At the break of Gawn

Of the game itself, I thought we were far better with contest and clearance, but as expected, Collingwood's defence was just too good and our forward entries not dangerous enough. I'm a firm believer that we're never going to have the wood over Collingwood until both Pendles and Sidebottom retire. Their on-field leadership and footy IQ is too far above ours.

May played a ripper of a game, but he has form with sort of behavior. Gawn on the other hand has been reminded time and time again to be aware of his limitations with his kicking, yet decides to do a torp and inevitable turns it over I'm sort of in both camps here, but May needs to say this at the team review. Not out on the field

Hopeful but not confident like many others on here. A bit like before the Brisbane game although I think we have a good history of challenging the Lions, the Pies we don't. We flipped the script against Freo back in round 6 so maybe we can do it against the Pies. If there's one vulnerability for the Pies it's their midfield, and despite the debacle last week in Alice, we've been basically the best contest and clearance side over the last 6 weeks. Stopping Daicos is crucial and someone needs to run with Sidebottom all day. Melksham can hopefully limit Moore's intercepts and then we're in with a shot. Dees by 10 if the above can happen.

You know May got coaches votes last week, right?

I'm happy with the JvR inclusion. He really troubled Moore last year in this game. Although tbh more forwards troubled Moore last year. Not quite sure about the Howes inclusion. Only thing I can think of is allowing us more flexibility with Turner or it's to move Windsor back to the wing.

I'm actually happy that Cox played VFL and not an inclusion. Cox has played some blinders against us and he always goes in hard against Gawn almost with an intent to injure. McStay will be severely underdone and I hope they select him.

In: JvR Out: AJ Does McVee take Hill or Elliott?

Was thinking the very same thing this evening. The Suns streak since 2015 being broken was also a real shame.

Interesting you say that because the last two times we've played there we've let the opposition have 140+marks and 100 more disposals. Ross must have just watched last year's tape because it's pretty obvious we just don't know how to defend that ground or the players just curl their toes up every time they go to Alice.

Yeah I agree their intensity was way off. But surely to allow an opposition 140 marks comes down to coaching too? Surely it's just not a matter of asking the players to close down space but not being able to. Clearances were relatively equal and contested possessions were too.

Pressure ratings can sometimes be misleading in high possession games. The saints had 100 more disposals than us and a 140 marks which is just ridiculous. They made the ground wide and played keepings off the whole game. Unfortunately when you play a zone defence, you just open up pockets of space.

Excluding the round 24 game last year where we basically played our Casey side, our last 3 games against the Pies we are: 6.15 to 14.5 7.11 to 9.6 8.18 to 9.8 I can absolutely see a score line like the above happening again. The Pies always force us wide and out pressure us. It will happen again. We flipped the script against Freo in round 6. Surely we've learnt from previous encounters and try and do whatever we can to get some corridor shots on goal?

We just don't have enough wriggle room after the 0-5 start. We're now up to 7 losses and basically need to go 8-3 in our last 11. Need to go 3-1 over the next 4 weeks to realistically have a shot. That means beat Port and then only drop 1 of GC away, Adelaide away and Pies.

I watched Lyon's presser and he mentioned the local school football team wears the Saints colours which may have been why.

For those just blindly blaming our inaccurate kicking need to have a look at the shot map in wheelo's stat files. We barely get any opportunities straight in front. For all the strides we've made over the last 6 weeks, our forwards continue lead into the pocket leading to difficult shots on goal. The Saints used the corridor much much better for better quality entries. They kicked 7 goals basically dead in front within 30m. Our entries still aren't good enough, and if you go back and watch the QF against the fifth in '23 you'll see the same thing. If you pressure the opposition and force them wide, guess what? They have difficulty converting. Given how close the competition is, I think we need 14 wins to definitely make it. That means we basically can only afford 2 maybe 3 more losses for the year but still have Collingwood twice, Gold Coast in GC and Adelaide away.

Absolutely [censored] me that Petty and AJ give away some of the most unnecessary free kicks. Unless AJ has a remarkable last 3qtrs, then there's surely no way he plays next week. JvR actually worried Moore a bit last year so I'd definitely bring him in.

I think if we get off to a good start and the Saints players start to doubt whatever strategy Ross has cooked up, we could turn this into a big win. Dees by 57pts.

Really need to win tomorrow to stay amongst the pack. If we lose, we're then 2 games outside the 8 and then a red hot Pies, Port away and GC away.

Giants and Freo winning makes tomorrow really important for us to stay in touch. A win and we're still only one game outside the 8. A loss and we're 2 games out and face s red hot Collingwood.

We're going to challenge the Pies far more than the Hawks are. You need an A grade midfield and a dominant ruck to challenge Collingwood. The Hawks have neither. It's a pity our kicking was so bad against the Hawks a few weeks ago, we really should have won that.

I agree that does make sense, but I also get the sense there was some attitude shifts from round 6 onwards. Pressure and the manic tackling inside 50s are all effort based. As Goodwin talked about, there seemed to have been a lack of focus on the things we value defensively. That was switched back on from round 6 which has complemented other parts of our game. It would have been nice for that shift to have happened earlier because being 0-5 gives us so little room to make a really good run for finals.

Even Carlton are in the top handful of teams who transition well from the D50 to their forward 50 but are 18th for scores per inside 50. I'm not sure you can really hang your hat on that stat when it's not a complete picture of ball movement in regards to scoring. Also, most of our scores are coming from forward half intercepts, not via the back half. The added defensive pressure, the tackles inside 50, the way we're changing angles on entry are all contributing. Clearly there was an emphasis on forward 50 tackling pressure too from round 6 onwards. It's been off the charts since the Freo game.

Again, the stats don't support this. A significant shift in our ball movement, defensive pressure, territory and forward half intercepts all started from round 6 onwards. I find it amusing that Binman questions this when the first thing on the Freo episode of the podcast he mentions the change in our pressure rating which has clearly gone through the roof since round 6. I'm not saying they weren't working on it all summer, but I am saying that the players clearly weren't executing it properly. Take our forward handballs as an example. We basically had no forward handball game before the Freo game. Suddenly, it's brought out and it's obvious for all to see. In round 1-4 Oliver had close to a 50-50 kick-to-handball ratio. In round 6 he had 20 handballs and only 5 kicks. Do you think he just woke up that morning and decided to handball more that game instead of getting direction from the coaches?

Then why don't the stats support this? Surely we would have seen some of this in the earlier rounds.

I have to admit I had already considered Goody gone after the Essendon game. This is a guy who has been nothing but stubborn in his tenure, and always playing his favourites. What him and the coaching staff have been able to do is pretty amazing. I'm not sure what meetings took place the week of the Freo game, but clearly there was a change in our playing style from that game onwards like what the data suggests (no team changes angles more than Melbourne the last 6 weeks). My guess is that they knew that if we rolled out the same method, we'll get killed by Freo. The plan worked which has then given clear evidence on how much it can help us I don't buy the 'teething issues' excuse to start the season. There was a fundamental change in how we played from round 5 onwards. It was bold, but it's bloody worked well.