AFL players don't even know how to act when they are tackled, according to rugby league, they need to furiously jiggle around on the ground til their opponent lets them go.
Training 2023 Preseason + training discussion
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I reckon it is a bit of a myth. They are completely different sports. The tackling within rugby and league might look better, but it is a lot easier when someone runs straight at you and is mostly going to hold onto the ball through the tackle, versus the 360 randomness of Aussie Rules and attempting to dispose of the ball in any direction while being tackled.
Rugby players also have a different body type, and a lot of the tackling is done by people with massive necks and shoulders. If you put a rugby prop in an AFL game, they would barely be able to lay a hand on anybody. Doesn't matter how good their tackling technique is. While if you put a typical AFL mid/flanker/winger in a rugby game, they'd probably get snapped in half pretty quickly.
How did Hunt and Folau look at tackling when they played AFL? They weren't any better than the other players on the field.
O'Meara looks the goods.
Strong, hard and smooth .
Possibly the reason Chapman doesn't get many mentions is he doesn't stand out for all the right reasons. I haven't seen him make single mistake.
Hamling marking well in one on one contests.
Liking the look of Knobel and Reidy.
AA Frederick.
Pearce doing a bit of on field coaching. This happened a few times.
Strong, hard and smooth .
Possibly the reason Chapman doesn't get many mentions is he doesn't stand out for all the right reasons. I haven't seen him make single mistake.
Hamling marking well in one on one contests.
Liking the look of Knobel and Reidy.
AA Frederick.
Pearce doing a bit of on field coaching. This happened a few times.
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Interesting commentary on tackling. As someone who grew up with both rugby (union) and Aussie rules, and also played both, the skill is in the footwork IMO, and that’s what’s transferable. Getting yourself in position to make a tackle, rather than the body work of tackling.
Watching open field tackling in rugby/Aussie rules or even American football, the difference between a good tackler and an average one is very much the footwork, and that was my experience as a player too.
Holy moly tho, if you want to see awful tackling technique, the Americans win the prize. It’s like they don’t have the money to coach tackling or something.
Watching open field tackling in rugby/Aussie rules or even American football, the difference between a good tackler and an average one is very much the footwork, and that was my experience as a player too.
Holy moly tho, if you want to see awful tackling technique, the Americans win the prize. It’s like they don’t have the money to coach tackling or something.
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Hunt and Folau both had the disadvantage of being highly athletic… it makes up for average technique. Us unathletic types have the good technique (cos it’s that or get broken)
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Wobbly Punt
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Yep I think the lack of aesthetic of the training facility is overblown a bit. Its because the camera angles usually shoot away from the decent spots there and therfore pick up the crap areas - of which there are plenty. It could be improved for sure but its not like the training watchers have to sit on that crap to watch training. Check out the training photos for Essendon and you'll see the same thing in terms of crappy grounds over the fences.
Wobbly Punt Training Report 07/02/23
Wobbly Punt
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Very brief trip down there today for me. I got there late, left early and was there for only about 30mins. Still I know when I don’t get down there I come on here hoping for any report as its better than none so I’ll share what I can.
No match sim today unfortunately – not when I was there anyway. As I watched the guys were split into groups doing a range of drills when I was there. These all seemed to centre on connecting with forwards from stoppages. 1 group was twice as large as the other 2, it was at the Southern end of the ground and on the ARC pocket side away from me so harder to pick anything out. That group seemed to have 2 full sets of fwds/backs/mids teamed up. The ball was put in play between wing and half forward on that side of the ground and then it was game on. Good intensity and pretty slick ball movement for the most part. Some nice goals or good lead-ups to missed shots in amongst some good defensive work too. Chapman, Young and Pearce all killed some promising moves forward from deep in defense.
A few things stood out for me in this drill. Twice Fyfe came out on the lead and received an ok ball delivered to him. Both occasions it was a bit low and wide and coming in fast. Both occasions he marked the ball as though catching a tennis ball thrown to him by a toddler. The skills these guys have is taken for granted so often. Unreal talent to do that. The next thing was Liam’s defensive improvement. He had Rick, Hughes (I think) and Colyer all try to push through a tackle from him and on each occasion he held on. He missed other tackles as all others did but his strength increase was evident to me in those 3 plays. None of those guys are Fyfe level bulls but all had the advantage of momentum and angle and on each occasion Liam held on for dear life and stopped the ball. Brodie and Brayshaw are still below par when kicking for goal. It’s enormously frustrating for them and it does need to improve. On the flip side, Brodie made a pass in to a forward I couldn’t make out that was a kick that absolutely anyone in the league would have been delighted with. Low drilled pass around the corner and over the defenders right on to the chest of the forward. Really good stuff.
The other drills were scaled down versions of those and done at the other end of the ground and started at high half forward. The ball was put to ground, mid units fought for it and then the ball was delivered to a leading forward who had only cursory pressure from a coach. On the ARC side they utilised 2 forwards with the first hit up being required to then hit the deeper forward on a back lead or on a more regular leading pattern. The other drill just hit up the only forward which was either Tabs, Fyfe or Schultz when I was there.
One thing I really enjoyed was seeing once again that Treacy and Amiss were paired together as forwards in the drills when I was there. Both in the higher numbers drill and also this drill when they used 2 forwards. They were concentrating on splitting away and working together. Both are very good field kicks as well as being great set shots. That will be very handy in years to come. Also paired up for this drill when their turn were Lerong and Corbett.
Walker is clearly experimenting with taking the contest on more. Those who don’t like him will get plenty of reasons to howl this year I’d say as he’s taking things on quite aggressively by trying to evade or beat tacklers. A couple of occasions in went to hell or he chose the wrong option. Those occasions looked really bad. When it worked the clear avenue to goal he gave to his teammate or got himself was nice.
Just in case we hadn’t mentioned it, Hayden Young can kick a football pretty well. Young has got a lot of coverage from us all and in the media but not far behind him in my view this PS from his backline mates is Clark. Polished, smooth, physical presence is growing. He’s been excellent.
Amongst the normal crew of TTHD contenders - Freddy, Sturt, Clark, and Schultz were busy in the large number drill. I think it’s been covered so maybe repeating someone or myself but Reidy is the next man up if we need another ruck. He’s clearly ahead of Knobel but that’s not a knock on the younger guy at all. Knobel looks fine too, just a bit undercooked for the moment.
Scrappy days today from Tabs and Pearce. Ryan, Worner and Hughes were also a bit meh in my time there and Walker had some tough moments too. Worner is gertting back up to speed after his little layoff so no real concerns there. Colyer, Schultz, Banfield and Kuek missed some easy targets in the larger drill which was disappointing. However, 3 of those 4 also did some great setup work and redeemed themselves somewhat. I don’t know if I’m right but I felt like when Tabs was in the main numbers drill the ball went wider and ended up deeper in the pockets than when others were in there.
Kuek gets space on his opponent in a flash. His first 5m is killer quick and when our guys get used to keeping the ball out in front of him rather than our kicks letting the defender get back in the contest by us kicking it too close to him the more dangerous he’ll get. There’s much to work with there and the idea he has only this year to develop or be cut is a strange one to me.
I saw the exchange when the photo above was taken of Pearce coaching Williams too. Just prior to that Darcy had jogged over to him and spent a little more time than Pearce did with Williams. They were both talking about the same thing with him given the repeated gesturing and Williams took it all in really well. If I was a coach I would’ve liked the interactions on all accounts. The fact 2 senior guys came and talked him through something was great. The fact he didn’t nod it off and just try to end it but instead clarified and queried it was good too. Just as nice was that Fyfe saw it too but he was the lone forward at that point so didn’t go up to Williams during those exchanges but as the team moved to the coaches as a full team to reset he sought out Williams and gave him some encouragement and more info and they shared a laugh. This stuff should always occur at elite levels but it’s also common the senior guys leave the junior coaching to the coaches. Nice to see all round. Williams seems a popular kid.
Chappy was solid and had a couple of really nice rebound moments in the numbers drill and hit some great leads in the smaller drills. His delivery defies his awkwardness.
After rotating through these drills, they split up again and did some varying types of open field tackling drills – serendipitous given the discussion in here earlier. Once again multiple groups doing different types of drills but the common theme was sticking tackles as a defender and keeping the ball moving as a carrier. The intensity on this was pretty high and Corbett stayed out of this side of things and took some marks working with a coach kicking to him on his own.
I left when they started doing extended run throughs as a group.
Apologies for the small sample delivery but I missed more than I saw so any others there will have to do the heavy lifting today.
No match sim today unfortunately – not when I was there anyway. As I watched the guys were split into groups doing a range of drills when I was there. These all seemed to centre on connecting with forwards from stoppages. 1 group was twice as large as the other 2, it was at the Southern end of the ground and on the ARC pocket side away from me so harder to pick anything out. That group seemed to have 2 full sets of fwds/backs/mids teamed up. The ball was put in play between wing and half forward on that side of the ground and then it was game on. Good intensity and pretty slick ball movement for the most part. Some nice goals or good lead-ups to missed shots in amongst some good defensive work too. Chapman, Young and Pearce all killed some promising moves forward from deep in defense.
A few things stood out for me in this drill. Twice Fyfe came out on the lead and received an ok ball delivered to him. Both occasions it was a bit low and wide and coming in fast. Both occasions he marked the ball as though catching a tennis ball thrown to him by a toddler. The skills these guys have is taken for granted so often. Unreal talent to do that. The next thing was Liam’s defensive improvement. He had Rick, Hughes (I think) and Colyer all try to push through a tackle from him and on each occasion he held on. He missed other tackles as all others did but his strength increase was evident to me in those 3 plays. None of those guys are Fyfe level bulls but all had the advantage of momentum and angle and on each occasion Liam held on for dear life and stopped the ball. Brodie and Brayshaw are still below par when kicking for goal. It’s enormously frustrating for them and it does need to improve. On the flip side, Brodie made a pass in to a forward I couldn’t make out that was a kick that absolutely anyone in the league would have been delighted with. Low drilled pass around the corner and over the defenders right on to the chest of the forward. Really good stuff.
The other drills were scaled down versions of those and done at the other end of the ground and started at high half forward. The ball was put to ground, mid units fought for it and then the ball was delivered to a leading forward who had only cursory pressure from a coach. On the ARC side they utilised 2 forwards with the first hit up being required to then hit the deeper forward on a back lead or on a more regular leading pattern. The other drill just hit up the only forward which was either Tabs, Fyfe or Schultz when I was there.
One thing I really enjoyed was seeing once again that Treacy and Amiss were paired together as forwards in the drills when I was there. Both in the higher numbers drill and also this drill when they used 2 forwards. They were concentrating on splitting away and working together. Both are very good field kicks as well as being great set shots. That will be very handy in years to come. Also paired up for this drill when their turn were Lerong and Corbett.
Walker is clearly experimenting with taking the contest on more. Those who don’t like him will get plenty of reasons to howl this year I’d say as he’s taking things on quite aggressively by trying to evade or beat tacklers. A couple of occasions in went to hell or he chose the wrong option. Those occasions looked really bad. When it worked the clear avenue to goal he gave to his teammate or got himself was nice.
Just in case we hadn’t mentioned it, Hayden Young can kick a football pretty well. Young has got a lot of coverage from us all and in the media but not far behind him in my view this PS from his backline mates is Clark. Polished, smooth, physical presence is growing. He’s been excellent.
Amongst the normal crew of TTHD contenders - Freddy, Sturt, Clark, and Schultz were busy in the large number drill. I think it’s been covered so maybe repeating someone or myself but Reidy is the next man up if we need another ruck. He’s clearly ahead of Knobel but that’s not a knock on the younger guy at all. Knobel looks fine too, just a bit undercooked for the moment.
Scrappy days today from Tabs and Pearce. Ryan, Worner and Hughes were also a bit meh in my time there and Walker had some tough moments too. Worner is gertting back up to speed after his little layoff so no real concerns there. Colyer, Schultz, Banfield and Kuek missed some easy targets in the larger drill which was disappointing. However, 3 of those 4 also did some great setup work and redeemed themselves somewhat. I don’t know if I’m right but I felt like when Tabs was in the main numbers drill the ball went wider and ended up deeper in the pockets than when others were in there.
Kuek gets space on his opponent in a flash. His first 5m is killer quick and when our guys get used to keeping the ball out in front of him rather than our kicks letting the defender get back in the contest by us kicking it too close to him the more dangerous he’ll get. There’s much to work with there and the idea he has only this year to develop or be cut is a strange one to me.
I saw the exchange when the photo above was taken of Pearce coaching Williams too. Just prior to that Darcy had jogged over to him and spent a little more time than Pearce did with Williams. They were both talking about the same thing with him given the repeated gesturing and Williams took it all in really well. If I was a coach I would’ve liked the interactions on all accounts. The fact 2 senior guys came and talked him through something was great. The fact he didn’t nod it off and just try to end it but instead clarified and queried it was good too. Just as nice was that Fyfe saw it too but he was the lone forward at that point so didn’t go up to Williams during those exchanges but as the team moved to the coaches as a full team to reset he sought out Williams and gave him some encouragement and more info and they shared a laugh. This stuff should always occur at elite levels but it’s also common the senior guys leave the junior coaching to the coaches. Nice to see all round. Williams seems a popular kid.
Chappy was solid and had a couple of really nice rebound moments in the numbers drill and hit some great leads in the smaller drills. His delivery defies his awkwardness.
After rotating through these drills, they split up again and did some varying types of open field tackling drills – serendipitous given the discussion in here earlier. Once again multiple groups doing different types of drills but the common theme was sticking tackles as a defender and keeping the ball moving as a carrier. The intensity on this was pretty high and Corbett stayed out of this side of things and took some marks working with a coach kicking to him on his own.
I left when they started doing extended run throughs as a group.
Apologies for the small sample delivery but I missed more than I saw so any others there will have to do the heavy lifting today.
As I said, I played both rugby and Aussie rules and are pretty aware of the differences.
Look at it this way, there are situations in all the codes where the same tackle is the perfect thing to execute. There are a few tackles that don't work all that well across codes (eg below the knee, grabbing one arm), but work in their particular code(s).
Tackling is a cornerstone skill in the rugby codes, especially league. It happens much more frequently and often in more confined spaces.
It's too shallow to think you can bring a cookie cutter approach. I don't think anyone who's serious about coaching tackling skills or thought about it in any depth would do that.
However there's little doubt on average players in Rugby and league are more aggressive, confident, experienced and technically knowledgeable in tackling (and being tackled - or not) by a margin than AFL players are on average.
Attitude, fundamentals and commitment is what you want to teach. These are wholly transferable to AFL.
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"Attitude, fundamentals and commitment is what you want to teach. These are wholly transferable to AFL."
I think every year some rugby dudes come down to a footy club somewhere and run through some tackling drills. The message is always the same and it is always, fundamentally, what the arsemart bloke just said.
They'll say "Drop the shoulder and go in hard" - they mean, attack the contest with attitude and commitment.
I think every year some rugby dudes come down to a footy club somewhere and run through some tackling drills. The message is always the same and it is always, fundamentally, what the arsemart bloke just said.
They'll say "Drop the shoulder and go in hard" - they mean, attack the contest with attitude and commitment.
PurpleReign
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Ooh, is training at the Lancelin sand dunes today?
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Fyfe to step down as captain, and from the leadership group altogether.
Dockers star steps down as captain after six seasons
Dockers star steps down as captain after six seasons
Wow didn't see that coming.
It'll hopefully invigorate Fyfe and allow him to fully focus on his game and physical state.
Will still be a flagship player.
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Hopefully Alex Pearce for 1-2 years then long live AB
That's true Leadership, knowing when your time is up and setting up the place so the transition is smooth.
It was his call but huge respect.
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It appears you may have forgotten the Norm Smith as well….but you are correct, way too much for one man in one season
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Thanks for a very impressive and comprehensive training report Wobbly, a reasonable effort for 30 minutes of watching training I must say.
Arcassius
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how long until we can start expecting drone footage annotated with the names of each player and commentary?
I don't want AP, as he is injured too much and plays at full back. Can be out of play too much.
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Missed about 3 last year I think. You expecting us to win 22 games?
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