Autopsy 2018 Rd 17 Kreuzer out early, another terrible loss

[BlueBayou]

C

In fact I would let him run pre season.

Crippa as captain/coach? Not the worlds worst idea.

(-no, I'm not serious-)

 

[AndyLucimitis]

Yeh that 2-year extension for Polson was bizarre. Not a great VFL player and looks beyond lost at AFL level.

Doesn’t have a great football brain, low accumulator, not quick, fumbly... also very undersized at the moment. Not enough X-factor to play forward, but doesn’t win enough ball to develop into a midfielder.

Not for me

....but apart from that do you see any negatives in Polson ???


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Faz 2000]

Last week was a train wreck, and this week we had a plane crash into a container ship at the docs which tipped over onto the train wreck (because the train line was by the dock, see?).

There's glimmers of hope. It certainly won't always be this bad. Part of what is horrible is that we're, say, only 75% competitive everywhere. Consistently, all over the ground, we have something, but it's not good enough. So more often than not it loses. Be it centre clearance set up, forward line, defensive structures, 1:1 defensive contests. We roll out a team, it's not that it has got NOTHING or no talent or no ability, but it's not good enough. The cumulative effect of that, though, is disastrous.

Dow shows wonderful potential, but he's not NOW a "good" AFL midfielder.
Jones (effin' Jones!) has moment where he's big, strong, powerful in the air... but also gives away freebies every single week with turnovers, runs to the wrong spot, and cannot be trusted.
Daisy (bloody Daisy!) works hard, up and back, wins the ball, does some nice things. But he also shows off, and does ill-disciplined things in a team that absolutely cannot afford them.
Kreuzer is a heart and soul warrior, capable of matching the best ruckmen in the AFL. At the moment, he cannot seem to last 15 consecutive minutes on the field without hurting something.
Ed's a gut-running, honest competitor. He's always had lousy footskills, and that's why he's a tagger.
Etc, etc, etc.

You can forgive the youthful for having deficiencies in the hope (and in some cases, it's almost a metaphysical certainty) that they will develop, improve, address their weaknesses and build on their strengths. The veterans with deficiencies are what they are, and can/should play a role until we can replace them with someone better. Nobody should forgive the likes of Thomas and Jones (Kerridge, Wright, etc), because if they were going to be better, they would be by now, and therefore they have to go as soon as reasonably possible.

So not good enough all over the ground with 3-4 extremely obvious exceptions, this issue is the whole structure and approach falls apart. When no player can rely upon their teammate to "do the right thing" or "halve a contest", where do you run? The coach might want them to run forward for a receive, but if they player with the ball is unreliable at getting it to them, do you want to be out of position? The player might be a natural interceptor, but when there's no pressure up field he first has to think where his man is, no wait do I read the ball, no wait damn my opponent has out-positioned me! How does a young, raw KPF prospect work on his running patterns when there's 10 guys up field who can't get the ball anywhere near him?

Bolton can't put in place any meaningful gameplan because the team right now is too inept to execute on anything. Not fit enough, not strong enough, not skilled enough, not good enough, and (damningly) not disciplined enough. As an added bonus, now utterly devoid of confidence, too, because they KNOW they're going to lose, they KNOW the turnover will happen, they KNOW their teammates won't get it done.

The discipline has to be addressed. And then the plan dumbed down for the balance of the season so we get something out of it. Eg. Man on man. We are not without talent or hope, but right now the whole is far less than the sum of the parts.

PS - Cripps, CCurnow and Fisher aren't just our best players, they are/have AFL star potential. They are excused from basically all criticism and just need to keep doing what they're doing and not lose all hope. Cripps can win a Brownlow. Curnow can be the best player in the comp. And Fisher is the kind of laser-booted midfielder that can tear big games to shreds.

PPS - thankyou for reading my rambling stream of consciousness mess. This place saves me a lot of $$$ on therapy.

 

[George]

Sorry to intrude but commiserations guys. Being a St.Kilda supporter believe me when I say things will get better and can turn pretty quickly.

You have a great core of young players to work with, probably better than most in the league and after a few pre-seasons I think you'll become a quality side.

Cripps was enormous last night - he is an absolute animal and one of my favourite players in the league. Love the way he goes about it & Charlie Curnow reminds me of Kouta - big imposing forward and moves well. Two players that you can build a side around for the next 10 years.

Best of luck for the rest of the season!

 

[DIG]

I wish we'd just ditch the zone and just man up. Continuously get cut to pieces when teams transition from defence all the way to goal.

I really think that would stem the tide a bit and help the players feel less lost out there. Doesn't mean we have to go full defensive either.

I want to stick with Bolton at least into next year (this year being a write-off anyway), but I don't like some of his tactics this year.

 

[TheHeatleyStand]

I think a massive problem is the fact that the club is spent by the break every season
players switch off

it's conditioning that makes them mentally challenged for half a season and no more

 

[AB_Blue]

I have had the advantage of a full nights sleep after the game, so I'm not as emotionally raw as I would have been if I posted straight after the game.

I'm not going to buy into whether clubs respect or disrespect us. Their mindset is not my immediate concern although it will play a part in luring senior players from other clubs during the trade period. I definitely think the players care as a whole. No one likes losing and no one is deliberately throwing away their football career. To keep perspective though, there are some players who aren't up to the grade. We can only play who we've got for now, unless they introduce mid-season trade windows like the EPL. We're getting games into the kids and that's a positive.

When we hold up to teams that run and gun, then we'll be on our way. For some time, we haven't been able to contain the teams that play a free flowing game-style. It's not so much about where they are on the ladder. It's about the game-style that we match up well against, or poorly against. Our zone currently provides easy goals on a platter for teams that have a strong outside game.

It looks like its all a fitness and effort problem but that's not it. Whenever I've looked at our GPS numbers, we've been equal to or higher than our opponents in distance travelled. So it looks bad because players are caught out of position in the zone, spend too much time chasing tail, and look slow while changing direction. Fisher did the same to them when he kicked that goal from just inside 50. Caught them wrong footed. We're probably working harder than the opposition because we are so often caught out of position as a result of turnovers.

I agree that the skill level is poor but I'm confident that it's more a confidence issue with the kids. When they get a little more experience, they won't get that mad adrenaline rush when they get the ball, or feel rushed and panic. They'll have been in those situations a few times and get it right more often than they do now. Obviously, our senior players are making skill errors because many of them are place holders who are skill capped. We know what we're going to get from players like Sammy Rowe week in week out. He's not going to make team of the week, but until someone can perform his role better, he'll try his guts out for the jumper. I don't want to create a list in this post but I'll put something together for the list management thread during the week.

We lost/traded players who had currency, and the senior players that remain are currently average at best. We spent those picks on youth. Our growth will come from getting games into those kids and playing them together. Cohesion isn't just a Bolton cliché. Some of those kids will work out, some won't. But we need to spend every spare cent/spare minute on developing them into the best footballers they can be.

Last thing I've got to get off my chest is the posters who blame SOS for getting in players like:

Lang - Pick 58
Lobbe - Pick 95
O'Shea - Preseason Draft (that no one has used since 2014)...FREE
Palmer - Pick 135
Shaw - Rookie
Mullet - DFA

Seriously, it's not a fail if none of these players are AFL standard. It's a dice roll that you're not expecting to win. But if even one of those players worked, its a win. They weren't picked instead of some AFL superstar who was begging to come to us. There are only so many players available, and there are only so many kids you can pick. If they don't work, you move them on and try other players. Some of these pick ups were salary dumps that facilitated other trades.

We have no choice but to take a deep breath, and battle through the last few games (like we expect our players to) with our scarfs high in the air. Show the media that we still love our club, and show prospective free agents that we don't snipe our club when times are tough. We are a part of our clubs culture.

At the end of the year, we'll move on some players that didn't work out, we'll bring in some exciting new players, and we'll get another pre-season into our talented youth. We'll probably take a different approach with the game plan and structure for 2019, and we'll jump really quickly.

GO BLUES

Yep

If only AFL media could write like this!

 

[passmark]

want you to watch this short documentary and let me know your thoughts with regard to your journey as a carlton supporter this season - thanks

Spooky how accurate it was.

 

[rp84]

Wasn't specifically referencing you - there's plenty of that crap in this thread that I'm talking about. And it often comes from people who only like to log in after a loss, or so it seems to me anyway.

I agree our game plan isn't working and needs changing. The degree to which the cattle we have to choose from affects all that is a big question mark though.

While I am against been too far either way (positive or negative), realistically the only time log in IS after a loss.

The blind optimism by some on here has driven me batty over the years. All the belittling of the 'chicken littles 'seems ridiculous now.

That said, some people take the negativity way too far too.

We are in a shit spot. We have some talent but absolutely run the risk of becoming the next Melbourne. Unfortunately, we had no choice. After the chicken littles were proven right all along (awful teams, poorly coached and poorly developed), we had no choice to cut to the bone.

Who knows how it will turn out but I was a betting man, I see us being a basket case for another five years. I hope I'm wrong.

 

[Lawrence Angwin]

Umps killed us. Plus bad errors from experienced players


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Umps had nothing to do with it.

We just stunk it up!


On iPhone using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[AB_Blue]

want you to watch this short documentary and let me know your thoughts with regard to your journey as a carlton supporter this season - thanks

Great now Curnow’s missing a kidney!

One more knee in the abdomen and it’s career over! FFS!!!!

 

[bluebrew]

C

Crippa as captain/coach? Not the worlds worst idea.

(-no, I'm not serious-)

No taking the players to work on their weaknesses so they can see how hard he works on his game.

 

[LemmingMaster]

It would be interesting to see what expectations our supporters have of our club this year?

Before the start of the season these are my personal thoughts.


Lost two key elements from last years team. Doc and Gibbs and only the addition of rookies. Teams around us other than Gold Coast looked like they were further along in their development of their rebuild, so Carlton should finish in the bottom two clubs.

What I wanted to see

Development of the following players
Dow - Tick
Cripps - Tick
Curnow - Tick
Fisher - Tick
LOB - Tick
SPS - expecting a little more from him
McKay - I will say a tick at the moment as he is young and talls take time.
Weitering - Expecting more
Marchbank - Expecting more
Plowman - Expecting more

I have a feeling that our defensive structures are getting smashed from the lack of pressure from our midfield and forward half.
Modern day football you need extremely hard working forwards and midfielders and we just don't have the cattle yet.

With our club, I expected some bad losses and close games here and there. Maybe one or two more wins would have been nice but finishing second last instead of maybe last makes no difference to me.

It is painful to watch and support Carlton, but we just have to put games into these young players and ride out the pain.
People suggesting we need to do the old Carlton trick of a quick fix will not give us long term success. (The rules have changed these days and we can no longer buy our way to a premiership)

A quick fix may have got us 3 or 4 more wins but long term it screws us. Doing something like Carey suggested and trading pick 1 for a bunch of mature bodied players is just pure crazy and does not help long term success.

People were calling for Hardwick and Buckley's head for ages, calling for Bomber's head for years and sometimes a coach needs a combination of experience and the cattle to produce results.

If we had Clarkson coaching the blues, what results do you think we would have had? (I am sure they would be better, just not sure how much better)

EDIT: Added Dow - Tick

 

[thylacine60]

Can’t disagree with any of that.
Bolton has shown signs of weakness which is evidence he’s not up to it.
Example number 1-
Last two years we had a plan to defend and stay in games which got us a few wins,then the media says we need to be more attacking,so Bolton changes the game plan under pressure from the media with disastrous results.
Example number 2-
All week the media have been reporting that blues fans are furious that McKay can’t get a game. Bolton rolls out the reasons for the umpteenth time,fair enough he’s the coach and knows his players well. Then this week McKay gets a game off the back of no game last week. So why didn’t he play against the lions? Did he trim that well?
Bowing to media pressure is a very bad look and these 2 examples give me no confidence in him going forward.
Who’s improved under his watch? Fisher and who else? Nobody. Teague ,Bruce and the other coaches are they up to the task of developing our youngsters?
We’ve got problems off field,big problems. I question our fitness and conditioning guys and our preseason program. Who’s decision was it to take us on a cow paddock in the preseason? It’s like driving a Ferrari on a farm,result doc down.
DEVELOPMENT that’s our biggest issue. Willo McKay Macreadie should have been played more. Don’t care that they’re injured I want to know why?

just so you know you agreed with this guy carlton2dabone and your comment was liked by this guy Toddski and this one Snoozer. Have a great day!

 

[Jeffy38!]

Just listen to this.

 

[Jeffy38!]

It would be interesting to see what expectations our supporters have of our club this year?

Before the start of the season these are my personal thoughts.


Lost two key elements from last years team. Doc and Gibbs and only the addition of rookies. Teams around us other than Gold Coast looked like they were further along in their development of their rebuild, so Carlton should finish in the bottom two clubs.

What I wanted to see

Development of the following players
Cripps - Tick
Curnow - Tick
Fisher - Tick
LOB - Tick
SPS - expecting a little more from him
McKay - I will say a tick at the moment as he is young and talls take time.
Weitering - Expecting more
Marchbank - Expecting more
Plowman - Expecting more

I have a feeling that our defensive structures are getting smashed from the lack of pressure from our midfield and forward half.
Modern day football you need extremely hard working forwards and midfielders and we just don't have the cattle yet.

With our club, I expected some bad losses and close games here and there. Maybe one or two more wins would have been nice but finishing second last instead of maybe last makes no difference to me.

It is painful to watch and support Carlton, but we just have to put games into these young players and ride out the pain.
People suggesting we need to do the old Carlton trick of a quick fix will not give us long term success. (The rules have changed these days and we can no longer buy our way to a premiership)

A quick fix may have got us 3 or 4 more wins but long term it screws us. Doing something like Carey suggested and trading pick 1 for a bunch of mature bodied players is just pure crazy and does not help long term success.

People were calling for Hardwick and Buckley's head for ages, calling for Bomber's head for years and sometimes a coach needs a combination of experience and the cattle to produce results.

If we had Clarkson coaching the blues, what results do you think we would have had? (I am sure they would be better, just not sure how much better)

Dow = tick. Plus nobody could change the way we play now. Grin and bear it and live in the knowledge that things can only get better.

 

[Stig O'Hara]

Was trying to watch his second efforts and work off the ball as closely as the tv would allow, and I didn't really see anything that was disappointing from H. Maybe the messages are getting through and hit fitness is improving?

Watching the replay, he seems to cover the ground ok, was changing ruck out of the square.

There’s one bit in the second where he and Carlisle are after a loose ball near 50, and H just burnt him off.

So he’s got that turn of speed.

 

[Skip Donahue]

Deplorable.

Six more weeks of this rubbish.

Sick of it.

Opposition teams laugh at us.

I am not laughing.

The blues have some serious young talent. You're a few years and a bit of careful recruiting away from being GWSish.

 

[La Dispute]

....but apart from that do you see any negatives in Polson ???


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Occupying a spot on the list?

He was a speculative pick at the time, but looked like he had some nous in his games of school footy.

I hope he comes on to be a good player, but he’s shown next to nothing. Currently getting a game because we have no one else and we may as well see how he progresses over the course of the season.

 

[Jeffy38!]

Watching the replay, he seems to cover the ground ok, was changing ruck out of the square.

There’s one bit in the second where he and Carlisle are after a loose ball near 50, and H just burnt him off.

So he’s got that turn of speed.

When H clicks, it's gonna be more like a bang.

 

[Bearded Carpenter]

Remember the days when we were happy with a 10 goal win but annoyed we missed so many.

Should've been over 100

Can't wait to have that feeling again

Hurry up FFS

 

[ShanDog]

While I am against been too far either way (positive or negative), realistically the only time log in IS after a loss.

The blind optimism by some on here has driven me batty over the years. All the belittling of the 'chicken littles 'seems ridiculous now.

That said, some people take the negativity way too far too.

We are in a shit spot. We have some talent but absolutely run the risk of becoming the next Melbourne. Unfortunately, we had no choice. After the chicken littles were proven right all along (awful teams, poorly coached and poorly developed), we had no choice to cut to the bone.

Who knows how it will turn out but I was a betting man, I see us being a basket case for another five years. I hope I'm wrong.

I put my hand up regularly and admit we were so much worse than I thought we were under malthouse. The chicken littles were right and I was wrong.

Having the opinion that we aren't on the right path or aren't doing something good enough is fine - even encouraged. Just post with some explanation and not "We are a rabble, sack everyone and abandon all hope". That's just shitposting because of anger.

 

[ShanDog]

Anyway I've laboured my point enough. Don't want to derail more.

 

[Jimmae]

It's definitely influenza. Of course, definitely.

Judging by your posts here, comprehension is not your strong suit.

My first post was about swine flu.

 

[Johnny James]

I have had the advantage of a full nights sleep after the game, so I'm not as emotionally raw as I would have been if I posted straight after the game.

I'm not going to buy into whether clubs respect or disrespect us. Their mindset is not my immediate concern although it will play a part in luring senior players from other clubs during the trade period. I definitely think the players care as a whole. No one likes losing and no one is deliberately throwing away their football career. To keep perspective though, there are some players who aren't up to the grade. We can only play who we've got for now, unless they introduce mid-season trade windows like the EPL. We're getting games into the kids and that's a positive.

When we hold up to teams that run and gun, then we'll be on our way. For some time, we haven't been able to contain the teams that play a free flowing game-style. It's not so much about where they are on the ladder. It's about the game-style that we match up well against, or poorly against. Our zone currently provides easy goals on a platter for teams that have a strong outside game.

It looks like its all a fitness and effort problem but that's not it. Whenever I've looked at our GPS numbers, we've been equal to or higher than our opponents in distance travelled. So it looks bad because players are caught out of position in the zone, spend too much time chasing tail, and look slow while changing direction. Fisher did the same to them when he kicked that goal from just inside 50. Caught them wrong footed. We're probably working harder than the opposition because we are so often caught out of position as a result of turnovers.

I agree that the skill level is poor but I'm confident that it's more a confidence issue with the kids. When they get a little more experience, they won't get that mad adrenaline rush when they get the ball, or feel rushed and panic. They'll have been in those situations a few times and get it right more often than they do now. Obviously, our senior players are making skill errors because many of them are place holders who are skill capped. We know what we're going to get from players like Sammy Rowe week in week out. He's not going to make team of the week, but until someone can perform his role better, he'll try his guts out for the jumper. I don't want to create a list in this post but I'll put something together for the list management thread during the week.

We lost/traded players who had currency, and the senior players that remain are currently average at best. We spent those picks on youth. Our growth will come from getting games into those kids and playing them together. Cohesion isn't just a Bolton cliché. Some of those kids will work out, some won't. But we need to spend every spare cent/spare minute on developing them into the best footballers they can be.

Last thing I've got to get off my chest is the posters who blame SOS for getting in players like:

Lang - Pick 58
Lobbe - Pick 95
O'Shea - Preseason Draft (that no one has used since 2014)...FREE
Palmer - Pick 135
Shaw - Rookie
Mullet - DFA

Seriously, it's not a fail if none of these players are AFL standard. It's a dice roll that you're not expecting to win. But if even one of those players worked, its a win. They weren't picked instead of some AFL superstar who was begging to come to us. There are only so many players available, and there are only so many kids you can pick. If they don't work, you move them on and try other players. Some of these pick ups were salary dumps that facilitated other trades.

We have no choice but to take a deep breath, and battle through the last few games (like we expect our players to) with our scarfs high in the air. Show the media that we still love our club, and show prospective free agents that we don't snipe our club when times are tough. We are a part of our clubs culture.

At the end of the year, we'll move on some players that didn't work out, we'll bring in some exciting new players, and we'll get another pre-season into our talented youth. We'll probably take a different approach with the game plan and structure for 2019, and we'll jump really quickly.

GO BLUES

Top post.