binman

The thing is with the kicking skills isse, there is no easy fix, and they certainly won't solve themselves naturally (which is not to say we can't try something up forward - but really rhey are pretty limited what they can do. They have after all tried petty and brought Smith) Goody has built a game style that this list of players can win flags with. What's the point of us, say adopting the pies model if we don't have enough players who can reliably hit high risk kicks that model demands. We went all in on contested ball winners in tracc, oliver, Gus and viney - none of whom who are elite kicks. We had Max, a generalation ruck - but just a passable kick, albeit he has really improved his kicking over the journey. Only two elite kicks, in Watts and Salem, though Wattsy not tough enough, or committed I'm guessing, for goody, so he's soon out. And in Salem, we essentialy took him and Hunt, instead of Kelly, who is exactly the sort of plsyer we now need. Max, tracc, viney, oliver, gus and salo. Some A grade stars. Contested ball beasts. Bulls. Not much silk. But, with the exception of salo, often unreliable by foot and only salo an elite kick at the Pendulbury, Sidebottom level. That's the foundation goody inherited. To that he added key the structural players in May, Lever and Langdon he needed to build a premiership team. But again, all three are ok kicks, but certainly not elite. In May's case he is elite sometimes- but turns it over way too often in the 20-30 metre range, often under no pressure. It will take time to bring in some really skilled players to support Max, trac et al - all of whom are locked in on long contracts. Taylor has been working on it though. JVR is a terrific kick, nice simple technique, Mcvee is a great in, Laurie is waiting, Howe looks like he has neat skills, and I really like Sestan's kicking - has the knack of balancing up a touch before hitting it. And Hunter was a good pick up - adding an elite kick straight in to the 22. When the weather improves and we get closer to finals, we will increase tge speed of ball movement and transition. And all things being g equal we look like we did rounds 1-6. More space, more free players ahead of the ball, more movement by hand, riskier corridor kicks leading to better angles leading lanes openingup etc etc- all of which mitigates the kicking skills issue. Frustrating, but we're close to playing that sort of ballistic, fast game that everyone loves. Let's just hope it doesn't rain again this year. It's also worth remembering that the method goody has built is based on that of the tigers - who also had a pretty average list in terms of kicking skills. The tigers also built a model to take advantage of the strengths of their list - and won three flags.

Agree. The model works completely differently in the dry. For one thing a forward line with three talls in it ( say resting ruck, bb, jvr) has a chance of marking - or in Brown's case keep his feet. And we convert more ground ball wins. We can spread and switch, and take on more risky kicks. But in the wet, the model becomes too blunt. All congestion. Contest to contest. A battle. Perfect for viney, but not many others. And there's the rub. Why doesn't goody change the approach? One possibility is he believes the system is the key, and to maximise the likelihood every player executes their role on grand final day every game should be used as an opportunity to drill the system so it becomes instinctive. For an infinite range of other possibilities, please see the Is Goodwin the right coach uber thread.

Sure In dry conditions. And besides 77 inside 50s is very misleading. I'm guessing half of them were reentries. Meaning the ball was coming back into a forward line with 30 odd players in there. No space at all. No leading lanes. All but impossible to take a contested mark. Wet. Slippery. Chaos. We basically didnt score on transition. In part because the ball was in our forward half most of the time. Meaning there was almost always congestion ahead of the ball. And no overlap run meant no free players ahead of the ball. And again, its worth pointing out the giants scores to inside 50 efficiency was significantly worse than ours - 26% to our 36%. Unfortunately their goals to inside 50 ratio was a hell of a lot better than ours. We kick straight. We win.

Another theme in the wet.

Great post. Didn't mcvees ball handling skills really stand out. Classy player.

That's a fair point - though it's worth noting their smalls didnt do any damage either. And the reality is we don't have any small forwards ready to play seniors at Casey. But if koz kicks 2.1 like Greene did from hid three shots, instead of 1.2, we win the game. Tbe swans have some terrific smalls and medium forwards. Didn't help them kick accurately in their draw with the cats - a game also played in the wet and one they too should have won easliy.

Yep, they have more skilled players. And like highly skilled players do, they take their chances Nor sure i agree, but that is a completely valid question about our game plan. But one thing we can say with certainty, given the overwhelming evidence, is it doesn't hold up in wet conditions. On the conditions, I'm glad we only had one injury. The ground was giving way and shifting all over the ground. Perfect conditions for knee injuries.

Look, if you are of a mind that we have 'connection' issues then yesterday provided a scratch for that itch. But the conditions were appalling. And combined with our game plan of trapping in our forward half meant super congested forward zone, with it all but impossible to take contested marks and the ball living on the ground. But that didn't hurt the giants I hear you say. Well, our efficiency inside 50 for scores was 36% (26 shots from 73 i50s). Acceptable in those conditions with the way we play. The winners? They MUST have been more efficient right? Well the giants were even less efficient going inside 50, with an efficiency of only 26% (12 shots from 46 i50s). Imagine the melts if we went at 26% efficiency for scores inside 50! The difference was they kicked 7.5. And we kicked 5.15. That is the game right there.

What is the prognosis on Fritter's injury?

See post above jimmy.

Fatigue is a moot point I reckon. And to he honest so is the connection and forward issues palaver. Though it didn't help having three super talls in Brown, Grundy and gawn in such horrendous conditions. Or losing our best kick for goal early for that matter. We didn't lose because of fatigue or game plan, structure, set up, etc etc. We lost that game away with our woeful kicking for goals. Again. It really is a simple as that. We dominated that game, and should have won it easliy. We smashed them in every key stat, including shots for goal. Twenty shots at goal in those conditions is fine. Particularly when the opposition could only manage 12. The expected score of 77 -43 tells the tale. A five goal win turned into a loss because we miss shots on goal we should make. Bottom line, we have too many poor kicks. Wet weather exacerbates that huge issue. The winning goal by kelly was the perfect example of how good technique stands up under pressure and in terrible conditions. And our ball handling skills are also a big worry, again exacerbated by wet weather. Even tracc fumbles way too often.

Expected score from Champion Data 77 - 43 Says it all.

The podcast is run by Elon musk this week - which is why it's not working. Good thing too. That was the most frustrating loss I can recall for a long time. Our kicking skills were absolutely horrendous. As were our ball handling skills. Good lord, we missed Oliver.

Def agree to disagree on tank - no chance bowey had the tank or high cruising speed of nibbler - an ability that is fundamental to the role. They are completely different types of athletes. And for context, unlike nibbler who never comes out of the side, bowey was dropped for a big chunk of last season and has played at Casey tgis year too. Whilst nibbler But leaving that aside, it makes little sense to take Bowey away from his best position as a distributor of half back and make him a high half forward, a role he has never played. And even less sense to take nibbler away from a specialist role he has trained and played in over three seasons and made his own to such a high level he is a clear best 22 lock. I mean a few years back, they encouraged him to look at other clubs. He stayed, and has played so well in that position that the club put him in the leadership group and resigned him on a new contract.

Bowey does not have the tank to play nibbler's role. Just about noone else does. Not yet. I find it so perplexing why people still callfor nibbler to be dropped. I mean, for one thing, he plays a very specific role, one tmac had said is the HARDEST role in football (his words, not mine), that there isn't an immediate replacement for. And leaving that aside, he has been selected in the ones for almost every game for two and half season. He has played something like 58 of our last 60 games for pete's sake. And that includes a premiership. Is there another player who can boast that record? Goody is a premiership coach, with a 58% win record. The idea that nibbler being one of the first picked and a best 22 lock is somehow related to goody having favorites, being stubborn or irrationally 'glued' to nibbler is an insult to goody. I mean c'mon, goody is the business of winning flags. If he didn't think nibbler helps us achieve that goal he's not in the side. Simple.

Lead. Bur agree - I've heard him do Casey a couple of times. Really like his work. The woman doing special comments, whose name escapes me but is an AFLW player, is good too. It makes such a difference to hear decent commentators.

Good thing we bear the other mob by 10 goals then.

Totally fair comments. I don't usually post my footy punting tips, bar the occasional comment on particular games. Was just struck by what I saw as great value accross so many games, and thought I'd share. But I get that people are sick of the infiltration of betting in footy. Me too. So I'll refrain from such posts in future.

Yep, that's exactly what I mean. Of course, I am likely wrong. But it is a possibility, one not considered if the game is assessed in isolation as opposed to being piece of the campaign puzzle

The suns don't have to win for me to win on that game.

Hodge makes Kelli Underwood sound like Dennis Commetti. How on earth can someone get job as a commentator when they can't talk properly, or without that weird resigned inflection at the end of every sentence - it is like fingernails down a blackboard. I mean, c'mon seven, cant you spring for some basic professional development and/or elocution lesson? Jesus wept.

The best betting round of footy for the season thus far i reckon (there is hardly ever so many game i consider good value - having already won on the Swans to make their line, and baulking late on the lions and leaving that game alone). Bets i like for the rest of the round: Adelaide to make their 44.5 point line - very long i know, but Roos coming off a bye and the Crows two games hence - and looking for percentage Gold coast to make their +6 point line - i think they win, so a six point line is good value Bombers to make their +12 point line - Port coming off a bye and Bombers two games hence, will run at Port and try to make it a running contest Hawks to make their +18 point line - Blues coming off a bye and Hawks two games hence, will run at the blues and try to make it a running contest Dees to make their 16 point line (in from 19) - Giants coming off bye and we will be looking to attack and run hard. Best bet of the round Saints to make their -50 point line - the Eagles are uncompetitive, not AFL fit, the saints will be desperate to take the opportunity to build some percentage and the weather is perfect for footy The only game therefore i don't have feel for the value is the dog freo game. The dogs are coming off the bye and Freo are up and running now. The line is a health -10 Dogs' way, so i give freo a real chance of beating that handicap mark. But i just have a feeling the dogs will buck the post bye trend and come to play today.

It was a weird Freudian slip. In cricket i always strived to make the ones. But struggled to get out of the 3s - hence the on3s.

1. Maybe, maybe not. There could be any number of other drivers for that call - refocusing the players at the half way point in the season, some training away from prying eyes, to practice a routine for our inevitable game down there next season, strengthen squad mentality etc etc. Even if its only purpose was 'to provide an edge to win the game', it was still an experiment that risked increasing our chances of losing. In the strategy segment on SEN, Sanderson was asked about it and said he didn't think it worked and the players wouldn't have liked it because it would have thrown their routines out of whack. My point is, would they have risked such an unusual change to their routine, and processes, if we absolutely had to win that game? I don't' think so. 2. Agree

I think one of the hardest things for fans to get their head around is the idea of a campaign that has as its goal peaking in September. Goody has said a variation of this at least five or six times in post match pressers. But his comments don't land, the instinct is to wave them off as coach speak. I think people get the concept in the abstract (premierships are not won in june). But not in terms of it informing their assessment of individual games. We have all been conditioned to see every game as critical and as some sort of litmus test or accurate meaure of the chances of ultimate success. Each game becomes a stand alone event unconnected to the arc of the season. The dees get beaten mid winter by the reigning premier on their home deck, a ground they have a home ground advantage bettered only by the lions. That loss confirms for many why we aren't a contender - despite the fact we had just vanquished the flag favourites. And there is the attendant gnashing of teeth and criticisms of: selection (why bring an underdone petty in! Spargo as sub?), coach (why so many handballs?) and players (dumb - just get it forward, no skill). But see the game as a stepping stone in our campaign and the perspective is different. Petty is selected, despite being underdone because it is the best thing for his individual program (and therefore the team) in terms of peaking later in the year. Or maybe they had been really worried Brown would not ever be fit enough to play the key tall forward role. And decided they needed Petty up there. Perhaps they got good news on Brown, changed course and decided they want Petty down back and wanted to give him as many games in defence as possible to get into the rhythm of the role. That might also explain why they didn't send him forward until near the end of the game after Cameron's injury. There are better, more versatile options for sub than spargo, but as flagged by goody at the start of the year they will use the sub role for both tactical AND load management reasons. Another sub might have increased our chances of winning this particular match, but the eyes are on the prize and spargo being in peak shape is an important piece of the puzzle. Give something up now and be rewarded later. We have had real struggles in the wet with our ball handling, but want to be prepared to stick to our method of chaining out handballs come finals - even if wet. So the direction is to continue to use handball in the cats game because the best way to embed something is apply it in a match. We turned it over way too often and as a result, for one of the only times this season , we were outscored on turnover. But perhaps the team was encouraged to take the high risk kick on because we they weren't encouraged to do so against the blues and pies games and they want to turn the dial a bit more to risk in this phase of the season to get us ready to play like we did rounds 1 - 6. These are all guesses of course. But they are possibilities not considered if the game is assessed in isolation, as a standalone, discreet event where the only goal is to maximise the chances of winning that individual match. But at the end of the day, for genuine flag contenders the campaign is about winning the war, not the individual battles. If our sole goal was to beat the cats, I am 100% sure a lot of things would have been done differently. Even our preparation might have been different - would we have experimented with the staying over night in Geelong stuff if that was an absolute must win game? Of course they wanted to win the game, but there were other objectives as well - winning wasn't the sole goal. And I think it is helpful to assess games, at this time of year in particular, through that lens.