Adam The God

I wouldn't send Sharp there because I don't trust his disposal. We have enough guys we can run through there at full fitness. Lindsay, Salem, McVee and Windsor. I think @binman may have suggested this previously, but we could also play Fritta at half back. He's not slighter than Lindsay or Windsor. My only question over Fritta's disposal is when he seems to play higher up the ground (and this includes the back end of 2018?), he seems to have a lot of his kicks intercepted, which is obviously poison at half back. The point is, I think we've got our guys that can slingshot now that have pace, poise and skill.

Yep, you've gotta be able to win it at the contest, if you can't, you rely on adding numbers to the contest to outnumber, pressure and force a turnover and sweep it away after winning ground ball (ala Collingwood 2023). We have a big advantage if we can break even in scores from turnover. As you've said, we don't need to be the best, we just need to be good at it. Our 1 wood is scores from stoppages. As I wrote prior to the GWS game, I'll be happy if we go for aggressive pure centre clearances that lead to scores (utilising forward handball, blocks and our power in and from the contest), because this will mean we'll lose our fair share of clearances too by positioning ourselves aggressively at centre stoppage. This then means the opposition has it in our back half, and we can look to transition off the back of that. It was obvious we were trying this in the first half of last year, but without a fitter Oliver, we struggled to get bang for buck from aggressive stoppage set ups and we'd end up losing too much territory, which goes to Hoyne's point. You don't want be camped in your back half, so breaking even with inside 50s as the ball moves from one end to the other is more the goal. And when you sweat that opposition turnover, and it's anywhere near D50 corridor, you have to score from it. We did this beautifully against Geelong last year, but the rest of the year, we were very hit and miss. This is why Windsor and Lindsay have the ability to completely transform our game.

Perhaps there is a time and place. You certainly don't want to overpossess by hand in the wet, but I think generally we still want to play the same way in all conditions, otherwise the way you want to play is vulnerable to externalities. Obviously, there are situations where you don't want to overpossess but if you're maintaining possession with uncontested kicks across the back half, I think that's still an acceptable move in the wet. Certainly with the right kickers. In all conditions, there'll be certain players who are instructed to kick longer to contests and other backs who will be expected to maintain possession with shorter kicks when the kick down the line isn't on. It's a great way of controlling tempo, even in inclement conditions.

I think Goody is ahead of the curve here, although Mitchell's team displayed a similar approach last year. Our plan seems to be: 1) get it in to a less crowded forwardline as quickly as possible on turnover or via (centre) stoppage. 2) if not, play keepings off at the back and pull the opposition higher up the field, leaving space in behind. This is basically the Man City playbook. Where we have an advantage if we can improve our ball movement with the likes of Windsor, McVee and Lindsay is we score a lot from stoppage. This year, like the first half of last year, is learning to score off turnover with slingshot from our defensive half, and continuing to beat our opposition with scores from stoppage.

But we've done this for 8 years. Repeat entries. I don't think that's what he's saying. He's saying the opposite. As long as you break even (roughly) with inside 50s, it's more important how you slingshot from your half back / ie how fast/clean is your ball movement. It's not about just getting it in there. It's about the ball movement being "ballistic" enough to break lines and zones and deliver quality entries as opposed to the quantity of entries. Ah, sorry @binman, you beat me to it.

I think we'd be saying something different if Hogan played. TMac beat Cadman a number of times, but Hogan killed TMac last year. Without May, we'd have been in strife I reckon.

Opinion.

White will be a Melbourne player.

Oxdee has to be Fritta himself... On ya Fritta.

lol sounds like the AFL. The amount of rule-making on the run is incredible.

Good call on Bowser. Managed to miss him. I know he's small in stature, but I wouldn't mind Bowser taking some wing minutes when McVee and Windsor are fit again. Basically rotating Bowey and Lindsay between wing and half back. Structure up something like this: McVee May Petty Windsor Lever Salem / Bowey / Lindsay Lindsay / Bowey Oliver Langdon I'd also try and play Langdon majority wing, because his ball use has improved out of sight and he's reliable being a link in the chain. I'd keep Rivers in the midfield and injuries permitting, I'd hope we wouldn't need him backward of centre. That would leave our midfield with Oliver, Viney, Petracca, Langford, Rivers, Kozzy and Sparrow. I'd play Viney 60% forward, 40% mid. Trac 65% mid, 35% forward. Kozzy 40% forward 60% mid. Running the rest of the guys through midfield too. Down the other end, as I wrote the other day, I'd be open to TMac playing alongside JVR. If we want to play three talls, then it's between Turner and Jefferson for that other spot. But I'd prefer to play two talls and a mid sized Fritta or Melksham. I think our best team is probably something like this: McVee May Petty Windsor Lever Salem Lindsay Oliver Langdon Sparrow JVR Trac Spargo TMac Viney Max Rivers Kozzy Bowey Langford Fritta Henderson/Kolt Sub. Melksham If there is an injury to a tall, Petty can swing if necessary, otherwise you structure up around Fritta/Melksham/Trac and push Kozzy permanent forward too. I have Spargo ahead of Chandler as well...

Agreed, but what I think we'll also see more of this year is more space in the forwardline rather than clumping together all our tall forwards to protect against the slingshot. I think we'll look to isolate our forwards more, it's a very different set up to the Stafford forwardline. To my eye, Sunday was evidence of this already. And surprisingly, despite his wirey frame, on a dry day, I think Jefferson would have plucked 3 or 4 good marks at the top of the square. I don't recall him being beaten in the air. We were also playing a team that is devastating on the counter, so I think we got the balance right between kicking to contests in our forwardline and trying to isolate forwards and have the ball ping back against us.

It's interesting, because to my eye our kicking efficiency was really pleasing against GWS, but the higher efficiency was also padded out by those short uncontested kicks across half back to control the game. The kicks that we miss were those 15-20m short angled kicks coming back through the corridor or along the wings. Make those kicks and as @binman often says, you have a chance to chain for a score. Rivers is super unreliable and turned it over in these sort of spots, and has for 2-3 years now. He gives great bounce and has great penetration with his kicking, but isn't who we want trying those shorter kicks IMO. As often as possible, we need to involve Windsor, Lindsay, Salem and McVee from the back. Despite Salem lacking pentration, and even the ability to hit those angled kicks, what Salo does do is nails those 15-20m passes, which maintains possession and continues the chain. IMV, another guy that could really help with our forward entries and ensuring the chain doesn't breakdown is Melksham. I just wonder whether Fritta is playing the Melksham role at the moment, and that when Melksham is fit, it'll be between those two for the leading high half forward that turns and enters A50 as that final link in the chain.

And as @Little Goffy says, and I've said many times, Chaplin was responsible for our 2018 forwardline, the highest scoring forwardline in the league, with a huge and varied spread of regular goalkickers. It'll be a work in progress this year, but if it clicks early enough, we'll be a premiership threat.

Schwarta was a great player. One of my favourites growing up. That 1994 finals series as a 7 year old was 👌

I'm pretty sure he's responsible for ball movement and how we enter A50.

That's Chaplin's role...

Content going through the roof. Awesome stuff. Kudos to the club for this. More please. From a doco camera perspective, the camera work in those last few shots is really bloody good, capturing all the debutants with their friends and families without a cut.

So the MFC presumably leaked this?

But we have 2 of the top 5 best contested players in the comp in the same midfield, just need the outside polish to finish off the good work.

My favourite pass of his was the beautiful kick to Max on the lead. Perfectly weighted. Not many of our players can hit that regularly.

He played on the wing and at half back...

Yep, that's where I'm at. @Slartibartfast, you'll be happy to know that I see a spot for your mate as a KPF alongside JVR. 😄 I just think if TMac takes the best defender, can still bring the ball to ground, his being run off is really no different to defenders running off JVR or Turner, and it frees up JVR to get the second best defender. I'd happily stick with just TMac and JVR with the latter taking second ruck duties, but if they insist on playing three talls forward of the ball, TMac, JVR and Turner could work.

The basic shots I refer to are Max's from 20m out, Tom Sparrow from 40m out directly in front with a near dry ball and seemingly little wind, and Fritta's snap from 20m at the top of second. The latter is a goal Fritta would have nailed at least 30 times in his career, and would surely be 9.5 from 10.

We had 9 to 8 tackles inside 50 yesterday. I really don't think we lost because we had "three lumbering forwards". We lost because we couldn't convert basic chances in front of goal.