Demon Dynasty

Round 13, 2022 MCG - Magpies vs Demons Well there's probably only two things we can relate to right at this moment that encapsulate the word 'Consistency'. One of them is a group of players... Clarry / Max (both legends... Max's injury can't be helped), Gus, Viney & Jordan. I would also throw May in here...IF he had played! I won't mention the other as it starts with L and not very enjoyable. Aside from the above another positive from these numbers is the top 6 total score which is the highest for the season. Clarry had a very good game but if he could just turn some of those handballs into meters gained with a quick kick forward...and get on the hunt a little more (pressure & tackles a bit low? Not alone here) However, in a losing team to post that and win the Danner's Cup you have to have a pretty crazy game. If only a few others down the line could step up a little more and go with him... 35 effectives @ 81.4%, one percenter, 6 clearances, 2 rebounds, 8 inside 50s, 3 tackles, 6 score involvements, 5 intercepts, 614 meters gaines, 1 goal and 6 turnovers (not that bad given the amount of ball he had). Gus i thought was almost BOG or had as big an impact as Clarry on the day (defensively). 13 intercepts on the day, the most for either side just ahead of Maynard on 12. The Pies had plenty more intercepts than us overall however as it seems our bombing days just keep on keeping on after about 5 years! A big number for Salem in only his second game back but is he playing too short/safe with 25 effectives @ 100% suggesting he might have been handing the pressure off to others with too many short lateral passes vs the occasional medium one inside etc? Top 5 Meters gained (MFC); Jordan (No.1 on the day) with a massive 829, Clarry 614, Hibb 463 (thought he had a decent return bar the dump around the body turnover kick on the wing late in the last), Viney 425 & Gus 400. After Benny Brown the player scores below that provide a bit of a form 'signal'. Showing why we aren't winning many games of footy of late. The form line after Benny (and he was borderline but a slight improvement on a horror four weeks...what was that around the body brain snap in the last though!!) is just too far off AFL level to win against anyone other than say the bottom three or four. Very few teams can 'carry' roughly eight players that are this badly out of form (not including Turner here for obvious reasons). If only we had that sort of depth! Personally, unless we fix how we play, from the middle of the ground forward, we are going to continue to struggle against other in form sides from here. Can we fix it? Who knows! Player Score Rank C Oliver 6.800 1 C Salem 5.300 2 C Petracca 4.925 3 A Brayshaw 4.850 4 J Jordon 4.400 5 J Viney 4.375 6 T Sparrow 3.875 7 L Jackson # 3.400 8 M Hibberd 2.975 9 C Spargo 2.875 10 H Petty 2.800 11 Max Gawn # 2.675 12 Ben Brown 2.375 13 Jake Bowey 2.125 14 Ed Langdon 1.825 15 J Harmes 1.775 16 Jake Lever 1.700 17 Alex N-Bullen 1.675 18 M Brown 1.450 19 B Fritsch 1.325 20 D Turner > 49% TOG 1.200 21 K Pickett 0.450 22 K Chandler < 22% TOG 0.250 23 Team Score 65.15 Top 6 30.65 Bottom 6 7.80 # Hit outs to advantage not captured > Subbed Out < Subbed In Stats courtesy of footywire.com

He was up and down (with May playing) after his return from injury but has yet to find something like his 2021 levels consistently. As soon as May went out any 'ok' days for him have disappeared and any bit of intermittent (every other week) ok days have dropped away badly since. This is also backed up statistically (starting with the Dockers). Including that game he has produced a worse result post May's exit each week, culminating in his worst performance for the season yesterday. 3 'ducks' in a row. Not good for us. May makes every defender look better when playing, he is that good. Funny thing is Lever will probably start improving after May returns. If he doesn't however, we need another hard nut defender and would like to see what Turner can bring (once he recovers). I'd bring him in for Lever within a few weeks of May's return if Lever doesn't get back near his best. Not many other options in this area other than Tomo and Smith who are pretty much a coin toss in difference in terms of the impact they are having at this stage in their careers.

100% ...too slow on decision making as well for now at this level. Playing at VFL pace at the moment. Time to head back for as long as it takes to reset. Not expecting massive improvement from Dunstan either but i'd be getting a block of games into him and letting him try to settle well before finals.

While im including Macca in this as he does make a significant difference up forward imv... After 3 losses to top 8 clubs (in a row) is it too simplistic to be saying... "No May, No Melbourne"?

Whatever we are attempting with that zone it's the most frustrating thing about our team defence for me. We fold back way too deep at kick ins i reckon, giving the opp far too much time and space in their defensive 50. Giving up 1/3rd of the ground before you start to try and close down the gaps and space on your opponents is pretty much asking for the opp to kick your [censored] if they have high level kicking skills and willing to work hard on their leads as they move the ball (in most cases) with relative ease up the field. Often choosing the time and place from which to launch pretty deep entries into our 50 or just run the ball in. To just keep playing this strat throughout the game when it obviously isn't working? No wonder we are 17th in pressure/tackle strats this season vs No.1 last year. Maybe it's by design and we are conserving ourselves for a big push in the second half of the season? If that's the case then i'm happy to stick a sock in it in the realisation (again) that i know very little about strats and game styles/methods and managing player loads etc. But after watching three top 8 teams pick us apart by waltzing the ball out of D50 and down the field from about quarter time to over-run us with relative ease, i have to say this very loose fold back zone (or whatever it's technical name might be) is absolutely killing any chance of staying in the game long enough to win (even occasionally) against the better in form teams. I understand many teams play this style but when i watch some of the rated clubs i can't say i notice them staying so far 'off' there opponent as they bring it out of their D50 (not for as long as we seem to do this anyway). The gaps are a little closer and they work harder to push up into the face of the opponent as quickly as possible to 'Stand' the mark and make it as hard as possible for them (within the 8 seconds they supposedly have to dispose) to hit up their next player on a lead or in space. So then you have to ask.... are we conserving ourselves for the back half or are we deliberately not closing the space down early and instead backing our usual 'trusty' defence to intercept and/or force a turnover before the ball gets near the 30 meter hot spots?

That's how i saw it from behind the play also. Clarry had a chance to burst and kick it forward off a few steps but went the suicide handball over the top to a stationary Sparrow inviting more pressure and the Pies just swarmed. They're gonna have to sort out this crap in the middle pretty quickly if we're to start winning games against the top 8 again from here. Footy's a really tough game at most levels and obviously super tough at this level but as the experts often say, might be time to get back to the basics. We look a much better team when Clarry's bursting out of congestion and kicking long i reckon.

Maybe don't take significant injuries / illness impacted players into a game? You don't always need a Maxy to square the ledger in the big man dept. Use Majak in small doses as required and craft / grind out some of these games. Maybe for the odd win. Ok so we lose a few ....we probably would've lost them anyway taking in compromised players. Gives the injured / ill time to reset and come back primed. I'm only a keyboard amature but seems a little strange to be managing a team in this manor over such a grueling long season. Goody goes back to learnings but it appear he has allowed this error with two of our key players now over the last few weeks. An error that could be the difference between 2nd and 3rd maybe if things get tight? As we know this is often a game of inches or small percentages. A few good/poor decisions can be the difference. Playing a big time player impacted by such issues to me also has the potential to effect a player's mental state / confidence in general, IF he ends up feeling he has not been able to play at his best and has let the team down etc. Simply not worth it in my book. Would we take this risk in a big final? If not, why do we do so in regular season?

Agreed Mr Leg but i still think he halved many of those center bounces in the air before then competing as that handy extra mid at ground level. Prevented the opp hitting to advantage first (some of the time). He's doing less of the former and seems to be a fair way off the level he showed in the GF on the ground at the mo also. Not expecting him at GF levels either every week however he's been a fair way off that for about 5 weeks now (post Covid?). Slightlly improved around the ground the last few but not in the middle IMO.

6/7 days to train prep is plenty enough coach. They need at least 2 to 3 days off to recover & freshen up for a tough back half i would think.

Leaps way too early at the center bounces too often...cant see how we're going to win many hits to advantage or even neutralise the contest unless he corrects this.

Nothing is that bad or that good in all this. May back in makes us roughly a two goal better team defensively. A great general/Quarterback and makes the others around stand taller and their jobs a tad easier. A great intercept player and the team sets up further down the ground on his kick ins....making any losses/turnovers at those contests generally less damaging coming back in as they arent coming back in as deep as often. Then there's Macca up forward as our only genuine contested beast who can out mark opponents in a pack and/or.get the ball to ground much of the time if he doesn't. We have no replacement for Macca until/unless he returns and if he does.i doubt he'll be able to get back to the level he was prior to going down in time to inpact finals in a big way. But you never know eh. So the elephant in the room for the FD is .... how do we solve the Macca problem? Maybe we can't and just need to go smaller up forward and do a Richmond pre-Lynch arriving ie; just Riewoldt surrounded by a bunch of smalls and one medium-small in Fritta?

This 👆🏼

This sums it up to a tee for mine. We have the same forward line coach though GY 🤷‍♂️

Both the KTs are too easliy pushed off the ball or kept out of the marking contest with even a slight bodying from an opponent. Without Macca we have no contested beasts in the air up forward aside from Max on occasions. Fritta one on one gets hold of opponents at times and that's about it.

Very very solid but.... he slow plays far too often for mine and often down the line when (sometimes) the better option would have been to move it quicker with a short pass inside or over the top (when options were clearly presenting..obviously you cant if there isnt) and keep moving the ball up the field before opp has time to call in the cavalry and get extras behind the ball. Nice but also a liability in this regard on occasions. Love the effort and the rest but would like to see a bit more quick ball movement and/or play on at times. Not doing so makes scoring on the counter that much harder

I watched BBB a fair bit today SPC and im sorry but he just aint working hard enough for his $$ as a key forward. He sits back way too deep for too long even when players are a good kick & a half out and you know they're probably going to drop it short around the 30 - 35 meter mark. He often starts from behind his opponent too without any body work and is waiting for the perfectly weighted pass to run onto. In a tight pressure encounter you aint gonna get that sort of service to often. As a KF you would expect multiple leads, or even one coming at the ball carrier early to offer him 'something' coming through the middle under heat. With BBB ... most of the time you get nada, zip... just the kick--it-to-me long option and i'll leap from behind and try and clunk the odd head banger. While BBB was slightly better today than previous 4 weeks, it wouldn't take much as he basically gave us nothing in that block of games. Then there was Mitch.... oh boy. Wheras Mihoceck was a big part of why they won today. Chalk & cheese Up forward IMHO.

Poor player management through those two rounds. Had we rested about half a dozen key players in those matches it may have at least given us a fair chance to win one of the last three coming into the buy. Along with the May saga and Macca going down, the lack of player management stands out for mine. Many were jogging on the spot for a fair part of the match. Their were hands on hips all round just after the warm up prior to the bounce as well. Did they come into a huddle and do the usual rev up? Might have missed that.

The rolling zone is a steaming pile of dung at the moment. We have no ability to close down space and shut a team down, even for 10 minutes of a quarter to wrestle the game back on out terms. Forward craft, play, lack of leads, lack of crumbing, kicking to the same spot far too often.... shizen houzen. Clarry's one extra handball or two through the middle instead of a quick kick inside 50 is killing this team. Teams have worked out the bang bang bang bringing someone off the square. You have to go over and inside 50 with the quick kick. A stack of work to do from here to get this slightly deerailed train back on track

The only good thing to come outta that (aside from a great cause) was the $$ i had on the Pies

Mitch to Mihoczeck

Barely touched the ball (vs his usual)

Did a couple of decent things that quarter but far too quiet and lacks intensity on his opponent. Pushed off the ball too easily. Still zero goals and thats what he's there for. Would need to kick a couple of goals this quarter or at least one plus a few asists to have any chance of holding his spot. Sparrow looks very shakey with the ball and too loose without at this stage. ANB far too quiet. Again unless they lift and do something pretty special it's Bedford time for one of those two pls.

Yep and this is the case in general around stoppages and in game play. A few too many handball receivers are flat footed but....this is also being brought about by one or two extra (unecessary) handballs to a nearby player drawing further pressure. Too me this is a structural adjustment thing. Get the outliers out a little further so they have a tad more time to change lanes after the receive & execute by foot or get the overlap going over the top by hand.

Put Harmes on DeGoey. Needs a cooler. Kozzie the invisible man so far. I'd be switching him on to Daicos as a hard lock and run off role if he wins the one on one....give him the challenge to win defensively first...then go go go to damage. He cant just be a forward crumb in a big game as he just doesnt get enough of it (at this point...might happen later as he gets stronger, tougher, more experience)

This bloke is such a big game white line player. Anyone who says Hibb is done & dusted well think again. Our best down back so far by the length of the Flemington straight