Explain the forward press to me

[Faz 2000]

A basketball court isnt 150 metres long.

The ball is a different shape, too. And there are a few other fundamental differences.

But... I think it makes sense that AFL footy borrows tactics from other sports. There are sports that have been around longer (though not too many), but certainly sports that are played by more people, have more money spent on them, more coaching and analysis done than AFL, so I think it's reasonable that some sports are more fully evolved than out game.

Our game is pretty chaotic, not least because it's played on a MASSIVE surface with a shedload of players and bugger-all rules about where you can go. However the precision plays of American football, the ball movement of basketball and the structures of soccer are all things that I think have been/will continue to be borrowed and re-purposed for AFL. One could argue the bench rotations now look an awful lot like ice hockey "shifts", and subbing out players is almost like relieving pitchers in baseball. You have your main guy, and a closer.

 

[Mancey]

A basketball court isnt 150 metres long.

True, but basketball teams also don't have 18 defenders at their disposal

 

[Hencho]

Organsied Flooding

 

[Slattery_20]

It'll last a season or two before tactics shift again. Perhaps to an American football style setup where the defensive team gets the ball back to a "quarterback" like Shannon Hurn/Josh Drummond/Matt Suckling and provides a protective screen (like the offensive line in gridiron) to get the ball over the press? Something.

That's essentially the set-up from a lot of kick-ins now, cf Harry O running interference.

 

[Bassy]

I think it's more interesting seeing teams beat the press.

Some try to pinpoint pass going slowly across the ground. Others kick to a contest. Others just kick near the line so that it goes out and you try to get a clearance.

In some ways it has hurt the game but it has brought in pack marks again. I think the weakness of the press would be a player that consistently takes contested marks. Once you complete that it's just a simple matter to kick over the press.

 

[Baldur]

I think it's more interesting seeing teams beat the press.

Some try to pinpoint pass going slowly across the ground. Others kick to a contest. Others just kick near the line so that it goes out and you try to get a clearance.

In some ways it has hurt the game but it has brought in pack marks again. I think the weakness of the press would be a player that consistently takes contested marks. Once you complete that it's just a simple matter to kick over the press.

Fremantle when Sandilands was fit used to kick to him, he would either mark it or if the pack was too hot hit it backwards over his head.

Many teams are now kicking to a ruckman on a wing to get out, but there is only one Sandilands.

 

[Leather Poisoning]

I think it's more interesting seeing teams beat the press.

Some try to pinpoint pass going slowly across the ground. Others kick to a contest. Others just kick near the line so that it goes out and you try to get a clearance.

In some ways it has hurt the game but it has brought in pack marks again. I think the weakness of the press would be a player that consistently takes contested marks. Once you complete that it's just a simple matter to kick over the press.

Yes, I'm also very interested in this.

Some will chip it around the backline, relying on perfect skills (how will this go in the finals?)

Others will kick long the ruckman about 70/80m out from the opposition goal and either mark/force the ball out of bounds.

Every now and then on the kick out you see a team that has over-commited to the forward press leaving the centre corridor open to the big old fashioned kick up the guts. Love it when this happens!


We're talking up the value of the contested marking players to break the forward press, but which of the top four sides has a multitude of contested marking specialists? (And before you say Cloke/Dawes just remember we're talking about the forward press - i.e. how to get it out of defensive 50)

The hawks seem to switch a lot and rely on sharp kicking from Guerra/Hodge/Suckling/Birchall/Burgoyne. haven't really watched Geelong/Carlton or Collingwood closely enough in this regard to see how they do it.

 

[maxmustard]

It's ugly and boring that's for sure

Amen. Hugely effective, but renders some of the more exciting and appealing aspects of the game redundant. In all honesty I loved the cats beating the saints in 09 (press not as evolved then I know) purely because it was a great football team vs a system which had a few great players. I also think it's contributing to massively one sided games this year. Something else will replace it in time, can't wait.

 

[PieNSauce]

Yes, I'm also very interested in this.

Some will chip it around the backline, relying on perfect skills (how will this go in the finals?)

Others will kick long the ruckman about 70/80m out from the opposition goal and either mark/force the ball out of bounds.

Every now and then on the kick out you see a team that has over-commited to the forward press leaving the centre corridor open to the big old fashioned kick up the guts. Love it when this happens!


We're talking up the value of the contested marking players to break the forward press, but which of the top four sides has a multitude of contested marking specialists? (And before you say Cloke/Dawes just remember we're talking about the forward press - i.e. how to get it out of defensive 50)

The hawks seem to switch a lot and rely on sharp kicking from Guerra/Hodge/Suckling/Birchall/Burgoyne. haven't really watched Geelong/Carlton or Collingwood closely enough in this regard to see how they do it.

Collingwood rarely have to contend with an opposition forward press because they have such a strong midfield that they tend to dominate clearances and get the ball quickly into their forward line.

When we have lost the clearances we obviously haven't been anywhere near as effective but we have a good number of talented backs like Reid and Leon who can kick accurately over a long distance or Harry and Heater who just break the lines with gut running. On occasion Collingwood has also utilised the barrel from full back down the guts but I think that was more experimental and I don't recall having seen too much of it since the NAB cup.

I think Hawthorn's challenge come September will be whether it can dominate clearances because so far I'm not convinced the chip, chip, chip escape route will work in the heat of finals footy or against the better exponents of the press.

 

[Timmy from Thomastown]

Amen. Hugely effective, but renders some of the more exciting and appealing aspects of the game redundant.

Travis Cloke is the leading contested mark in the competition right now and Chris Dawes takes plenty. They have a dozen goalkickers a game. They lay heaps of tackles.

Collingwood play a pretty exciting brand of football - a good mix of marking running and tackling. They rarely play "tempo" football which I find unwatchable. When they are in defence they dont often kick sideways, they try and move the ball forward quickly and then apply the press to ensure the ball is locked in their forward 50.

 

[krisholio14]

A basketball court isnt 150 metres long.

Basketball courts don't have 36 guys out there at one time.

 

[Timmy from Thomastown]

Basketball courts don't have 36 guys out there at one time.

No but on a basketball court you can run from one end and score. It happens a lot. Its almost impossible in our game to collect the ball in the back half from a long kick over the press, run 40-50 metres to the 50 without being run down and/or tackled, and then kick a goal from 50.

 

[bluekidjoe]

No but on a basketball court you can run from one end and score. It happens a lot. Its almost impossible in our game to collect the ball in the back half from a long kick over the press, run 40-50 metres to the 50 without being run down and/or tackled, and then kick a goal from 50.

So much love for C. Yarran in this aspect!!!

 

[invinciBlues]

There was a brilliant explanation on AFL 360 or AFL insider the other week, I had a bit of a search to no avail unfortunately, but it cleared up every angle that I didn't fully understand.

Maybe someone else/you can find it?

 

[RooHooDoo]

No but on a basketball court you can run from one end and score. It happens a lot. Its almost impossible in our game to collect the ball in the back half from a long kick over the press, run 40-50 metres to the 50 without being run down and/or tackled, and then kick a goal from 50.

Theres always this bloke

[youtube]OUCzN1o2qGM[/youtube]

 

[Rod Stroker]

Great thread Refreshing to read a topic that's actually about the game and not some periphery garbage like which schoolgirl is humping which player manager, which coach the media wants to execute, and which player has been busted for urinating in public, all discussed with large servings of vitriol thrown from poster to poster.

This thread here is what this forum should be about. Sadly it seems to be exception rather than the rule.

 

[Max zero]

Amen. Hugely effective, but renders some of the more exciting and appealing aspects of the game redundant. In all honesty I loved the cats beating the saints in 09 (press not as evolved then I know) purely because it was a great football team vs a system which had a few great players. I also think it's contributing to massively one sided games this year. Something else will replace it in time, can't wait.

Encouraging fast breaks and contested marking is now boring?

The press's primary strength is against the chip-chip/chip backwards play style which pretty much everyone thought was a blight on the game.

I would say, at the moment, the teams which perform the press the best also play the most exciting football.

 

[TIME IS NOW]

Great thread and great read.

The game will evolve as it always does, but also some strategies may come full circle.

For example when you see a team form a defensive zone from a kick out I dont get why the team kicking in dont go old school and huddle before breaking. You basically tell opposition we wont be dictated by your terms so man us up or let us run with numbers.

Also the zone as is used in basketball can and will be further developed in AFL.

Basic idea is in basketball you leave the crap players open to shoot the ball, in AFL I can see players leaving someone with poor disposal open to create the turnover.... teams already do it with Judd!

 

[Simple Jack]

More or less. Im thinking of guys like Gartlett (blues), Grant (dogs)... guys who are basically significantly quicker than most of their opponents. Dont kick to them in order to mark it, kick in front of them and they run onto the loose ball and then run it all the way to 20m out. Fast break, and easy layup in basketball terms.

St Kilda took the Clarko cluster from 08 and added the pressure aspect to it to form the 09 game plan which was so effective. Then in about round 6 2010 when we played Carlton this is exactly what they did and they smacked us by 10 goals. The first time we had lost a game by more than 2 goals or so in over a year. It is also the reason Essendon were able to beat us last year even though they were a crap team. They were a fast, crap team.

The other thing about the forward press that is so good is that if you kick a point, and all the players are effecting the press well, you almost certainly will get the ball back and have another shot. The way this works is..

From a kick out, you start with your 18 man zone from 25-75 meters from the opposition goal. This means anywhere from 25-75 meters there should be no free space for opposition players to run and present an option for the kick out. Often you will see the full back (or 'kicker inner' now the FB doesn't really do that any more) kick to a target in the pocket (say the broadcast side pocket) where a free player is because the zone only starts 25m out. Because the player is now in the pocket on one side the effective '1 kick' length means he can now no longer reach say 65m out on the non broadcast side. Because of this you can start to collapse the zone towards the side where the player with the ball is (broadcast side in this instance) this congests the space further and means he if he wants his team to keep posession of the ball he has to kick back to the full back who is now near the goal line. Now because the man on the mark is 2-3 out from the goal line (as opposed to 15 out for a kick in) you shift the zone across to cover the field equally again but you move it 10-12 meters closer to goal. now because of the shape of a footy field a zone from 15-60 (as opposed to 25-75) won't have to cover as much ground there for is tighter with even less space for an opposition player to be free and you end up with the situation where all the FB can do is kick to the player in the pocket again (or the other pocket) really close to the line, now the zone collapses to that side and tightens up a little more, then the player in the pocket kicks it back to the FB (maybe not 15 and you can pressure and tackle) and the cycle repeats with the 'inferred' pressure building each kick. Eventually the player will have to kick it to a contest and give up effective posession of the ball.

At any stage of my previous scenario the player in defense with the ball could kick it long, but if the zone is working properly it will be to a contest which is the whole point. Now the attacking team either gets the ball back (turnover) or causes a stoppage (neutral contest).

The 3 ways I can think of that teams can get out of their defensive half from a kick in are;

1. Pinpoint passing with perfect skills (which theoretically shouldn't be possible with a well structured zone)
2. Kick to a big pack marking target 55ish out on the boundary line (Ben McEvoy for us when he is on song, I notice Freo use Sandi for this)
3. Long kick to the contest, ball is brough to ground, win the contested ball and spread.

As you can see, none of these 3 options are guaranteed to come off which is perfect for the attacking team. It's also one of the reasons you hear coaches always talking about the contested ball stat.

 

[Simple Jack]

For example when you see a team form a defensive zone from a kick out I dont get why the team kicking in dont go old school and huddle before breaking. You basically tell opposition we wont be dictated by your terms so man us up or let us run with numbers.

Because when the press is set up the players 'breaking' from the huddle are just going to be running towards an opposition player.

Basic idea is in basketball you leave the crap players open to shoot the ball, in AFL I can see players leaving someone with poor disposal open to create the turnover.... teams already do it with Judd!

Yep, this year in particular, far too often Jones/Peak have been the ones who are running down the wing and delivering the ball into our F50. Nothing against these players, they are good honest toilers, but they don't have the disposal of Dal Santo/Joey/BJ. It's not a coincidence.

 

[themidlandmaster]

I don't know if this is a delibertae aspect of the press, but Collingwood massively exploits its finess in the forth term. As the fittest team in the comp with a lot of guys who can play midfield, the Pies exploit the thier less fit opposition in the forth term, like the Doggies, the Crows and Melbourne recently - i think its about plus 100 points difference there.

 

[Snoref]

Hi Rodney! didn't know you visit BF

 

[mezaire]

Just a couple of thoughts that haven't been covered yet.

Collingwood have such an effective fwd press becasue their players work hard to cover the area that a tackling/covering player has moved from. They also trust one man to win a one on one contest and therfore never get caught out 1 on 2 by a quick handball. Therefore when a player gets the ball in the back pocket, he is cornered by a single, hardworking Collingwood player and everywhere he looks there are Collingwood players.

The second stage of the press is it forces the other team to push more and more players into theoir defensive zone to help the ball out so when the long bomb out of defence becomes the only option, they are out numbered on the wing.

And why don't players just put it too space for a fast player?
Well the HB players of the team executing the zone are sitting 60-70m from the ball, not 40-50m. Secondly, it risks a quick return of the ball back inside 50 and as they were trying to find space, the defenders aren't manning up and easy goals are created.

Why you would think the press would be the end of the big fwd, it is actually the start fo the movile big fwd. They need to provide a marking option on the wing if the press is broken and the ball gets that far, but also bee good enough on the ground so that if the ball gets there they can either win it, or atleast create a stoppage.
Players that have thrived this year becasue of that are Kennedy, Cloke, Dawes, Buddy, Walker and to a lesser extent Darling.

I also think this is one of the major reasons NRoo has struggled so much this year. He has been found out a bit as a slightly one dimensional fwd who allows the ball to be punched away too easily (doesn't hold his man back) and then isn't that great once the ball hits the ground.......but that's another thread all together!!

 

[Ritchie8]

Because when the press is set up the players 'breaking' from the huddle are just going to be running towards an opposition player.

Then why doesn't the team kicking out from the defensive end just get a huddle of all 18 players to one side of the ground? the forward press is covering the whole width of the ground so a full team huddle would effectivley cause a 17 on say 9-10 players in one part of the ground, then they could just work the ball up the ground with sheer weight of numbers.

 

[PieNSauce]

Then why doesn't the team kicking out from the defensive end just get a huddle of all 18 players to one side of the ground? the forward press is covering the whole width of the ground so a full team huddle would effectivley cause a 17 on say 9-10 players in one part of the ground, then they could just work the ball up the ground with sheer weight of numbers.

Simple. The more players you push into your defensive end the less players you have to create an outlet. With so many players in such a confined space you are never going to have time for quality disposal and so the best you can hope to achieve is a long kick forward. This inevitably would result in a very quick rebound and quite likely a goal to your opposition.

The press is about taking up space and ensuring there are very few places a backman can lead to without being under pressure. The huddle just doesn't work when the press is in play because it does nothing to change that fact and the pressure of the press almost invariably causes stoppages and/or turn overs. That said, to be effective with a press you must have the cattle to both implement the press and to win the contested ball so it's not really a tactic that works for a team without dominant on-ballers and good big contested marking forwards.