Earl Hood

You are probably right and he does have a lot of mates but not solely because of technique. I just don’t think the team game plan puts a premium on accurate kicking, it demands contested footy, get ball and bang it forward at all costs. Skill levels are secondary to brute, contested ability. If you get it right it overwhelms bottom 6 sides, is competitive with middling 7 to 12 sides but struggles with top 4 sides big time. In short the coach and game plan worry me.

Anyone know why he fell out of favour? He made mistakes early on then settled down Into the back pocket quite well I thought but was dropped and that was it. He showed some great qualities, burst speed, evasiveness, zero fear and willingness to take the game on. Might need some managing but plenty to work with, so was disappointed he didn’t get a late run.

Was Martin squeezed out? I thought at the time he took off of his own volition after experiencing the first year of Neeld. He is a highly intelligent individual and the Schwab/Neeld circus of stupidity was too much for him.

Grain of salt, surely? We supposedly had so many other players on our radar. Rory Sloane is often mentioned. Would he or Neale have been lost to the game early if we got them under the Bailey/Neeld/Schwab era?

Great career, all the best post footy mate. Never understood why we let him go at the time.

Gee interesting where AFL is at the moment. I am now watching the Rabbitohs v EELS which is closely fought final. AFL contests So often one sided.

And that pay scale [censored] is basic draft tampering but the AFL just sits there and watches it happen year in year out. It started with Luke Ball who walked from the Saints and refused to talk to suiters other than the Pies, we had first dibs. He had medical issues he would not devolve to anyone but his preferred destination club. Now we just get guys demanding front end payments that other clubs can’t meet, all to get to their preferred club.

Thought it would have been a 50m at least, happened after the whistle for the first infringement.

The holding the ball, incorrect disposal rule has reappeared! Been missing for 6 to 10 rounds but now back. Amazing.

The wife who is a Hawks tragic is telling me we have offered Isaac Smith a 2 year deal with the option of a third, not sure on what coin. She thinks the Hawks have offered one year plus a second depending on performance. Interesting! She reckons he will stay.

Interesting watching the replay it looks like a guy instinctively turning sideways for the impact as most people would to an oncoming player. You are expected not to bump but tackle but in that situation you can open yourself up for a shirtfront. We are talking about nanosecond decisions as to how you will take the collision. Perhaps I need to review the incident again from various angles but I think the decision is harsh. It reminds me a bit of the Viney Lynch collision a few years ago. In the end Viney got off because all he did was brace for the inevitable collision.

I wonder if J Smith has ever played on the wing. As you say quick, agile, can take a mark and apparently has elite endurance. He is an athlete first perhaps he could maximise his strengths running up and down a wing and spend the preseason learning from Langdon.

So who gets the FB nomination then? Andrews, Weitering, Jonas?

Strewth who got the small forward possie? I remember a commentator, can’t remember who, saying a small forward kicking 76 was the equivalent of a 100 goal year for a key forward. And Robbo did the equivalent a few years later, did he get AA?

And a lot of that gets back to coaching and developing strategies and techniques to maximise our strengths. I go to training frequently pre Covid and the rucks and mids are always practicing set plays at ball ups, throw ins etc. It often looked more complex and nuanced than what you see game day. In general at training the game simulations don’t often resemble what we do game day. I really think we have issues with how we coach.

Agree May delivers much more but his primary role is to stop big forwards scoring and he has done that all season and his AA squad membership should be judged on the primary role of the full back position in my opinion. How often have we seen KPB getting all the plaudits but their role is not to take on the big gorilla but to spoil, intercept, rebound. It looks great but often some other poor bastard has done the hard man on man work.

Someone posted this on Facebook. Can’t do much more playing as a legit fullback than stop the big power forwards, the position is not about rebounding, s intercept marking or come across the pack and punch the ball away stuff.

I am watching the game on CH7, can anyone tell me how many goals De Goey has kicked in his last 2 matches?

Why am I sure that we will have a great preseason and all will be positive in 2021 then we will lose some early games because we are lacking connection between our midfield and our forwards, our mids are bombing it long, while our forwards are leading out etc, etc. Then there will be the inaccuracy in front of goal, gee we need to look at our kicking technique etc. Then our mids learn to lower their eyes to pick targets.....Oh and then there will be selection, where we experiment with people unsuited to their new roles, slowly work that out and eventually drop them or move them to their more suitable roles. I suppose my point is we seem to be caught in some Ground Hog day circumstance with Goody. We start every season with the same game plan deficiencies, then slowly rectify them thru the season but drop vital games along the way. This has been a feature of the last 4 seasons, 2017 to 2020.

That might be it for Harley. Sad really.

Played ok but we were the exact opposite of ruthless, let’s face it. We managed to keep them in it all game to the point where we lost control and could have lost it. What’s the opposite of ruthless? Not sure but that is us.

Yes but hard to work out what is going on. This guy has serious footy ability but it goes missing for long periods that wouldn’t earn him a game in most sides but maybe it does in ours because we lack real footy smarts and skills?

At least he can kick straight! That is worth gold in our side, first qtr we should have been 4.1 not 1.4. Missing so many set shots from 30 to 40 on slight angles just kills us.

I think he can also take goal kicking instruction next season! Very good on set shots, snaps out of packs and on the run. Very good today.

6 Salem 5 Petracca 4 Langdon 3 Gawn 2 Fritsch 1 Hunt