Autopsy 2022 Community Series: Hawks v Tigers, 1:10pm March 5th

[Simon Crawshay]

I come from a generation whereby if our rucks were getting beaten the mids would rove the opposition tap work.
NOT saying ruck position isn't important but our mids are often in no man's land and are clearly defensively mind set.

Freo had Sandilands for many yrs... Opposition simply sharked to his tap work.

I'm merely trying to highlight that our mids, with guys like Duke, need to be more aggressive, even feral, to win their share of the pill.

I'm expecting this against the tigers. Sammy is one of the all time best mids. Surely he can improve our set up and movement at the bounce. If our Rucks are getting beaten we can still win a centre clearance. BUT we need to put opposition mids under manic pressure.

Maybe they should get some tapes on Brad Sewell. Not the most gifted mid but a manic desperate opponent any AFL coach would love in the centre square.

Oh yeh out of all of our past players Sewell is the one we need to most right now. A real mongrel in the packs who never, ever gives up.

Personally I see more than a bit of Sewell in Duke, I hope he can play a similar role for the current team.

 

[Mojo]

Neither Reeves or Lynch dominated against Collingwood. It might be worth giving them another game this week to get a better gauge as to who should be the starting ruckman for Round 1.

Quite pessimistic this early on, but Lynch came across to me as a bit of a battler; tries hard but doesn't quite have the tools to be that number one ruckman.

Reeves at least has the capacity to reach a higher level due to his height. I'd be silently putting my eggs in his basket.

 

[BIGHAWK23]

Quite pessimistic this early on, but Lynch came across to me as a bit of a battler; tries hard but doesn't quite have the tools to be that number one ruckman.

Reeves at least has the capacity to reach a higher level due to his height. I'd be silently putting my eggs in his basket.

Reeves got smacked in the centre and around the ground

Not a big basket

 

[Yardie]

The setup against the pies was horrible I re watched the 3rd quarter

Tom/Jom/Worpel got beaten 3 or 4 times in a row, Duke went in and joined Tom/Jom after, followed with Mitchell/Nash/Duke.

It didn't look like anyone was capable of breaking a line and hitting a target in any of these setups. The worst thing was the stagnet players they struggled to get a hand on a jumper when a clearance was going the other way giving our defenders no chance. Far to slow when the ball hit the deck it doesn't help without a dominate ruck granted.

Sam needs to make the hard decision here. It clearly doesn't work. Time to move on. He may need to drop one of the first two to create the opportunity for growth.

I'm gonna say it. I'd rather Howe in the team busting his guts on the wing and completely change the mix in the centre rather than pushing out Howe to keep the current centre clearance team.

 

[Mojo]

Reeves got smacked in the centre and around the ground

Not a big basket

You can't cross his name out because he got smacked around by Grundy in a practice game.

 

[Mitchell Madness]

Sam needs to make the hard decision here. It clearly doesn't work. Time to move on. He may need to drop one of the first two to create the opportunity for growth.

I'm gonna say it. I'd rather Howe in the team busting his guts on the wing and completely change the mix in the centre rather than pushing out Howe to keep the current centre clearance team.

Mitchell is a see ball get ball player, omaera is an outside player without the leg speed, worpel is the package.

Omaera is far too good for vfl, but lacks versatility.
Mitchell lacks versatility.

Can they be retrained?

 

[Blackhawk42]

Reeves got smacked in the centre and around the ground

Not a big basket

He pushed back to take a pack grab in defence.

Push forward and took a pack mark and converted the opportunity.

Up against one of the best ruckman of the century.

He's still raw. He'll have some up and down games this season but if he plays 15+ games he'll be ready to develop into a serious weapon in 2023.

 

[Steven Tyler]

Mitchell is a see ball get ball player, omaera is an outside player without the leg speed, worpel is the package.

Omaera is far too good for vfl, but lacks versatility.
Mitchell lacks versatility.

Can they be retrained?

O’Meara is an average kick
Mitchell is a poor kick
Worpel is a shocking kick

 

[TheFourPillars]

O’Meara is an average kick
Mitchell is a poor kick
Worpel is a shocking kick

JOM has been trying to fix his kicking over the pre season has a different ball drop.

 

[Steven Tyler]

JOM has been trying to fix his kicking over the pre season has a different ball drop.

He is the better kick of the 3 main mids

 

[grumbleguts]

Danger game

Future captain.

 

[Ned Ryerson]

Oh yeh out of all of our past players Sewell is the one we need to most right now. A real mongrel in the packs who never, ever gives up.

Personally I see more than a bit of Sewell in Duke, I hope he can play a similar role for the current team.

My hope is that Newk will be Sewell 2.0 - with even more mongrel and determination.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

My hope is that Newk will be Sewell 2.0 - with even more mongrel and determination.

He’s a better kick too.

 

[Ned Ryerson]

He’s a better kick too.

From his small sample size I would also put his footy IQ and vision a shade above Sewell's as well. While he is going to be a blunt instrument at times on the field I think he has a lot more to offer than just a battering ram.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Richmond are set to pick their Round 1 side this week, as a dress rehearsal.

I’d assume we do the same.

 

[Gut Runner]

Mitchell is a see ball get ball player, omaera is an outside player without the leg speed, worpel is the package.

Omaera is far too good for vfl, but lacks versatility.
Mitchell lacks versatility.

Can they be retrained?

Worpel needs to improve, we need multiple top 10 AFL midfielders in there. Currently we have none.

Mitchell can be if he gets back to his best - but it doesn't help the team around him.

 

[TylerDurden]

Richmond are set to pick their Round 1 side this week, as a dress rehearsal.

I’d assume we do the same.

We have to. This is it before the real thing.

 

[Mitchell Madness]

He pushed back to take a pack grab in defence.

Push forward and took a pack mark and converted the opportunity.

Up against one of the best ruckman of the century.

He's still raw. He'll have some up and down games this season but if he plays 15+ games he'll be ready to develop into a serious weapon in 202

He was out of it for about 15min, then at least broke even the rest of the game. Every player can be caught out early from time to time

Worpel needs to improve, we need multiple top 10 AFL midfielders in there. Currently we have none.

Mitchell can be if he gets back to his best - but it doesn't help the team around him.

I'm not sure if worpels issue is him personally, or the team around him

 

[JZedd]

Oh yeh out of all of our past players Sewell is the one we need to most right now. A real mongrel in the packs who never, ever gives up.

Personally I see more than a bit of Sewell in Duke, I hope he can play a similar role for the current team.

Oh yeh out of all of our past players Sewell is the one we need to most right now. A real mongrel in the packs who never, ever gives up.

Personally I see more than a bit of Sewell in Duke, I hope he can play a similar role for the current team.

My hope is that Newk will be Sewell 2.0 - with even more mongrel and determination.

Bingo. That's what I see in Duke too. Watched him closely at Morwell praccy game... And I thought yep, Duke is gonna be a player. Then Sewell came to mind. And got Duke for nothing too.

 

[Simon Crawshay]

From his small sample size I would also put his footy IQ and vision a shade above Sewell's as well. While he is going to be a blunt instrument at times on the field I think he has a lot more to offer than just a battering ram.

What Sewell had that I always think is an underated ability was that he could get a ball from the bottom of a pack, jump up and then power run for 5 to 10 meters before kicking it.

Admittedly a lot of his kicks were a bit hit and miss but it would always gain territory for the side and it's funny how often those chaos balls would work to the teams advantage.

To me this ability to find it in a pack, burst forward and hoof it were Brad's greatest assets (along with his excellent fitness base and desire to win).

I agree that Newk has greater skill than Sewell (not sure about the footy IQ) but he would do well to watch some old footage of Sewell to identify what made him such an effective player.

 

[TassieGrown]

Ground is in great condition after 60mm of rain overnight, centre wicket area still needs some softening but will be good to go for game time. A lot of rain expected on Friday and Saturday which is not ideal as the eastern wing does tend to hold water. A lot of work going on behind the scenes to get the Oval up to standard, shame if the weather intervenes. Go Hawks

 

[TylerDurden]

Tiges going full dress rehearsal apparently. God I hope we do the same.

 

[threesixpio]

Wanna update this someone pls and ty.

Also cant wait for 4 qtrs.

Yeah was pretty hard hearing players saying after the last game that they needed to play a four quarter game. This was pretty much true and the first two quarters were horrible

 

[CHUBBSS]

Ground is in great condition after 60mm of rain overnight, centre wicket area still needs some softening but will be good to go for game time. A lot of rain expected on Friday and Saturday which is not ideal as the eastern wing does tend to hold water. A lot of work going on behind the scenes to get the Oval up to standard, shame if the weather intervenes. Go Hawks

Any tractor action?

 

[Mrzohs]

I think while adding some class in the middle would be very nice for the moment. I’m not sure it addresses the real problems we have in there.

We just can’t get our hands on the ball in contested situations. We could have all the class in the world. But if the opposition has the ball it won’t help us.

We lose track of our opponent in traffic, letting them get free. Plus when we all dogpile on the ball, we are letting the opposition walk it out.

Something that I think is also one of our biggest weaknesses is how bad our mids are one-on-one. We get beaten often in one-on-one which causes us to dogpile on rather than being able to rely on winning the ball.

Structures don’t work nearly as well when you keep losing 50-50 battles all game.

Spot on I agree and I think this is our biggest problem in the middle as you have highlighted.

My logic would be to not keep playing the same blokes who let you down, can't find the footy, loose track defensivly and get beat one on one.
Replaying the same rotation seems like madness and ground hog day.
You would love to be the oppostion player or coach with that setup, Just knock the ball fwd and run away from the contest, Defensivly no need to put any time or a work into a player, if they are not capable of burning you the other way from the contest.

It's only early and I expect a response this week it will be intresting to see how we go in a fair dinkum hit out.