Stu

You’ll notice that the non ex-football commentators aren’t quite as rigid in their opinions, whereas the ex-players are. I think some part of it is their ego. They think that they swung the result of games with sheer desire and force of will, rather than training, natural ability, and emotional health in their outside life. No one is saying that it’s the only reason a team will lose but that it’s a key factor in performance (NOT result). But they see things more rigidly and think that the few % points lost in performance from loading won’t make a difference and to admit that it does dismisses how awesome the players are. But at the elite level (in any sport) it is only a few % points in performance between winning and losing.

Looking forward to another great show tonight gents! It was so enjoyable to watch how well we covered the switch, time after time! Freo are one of the best teams at making the ground wide, so to see us prevent it as often as we did was remarkable. We managed to intercept or slow up a number of their attempts to go quick through the corridor. In fact, a lot of their scores from rebound were from good fortune where we managed to partially intercept the rebound, but due to a bad bounce or a fumble they got lucky. Do you think that contributed to Freo playing more conservatively as the game wore on? Looking ahead to this week against Collingwood: Do you think the Pies will similarly revert into their shells under that level of pressure? Or will they be stronger in their resolve to be attacking? The fact that Collingwood couldn't close out the game against Port seemed to indicate their players are fatigued. Given they've had to run till the final whistle in pretty much most games in their 10 game streak, do you agree that they may be starting to fade? I can see there is a lot of questions and comments, so no pressure to include mine if time is short :-)

@binman

@binman I watched the segment you referenced and I had a obnoxious grin on my face while watching it, such was my confidence. All the talk of teams switching it so much against us just made me think of a rat in a maze. I don’t think Freo will know what hit them when they try to switch it against us tonight! I didn’t mention it because King contradicts himself day to day, so any take on it would be outdated pretty quickly 😂

I have to say that this line here really got me 😂 Who could turn down such an offer?

Dees 80 - Freo 38 ✊

What sort of draft picks would we need to give Fox Footy, to get the deal done?

Another thing to consider is how the dynamics of the mental side changes from here on out. Teams have clearly planned for games against us, either to prove their ability (freo, swans, pies) or get redemption (cats), with most of them playing their best game of the season against us. In each of the four upcoming games, our opponents will all have something to lose, such as a top 4 spot or even top 8. That changes how freely teams will play against us. Coaches can’t just take huge risks because the consequences may undo all their effort to this point in the season. It’s easy to throw caution to the wind in round 11 or 12 or even 17 because there’s time to undo a bad game, but not so much at this stage. Even the cats are coming up against the dogs and saints in what they will see as do or die games for their seasons. There will be a lot of surprises in the next four rounds. I’m sticking to my earlier prediction of 17-5. I believe the FD strategy and season planning has been building to these last 8 weeks. I anticipate a repeat of the intensity from our game against the Lions on Friday night. 💪

I think it balances out, plus the pre finals bye means there is less concern about player management given the two week recovery period available.

Couldn't agree more Von. Well said. It's the long term strategy "system" coaches vs the "tactical" coaches who like to move the magnets around and even try to rev up the players with us vs them pep talks.

I look forward to a great pod guys! An observation of mine over the past 3 weeks has been small changes in our gameday tactics to combat known issues: Efficiency when kicking inside forward 50 Scores generated from turnover / rebounds Teams have kicked a lot of scores from turnover between rounds 11 and 16, while also limiting how much we scored from turnover. I imagine our inefficiency going forward was probably the cause of teams being able to score more from turnover (many kicks to spare defenders who could then launch the rebound quickly). At the same time though we were still beating teams (or breaking even) in clearances and contested possession. Since Round 17 against the Cats, it seems we have tried a more rebound / counter attacking style where we sit back from the contest (very) slightly to win the post clearance possession or intercept, and launch attacks from defence. Against the Cats we had a few opportunities to get through their press, only for a fumble, a bad bounce, or the ball sticking in the heavy track, derailing it. This was more evident and successful against Port (which probably suited the much wider ground in Alice). Against the Dogs we probably reverted more to our close contested style in the first half, and went back to the rebound style in the second half - which proved costly. But in both the Port and Dogs games, our forward 50 kicking improved a lot, and from one game to the next. We managed to kick 100 points from 50 forward entries which would be our highest ratio for the year I imagine. We even kicked into the centre part of our forward 50 or a lot more than we have all year (which when it didn't work also resulted in a few successful rebounds from the Dogs straight through the guts). In those three games we've been beaten at clearances and in contested possessions. I think that's by design - Goodwin is trying to tidy up weaknesses of our game, and thinking it's easier to do so if we relax in other areas - clearance work, and defensive forward movement. I imagine the plan is to combine that 'refresher' on rebound strategy and kicking into forward 50, with our plan A - strong clearance and contested work, defence first forward movement. This will give us the two modes we saw in the finals last year. Have any of you noticed similar changes in tactics the last few weeks, and if so, do you think it's part of the tune up before the finals, or simply us not being up to the style that is popular this year?

I think he was outnumber 3 or 4 to 1 on many occasions, and on several of them he managed to effect the spoil to at least keep the contest alive. But he was certainly much more quiet in the second and fourth quarters in particular.

“We always try to walk it in”

In previous weeks we may have bemoaned the fact we can only score 60. Tonight we actually got to the magical 100 first (but still somehow lost despite that being a statistical improbability). Call me naive but I imagine that if the FD wanted that game to be low scoring and defensive, it would have been. Don’t get me wrong, I’m upset we lost and my night is ruined, but have some faith in the club. We may not win the flag this year, but let’s not sell the farm before the final game of the season. The Tigers went into the 2018 finals series in read hot form… how did that work out for them? I appreciate the next few games will give us an idea of where the team is at, but let’s give them the opportunity to prove themselves before we write them off.

But 7 goal leads are their kryptonite 😜

Good points. The benefit of our smaller forward line is the added pressure the smaller forwards can provide. I expect to see us either lock it in our forward 50 for longer, or successfully pressure them into coughing it up at half forward/wing by cutting off options. Given their taller forward line in Naughton, Bruce, and JUH we may have some success rebounding if we prevent marks inside D50.

Agreed! It’s an exceptional circumstance where a 20 year old ruck is being offered over $1 mil a year. Therefore it’s not unreasonable to expect the trade details to be similarly exceptional.

😂 Scott would complain about how unusually wide the ground is and how the AFL should set maximum dimensions (but not minimum as that would impact their under 10’s sized field).

I can't agree more. If (and this is the big IF) we can maintain our best through the last rounds and the finals I think we're a cut above the rest. The evenness of this season is only possible by our form drop since after Round 10. Before that it was "the Demons by how much". Should we get our best back in time for the finals, I strongly believe it will be too good for any of the teams rated as contenders.

When considering the Cats, I always remember that they have a very experienced (aka "old") team. That experience brings consistency and, to me explains the Cats regular season sustained success. As a result, the gap between their best and worst is smaller than any other team. The question you need to ask is: when the finals begin and other teams go up a level, do the cats have further to go? Or is what we've seen the last few weeks the best they have? Further, Scott's approach to games (willing to modify his game plan to get wins) means that they look great in any given game. However, that comes at the expense of the type of muscle memory you saw from Dees players last September. This is the same as the Swans where Longmire changes things quite significantly in order to win any given name, least of all the Freo game this round. The Cats do look great right now, and seem to be in the best position to win the flag for some time. I guess we will get an answer to whether a tactical coach (Longmire / Scott) can best a system coach (Goodwin / Longmuir / Fagan). For the Cats, you feel that it will soon be... now or never.

Great show guys – I loved the passion and robust conversation, all done in a respectful way. Reading through the replies on this thread, it made me think of that fast disclaimer at the end of superannuation and investment ads… “Past performance is not an indicator of future performance”. I don’t assume @binman and others are implying that because we went through a similar form drop last year, that it must mean this year we are a certainty to improve as we did across the final seven games in 2021. But to highlight that the football department knows how to peak at the right time, and that they may likely do the same again this year. MAY. Not WILL. In all team sports that have a post-season, the teams expecting to be there at the pointy end, all have periods where they look toward the finals / playoffs beginning. In the NBA (82 games) and MLB (162 games) there are periods where they accept that losses will occur due to fixturing and the need to rest and then load up the fitness of key players across a long season. Across foreign and domestic competitions like these, you need a greater than 70 percent winning rate to guarantee optimal post-season conditions (home ground advantage in US sports / double chance in AFL). Further, there is no additional benefit to running at an 85, 90, or 100 percent winning record once you guarantee the double chance. Now in an AFL season with only 22 games, you couldn’t guarantee this earlier than round 16 (going 16-0). The question becomes - do you do everything to bank those 16 wins as early as possible and then begin preparing for finals and risk it being too late? Or make judgement calls in season to prepare for the finals in the best possible way while also doing your best to (first) qualify and then finish top 4? Reading through this forum in the off-season, the collective wisdom of users identified that we would become ‘The Hunted’, that opposition coaches will be studying our style and dissecting it, and coming up with strategies to beat us. If we worked that out than so too did the football department. They would likely have looked at the fixture and considered each game through that lens. They would have developed a strategy on how to manage the teams mental and emotional energy given that we would be a lot of teams ‘grand final’. They would have set targets for where they aimed to be at certain points in the season, and how they would adjust various fitness and player management schedules based on those metrics, e.g. aim to be 7-2 (or better) at round 9 to implement an aggressive loading schedule versus a record of 5-4 where a more moderate loading schedule would be applied. This strategy would be tweaked and changed based on injuries, team form, and the quality of opposition we face. That is why it is risky to compare 2021 to 2022 too closely. In 2021 we (mostly) played poorly against bad sides whereas in 2022 we have only lost to top sides. Firstly, our fixture is different and secondly, we’re the benchmark in 2022 when we weren’t in 2021. I’m sure this is highly biased as a dee’s supporter, but it has felt as though most teams this year have really brought the heat against us for at least a half (relative to their overall quality). I can’t be the only one who has felt that. You don’t want to exhaust the team mentally and emotionally by trying to raise the stakes for our players (across 22 games) to the same level that opposition players have instinctively purely because they are playing the reigning premiers. No coach or player wants to lose any given game of football. However, the FD will have what they are willing to change and risk in order to win any given game, based on their season strategy. If a team is so superior in quality and application that it can juggle it’s finals preparation objectives while also winning 22 straight games, I imagine that is what would happen. Goodwin and the FD will plan for, and go into each match with a plan they think gives them the best chance to win the game within the context of the larger season objectives. They will have things they plan to try / test out in game, and small tweaks to the gameday tactics they will utilize to win that game. What they can’t account for is the oppositions desire and application, and the changes in tactics they implement to wrestle back control of the game. Goody may or may not have had answers to the tactics Geelong used to control and win Thursday nights game. However, what he now has is additional tactics that Geelong and other teams might use to beat us in the remaining (up to) 10 rounds of the season. What opposition coaches do not have is the counter measures Goodwin may employ to counter those tactics. Whether that is by chance or by design is (almost) irrelevant because the opportunities it presents are the same in either scenario. The Bulldogs played an almost perfect 1.5 quarters in the Grand Final and got 19 points up. Goodwin had faith that our preparation would allow us to weather the storm and eventually wrestle back momentum. And that when we did, we’d have the explosiveness to pull away. At this point in the season, we will soon learn whether there is method in the madness of our form slump, or if we’re just not as good as we hoped we would be this year. But while we’re in 2nd and with more points For and fewer Against than at the same time last season, I’ll put faith in the FD that delivered us a premiership.

I got the impression the ground was very wet and heavy. There were a few closer shots showing how dug up the ground was. The weather had been dry in the few days before the game, which made me wonder… did they water the ground to make it slower and heavier? They train on it so they’d have a much better feel for how it “played” after a few sessions, and that would take away our explosive midfield edge. It’s a wild theory, but it aligns to the idea that they set themselves for this game (and clearly played like they set themselves for it).

It would have been a nice exclamation mark for his game tonight. Either way, play like that for the next few weeks and he'll keep his spot.

Well said! While I'm sad we didn't win by 90 points, it's almost a silver lining of our inaccuracy. We'll get the kudos of a strong win against the ladder leader, but it won't come with the over-the-top media spin that a complete flogging would have 😄

Sam played a great game tonight. Many may look at the stats and think he didn't kick enough goals or take enough marks. But his ruck work and taps to advantage were fantastic. He was rarely out marked and often brought the ball to ground. Further, he blocked for team mates to allow them to mark the ball and he checked many leads once he realised others were in a better position to present. He also ran both ways, showing up many times in screen when another player marked the ball. If you feel he hasn't shown mongrel and desire in the past, he certainly showed that tonight.