binman

That variability is the key reason why I don't bet on footy as much during the bye phase of the season. One example- lions scored 152 points last week at Adelaide oval against port. Are port really that bad? Are the lions really that good At home, in perfect conditions against a team further down the ladder than port (one, even most of its fans gave no hope too and started 5.35. Port were favourites to beat the lions) the lions could only manage just under half tthat. And almost got rolled. One thing that variability at this time of year does create is opportunity. Because unlike horse racing (my other sporting passion) most footy punters don't factor in the training program as a variable. No one expects a Melbourne cup winner to win first up at 1400, no matter how much better than they are than their opponents. In my assessment we were great value last night at the 30 point line because they are not a five goal better team than us and believe we planned our program to be closer to our optimal fitness for this game (im not being smart after the fact - I made that exact point on the podcast. And it would be hard to argue I wasn't proved correct given how the game played out). Similarly, port being givem a +3.5 line against the saints is overs because lots of punters are basing their assessment on port being smashed by the lions last week.

I know you do. And that's great - i wasn't suggesting otherwise. I was merely pointing out critising the club on demonland, even if that criticism is justifiable, is not being 'part of the solution' in so far as it has zero impact on how the club performs.

Based on goody's presser he won't be changing the forward line set up.

I think it is totally reasonable to question the high performance program. Fitness is clearly an issue for us. I wish a reporter would ask that exact question But what I would say is that it is really hard to make a reasoned assessment of the high performance program because there is so much we don't know and so little analysis by the media about clubs high performance programs in general. So for example, we can see we are not yet fit enough to run out games. But what is not clear is the impact of internal, behind the scene factors (that we as fans uusually know nothing about - eg motivation of players, niggles they might be carrying etc) or the impact of factors that we do know about, for example: - goody has emphasised trying to engineer playing our best footy in the back half of the season: has this philosophy informed our high performance program's planning (logic would suggest yes)? - we are playing a modified method, less reliant on winning the contest: how has that impacted a program that had previously emphasised power? -our schedule had been nuts, and we have had two byes: how has that impacted planning? - we lost two of our fittest, best 22 senior players in gus and Smithy in the off season. And you could add a third in melk, and a 4th in Ben bBrown (and salo and lleverhave both missed 4 games too): that's huge in terms of the teams overall fitness, not least because they have had basically had to be replaced by young players; but how big an impact has that had? - mutiple players had interrupted preseasons: we know that always had an impact oon overall teams ffitness how much of an impact had had it on us? - we have carried two players in petts and Clarry who have been a long way from optimal fitness (with the goal of being fit as possible in the second half of the year - positive signs last night on that front): it must have an impact on our capacity to run out games as a whole, but how much? - we had 10 players in the team last night, nearly half, who have played less than 50 games. And we had three players in their first season of AFL football: we know endurance and strength develop from a base and each preseason players start at a new level of fitness, ie its accumulative: what is the impact of having so many players in the side comming off only one, two or three preseasons? Or even dealing with the rigours of half a season of AFL football and needing to back up week in, week out? - how much does the program have to be adjusted when so many young players are in the 23? So many variables. Sure work rate is party mental, but the reality is if players are leg tired no amount of will power will help them cover the ground at pace, which is what is required of all players to make any method work. I'm hopeful that we will be much better at running out games and much closer to optimal fitness as a whole group, pretty much from this point on. I think we saw the start of that improvement last week and even more so last night. I mean how could anyone watch the second quarter, how we were running in waves, creating overlap and transitioning wnd to end, amd compare it to say the freo game where looked like we had lead in our boots, and think our fitness isn't on an upward trajectory?

Add salo and bowey to that team and it looks a lot stronger. I can't see amw or kolt getting dropped. Perhaps woey and pup come out and amw is the sub.

I meant set ourselves physically in terms of the high performance program and load management, ie being as fresh as possible for this game.

Agree on all of the above. On the may non mark, what is so galling is they pay a mark like the one to the big one near the end of the first q, which was marginal on terms of him controlling the ball. And may controls it for longer- and doesn't get paid. The inconsistentcy is infuriating. Same goes for riv running too far. There wasn't really another that wasn't paid in tgis match but games plsyers get away with running further mutiple times.

This is my explanation. Last week we didn't score a point in the last quarter because we completey ran out of gas because we trained hard in our bye period and set ourselves for this game. Last night we also ran out of gas, though nowhere near as much. The six day break and travel was no doubt a factor. Last week maxy said an issue in the roos scoring we were trying to score too much rather than control the tempo. That's to say we let the game open up And so this we tried to control the tempo in the last mote effectively. And did a good job of doing so for much of the last quarter. The critical problem was missing four very gettable goals in the last quarter - petty, clarry, langers and fritter. Kick one of them and we likey win (or perhaps draw in fritters case).

Picket what does that actually mean? I mean, it's your right to post what you want about the club. Vent all you like. Ditto for others too of course. But are you seriously suggesting a fan knocking the club on a footy forum will actually help us improve - ie is part of the solution? The only realistic way fans can be part of any 'solution' that leads to on field improvement is SUPPORTING the club. Turn up to games, if you can (I was shocked to read someone on here saying they would refuse go to games as some sort of protest- that is literally the opposite of support). Buy a membership, if you van Don't buy into, and reinforce, the nonsense the media peddle about the dees (we all can do that). Hell, even push back against such nonsense. That's what we can do to help.

Yep. Heartbreaking result. But a fantastic performance. Most on here gave us zero chance. Lucky to get within 5 goals and all that. On that logic we smashed the expectations of most posters. I haven't read this thread yet - I hope those that had such expectations are acknowledging how good our performance was and not taking the loss at yet another opportunity to just pile on. Any in the 'we are so hopeless we wont get within a bulls roar camp' who still choose to pile on are showing their true colours. And they aren't red and blue. i was bullish about our chances and was confident of a really good performance. I was not in the least surprised that's what we got. My expectations were we set ourselves for this game and that we would see a much more dynamic team running over the ground better and being better in the contest. They met my expectations as that's what we got. So much better in the spread, so much more gut running (which is why our all team defence was so good for most of the game - and why it dropped off in the last as we tired). The intensity and contest was great - though the pressure wasn't as good in the first as it needed to be. We we were lucky they only had a 15 point lead at quarter time. Viney was immense. Clarry was terrific, and worked himself into the ground. As did chin and others. Koz was simply brilliant. The second quarter was our best quarter of footy for a long, long time. We ran out of gas in the last, but not too badly - certainly not as bad as last week. (In terms of running out the game, it's worth noting we only had a six day break to their seven). Not helped by petty rolling his ankle or goody not bringing pup on early in the last, or even late in the third, to inject some fresh legs and run. Losing bowey really hurt, particularly given salo was out too. Woey struggled down back and would have been sub if bowey played. And would have been a much better sub option than pup. More flexible in terms of role, more experienced and stronger. Goody would have brought him on earlier. But the biggest he issue was once again our inability to kick clutch goals. 2.8 in the second half was why we lost. Same story Poor kicking is our biggest weakness - and really the evidence is mounting up we have issues under pressure (which by the by is exacerbated by poor technique). The other big factor was we couldn't generate enough intercept marks - though they are less relevant in the transition game we were playing for much of the game. On the free against nibbla, he was unlucky because he was tripped. But the free was probably there and I want umpires to pay frees they see regardless of the point in the match. But what drives me insane is that free was in the context of us not receiving mutiple frees during the match and late in the game, that were also there. Where were our holding the bloody ball frees (made worse pinging us in the middle fir tge htb). Or May's mark that wasn't paid. Pay them for God sakes. And was that 50 to rivers against rayner at the end? Marginal perhaps, but so was nibblas. We are still well in the hunt this season. As goody had said all season, we want to be playing our best footy in August and September. The second quarter looked like our best footy. We need to see that for longer in games - and I expect we will. To misquote Paul McCarthy, reports of our death are much exaggerated.

I was channelling Scotty 'keep punching' Palmer.

It's a point I made before the season started ie how young our list is and how many best 22 are 22 and under. The idea we are suddenly 'playing the kids' because we have conceded the year and are looking toward 2025 is ridiculous. Yes the kolt ans brown came in. But apart from tracc who came out? Laurie, who is 22.

I'm in the drop tomo this week camp. But someone suggested dropping Howes instead, which isn't such a bad idea. The issue as I see it, is as a defender, tomo needs a one on one match up. He's too slow off the mark for the intercept role in my book. Is hipwood too quick? If not he could take him, freeing up may and Lever to wax on Daniher - or may to lock Daniher down and lever intercept. My concern though about the lions forward line is nor the talls, it's the medium forwards - Mccluggage, Bailey, Cameron and McCarthy. And for that reason, I think Howes will keep his spot. On tomo as a forward, I've long thought they should try him up forward. Perhaps in a defensive forward role on opponents intercepting defenders.

Our top 10 pressure players against the roos (which was a very high pressure game - the roos' contest and pressure was terrific). By the by, of all the stats I am 99% sure the correlation between winning the team pressure rating and winning is the highest - by some margin. A curious thing about the pies last year was that for much of the season they were able to win games when they lost the team pressure rating. They were a complete outlier. That changed come the end of year and finals when the game becomes all about the contest. Most Pressure Points Note: pressure points are the weighed sum of pressure acts. Physical pressure acts are worth 3.75 points, closing acts are worth 2.25 points, chasing acts are 1.5 points and corralling are 1.2. ( https://www.championdata.com/glossary/afl/ ) Player Pressure Acts Pressure Points Season Average Alex Neal-Bullen 33 80 54.4 Kade Chandler 23 61 47.2 Trent Rivers 23 52 24.9 Jack Viney 19 45 60.0 Tom Sparrow 20 45 46.0 Ed Langdon 24 45 31.2 Caleb Windsor 21 44 33.5 Koltyn Tholstrup 15 41 40.0 Clayton Oliver 15 38 45.3 Kysaiah Pickett 20 35 42.0

Say what you want about clarry, but even in his current form he is a better option than any mid running around at Casey. They're using AFL matches to get him fit. We might still see clarry somewhere near his best by seasons end.

From 13:03 of this link: https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/best-of-abc-sport-podcast/lingy-the-legend-will-may-be-fined-for-staging-/104012664 Key points: 'Look at the results this weekend' - it's a tough comp Focus when Roos were closing in - addressing some of the poor posture and body language in last couple of games If you look at the vision 'id hope you'd see' some improvement in that space 'They got within a kick with 4 mins to go (actually was 4:35), we were able to hold up in the last 4 mins' - good 'defensive actions' The Roos attacked and we were looking to 'score too much' in the last The Roos 'brought a couple of numbers to stoppages late' which we 'probably didn't react quick enough' to Clayton has been playing a defensive midfield role this season - 'people don't see that', but he has been 'playing a completely different role' which frees up other mids and explains his drop in possessions He was freed up to be more attacking this week, but got tagged Handled it ok after the first 15-20 mins Clarry tried to go to Davis Uniake, freed up Jack to play his game Clarry working super hard and hopefully will get back to his best 'in the next few weeks' Next week's game - 'i left last night really, really pumped' to play Brisbane 'I'm really pumped' for Friday night (he said this twice) We have a rivalry with the Lions He's 'set it up so well, Goody, that i think we are going to see a strong effort from our club up there' 'I can get a bit too personal' in terms of focusing on his ruck battles Winning clearances critical at the GABBA Not 'concerned' about our forward line Still haven't seen Tracc - still in isolation Where do you see this group in terms of playing your best footy in the back half of the years?: Love to be where the Swans are but 'we've been there, in 2022 we were 11 zip and went out in straight sets' Its all about being in form in the right part of the year, referencing the Blues and Giants last year as examples of teams hitting form at 'the right part of the year' Excited to try to get there - 'not there yet, but hopefully with a couple of little tweaks and we keep smacking in on the contest and our defence side of our brand and hopefully get there by the back half of the year'

Indeed. We have struggled pre and post bye since burgess was made high performance manager (well, from 2021 - we didn't get a proper bye in 2020 because of covid) 2021: post bye we could only manage 68 points in a scrappy 11 point win over an average bombers side. In the lead up to the bye we had two 'uncharacteristic defeats' in our previous four matches. 2022: post bye, we came out running on top of the ground, and in a shock result flogged the lions by 62 points at the gabba. It was a shock because prior to the bye we had been in terrible form, losing 3 on the trot (having won our first 10 games) - freo flogged us at the G by 38 points, the swans rolled us the g and we could only manage 56 points against a very average pies team, who won by 26. 2023: post bye, in a super scrappy match, we led the cats by 7 points at 3 quarter time (6.11 to 5.10), but stopped to a walk in the last quarter and gave up 6 goals to go down by 11 points. In the four pre bye games we lost to Port at AO (but played well), lost, again, to freo at the g, had a scrappy win over the blues (who were 15th at that point) and a good win over the pies. 2024: after our first bye we we were woeful in the first half, and not much better in the second, in a scrappy win over the tigers. After our second bye, we again stopped to a walk in the last quarter and were lucky to hold off the lowly roos. In the 3 pre bye games, we played pretty well in our win over the saints, we were woeful against freo and better than the scoreline suggests against the pies, but still very scrappy. For context, it's important to note that in spite of (arguably BECAUSE of ) of those performances we finished top 4 in 2021, 22 and 23.

They clearly hope so. Same goes for petty. That's to say both players had severely interrupted preseasons. And they have made the decision to try and get them somewhere near optimal fitness come finals by playing them in the ones. Risky move, in so far as we have two underdone players in the 22. But they obviously think this approach is better than playing them at Casey. Petty was moving the best he has foe ages, so hopefully we're starting to see the results.

Many Demonland posters are too negative and should drink some concrete and harden up.

Awesome vision. Yze seems a genuinely good bloke. I loved Brown dog's expression too. Sick with nerves. I could relate.

Max gawn about to be interviewed on abc radio.

Thank God.

Huh? No, I'm asking where is the advice, that I received, for the posters pouring scorn on the club to just 'enjoy the win' and not create bad vibes in a post match thread. Of a game we won.

Are you being serious? Playing the man? You just accused me of relying on stats and not watching the game. That's not playing the man? Give me a spell It's been a very long time since stats were not used by coaches to help understand the game. Hell, AFL clubs employees full time stats analysts. Ours, like at other clubs, sits on the interchange bench and feeds info direct to the coach the whole game. The players have a screen in front of them with key data, eg pressure rating. The players are advised at the breaks of key data, eg time in forward half, contested possessions etc I watch the game pearl. Live at the ground when we play in Melbourne, then on replay. I also analyse stats post game. Helps me understand and contextualise what I've watched. Others may not. And just 'trust' their eyes. Each to their own.

How old is your coach?