tiers

I like Mooney. 2020 Go dees.

@skuit I never posted about monkeys. @demonland Someone has posted a fake comment in my name. Please investigate and fix.

To @Skuit Thanks for the suggestions (I have used them before) but I prefer to keep my postings as short (in length) as possible. Some posters quote long entries and add only a single line of commentary. I find these posts wasteful. Navigating these threads is hard enough without spending time scrolling through pages and pages of repeated entries.

to PaulRB Agree. The best captains can swing the momentum of a game. I recall how Garry would move on to the ball when we were lagging and lift the team by his own effort and leadership. None of our captains since have had this ability. I hope Maxie has.

To La DVC There are very few players with the awareness and intelligence to be good on field leaders. There are plenty of media and pr people at a club to fill the role. Think Maxie before he was made captain. I want to win games, not hearts, minds and clicks. They will follow if we win games. My first choice was TMac because I have seen his leadership on the field in close games.

The captain should be the on field leader of the team. Not the media darling nor the pr front man for the club. So long as Maxie provides the on field leadership and direction I don't care how he speaks or how entertaining the press conferences are. Nathan Jones was a great captain who led from the front and whose only weak point was that he could not lift the team in a match. Should we ever get silverware while he is still playing, his hand should be on the trophy together with the captain and the coach. My hope is that Maxie can add the extra dimension and lead our club to success. 2020 Go dees. Go Maxie's mob/mates/maulers/mugs/mass/multitude/ - add your own.

2007 was the year that it all fell into place for cats. The squad was mostly 5+ years into their careers (many had been drafted in the early 00s) and they had played together as a team for three to four seasons. They were primed. Should apply to us. 2020 Go dees.

Who cares?

Easy transitions for our opponents arise when the ball movement into our forward line is so poor as to almost invite an easy repulse and transition. Moving the ball into the forward line with purpose and skill and holding it there will mitigate the problem. Get the forward line working properly should be the key. At that point, a single defender behind the ball is the best strategy to protect against transitions. 2020 Go dees.

Thanks to the administrators for providing quick links to the quality training reports by Deespencer, Baghdad Bob, George and others at the front of this topic so that we can get straight to the important stuff. The training posts have been excellent in their objective and succinct coverage of the happenings at training and they are the best feature of the summer months. In their training reports they avoid the banal commentary in other posts. They have elevated their contributions for the benefit of those of us who just wish to follow our team, unconditionally support ALL our players no matter what and are excited about season 2020. 2020 Go dees.

Simple. Left footesr have a natural advantage over the majority right footers in that they can turn clockwise onto their kicking foot and evade right footers who find the turn unnatural. As a result, they have less need to kick right foot. But right footers have no such natural advantage so have to learn to kick both feet. Its what made to dorks more potent under Clarko.

Or a spring roll for vegetarians.

A goal is a goal is a goal .....and six points no matter how it is called.

Northey came to the club at the end of the Barassi era and inherited a group of emerging u19 players such as Greg Healey, Yeats, Newport, Bailey and others who had played together as a group under Slug Jordan. He added recruits Spalding, Viney, Dean and Lovett (from Dorks) and changed the structure of the team. At the beginning of 1987 our best half back line was R, White Icke Giles. By the end of the year it was Lovett Spalding Grinter. That change alone made a colossal difference. Neale arrived in 1998 and was blessed by the return from several injury affected seasons injury of Lyon, Tingay, Schwarz, G Lovett and the drafting of White and Johnstone. He did well until he was comprehensively out coached in the preliminary final by Pagan. His reluctance to play Stynes and White on the ground at the same time arguably cost us the game. Thereafter while we made finals we never competitive. Northey coached finasl for five consecutive years, Neale coached finals 6 years out of 9. Each had a very slim chance in a GF but 1990 under Northey still hurts. Neale probably had the better list but did less to develop them and left a lesser legacy for his succesor. Balme got us into finals after only 2 years after Northey whereas it took 12 years after Neale. That Neale is still with us is a comfort. Blessings.

For sheer beauty and consistency, Phil Roden's drop kicks from full back in the reserves were without peer. Tassie Johnson and Bernie Massey were next best for drop kicks. Post the drop kick era, for distance, Darren Bennett and Paul Wheatley were consistently long and good. Flower, Lyon, Hughes, Yze, Davey and many others were long and reliable kicks and Jackovich especially when shooting for goal. But the greatest of all was Travis Johnstone who had the unique and innate ability to kick the ball so as to draw the player to the ball in the best position to take the mark. Unfortunately his team mates at the time could not adapt to his skill and did not anticipate his kicks and the coaching panel at the time seemingly ignored it. What a waste of a weapon.

Of all the features that are common to good teams, it is games played together as a group that is most important. Aerobic fitness and mental strength can be trained into the players but the intuitive and instinctive responses to team mates' play counts for at least as much if not more and can only be developed by training and playing together as a group for an extended period. Pre season 2019 did not allow this to happen and the team suffered. Pre season 2020 is looking much better. 2020 Go dees.

Co-captains are too confusing. Select a single outstanding on field leader and let him loose. Can have many vice-captains or particular function captains but only one leader for others to follow. TMac for me.

Limiting the choice to Maxie and Viney might not offer the best option. Viney's comments suggest he is getting ahead of himself. Many of the recent successful teams have not had captains that were their most outstanding or even their most determined players eg Maxwell, Harley, Easton, Cotchin but rather those who could lead the best. We should look for leaders, I still prefer TMac for the role. He is a leader who can lift the team.

Report post #51 This was posted in another thread by mistake. I believe it belongs here. I was once considered to be a very reliable shot for goal in my admittedly very, very low level suburban league team. I never trained goal kicking and took my kicks quickly in matches. I had a very simple kicking action - I was as good off 1-2 steps as off more. It's all in the balance at the point of kicking and the ball drop. I have watched goal kicking ever since with an interested eye and the standard of goal kicking has neither improved nor declined. The length of the run ups is irrelevant as the player needs to be balanced only at the point of kicking the ball. The ball drop is critical and that is the area in which I would focus the training. The angle of the run up for a set shot can make a difference eg Maxie should always run out to the right and use his natural hook to kick straight (a la Buddy reversed). When he run straight in he hooks. Any coaching must address this issue and how to abandon the 30 second rule. If the technique is right, who needs 30 seconds to stuff a mouth guard in a sock or jocks. So there are the key coaching principles - balance at the point of kicking, controlled ball drop and direction of run up. All can be readily implemented in a coaching regime. Confidence will flow from adopting these principles. One last comment - any player running free within 40m of goal should be encouraged and supported to shoot directly at the goals. Better to at least have a shot from a free position than to screw it up by short passing to a team mate in a worse position (recall how often this has happened and the opportunity for a score is lost).

I was once considered to be a very reliable shot for goal in my admittedly very, very low level suburban league team. I never trained goal kicking and took my kicks quickly in matches. I had a very simple kicking action - I was as good off 1-2 steps as off more. It's all in the balance at the point of kicking and the ball drop. I have watched goal kicking ever since with an interested eye and the standard of goal kicking has neither improved nor declined. The length of the run ups is irrelevant as the player needs to be balanced only at the point of kicking the ball. The ball drop is critical and that is the area in which I would focus the training. The angle of the run up for a set shot can make a difference eg Maxie should always run out to the right and use his natural hook to kick straight (a la Buddy reversed). When he run straight in he hooks. Any coaching must address this issue and how to abandon the 30 second rule. If the technique is right, who needs 30 seconds to stuff a mouth guard in a sock or jocks. So there are the key coaching principles - balance at the point of kicking, controlled ball drop and direction of run up. All can be readily implemented in a coaching regime. Confidence will flow from adopting these principles. One last comment - any player running free within 40m of goal should be encouraged and supported to shoot directly at the goals. Better to at least have a shot from a free position than to screw it up by short passing to a team mate in a worse position (recall how often this has happened and the opportunity for a score is lost).

If we can develop Oliver, Harmes, Viney, Brayshaw, Jones, ANB, AVB and Trac into a strong midfield group then we wont need a Dusty/Danger type. We will have all the attributes we need. Go to it coaching panel.

Was a deserved number 2 pick but sadly ruined by injury. The decision of the club in appointing him captain may have been unwise but it did not cause his injury problems. A fine young man who should be welcomed back to the club at any time. His experience with adversity might help others to overcome theirs.

I have posted before about the late Dean Bailey's comment that it takes 70 games for a core group playing together to build the necessary understanding within the team. Also McCartney once said that it takes five years to develop a footy player. When added together, 2020 is the year when both streams come together. Think Oliver, Brayshaw, Petracca, Salem, Viney, TMac, Frost, Weideman, Max, Harmes, Hunt, Melksham, Hibbert and others. Remember that Hogan missed playing in the great games at the end of 2018 and AVB finally played. There is genuine cause for hope if we have a full pre season. 2020 Go dees.

Shot on (not at) goal - a straight lift from soccer intended to make the person speaking sound more worldly and intelligent. Only used by dummies. Offence (not forward) - straight lift from basketball (the only sport where deliberate fouls in the last seconds are considered both good play and good form) for the same reasons as above. Only used by dummies. Left to right, right to left - describing the movement of the ball when kicking at goal - its like listening to cricket commentators talk about swing or movement off the seam. Yet to be observed by sentient viewers. Thankfully mainly used only by one of the biggest dummies in town. Minor premiership - straight pinch from rugby league for the same reasons as above to offer some kudos to the team that finishes on top of the ladder. Who has ever cared about who finished on top, only flags count. Makes dummies look dumber, not smarter. Off season - straight take from any foreign sport. In footy there is never an "off season" as we live it all year round, just don't get to watch much between October and March. Lastly the ugliest of all - it's the ladder, never a table. Straight pinch from English soccer for those want to sound more worldly and intelligent. Only used by phony, pretentiou,s self serving, so-called sophisticates. Really only dumb, dumberr and dumbest. Those who use this offensive term should be required to wash their mouths out with soap and disinfectant and voluntarily remove themselves from the footy world until they have served a long period of contrition, penitence and repentance and sought forgiveness and reinstatement to footy society. We have lost our pride and belief in the superiority of our footy. All other alien and inferior sports should be ignored and disregarded. Footy is good, better and the best sport ever invented by man (or God). Leave it alone.

Tex quitting is a lesson in understanding leadership qualities. There is no analogy with our captain. When he was firing and Bruuuuce couldn't wait to exclaim "Tex' he was seen as the ultimate leader able to "kick a captain's goal". When he struggled to get a kick, let alone a goal, he was seen as a impediment to success. What this episode says is that leadership is not dependent on personal performance but on personal qualities. Do not compare Nathan Jones to Tex. Jones has always shown the personal qualities of a leader but seemingly has struggled with the need to offer direction as well as leadership on field. His efforts against all odds in his career have been exemplary. He needs help and it is up to the coaching panel to find it.