The problem I see is after our best 23 we drop away fast and with no obvious replacements for May and Gawn we are open to problems. Maybe we'll get a good run with injury but with Gus and Smith leaving us 2 down, Melksham 3 down, BBB and TMac 5 down, Schache basically 6 down, you then add McAdam, Petty, Bowey and our list is threadbare. Unless guys like Laurie, Woewodin and Howes step up and the likes of McVee, Sparrow and Rivers keep going well we're in trouble if and when injuries strike. It looks like we've found one in Howes who by my reckoning looks set to build in confidence as the season goes on. Bowey a huge loss if it means Salem comes out of the middle. 

8 minutes ago, old dee said:

For some time now I have been wondering about van R. After Thursday’s game my opinion has been confirmed. I don’t see him as more than being occasionally useful. He is not an A grade player. We are desperately short of KPF’s which is no secret, we have no choice but to keep playing him but IMO he is far from the answer. 

It was pretty tough conditions for forwards but there needs to be less focus on intensity and contest, and more on getting seperation and space.  Fritta says hi.  4 marks a game this year to take the next step.  Below this bar and the odds of being a bona fide AFL forward is quite low.

He has the hands, so perhaps his positioning is NQR but hard to tell when not at the ground.   Having said all that he has an appetite to jump and impose himself physically which as we know is very desirable trait.  2nd year, just needs time. Not easy playing on the best key defender also.  

 

 

On 11/03/2024 at 09:03, Sydee said:

Having watched this game again in the calm of my living room I'm surprised there hasn't been much commentary about Jake Lever - imo one of the most mistake riddled games I've ever seen from him.

He certainly needs to lift next week, and I expect he will. 

Lever cost us 3-4 goals with turnovers and under 10s mistake in the goal square to give up an easy goal.  May was good. Lever was not.  

28 minutes ago, old dee said:

For some time now I have been wondering about van R. After Thursday’s game my opinion has been confirmed. I don’t see him as more than being occasionally useful. He is not an A grade player. We are desperately short of KPF’s which is no secret, we have no choice but to keep playing him but IMO he is far from the answer. 

JVR has some way to go before he is considered an A grade tall forward but put Petty next to him and I am sure his output would be much better.

Thursday was not the best night (from a conditions perspective for tall forwards), it was a pretty scrappy game and really slippery. The swans have a few guys that are decent overhead, and they really didn't fare any better than JVR.

McDonald 3 marks

McLean 2 marks

Amartey 1 mark

JVR had 2 marks with less support than the Swans guys and still similar output - I also note he had more disposals than the Swans tall forwards. We have unrealistically high expectations for Jacob because atm he is our only tall that can compete with bigger bodies. We need Petty back asap or move May forward or take a chance on Adams. 

While we keep persisting with other talls (who I don't need to mention) that can't physically compete and present in the F50 JVR will continue to struggle 

 

on a scale of 1-100, how absurd is the notion of moving may forward?

20 minutes ago, whatwhat say what said:

on a scale of 1-100, how absurd is the notion of moving may forward?

120