Akum

It will solve the problem when Petracca comes in - one of them will have to go out. That will restore the forward-line balance. They only need Hogan & Watts as the talls. We need more speed & crumbers. What bothers me is the possibility that the only reason they're both picked is that neither of them are adequate as a chop-out for Gawn. I can see why they want to put games into Frost, but he's not earning them on performance at the moment. It also bothers me that they seem to be avoiding playing Frost in defence (e.g. when O-Mac went off) or contesting any ball-ups. I thought he was recruited as a "swing-man", but they seem to be avoiding using him as one. Going to be a loooooooooong time before Frost's worth his place as a forward alone.

(Can't stop this quote appearing - sorry) Some have remarked about Jack Watts going around firing up all his fellow forwards after his goal at the beginning of the last quarter. But there's a telling bit of footage on the replay just before the next bounce. Marchbank goes to Watts, and Hogan physically pushes his way between them, while Watts stands in the way of the incoming Davis. They were working really hard to get the match ups to favour them - Hogan on Marchbank, and Watts on Davis. Both these match ups worked outstandingly well for us and were probably what got us home in the end, with both Hogan and Watts smashing their opponents in the last qtr. Is this our new "game analyst" at work???

I love it when you talk dirty!!!

There were also many times where if he hadn't been in the right place at the right time, we would have been in big trouble. It's not that his mistakes aren't important, but the coaches seem to believe so far that the good things he does are far more important than the mistakes.

Good pick up. He & Hogan are developing a great understanding. Jack seems to be able to tell where Jesse's running to. They were working really hard together in the last qtr to try to get Jack opposed to Davis and Hoges opposed to Marchbank. Davis is strong but nothing else, and we played right into his hands with all the stupid high bombs. But Jack was far too quick & smart for him, dragged him well out of his comfort zone, and absolutely smashed him in the last quarter. While Hogan was far too strong for Marchbank or anyone else, and we were able to isolate him one-on-one, instead of bombing it to a pack.

Viney was in perfect position to take the tap to Maxy's feet, exactly like he was against St. Kilda. However Shiel (like Steven) gambled on setting up for a fast break (because that was their only hope) and Maxy obliged by putting it right where he wanted it. Maxy had a great game, but that was easily his worst moment. He certainly won't make that mistake a third time. And to be fair, the bounce did favour Shiel's line of attack over Viney's, and even wrong footed Mumford.

Lot of deja vu about this thread.

Whoever this Stiffin Cognilio guy is, it'd be worth Tyson, Frost & Bugg having a word in his ear after the game about moving to a club that's on the up-&-up!

The Richmond nags? The Richmond 'mares?? The Richmond show ponies???

Strange comment. If "another scribe or media footy legend" had called it "disgraceful" instead of "concerning", and linked it to his contract, then the club definitely would have responded in one way or another. And any club response is better to come from the horse's mouth, so to speak. Schwarz was the only one to go in that hard on Jesse, so they couldn't just let it slide, and I think the club could have gone in a lot harder on Schwarz, but they preferred the "soft" approach, which was probably wise. Has Schwarz explained why he linked it to Jesse's contract? It wasn't just that the Ox raised the issue for discussion - it was raised by just about every commentator, and most brushed it off as an off-day; none of the others linked it to his contract. It was the inappropriate & unnecessary & loaded terms Schwarz used, as well as the fact that he's a former great from the same club.

Agree, but I think where we might gain on these teams is that they've been combining well, and had effective game plans and good slick ball movement, for years. We haven't had any of that until now. If we can keep our shape together under more pressure that we've faced in the NAB games - and avoid getting jumped in the first quarter, not to mention most of the teeth-grinding turnovers - we could improve a to faster than those sides.

And at 100% of his best - everyone bar Vince and Jones. If ... IF ... he regains full fitness & form. Which is a huge "if".

... Or, in other words, there's a tendency to exaggerate his bad stuff & neglect his good stuff, in a way that's not supported by the stats. What stands out about Grimes in that 2009 match compared to later years is his decisiveness. When he gets the ball, he instantly makes up his mind what to do with it and executes well, for the most part. For 9 games, he had excellent footy smarts, both in terms of positioning and disposal, with an ability to read the play 2 or 3 moves ahead. The Grimes of c.2012 to 2015 would get the ball in space, first go one way then another, then a third, by which time 3 or 4 good leads have evaporated, then under pressure hurries a nothing kick down the line to a contest which occasionally goes over. The trouble with "this" Grimes is that in his leadership role he simply tried sooooooo hard to do everything Neeld's way, but this meant having to go against his natural instinct, so he was second-guessing a lot of the time, so his decisiveness was knocked out of him. As a consequence, he's probably the one whose game has been worst affected by the Neeld debacle. From what we've seen so far in 2016, he seems to be back to taking the first option and trusting his instinct, like in 2009 & 2010. This is what Roos has been trying to get him to do for the past 2 seasons. And playing further forward - on the wing rather than HBF - seems to have helped this. And he has the added asset of being able to play tight when needed, so that if an opposing small forward starts to look dangerous or get on top of Jetta, he's good insurance to have in the team. But he'll be under much more pressure in the real season, and whether he can maintain it (going hard with the first option) remains to be seen, along with whether he's actually best 22 or not. I'd say they'll probably lean toward experience rather than youth in the first couple of games, so he'll probably start the season in the 22. But if he doesn't perform at or near his best, he'll be overtaken sooner rather than later by the younger options. The same probably applies to Lumumba & perhaps Garland.

On the other hand, just "feeding the chooks".

Don't think Dunny would like that. You're gonna get a jumper punch.

I'm just amazed that 'prendergasted' got past the censor. It's much worse than ... By the way, good to see you back jayceebee31.

The one who's often pretty good at cutting off the opposition's attempts to clear the zone & "get out the back" is Dunn.

Yep, totally agree. Ox had a fair point about his kicking action, but it was unreasonable to link it to his contract. (Though I'll concede that maybe it was a ploy just to get Jesse to grit his teeth & work on it - as if he wasn't going to do that anyway) So Jesse was only giving it back as good as he got by drawing attention to their respective accuracy.

You're absolutely right. After half time, at ball-ups & throw-ins, they would often have one ruckman with back to the umpire holding Gawn's arms with another coming over the top. And at centre bounces his opponent times his jump into his space just before the ball comes down. We can expect a lot of sides to use these tactics this year to nullify Gawn. His opponent will spend the whole of the week with their ruck coach practising these two plays. And we should fully expect them to get away with it too - he won't get any help from the umpires. If the umpires can't see it (because of where they're positioned) they can't pay it. We need to anticipate it and work out a counter to it.

Beginning to get annoyed about how medical reports are "used" in situations like these.

Roos, like most great leaders, has built a great team of coaches & assistants around him, getting the right people into the right jobs in the football department. They work as a team, which is far better for us than depending on one person, even one person as capable as Roos. Like all great leaders, Roos is aware that he's not the best person for everything that's needed for sustained success. If we get into the "it's Roos" or "it isn't Roos" argument, we miss the point. It's the team that Roos has built. Whatever Roos's capabilities as coach, it's his leadership capabilities that we have needed most. And part of those leadership capabilities is making sure that he can step out, when the time is right, without us missing a beat.

Nobody has mentioned Viney or Vince.

It was clear in the article that he's not taking it for granted that the club will want to re-sign him. That should make you happy, surely! I'd agree with the poster who said that if the club wants him, he'll re-sign, and if it doesn't want him, or if they tell him he should look around, he'll explore free agency. If the club wants him, he won't leave. The only negotiation is his value. Which, as he also realises, is largely up to him. Which should also make you happy.

OK, how about this. One thing the coaches want to practice in the practice matches is transition from defence to attack. So our main transition or "link" players from defence to attack (some of you aren't going to like this bit, but they are the ones who usually link up through the middle of the ground) are: Salem, Watts, ... Grimes, Mc Donald, ... Vince, maybe Kent, maybe even Jones this year, maybe Lumumba when he comes back. Now obviously some of these do it better than others. But if we're going to move the ball quickly through the middle of the ground, it's these who we're going to have to rely upon. These guys are under instructions - in the practice matches - to take the game on, to go all out attack - to take risks, to run hard, and to go for attacking delivery every time. This gives them plenty of material to analyse & work on with the coaches during the week. They will be expected to be more discerning about their disposals during the season proper, but it makes more sense to improve by taking risks than by playing it safe. This would explain the unusually high number of kicking mistakes made by Watts & Salem, even though they've both played fairly well. It also explains why Grimes is being played further forward. And as a team we had far more clangers than the Dogs, maybe because we're taking more risks. OK, so I might have the details wrong. But it's basically about some players, including McDonald, being under instruction during the practice matches to take risks with moving the ball and to avoid safe disposals, to try to improve our transition from, say, d50 to f50. At least it's possible. Or maybe we are just crap.

Seems that the opinions of those who were at the game are quite different from some of those who weren't ...