binman

Yep. I argued long and hard last season for Viney to play as pressure forward, for all the reasons you have highlighted. Viney might do some time up forward 9as he did on saturday night) - for example rotating with a Melksham. But i can't see goody changing tack, and going forward, pardon the pun, jack will remain a 80-20 mid forward.

Short answer is i don't think we should change our set up much. Some tweaks perhaps. And one i would consider is Meksham in an and playing some mid time. Perhaps at the expense of Harmes. I have always liked the idea of Viney as defensive forward, but i think it is easy to under rate his importance to our set up as a defensive mid. His tackle numbers and pressure is going up each week and come finals his heat around the ball will be critical. I was calling for them to rotate resting the young guns (and anyone else who needed a chop out) through the bye phase, but they have clearly made the decision to not rest players. The only time they have 'managed' anyone this season is Salem. And then only for a week. They haven't even taken the opportunity to give injured players extra recovery time eg bringing may, fritter and Viney back in ASAP. They seem to be using game time as tool to manage loads given the fluctuation in game time for our young players (many of who are only in the 50s and low 60s TOG percentage range) Continuity and consistency is obviously an important concept for goody and his team of coaches. Makes sense in such system, role focused team. Particularly one with 5 young players who have played less than 40 odd games and are in our best 22. They have lot to learn in a short time. Agree JJ is looking very tired but i'm sure he'll come good. And when he does he can play the same role he did early in the season - an outside players, who can can also win contest, who helps with our transition. And given he spent a good block of games replacing Viney, can be thrown into he midfield mix when required and with confidence. Not resting players is a calculated gamble. The price we've paid is the loses against Pies and GWs and the draw against the hawks i reckon. And possibly the loss against the dogs. If we don't make top four it will be gamble we have lost. If we do make top four, the reward should be a team that is fit, fresh and better able to run out games than the teams we play.

1. 100%. I'd add our overall kicking skills are a big, big problem. And an extremely hard one to fix. I hope that for the next 2-3 years that in their drafting and trading their number one KPI is elite kicking skills. I have confidence they will, given Bowey, Laurie and Rosman are all really good kicks. And Declase looks, dare i say it, de classy kick. 2. Disagree. As i noted above, when we are up and about, we generate a lot of our scoring through running in waves from half back. This often results in shots on goals from 30 odd meters in the corridor and/or where we are running towards, or into an open goal square. Which obviously improves our accuracy. Takes these out of the equation, as has largely been the case for the last 5 weeks and our inaccuracy goes up. But when are not running it down the ground in waves, or we are kicking it from a stoppage or free etc, i reckon we will continue to kick to the pockets. When we are on (ie applying forward half pressure, pushing our defensive wall high, stopping the switch and winning contest is and ground ball inside 50) this tactic increases our volume of shots on goals as trap it inside 50, and if we can't we win reentries and therefore get more shots on goals. Added to that it is the fact (when on) we make it hard for teams to clear their back half from kick outs after points as everyone has time to set up. Funnily enough we did go more central a bit more on Saturday night i thought, perhaps becuase of the rain. But the problem was they often won the ground ball and when they did it was in the corridor. I do wonder if come finals they might tweak the risk reward meter and maybe kick a few more to the hot spots at different times as a surprise tactic. 3. See above 4. Agree the mids are not in sync ATM. But don't agree we are deliberately giving up centre clearances. We're not. We are simply trying to increase the likelihood of scoring from any clearance we do win and so set up in a way that supports this. The key to making this approach viable is having a defensive system (which includes the pressure on the player kicking inside 50) that mitigates the risk of losing clearances . Sure Hawkins etc will halve most contests, but when on we win more of the ensuing contests than the opposition. Just as we did when we played the lions with their potent tall forward line. We don't want to lose clearances, but are prepared to risk doing so. Any goals we score from intercepts and rebounding from half back are a bonus that are factored into the overall risk reward assessment of our strategy. I have little doubt Goody will continue to pursue these strategies, perhaps with some tweaks or tactical surprises (that he is unlikely to reveal tile finals), but it is how we play. One person's stubbornness is another's confidence in their system. This is the way.

Its funny you should say that. A few minutes before reading this post I was thinking about the fact I tipped the dees, but in hindsight made a mistake in terms of the conditions. Before the game, my thinking was they would disadvantaged by wet conditions because it would make it hard for them to flick it around and possess the ball. And make it hard for Naughton and their other tall forwards. But I forgot to factor in how badly the rain would impact our poor kicking and how much the gap between their superior kicking skills and ours would widen. I also thought about the issue you noted about marks from hb. I'm not sure it had a major difference. Sort of. The issue was they were winning so many of the ground balls. And of course inside 50 stoppages. So I guess if we marked more balls coming in that would have stopped them winning those balls. And we we would have more opportunities to rebound. But we have been good at wiining those contests up till the last few weeks. I actually think the main problem we are having with scoring is fatigue related. At our best that we generate a lot of our scoring from overlap run from half back. Those goals where we run in waves and swarm it forward, often leading to us having an outnumber inside 50 with mids etc streaming towards an unguarded goal - like two of tracc's goals against Port. But atm only hunt and nibbler seems to be able to run and carry and offer overlap options. Rivers looks out in his feet. Jackson too. Same goes for Langdon. Kozzie is not getting up and down the ground nearly as much and nor is Spargo. Hibberd looks a plodder again. And Gus, never quick in the best of times is going back and staying there and offering very little in terms of run and carry. This lack of overlap run by multiple players was the reason we couldn't take advantage of periods where were on top. It also makes our forward line look more one dimensional, more crowded and our entries more difficult. The swarm overlap creates faster transitions, opposition teams are less able to get back to defend and it pulls opposition zones out of shape. Whatever the cause of the fatigue, I have little doubt it is the key factor in our performance atm. After 9 rounds most posters were quite rightly lauding the genius of burgess. We were clearly fitter than most teams. And we were running on top of the ground. We have lost that edge. But burgess hasn't become any less a leader in his field. And I have complete faith in his ability to make sure the team is at optimal fitness and freshness come the first final.

I read the headline and thought to myself that talking politics had been banned

Fair enough. Then lets say we are doing the same sort of loading than other teams. We have a young team. Five of our best 22 are 21 or under (rivers, kozzie, jordon, jackson and petty) And we have a physically demanding, which is more taxing than say the cats, Eagles and Lions, who hold the ball, chip it around and play slow a lot And all three of those teams have much older teams. Add to that the decision not to rest players and logic suggests that the combination of a young list and ballistic game plan will lead to fatigue. On not resting players, particularly the young players, it seems a curios decision but Burgess is regarded as the best in the business so I'll back him in to have it all planned to the minute.

On that chart we would would be at Max intensity last week. And Max loading round 13-14. Whilst you are no doubt right about not being much variation between us, burgess is known for pushing that envelope. There seems to be a consensus on demonland that we looked fatigued. My eyes tell me we are. The numbers for the young players tell me are For the sake of argument let's say we are fatigued. The key question is why are fatigued. As I have noted before if I apply the Occam's razor principle the answer I get is: - Long season, taxing game style young team AND - high training loads. As I said burgess has form at both port and Liverpool with loading Ayers up. Max said we had been loading. Looking at that chart above burgess would only need to be doing and extra couple of weeks than the norm (and maybe a bit more volume and intensity than other teams) for us to be feeling the effects on game day now.

One of the great myths of football is that wet weather is an equaliser. Bollocks. It puts pressure on technique and those with great techniques become more influential. And wet weather exacerbates poor technique. And so many of our players have woeful technique. Accriss the board, the skill gap in terms of kicking is huge between us and the dogs. And it is a canyon between our best two mids, tracc and Oliver, and their best two, bont and mcrae.

Go redlegs.

The first was in Salem. Terrible

Except when they're good.

For me this was the real frustration of that game. Shouldn't have mattered we were a bit flat, a near 5 goal lead at the end of the first q and again halfway through the second, should not have been squandered. Really should have further ahead at the end of the first too.

Does Brad post on demonland?

First order of business. Distribute vaccines in order of AFL ladder as of 23 July 2021.

Or girls

I 100% agree.

Did you know Jackson represented Australia in basketball.....

You think Viney makes that call? In 2019 and 2020 they made a call on Brayshaw. And that call was his days as an inside mid at the dees were done. And his days at the dees were done, if he could not adapt and play the position Goody asked to play. Last year, in response to people calling for him to be played in the midfield and the rumors about him wanting out, I remember writing that he is a professional footballer who needs to suck it up and play where the coach tells him he has to play. And calling out how ridiculous it is for a supposedly elite player to only want to play in his preferred position or not be adaptable enough to play in other positions. I have a lot of respect for the way Gus has got his act together, do the work required on his game (eg fitness, defensive mind set) and realization that he needs to play the role his coach wants him to play, and his teams needs him to play.

I'm totally guessing to be honest But my best guess (based on our performances, the numbers, my impression they have looked fatigued and the scheduling timing of games) is that we have been loading since before the Pies game. And perhaps continued right up to the Hawks game. All guess work on my part, but surely they would be looking to start tapering now. Certainly you'd think they would want to be as fresh as possible for the dogs game, which would mean a lighter week on the track and in the weights room. For the port game, given the 5 day break and travel , we likely did very little aerobic or weights in the lead up which may explain why we were pretty fresh. Its worth noting though that we basically dropped down a gear in the last quarter of that game. Hypothetically, if Burgess wanted to do one last blast of high intensity training (eg extra weights sessions, extra running etc) after the Port game, the ten day break before the Hawks game provided the perfect opportunity to do so. By that I mean he could [censored] them for 5 or 6 days and still give them a four day spell leading up to the game. If we did do some heavy loads in the lead up to the hawks game then fatigue would continue to be a factor. I heard Leigh Matthews say, that watching the hawks dees game it look liked we had led in our boots. That's how it looked to me too. Extra loads would go along way to explain our performance. It was factor in the Pies and Bombers game - why not now? Increased training loads would also jibe with the significant reduction in game time for players such as Jackson, Max and Spargo in the hawks game (ie managing their overall loads across training and games). With almost every player on the list fit, Burgess has the luxury of being able to plan loads to an exact degree. Our ladder position and the wins we have banked give us another advantage in terms of loads. Other teams are not so fortunate. For example, Port are no doubt desperate to finish top 4 have to priorities winning games now. They also have quite a few injury concerns. If they did big loads now they might lose game they might otherwise win. But not loading might mean they are are not as fit come finals as us. The finals start in September. That's when we need to be at optimal fitness, not now. I suspect they have been still loading and will begin tapering from now and in the lead up to the finals do do limited aerobic or strength work.

Agree. Its funny how ideas of how ideas form about some teams that don't reflect reality. The dogs are an attacking side who love to move the ball quickly side. And in the early part of the season banged on some big scores, notable thrashing the roos, suns and the saints (the week before being held to 50 odd points against us). But they have only scored 173 points more than us. And their points for is bolstered by the the three games noted above - 167, 118 and 144 points respectively. Against the teams around them on the ladder they have found scoring much, much harder. Against the Swans they could only manage 60 points, 59 points against us, 78 points against Geelong and 73 points against the Lions, the only game they won of these games. They did manage 96 points against Port, which they also won. And as you suggest people seem to think they their weakness is their defence. Yet have only conceded 18 points less than us - though it is worth noting that in the roos, suns and the saints games i noted above those teams only managed to score 39, 56 and 33 points respectively, which skews things quite a bit.

My bollocks comment related to your comment that Gus has had his 'career ruined' Which IS bollocks. In fact you could argue that playing him on the wing had been a major boost to his career. Why? Because if he wasn't able to adapt to the role he likely would have been traded. And if he had been traded, it may well have been to a mid table club like freo, or cellar dweller club like the roos or suns. So no finals. Why traded? And why to a mid table club? Because whilst he famously came third in the Brownlow he was a defensive liability. Did not run both ways. And no top club wants an inside mid who only runs forward. That sort of player is history. Viney, on the other hand is a fantastic defensive mid. Which is why, much to the confusion of some fans, he polls so highly in the bluey every year. On the wing Gus has turned his career around. His two way running, defensive work and selflessness is now fantastic. He will have earned heaps of respect in out club- and at others. And I reckon he will do well in the bluey this year.

Good points. As you say, he is really young to be playing as much ruck time as he is. Nick nat is the only ruck that I can think of who was doing those sort of minutes at the same age. I thought they might have used the bye period to give him, kozzie, rivers and kozzie a chop out and a game or two off. And as you say they could have used weed to play Jackson's role and would have done a good job I reckon (I like weed in the ruck - pretty good technique and gets him into the game). I reckon it might be too late now. Surely from now they will want to play their finals team.

Must be a morning for being argumentative. Maybe lock down is getting to me. Jackson was poor last week. And is yet another ayer who has been down for a few weeks. Again I reckon extra training loads is likely to be a big factor. Particularly for a young fella in only his second year of afl. And he plays a pretty tough role. Like Gus, super important to our structure and tactical flexibility in terms of how we utilise Max and create match up problems for opposition coaches. Luke ain't going out of this team.

What bollocks. Gus is having his best season since 2018. Has not missed a game in a team sitting in top of the ladder. And he has done a fantastic job on the wing. Hugely important to our structure Not sure why people think he is not playing the wing atm. He still is. Jordan is supporting him there, but Gus is still playing wing. He has been a bit flat the last few games, but so has the whole team. As I suspected we have been doing extra training loads which would impact all players. In his position has to do a lot of, often unrewarded, running. And unlike say Langdon, Gus is far from a natural athlete. So tge extra loading would have a pretty big impact on his output.

Yes he had his fair share of poor disposals, which unfortunately is part of his game, but his pressure was fantastic. And in a game where our pressure was down, and the hawks out tackled us, Jack had 11 of the team's 70 tackles , by far our most and I think topped the pressure acts. Jack got 2 coaches votes last week. So, it appears one or both coaches rated his game pretty highly