binman

Why? He played the lever/petty role today role today and had a better game than Tomlinson l

Maybe. Though he looked good today. But Smith is more suited to Petty’s role with his ability to zone off, spoliation and take intetcept marks. Smith was dynamic today

I have little doubt that in the first instance Smith will come in for petty. Not sure where that leaves thommo

An interesting part of our preparation last season was that we played an almost full strength team in the corresponding practice match against the tigers (which we won, just). And we seemed to approach that game like a serious hit out. In the actual preseason game against the dogs we rested key players and played Jordon and i think from memory Bowey.

Ta. Just turned on kayo. Fair crowd Bulldogs by 11 near end of third

Agree on all of the above. I'd add that i suspect in the last couple of years people have got used to watching games at home and some people may have fallen out of the habit of going to games. I think as result crowds will be down across the board all season. All part of the new normal. I'm thinking we will do well to crack 50k.

Yep, agree.

How ironic. West coke have to sack a player for REFUSING an injection

47, 644

Coaches votes stylee Harris 10 Paxman 7 L Pearce 6 D Pearce 6 Bannon 6 Brownlow stylee Harris 3 Paxman 2 L Pearce 1

Ta. I thought it was Friday. Good thing you posted this!

Yep, a very good comparison. Sean is one of my all time favorite players and i love Goldy for many of the same reasons.

Absolutely. She has a height and reach advantage over many of her opponents, but as you say it is her natural marking skills (eg use of the body, reading the flight of the ball, aggression. marking technique, smarts etc etc) that means she is on another level. And becuase she is on another level we get other benefits, even when she doesn't make it. Opposition temas are too focused on her, as is often the case with such key players - but it means their defensive system is often out of shape. Westy's goal was good example - three Lions players up to spoil Harris and no one the ground. She draws frees too, as often opposition players panic in their attempts to stop her. I went to the Dogs game and was a bit critical of her second efforts. But she has improved immensely since then in that regard, no doubt because she has got fitter in the last few weeks. Taylah was the difference last night - there is simply no way we win that game if she is not in the side. With scores being comparatively low, one player can make a bigger difference in terms of influencing a result than is the case in the AFL. Which as you correctly note, means she could well be the difference at the pointy end of the season.

To be fair, the same could be said of the AFL

Agree on bolded bit (and the rest actually). She is such a clever footballer - exhibit A was her decision to play on immediately after marking about 45 out, running to 30 and kicking the goal. She would never have made it from 45 and gave them no time to cover the line. Also loved how she kept running towards goal on the off chance the ball stopped before crossing the line. That is a smart footy brain at work Speaking of smart, it was a good move putting her forward i thought as she is natural footballer, like Tayla, and as such reads the ball in flight super well, which gives her a big advantage over lots of defenders, many of who it seems me struggle one on one against such players. Libby Birch stands out becuase she is one defender that reads the ball so well. I'm starting to think she is up there in our top 2-3 most important players.

She is such a fantastic player to watch. What she lacks in skills and finesse she makes up 10 fold with her intensity and attack on the ball. In that sense she reminds me a lot of Viney. And she reads the play so well and times her attack her on the ball and when to zone off brilliantly. I'm guessing that is part natural ability but also large part her experience of playing Gaelic footy all her life and playing that sport at the elite level. I wonder if that that is perhaps the most transferable skill from Gaelic footy? I also wonder if Goldy playing further up the ground might negate that skill a bit as at half back she has more time to watch the ball coming at her.

A super enjoyable game to watch. The skills were great, in large part because of the brilliant conditions and surface A good example of my point about the need to play all the AFLW games on AFL standard grounds with stands to provide protection from the wind.

No, not tongue in cheek. I don't want to bag Daisy as she is fantastic and the best special comments person in the footy media. But in the second half i think she got a few things wrong. Funnily enough the examples you highlight are two of those things I hate to say it but BT was right - that kick should have gone to Pickett not Tmac, albeit not for the reason BT said. And curiously for the very reason that Daisy noted a few minutes after that the kick to Tmac was the right option. Pickett had space in front of him and if he did win the ball he would have swept it forward into our forward line with his electric pace, as he so often does, which would have made it impossible for the dogs defensive zone to properly set up and mids etc to push back and allow a forward like Fritter to lead into space. But of most significance kozzie was close to the boundary, so if he had not won the ball there was a high chance it would gone over the line for throw in and stoppage, allowing us to set up behind the ball and get our defensive zone set up (which, ironically, was Daisy's argument for why it was right to go to Tmac). If his opponent wins the contest, they are hard up against the boundary and either have to risk switching (which we are brilliant at defending) or kick down the boundary line, which is how we like it as we set up to cover it and if we can't intercept smash it over the line for a stoppage. Tmac was central, nearly in the centre corridor and had a man on him (ie not leading up into open space for an easy spot up kick). If the dogs win that contest it is in a very dangerous spot, one that is very hard to defend, as they have three lanes to choose from going forward. Going to Kozzie near the boundary was the percentage play and as such in line with our tactical model and related team rules. The fact we ended getting a stoppage and were able to to set up behind the ball was lucky. As for the comment about us going into our shells, that was the one of the things that really rankled for me. At one point Daisy said we needed to 'rediscover our dare' and later after we had kicked some goals, used the example of one of our players keeping the ball in play rather than letting it go over the line as an example of us doing so, noting it was something we weren't doing in the second (ie before we 'rediscovered our dare') But that is how we play, and how we always play - indeed there was an example in the second quarter where Gus did a look away over the head handball right on the boundary line rather than take it over as he easily could have. I posted right after the grand final that Daisy fed into what i think is a false narrative that the dees were looking shaky and came back from the dead, so to speak. I think she got it wrong in the third declaring we desperately needed a goal just for confidence. We had a poor second quarter. The simple reason why was that they smashed us in contested ball. It was not surprising the dogs lifted their rating in that quarter, but it was really surprising we dropped off. And they were clearly on top. The dogs carried that pressure into the third, but despite them getting the first goal in the third (early) we were matching them in contested ball and had clearly got the game back into the shape we like it to look like. It was back to contest to contest. We had stopped their transition game. And stopped them flicking it around. And stopped allowing unpressured kicks by the like of Daniel. We were back grinding. This is how we played all season. Absorb opposition pressure, let them take their best shot, and then kick a goal against the run of play and then pile on multiple goals and take the game away from our opponents in a ten minute burst. There were so many examples through the season of that exact same pattern, and funnily enough examples where that occurred in the third quarter as it did in the GF. The two best examples were the round 17 Port game and the round 23 Cats game, where both teams were on top but couldn't score enough to, in the Cat's case put us away and in Port's case get in front. In both games our opponents could only manage 2 goals (same for the dogs), despite throwing everything they had us. What Daisy, and all the other commentators, should have been all over is that the dogs simply had to get more reward for their effort in the third quarter. Two goals was never going to be enough, particularly because we had such a huge fitness advantage. We were always going to score a goal and all evidence was that once we did we would pile on more. It is important to note in this context that it is not like the dogs missed any easy shots or failed to take their opportunities - they only had 2 scoring shots in the third, both goals, and perhaps only 2 or 3 other deep inside 50s that might have resulted in a score. We didn't win it becuase we 'rediscovered our dare' or scored a goal to get our confidence back. We never lost our dare or our confidence. We won the game by absorbing the dog's pressure and getting our pressure levels back to where it needed to be, after it had dropped right off in the second The dogs lost the game by not finding a way to score more goals in the third quarter. They simply had to get get the lead out to 5 plus goals, and even then i am confident we would have reeled them in. In fact if anything i'd argue the dogs needed to show more dare in the third. They needed to take more risks, switch more often perhaps or try different match ups. Instead they just played into our hands and did the same thing over and over, largely trying to engineer a goal from a inside 50 ground ball, which is their go to. They were the critical points that needed to be made.

I think she is fantastic - and for all the reasons posted above the best special comments person in the business. But I don't think she had a good grand final - specifically the second half.

Agree with both paras. Watson11 makes an really good point about those three tough goals you mention - all involved our strategy of going to the pockets In terms of the third quarter center clearance goal, my sense is that they were examples of what i mean of being aggressive and consciously dialing up the risk factor. And also an example the point i made earlier in this thread about the way we look to really take advantage of periods where we get the momentum by kicking bursts of goals, something that we did all season - time and again we withstood opposition pressure and then in 10 minutes took the game away from them. One, they went against what they would normally do in such circumstances, which would be to put Max in the center for those bounces. Instead they left Jackson in there, which was definitely risky given his inexperience, the critical point the game was at, and the fact that max is the best ruck in the game. The safe option was definitely to put Max back in there. Two, i think the mids took up pretty offensive starting positions. And three, related to number two, i read somewhere on DL (in this thread perhaps) that after the first of those goals Tracc and Oliver considered going more defensive but decided bugger it lets go for it. Now perhaps that is apocryphal, but it gels with the outcome.

I totally agree with the bolded bit. My feeling is that rather than it being about Brown etc it was more to do with conscioulsy deciding to being more aggressive - turning the risk/reward dial to risk for longer. Our scores from round 20 through to the ground final reflected this aggression (something like an average of 120 points a game, which is just nuts) But that sort of aggression is pretty taxing, and i think that part of the logic of being less aggressive through the season is about load management and being cherry ripe for the finals. And perhaps also not showing all your attacking cards too early. My feeling is we will see a similar pattern next year, which some will find frustrating no doubt as for much of the season we will win games in the four to five goal range again, as opposed to going all out and smashing teams. But the pay off is unleashing the beast come the last couple of rounds of the home and away and finals. Also totally agree with your last paragraph. I'd add that in addition to being ok with losing possession so long as we had numbers behind the ball, we were also happy to give away free kicks and basically stop the game so we can set up our defensive system - something that became apparent for me when watching the replays in the last month or so.

I think the coaches believe it is optimal and i very much doubt we will change the tactic much. As flash notes above kicking to the pockets as opposed to more centrally supports our model of trapping the ball and the opposition in particular areas, in this instance tour forward line, and making it super hard for them to transition. As Flash also notes, it is a trade off - sure it is harder to be accurate but that is offset by the fact that teams simply do not hurt us on transition (I'm pretty sure we conceded the least number of points from our back half). This really hurts teams, like the dogs, that rely on scoring on transition. So many of our strategies are underpinned by a philosophy of playing the risk/reward percentages. For example playing along the boundary, kicking long to Gawn after a point, getting territory and our (much anaylsed) clearance system are all examples of playing the percentages ie approaches that statistically over the journey will concede less goals and create more for us. Kicking to the pockets is in the same boat. The other element, one that i hadn't thought of last year, relates to my comment on the previous page in this thread about how we use the clock as a weapon. That's to say we suck time out of the clock and in doing so give the opposition less time to score and less opportunity to seize and/or take advantage of any momentum. I'm guessing at least half the time the ball is kicked to the pocket we get a stoppage of some sort. And then we crowd our inside 50 zone and often there is a secondary stoppage. If the opposition win and dump kick it out it often comes straight back in. All of this sucks heaps of time from the clock. And no doubt is super frustrating for the opposition, again particularly at team like the dogs, who are used to winning the ground ball in their back half and sweeping it up the other end of the ground. And if a point is kicked, we allow the short kick to the pocket but then make it super hard to clear the zone, usually forcing frustrated opposition players to kick long down the line to one of our talls. How many times last year did we see frustrated defenders holding onto the ball for ages looking for options. Again all this sucks valuable time from the clock and doesn't allow the opposition to get into any rhythm or to play fast. There was a fantastic example of our approach in one of the late season games i watched recently (i can't recall exactly which one, but i think it was the hawks game). One of our players had the ball at center half forward (Fritter?) and there was no one in our 50 metre arc expect Kozzie who was running toward goals, with a defender on his hammer. The ball could of easily have been kicked out in front of Kozzie in the corridor and there was every chance he would have run on to it and scored an easy goal. Instead it was kicked towards the boundary, had too much on it and went over for a throw in. BT was flummoxed. But going to the boundary was the percentage play because whilst Kozzie might have been a 70-30 chance of scoring if the ball had been kicked into the corridor, if his opponent won the ball it would have been easily rebounded as it would haver been in the corridor, and all our forwards had pressed up to help our defence so there was no help. Instead, whilst we had lower chance of an easy goal, there was still a good probability of doing so (maybe 50-50?) and when we didn't, we got a stoppage, reset, gave our forwards and mids time to crowd the forward line and gave our defenders time to press up and create the wall to stop transition. Goody's comments are interesting about looking create more scoreboard pressure, and perhaps being more offensive. My feeling is that rather than than that being an indication we will use the corridor as the go to spot, it will mean we look to surge and go all out attack more often, and in doing so turn the risk/reward dial to risk for longer. Which will mean more kicks to the corridor, but also perhaps more rebounds and scores on transition from the opposition.

Agree that accuracy is an area we can improve - particularly by non regular forwards like Oliver and Tracc (Brown, Fritter and Tmac are all statistically very accurate i would have thought). But i think it is actually pretty hard to compare teams because the pure accuracy number does not take into account where the shots are taken from. Much to some fans frustration we often kick to the pockets, meaning many shots are from difficult angles. I suspect that Brisbane and Sydney (who top the accuracy table) go more centrally and therefore have more shots from better angles than we do. The other issue is how close to goal kicks are - obviously if you get lots of goals running into open goal squares your accuracy is going to be better. When we open up sides, as we did in the Grand final, we swarm teams and get more of those goals where we tic tac and get it to a free player running into an open goal. I reckon Jackson got half of his goals that way last season and fritter also got a bunch of them. When on top we also use the corridor more often, as we did in the GF. There was discussion about us kicking to the picket in this thread back in April last year. This post from that discussion covers why i think we go via the pockets so often.

The change i would make is to the timing of the season. I know the timing of this season is a function of COVID, and I know the AFL don't want to run the AFLW head to head with the AFL, but starting the season in the heat of summer is stupid. They should start the AFLW season in say early Feb and play the grand Final in the first week of the AFL bye rounds, which this year starts 3 June. Yes that would mean the AFLW would go head to head with the AFL for three months or so, but they would get two months of clear air until the AFL season proper starts and then the opportunity for stand alone Grand Final at a time when the AFL season gets a bit stale. That set up would affect the state women's comps i suppose but if the finals started early May half the players (ie the ones not in final's teams) would be available by mid may for their local teams. And in any case the current set up impacts the local teams in so far as the women have to train for their local teams and then kick of training for the AFLW almost immediately those seasons finish. Which can't be helpful for either comp. The other change i'd make is that all games should be played in AFL venues or on grounds with proper grandstands and AFL standard surfaces. To support this they should advance plans to make Princess park (or Arden street perhaps) into the Victorian AFLW hub (but with Geelong could continue to use Kardinia Park) and replicate that model in the other states as far as possible. Play all games at these hubs. They need to create a playing environment where the effects of the wind are minimised, because if there is a strong wind the game becomes really scrappy and crap to watch because they use smaller balls and obviously they are not as powerful as men so the ball doesn't penetrate. it often becomes a territory game and poor skills get exacerbated. So of course that would mean no games at Casey. Or Punt road oval The other problem for the AFLW is that each team has adopted AFL defensive systems and the mantra of pressure being fundamental. Which is all well and good, and it is incredible the ferocity the women crack in, but the defensive systems and pressure impact the skills too much and as a result many games are devolving into scrappy combat with huge numbers of players around the ball and crazy numbers of tackles. We can't change that part of the game, its here to stay, but uniform AFL standard grounds that offer some protection from the weather will go a long way to help as more kicks will hit targets, skills will be better and kicks for goal will be more accurate.

Tommo was terrific. Reliable, strong one on one, a terrific kick and a key part of the structure and system in the first third of the season. But i reckon it is important to note that he and Petty played pretty different roles. Tommo was really much more a lock down defender that played tight man on man. More often that not he was also the deepest player in the goal keeper role that Omac played. With Petty in the team, the structure is much more fluid, with May often being the deepest, but Petty also rolling back into that slot, and less frequently Lever too. As result Petty gets up the ground more than Tommo did. And Lever, Petty and May swap opponents more often than was the case with Tommo in the team. But the big difference is Petty was much more offensive than Tommo, much more likely to zone off his man and of most significance much more likely to take intercept marks. I suspect they will want to replicate that same system (ie the one with Petty in the team). Tommo might be able to play in a similar fashion to Petty, so he might slot straight in, but i wonder if they might go with Smith. Where that would leave Tommo i'm not sure, but i have little doubt Petty will come straight back in once he is ready to go, so perhaps they are better to find another role for Thommo anyway.