BW511

I’d also be asking the club to have a think about the role Jake Lever plays. He is an excellent interceptor but in the same manner as our forwards being defenders first, he’s not flash at actually defending. I don’t think there’s any reason for a captaincy change, I certainly wouldn’t be giving it to Trac.

I think the coaching staff also owe a few blokes an apology over the preseason/exit period. They may all be gone but Tommo, Laurie, Woey, Dunstan, Melk, Hibbo, Ben Brown, JJ and Spargs could all feel hard done by. They may not be the absolute best option at times but selection integrity has been a disaster. We’ve stuck with a system and group of players that have fallen short for two years straight. Ultimately, the stubbornness and system have failed that group and the club in general. I think there will be considerable movement over this off-season and we’ll find the club isn’t quite as harmonious as it should be

The strategy in our forward half is to be defensive first, it’s what I mean by stifling our players. The only player who is allowed to play as a genuine attacking forward is Fritsch and unsurprisingly, he kicks goals. The gameplan and strategy needs to loosen up to allow pure offence because the defence first version is being shown up year after year.

We need a re-think on the type of player we are drafting/recruiting. McAdam seems to be a shift in that mindset. Being combative is important and has kept us around the mark but the limitations on our playing group are overwhelming. We are exposed for height between HBF & HFF, we lack elite ball users nor do we value them, our gameplan stifles opposition but hurts us even more. Development of players seems to have come to a screeching halt beyond Judd McVee who has been absolutely phenomenal - yes, he made a couple of errors but no more than our leaders/best players do weekly. Our 3 best players, Clarry, Trac and Max have become almost ineffective. They get great stats but what the team gets from them is of far less value. Its’s just so disappointing to be here again and I hope we can address the mental side of our game and double down on ball use

Gut feel, our list is not as strong as people think. Our best 3 players let us down horribly with their skills at key moments

May 6. Rest, better luck in 2024

Being defensive keeps you in games but it doesn’t win you games

Be nice if the 2021 version of Langdon poked his head in

Not sure Petty played any more than 7?

If what you are saying is true, this is the unicorn I have been dreaming of

JVR > Grundy, every day of the week. Despite not hitting the scoreboard, he’s contesting and his ruck work has been really good for such a young kid

Interesting that JVR was excluded, surely if we win he comes straight back in.

Grundy suits the SCG and will make Sydney instantly better.

Langdon and Hunter would want to have huge pre-seasons. Would love to draft a highly skilled mid to enter the rotation and lessen the reliance on Clarry/Gus/Viney.

I hope one of them snaps him up, for his sake and ours

Watching GWS highlights our need for better ball users between HBF & HFF.If I can be real greedy, I’d like them to be 185cm+ and with some pace. Sounds like McAdam might be a start, and then at least one more from there.

I am really struggling to see how people think Maynard’s thought process was anything other than ‘if I don’t get the smother, I’ll take a body’. His intent may not have been to absolutely hurt Brayshaw, but he definitely made the decision to jump knowing body contact would happen. This is where it begins and ends, he went ahead with his chosen action knowing contact would happen. NBA players can run full steam at players to try and block passes/shots in the exact same fashion and this outcome doesn’t occur.

Such a great way of putting it. Stupidly, I read your post at 3am after my 3yo had just woken me up. Spent the next 90 minutes thinking about the Brayshaw and Frawley families and what they are going through. I’ve also had a similar train of thought but related to the smother attempt. If the smother actually worked and the ball was live in the area, I guarantee he lands with his hands ready to push off Brayshaw and win the ball back. The whole thing stinks, if Maynard cared for Brayshaw in the manner he said, it would have been the first thing he mentioned when they interviewed him. Instead he was already pleading his case. I liken it to someone being upset for being caught, rather than for the act itself.

The giants play bloody good football, good to watch and their top end is absolutely elite

How do the Tigers let Lynch go? They won’t have a single forward

I think this is important too. It’s a big risk that high up the draft board. We already get easily beaten in the air across half forward Chandler is very strong overhead and has played well at times, although he’s hardly having a huge impact each week. Caleb Daniel plays for a team that’s gameplan is glorified circle work. He’s not being asked to play up forward and be a key scoring target. More relevant to the role is Weightman, I’m not sure many dogs fans value his output highly. I firmly believe good players can be good regardless but I don’t think our game plan suits a Watson and I don’t know that we do Kozzie any favours either

100% agree with all of this. I was not at all concerned for the result for the night, I just felt sick about what Brayshaw and his family would be going through. Goody openly said Gus was very shattered and upset, I bet it was emotionally charged in the rooms. To interview Maynard after the game was probably the most disrespectful thing I can remember. Gus is downstairs in a really bad way and Ch 7 think this is appropriate? I’m not typically an overly empathetic person and I’m not a huge Gus fan but his health and well-being is significantly more important than anything else right now. The way the AFL is stage managed and the fact that it’s gone to the social media/clickbait model makes me want to permanently walk away.

Genuine question @dazzledavey36, how do you think he performs in our current setup? I am 100% on board for his pace, skills and goal sense, just fear for the bloke when he’s working in a jam tin with 36 other bigger blokes on top of him.

This is by design though, I doubt Stafford says to Goody, what we really want is 26 blokes in here to limit our space and opportunity. Our forward structure and method is the way it is because we don’t have good/reliable field kicks and we want to lock the ball as far from the opposition goal as we can. Our forward setup is all about defence. Stafford nor anyone else will change that

I don’t think any gun forward would want to sit under high balls every week like we demand. We are relying on very low probability marks (huge pack marks) to generate scores and we are asking two undersized players (Fritta and Smith) to be the ones doing it. If you were Fritta (who was very proppy all night), this is the hardest possible way to impact a game/earn a wage. Also, the most risky being in contests with 6-8 blokes all night The most damning thing is every team mentions how they want to keep the ball away from May and Lever because of how they control the air, yet we actively kick to Moore/Murphy/Howe in this way and let them do it to us