Autopsy Doggies Woof all over Cats by 47 points.

[Strange Cat]

Has this cost us top 4? I can't even be bothered doing the math.

If they play like that in the finals it’s not worth stressing about imo

 

[Mad_Hatter]

Has this cost us top 4? I can't even be bothered doing the math.

No. Could easily still lose to freo and finish third.
The real question is, in this form is there any point?

 

[Mr Meow]

Has this cost us top 4? I can't even be bothered doing the math.

Way too early to tell. It has stopped us being overwhelming favourites for top 4, without knocking us out. We might not be able to afford a loss though, with the Freo game to come. Losing one more game and finishing 4th is still a chance too. I'd say finishing around 6th is "expected" but if we play like last night, obviously worse than that.

 

[Pure_Ownage]

Has this cost us top 4? I can't even be bothered doing the math.

If we win out we should be top 2 or 3 (either way carlton at mcg probably).
If we drop freo and win the rest (more likely) we finish 3rd or 4th. 4th is less preferable as it means syndey in sydney.

 

[Pure_Ownage]

No. Could easily still lose to freo and finish third.
The real question is, in this form is there any point?

Yes because this could be a bradbury flag year.

 

[catempire]

As bad as it was, please get a grip saying it cost us top 4. It barely made a dent.

 

[CatToTheFuture]

Yes but there's a point where being humiliated might do more harm than good. We're in no man's land. Clearly not winning a flag and not getting high draft picks

Just back them

 

[Generalissimo]

No. Could easily still lose to freo and finish third.
The real question is, in this form is there any point?

Getting finals experience into Dempsey, Humphries, Bowes, Bruhn, Mannagh? Absobloodylutely.

 

[King Cat]

We should have lost by more but for inaccuracy.

For mine losing contested possession by 17 was shocking. Too many players simply didn’t want to get their hands dirty and dig in against a side who clearly wanted the footy in wet conditions more.

We have too many front runner who look great when everything is going our way but won’t stand up when the going gets tough.

Ollie Henry is probably the worst. Couldn’t win a hard ball to save himself. Had an opportunity to run back with the flight of n the past quarter but just didn’t want to do it.
Brad Close is a front runner.
Stengle,Holmes, Rohan, Miers all recorded one tackle. Not good enough in a contested scrappy game.

Give me a player who has a crack everyday of the week.

Mannagh is playing like his life depends on it. Maybe guys like Hardie and Clohesy could get more games as they show more heart than a lot of guys who are gifted games based on how well they go when things are going good.

Mitch Knevitt is just not up to the level yet. How he gets a game in front of say Mitch Hardie who’s form in the VFL has Knevitt covered is puzzling.

Jack Henry

38

Jack Henry

Age

26

Ht

192cm

Wt

96kg

Pos.

Def

Career

Season

Last 5

D

10.3

3star

K

7.3

3star

HB

2.9

3star

M

4.0

4star

T

2.2

4star

MG

142.6

2star

D

8.6

2star

K

6.7

3star

HB

1.9

1star

M

3.9

4star

T

2.1

3star

MG

142.6

3star

D

9.6

3star

K

7.0

3star

HB

2.6

3star

M

3.6

4star

T

2.0

4star

needs to be stronger in the contest. He constantly gets beaten one on one with a lack of strength in a contest.

And Jezza had his arse handed to him by Rory Lobb

7

Rory Lobb

Age

31

Ht

207cm

Wt

106kg

Pos.

Fwd

Career

Season

Last 5

D

11.0

3star

K

6.7

3star

HB

4.4

3star

M

4.0

4star

T

2.4

4star

G

0.9

4star

D

11.3

3star

K

8.0

3star

HB

3.3

2star

M

4.6

4star

T

1.4

2star

G

1.0

4star

D

7.0

2star

K

4.0

2star

HB

3.0

3star

M

2.6

3star

T

2.8

5star

G

0.6

3star

. Cmon Jezza. You are better than that.

I want a team of guys who are committed and have a crack not the bunch of soft ***** we saw last night.


Sent from my iPhone using BigFooty.com

 

[Vdubs]

No. Could easily still lose to freo and finish third.
The real question is, in this form is there any point?

Assuming wins against NM(Tassie), Saints (Marvel) is risky, and our form at home suggests Crows will not be easy.
Owaat again is the safe thing to look at.

 

[Strange Cat]

Getting finals experience into Dempsey, Humphries, Bowes, Bruhn, Mannagh? Absobloodylutely.

Even last night Humphries is showing so much promise and they will all be better for finals exposure to get them motivated for a massive pre season in the gym

Humphries deserves all the hype on this board he’s going to be special

 

[Pollywaffle]

I will call out JC.
You cannot lope around the place, meters off your opponent all the time. You have to get yourself involved. Subsequently you can't tell other players what they should be doing cos they will be looking at you and thinking wtf.

You need to force it a bit more.

He has always been hot and cold I recall many days when he played for the giants where he was AWOL..

 

[Vdubs]

As bad as it was, please get a grip saying it cost us top 4. It barely made a dent.

View attachment 2054295

I'm glad you are heartened by that. All I know is what we see, and can only hope last night was truly an aberration, or that we were viral or something, but imho, credit where. credit is due- we were humbled by a brilliant and accomplished team with strengths all over the ground, and in areas we have weaknesses.

 

[Pollywaffle]

Assuming wins against NM(Tassie), Saints (Marvel) is risky, and our form at home suggests Crows will not be easy.
Owaat again is the safe thing to look at.

Could easily lose all three of those games

 

[Chinacats]

Why is it that when Cameron, Rohan and OHenry can all jump high, we get out marked without any apparent effort to spoil if we aren’t in a position to grab it?

O Henry what a joke! Shouldn’t be in the team. Has an opponent won’t get near the ball…. Out the backer has been found out!

 

[CatToTheFuture]

Even last night Humphries is showing so much promise and they will all be better for finals exposure to get them motivated for a massive pre season in the gym

Humphries deserves all the hype on this board he’s going to be special

I tend to think that Humphries, Bruhn, Dempsey, Mannagh etc are all pretty resilient. Getting smashed in a prelim wouldn't be the worst thing

 

[CatToTheFuture]

Could easily lose all three of those games

I don't know about easily. We'd have to put some effort into taking that bad

 

[Pure_Ownage]

Assuming wins against NM(Tassie), Saints (Marvel) is risky, and our form at home suggests Crows will not be easy.
Owaat again is the safe thing to look at.

All of those teams are crap as are west coast. If we are decent they are all wins. Only freo is dicey and thats only because of the travel.

 

[foxdog50]

You would get him for sweet fa and mainly because he’s on a large contract
A 3rd rounder

If that's is the case, I'd do it .... when does his contract finish?

 

[Strange Cat]

I tend to think that Humphries, Bruhn, Dempsey, Mannagh etc are all pretty resilient. Getting smashed in a prelim wouldn't be the worst thing

I can see it motivating them over the pre season to get some size into them as you said it wouldn’t be the worse thing

 

[Finknottle]

Leaving Neale out mean't Cameron was our only tall forward. And Cameron plays like a small forward. He was lost out there against the Bulldogs tall backs. The match committee should take responsibility for that disaster. On a number of occasions Close, Stengle and Miers were trying to take contested marks against Lobb, Khamis, Bontempelli and even English. I felt sorry for them.

 

[BORIS332]

A nice reality check against a team who played to their potential while we were a few steps behind. Selection going forward will be interesting, you could make the case that Stanley, Clark, Bruhn, MOC, Neale and of course Atkins would’ve made us better last night. Ted looked good and Mannagh one of our best. Odds for this game were mental, thought it was a 50/50 game going in.

If you watched the VFL game you’d know that is Stanley’s level. He may have dominated the hitouts but he is absolutely hopeless around the ground.

 

[BORIS332]

No. Could easily still lose to freo and finish third.
The real question is, in this form is there any point?

That is very unlikely.

 

[D BRIDGE]

We should have lost by more but for inaccuracy.

For mine losing contested possession by 17 was shocking. Too many players simply didn’t want to get their hands dirty and dig in against a side who clearly wanted the footy in wet conditions more.

We have too many front runner who look great when everything is going our way but won’t stand up when the going gets tough.

Ollie Henry is probably the worst. Couldn’t win a hard ball to save himself. Had an opportunity to run back with the flight of n the past quarter but just didn’t want to do it.
Brad Close is a front runner.
Stengle,Holmes, Rohan, Miers all recorded one tackle. Not good enough in a contested scrappy game.

Give me a player who has a crack everyday of the week.

Mannagh is playing like his life depends on it. Maybe guys like Hardie and Clohesy could get more games as they show more heart than a lot of guys who are gifted games based on how well they go when things are going good.

Mitch Knevitt is just not up to the level yet. How he gets a game in front of say Mitch Hardie who’s form in the VFL has Knevitt covered is puzzling.

Jack Henry needs to be stronger in the contest. He constantly gets beaten one on one with a lack of strength in a contest.

And Jezza had his arse handed to him by Rory Lobb. Cmon Jezza. You are better than that.

I want a team of guys who are committed and have a crack not the bunch of soft ***** we saw last night.


Sent from my iPhone using BigFooty.com

I agree with plenty here.

 

[cats_09]

Yeah before the game (watching VFL) I understood the go small to contested ground ball players move….but as you say it didn’t fit with the bomb it long strategy (which hasn’t worked for us all year tbh).

Sorry if this is a long read - essentially there was **** ups by both the coaching group & players last night...


This is where it's fun being a Geelong fan, and as most of us have come to learn the circular nature of discussion depending whether it's a win or a loss - the past few weeks it's generally been positive post match & praise for how the players have gone about things. And then like clockwork, after last nights match, I've been reading a whole lot of pile on against Scott - not necessarily this forum, but damn it's head shaking shit

My favourite comment is that last nights loss is 100% Chris Scott's fault - don't get me wrong, I don't think that Scott & co go everything right last night, but let's not excuse the players for their performance because not too many could say they had good games last night


In regards to Scott & the MC, this is where hindsight is a glorious thing - I don't think there was anything excessively wrong with the team that was named on Thursday night, and that includes the emergency list. We now know that Bruhn got through the VFL unscathed & was our most influential player, but I don't blame them for wanting to play it a bit safe in his return rather than risk rushing him back and it not working out. Obviously Atkins failing a fitness test on match day wasn't ideal and for those who question his spot in the team I think his absence last night showed his value in our best 22 - guessing it was a toss of a coin between Parfitt & Clohesy to replace him, and considering how Parfitt went in the wet up in Brisbane earlier this year, I can understand them going with the experienced player

As for late change with Neale out, having watched the VFL it didn't seem the worse call at the time - I would gather that Scott & Co spoke with the VFL coaching team, possibly a few senior players also to get an understanding of conditions and went from there with the decision to withdraw Neale. Could also ask if Neale was 100% after his hit to the throat last week and with the conditions they decided to err on the side of caution in giving him a rest

WHERE I think they went wrong was with the positional changes & one field match-ups. One major positional change we made during the Essendon match was Stewart to the guts, Holmes returned to his backline role from earlier in the season & over the past couple of matches we really condensed the core midfield rotation to 4 players (this excludes SDK/Blicavs ruck combo) - Dangerfield, Stewart & Atkins have attended the majority of centre bounces over the past fortnight, with Bowes the 4th player in the rotation

Losing Atkins & bringing in Parfitt, I would have expected something of a direct swap in roles also - instead what we saw was Holmes take Atkins spot in that midfield rotation, Bowes dropped back into the Holmes role and then we saw the odd CBA from Parfitt & Bowes but neither hitting double digit attendance. Where I don't think that worked is we suddenly had 3 attacking style players at centre bounces and didn't really play that lock-down, defensive option. In Atkins absence, I would rather have seen him replaced by Bowes or Parfitt in the rotation as I think they would have been more similar in style and we really did miss that defensive minded player

I'm not opposed to Holmes in the guts - but I think he's more in the style of a Dangerfield type where he wants to burst away from the pack rather than necessarily dig in & just scrap...that's not a bad thing, just the style of player he is. And that then flows on to Bowes & Parfitt, with both those guys playing their best when part of that midfield rotation, but don't think we were smart with how we used them last night

So from a coaching side of things, I think they need to review some of those types of changes & decisions as I think we have the personal to player a similar style to our previous 3 weeks but the way we lined up had an impact on our ability to do so


From a player perspective - more than a few needed to pull the finger out last night. The execution or lack of, the intensity around the contest, the acceptance to be second to the ball rather than be the ones to hunt the ball, and continually making stupid decisions with ball in hand, that's on the players. Then add in how we seemed more than happy to sit back & wait for the ball rather than be the ones to attack the ball, and it just meant we were on the back foot more often than not

How often over recent months have fans bitched about Cameron getting on his bike & spending too much time up the ground compared with playing more from the forward line. Last night was the night he needed to get on his bike and do just that though - playing deep, not really offering anything of a lead & at times waiting for the play to come to him, really just played into the hands of the Lobb & the Bulldogs; he's approaching game #250 but sometimes looks like he's played less than 10. He's a senior player and needs to take ownership of his own game & approach within games

Henry has been crazy frustrating this season and we've often seeing the best & worse of him within games - not sure if it's a confidence thing, not backing himself in or what, but when he's showing urgency is when he's at his best and it's when our defence functions at it's best

Holmes has a habit of making one or two really stupid mistakes each match, where he just tries to bite off more than he can chew, and we saw similar from Rohan in the last where he had short options or a player available on the overlap but instead went the long kick into the 50 to an unnecessary contest - even when we were still in the match, we started to unnecessarily panic & make stupid decisions and that really cost us in the end


So yes, the coaching group didn't get it totally right last night but neither did the playing group - ultimately, it doesn't matter what selection & positional decisions the MC make, when the players fail to execute out on the field. There's got to be some shared responsibility for last nights failure