Injuries under Sando

[Team DJ]

But their is more to coaching than just winning and losing.

Coaches are like administrators, simply custodians of the club who are supposed to leave the club in better shape than what they found (or inherited) it.

That's not to say Craig was or wasn't a better coach than Cornes or Shaw but had different assets to work with at the time. as a club, I feel we are really lukcy that every coach can be seen in some positive, either premierships, development, transitional period or simply being Neil Craig

As a coach, Robert Shaw on field and match day coaching was a joke but his player development and player promotions were spot on and helped the 1997 and 1998 premierships.

Nailed it. AFC979810

 

[A FEW GOOD MEN]

I am struggling to understand what the last 2 pages have to do with "Injuries and Sando".

Since certain members of the MOB are determined to recreate history once again, I will restate the FACTS.

In Patty's first season on the Crows list he spent very little time in the midfield. He was played predominantly as a forward BY THE GEELONG FALCONS.

He moved to Adelaide in 2009 and as an eighteen year old and PLAYED 21 GAMES in his first season at the club. (Yes, that's correct, he only turned 19 in April 2009, his second year on our list and his first year in Adelaide). It was unfortunate that Neil Craig left him to languish in a forward pocket that entire season and what a remarkable job Patty did, finishing 4th for the Crows in 2009 in centre clearances, a miraculous effort for a player that spent no time in the midfield.

He spent more game time in the midfield each season under Craig. In 2011, prior to Craig's departure, Patty was only second to Thommo in attending centre bounces. Clearly we must have had 5 players in the centre square since we all know that prior to Craig leaving Patty was used exclusively as a forward.

You can argue that Patty should have spent even more time in the midfield in 2011, but AS A 21 YEAR OLD he spent more time in the midfield than most of the players listed earlier (check the champion data, only Selwood spent significantly more time in the midfield at the same age, and what a disgraceful treatment of Gary Ablett Jnr in his first 5 seasons. He could have been anything if Bomber hadn't mistreated him so much in his early years).

I suggest some posters spend a few bucks and subscribe to some of the Champion Data information rather than making up their own FACTS.

 

[AFC979810]

Nailed it. AFC979810

Nope. I am sorry - no matter how you try and spin it you are dead wrong in stating that Craig was as bad as a coach as Shaw.

The fact remains that the #1 criteria in which coaches are measured is through their success on the football field. I pointed out previously that Craig had a ridiculously superior record over his 5 years than Shaw did over his 2 years. To compare the quality of football the Crows played under Craig to the football we played under Shaw is chalk and cheese.

Now I understand that there are other factors that need to be considered when looking at a coaches success -such as player development and whether they leave the list in a better place than they found it....

Robert Shaw took over a side that was in a prelim in 1993 and finished 11th in 1994. Craig took over a team that was in a prelim in 2003 and finished 12th in 2004. The first year after Shaw left we finished 4th and won a flag (after winning a prelim by less than a goal). The first year after Craig left we finished 1st and missed out on a grand final by less than a goal. Not much difference there as far as leaving the list in good shape.

I think it is finally time for you to admit you were too young to actually see the Crows play in 1995 & 1996 (and probably 2005/2006 by the sounds of it) and are talking out of your arse. In no way can anyone reasonably or correctly give credit to our success in 1997/1998 to Robert Shaw and deny Craig credit for our success in 2012. You have not had one original thought in your Craig bashing and are just towing the same line as many of the other Craig detractors on here.

 

[Team DJ]

Nope. I am sorry - no matter how you try and spin it you are dead wrong in stating that Craig was as bad as a coach as Shaw.

The fact remains that the #1 criteria in which coaches are measured is through their success on the football field. I pointed out previously that Craig had a ridiculously superior record over his 5 years than Shaw did over his 2 years. To compare the quality of football the Crows played under Craig to the football we played under Shaw is chalk and cheese.

Now I understand that there are other factors that need to be considered when looking at a coaches success -such as player development and whether they leave the list in a better place than they found it....

Robert Shaw took over a side that was in a prelim in 1993 and finished 11th in 1994. Craig took over a team that was in a prelim in 2003 and finished 12th in 2004. The first year after Shaw left we finished 4th and won a flag (after winning a prelim by less than a goal). The first year after Craig left we finished 1st and missed out on a grand final by less than a goal. Not much difference there as far as leaving the list in good shape.

I think it is finally time for you to admit you were too young to actually see the Crows play in 1995 & 1996 (and probably 2005/2006 by the sounds of it) and are talking out of your arse. In no way can anyone reasonably or correctly give credit to our success in 1997/1998 to Robert Shaw and deny Craig credit for our success in 2012. You have not had one original thought in your Craig bashing and are just towing the same line as many of the other Craig detractors on here.

I stand by my comments.
We're all allowed an opinion?
IMO Robert Shaw was betterfor the Football Club then Neil Craig.

FWIW Yes i was old enough to remember those years. 96 D Jarmans first year at the club. Who could forget

 

[Slippery Pete]

I am struggling to understand what the last 2 pages have to do with "Injuries and Sando".

Since certain members of the MOB are determined to recreate history once again, I will restate the FACTS.

In Patty's first season on the Crows list he spent very little time in the midfield. He was played predominantly as a forward BY THE GEELONG FALCONS.

He moved to Adelaide in 2009 and as an eighteen year old and PLAYED 21 GAMES in his first season at the club. (Yes, that's correct, he only turned 19 in April 2009, his second year on our list and his first year in Adelaide). It was unfortunate that Neil Craig left him to languish in a forward pocket that entire season and what a remarkable job Patty did, finishing 4th for the Crows in 2009 in centre clearances, a miraculous effort for a player that spent no time in the midfield.

He spent more game time in the midfield each season under Craig. In 2011, prior to Craig's departure, Patty was only second to Thommo in attending centre bounces. Clearly we must have had 5 players in the centre square since we all know that prior to Craig leaving Patty was used exclusively as a forward.

You can argue that Patty should have spent even more time in the midfield in 2011, but AS A 21 YEAR OLD he spent more time in the midfield than most of the players listed earlier (check the champion data, only Selwood spent significantly more time in the midfield at the same age, and what a disgraceful treatment of Gary Ablett Jnr in his first 5 seasons. He could have been anything if Bomber hadn't mistreated him so much in his early years).

I suggest some posters spend a few bucks and subscribe to some of the Champion Data information rather than making up their own FACTS.

Let's say you're right, that he did spend "enough" time in the midfield relevant to his age and experience. Okay.

My next question is, why was his possession count so low? Did he have a job other than to get kicks?

 

[cmndstab]

The issue with Dangerfield is that he was a clearance specialist, but one who had serious deficiencies in his game.

First of all he spent the entire 2008 season injured, and since he was away from the club, it was never diagnosed and treated properly. That, along with the entire class of 2008 receiving injuries, was the catalyst for changing the way new draftees are introduced into training at the Crows.

Second, he was still an undersized body playing a crash-and-bash style of football. That, combined with his lack of fitness (which was adequate but certainly not at midfielder level) meant that he simply couldn't play in the midfield for too long at once.

Third, his approach to football was "see ball, go at it" which works fine in the juniors when you're bigger, faster and stronger than all of your opponents and teammates, but at AFL level he would often either spoil the ball from a teammate, or would leave himself prone on the ground and unable to affect the next contest. Hence, his uncontested possession count was way down, and his only real contribution to the side during his midfield spurts was the clearances he was able to win.

Craig, to his credit in my opinion, was able to juggle these issues without taking Dangerfield off the ground. By allowing him to have stints up forward, a role he had played many times as a junior, he was able to stay involved in the game and contribute to the team. He periodically moved to the midfield (despite claims of 75/25 or even 80/20 here, I'd say the split was roughly 55/45 once you take bench time out of the equation) and was able to have an impact for a while.

In the mean time, Dangerfield worked on his fitness, on building his body, and on choosing the right time to dive at the ball and the right time to stay on his feet. Finally, in recent times, he has developed to the stage where he can play a full match in the midfield and be effective, sometimes very effective.


How much of his recent form is attributable to Craig's handling of him, and how much is attributable to Sanderson's handling of him, is up for debate. But it's ridiculous to claim that Craig mismanaged him by sticking him up forward, or that somehow Craig didn't realise Dangerfield was primarily a midfielder. If Craig had put a 19 year old Dangerfield in the midfield for 100% of his on-ground time, that would have been mismanagement. He wasn't ready for it.



The debate about Walker is another interesting one. People seem to love claiming that Craig "stifled his development", by pointing out that he kicked many more goals under Sanderson than he did under Craig in a season. The reality is Sanderson inherited a player who was ready to start performing at the level he did last year. Yes, Sanderson has handled him well, developing a strong relationship with him and putting a public show of confidence in him, exactly as he should have. However, he was able to do that because Walker had already been developed into a very well-rounded player. Like it or not, many of the traits Walker displayed in 2012 are traits that Craig demanded he develop - consistency, harassing, hardness, leadership. And develop them he has.




The thing is, Craig had Dangerfield and Walker during their formative years. Sanderson took over as they emerged from this period. If they have emerged as very strong players, Craig deserves much of the credit for this. And we, as supporters, can reap the benefit of the timely change of coaches. While I believe Craig developed Dangerfield and Walker exceptionally well, the other issues surrounding him at the time of his departure would have made it difficult for him to take them further so quickly. Sanderson was able to come in with a clean slate and take those two players to the next level.


I don't see why we can't celebrate the role that both coaches have played in the development of our two brightest young players, rather than feeling the need to choose one coach to worship and another to denegrate.

 

[Slippery Pete]

I don't see why we can't celebrate the role that both coaches have played in the development of our two brightest young players, rather than feeling the need to choose one coach to worship and another to denegrate.

I think most of us have stopped short of worship.

I think when it comes to Walker Sanderson has done at least the bare minimum of what you'd expect a coach to do with a player with such enormous x-factor. You can't tell me that the suspension saga last year would have been handled the same under Neil Craig. You can't! You won't!

Neil Craig was a frustrating coach for Taylor Walker. Anyone who denies that is kidding themselves.

 

[cmndstab]

Being asked to work on your deficiencies is frustrating for anyone. That doesn't make it unnecessary.

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

A few things

Dangerfield 4th on centre square clearance... where on total clearances? No one is denying he was used often as a centre square battering ram. Also no one is denying that our Reilly and Douglas led midfield sucked complete balls.

Walker was the youngest player in SANFL history to kick 50 goals. That's before he even played a game for us and was only 17 at the start of that year. So you can measure a coach's achievements about what he inherited and how he progressed it. Yes - under Craig, Walker developed to a point that placed him above many late draft pick KPP's. Whoopty doo.

 

[A FEW GOOD MEN]

Let's say you're right, that he did spend "enough" time in the midfield relevant to his age and experience. Okay.

My next question is, why was his possession count so low? Did he have a job other than to get kicks?

My apologies for the delay in responding. My new job does not enable me to participate in Big Footy during the day.

Patty's development was exactly what you would expect of a future elite midfielder. In his first three seasons his average supercoach score went from 63 to 70 to 80. I believe this is the best measure of his overall performance rather than number of possessions that increased from 13.0 to 15.7 to 18.1.

After three years under Neil (not even Craig's greatest critics would suggest that Patty's lack of development in 2008 had anything to do with his coach since he was living near Geelong and completing year 12. He hardly trained with the Crows throughout 2008. The fact that Patty nominated for the draft but declared that he would not be training/playing with the team that selected him worked in our favour since it allowed him to slip to number 10 in the draft) his performance as a 20/21 year old in 2011 was spectacular.

Everyone was impressed with the impact that Patty made when he was in the midfield in 2009/10/11 since he usually made an immediate impact. What few Crows fans noticed was the pattern of his possesions. After a couple of dynamic minutes in the midfield his possession rate then dropped to almost zero (go back and watch a few of the games).My best guess is that this was due to

1) his overall fitness was not up to the required level for a full time midfielder. It usually takes several pre-seasons to build that kind of fitness base. Patty had a very restricted pre-season prior to 2009 and he also started 2010 pre-season in a self confessed below par state. Despite a modified pre-season Neil played him in 21 games in 2010.

2) Patty did not know how to control his manic attack on the ball and not even the fittest player could maintain the intensity that Patty showed in the early days.

Was anyone surprised that despite having one of the highest supercoach scores as a 20/21 year old he went to a new level in 2012. Last year Dustin Martin had a supercoach score of 88 and he has played 63 games in his first 3 seasons compared to Patty's 62 (plus 2 tasters when he was living in Moggs Creek). Martin spent quite a bit of time as a forward last year but providing he has not been influenced by "extraneous" factors I'd expect to see a lot more of him in the midfield in 2013 and he might be competing with Patty for an All Australian berth.

 

[Elite Crow]

Not this again. What you are ignoring is in 2011 under Craig he had 4/18 20 possession games, under Bickley 3/6, including his two highest possession games. Craig kept him up forward when we were being smashed in the midfield. Bickley said **** it and played him there and he hasn't look back since. Did he all of a sudden get fit for the last 6 games of 2011?

 

[cmndstab]

Not this again. What you are ignoring is in 2011 under Craig he had 4/18 20 possession games, under Bickley 3/6, including his two highest possession games. Craig kept him up forward when we were being smashed in the midfield. Bickley said **** it and played him there and he hasn't look back since. Did he all of a sudden get fit for the last 6 games of 2011?

A coach has a lot of freedom to move a player around when he only has to keep them up and running for six more games.

Dangerfield's midfield time increased, albeit it slowly, over his time under Craig's reign. It could have been increased more quickly, I agree, but it's not as though Craig had him pigeonholed as a permanent forward.

As with everything, hindsight shows us how things could have been done better, but I think Craig's approach to Dangerfield's first few years was much closer to optimal than those who called for him to be primarily a midfielder from the get go.

 

[A FEW GOOD MEN]

Not this again. What you are ignoring is in 2011 under Craig he had 4/18 20 possession games, under Bickley 3/6, including his two highest possession games. Craig kept him up forward when we were being smashed in the midfield. Bickley said **** it and played him there and he hasn't look back since. Did he all of a sudden get fit for the last 6 games of 2011?

Ahhh, the Bickley Bounce. Am I allowed to bump some of the Big Footy comments in that magical 6 weeks under Bicks. Let me see, we beat the 15th, 16th and 17th teams, lost at home to Richmond who leap frogged us to 12th, had a competitive home effort against Geelong and then went to Perth for a 95 point arse licking.

Like everyone else I was happy to see Patty spend more time in the midfield (although he spent a lot of time up forward against the Eagles). Yes E.C., absolutely irrefutable evidence that it was Mark Bickley that turned Patty from a plodding forward pocket into a midfield superstar.

 

[Allefgib]

Like it or not, many of the traits Walker displayed in 2012 are traits that Craig demanded he develop - consistency, harassing, hardness, leadership. And develop them he has.

Like it or not, no matter how much Craigy 'demanded' it (thanks for using that word ) Tex was unable to meet Craigy's demands.

New coach, new approach to managing the man and he's gone from a guy who twice in a season looked weak and to pull out of contests with lame bumps when he could have tackled.. to a guy who has wrecked havoc with hard, strong tackling in the forward line AND chased down the likes of Jetta to make a game winning tackle attempt.

I've no issue with saying Craigy played a great role in developing the guys fitness, work ethic and some footy basics. But his man management, ability to adapt and gameplans were goddamn awful IMO.

Why do you think people are so frustrated by Craigy and like to denigrate him? (even now!)

 

[A FEW GOOD MEN]

I still can't see how any of this relates to injuries under Sando.

Has anyone had the time to read the 2012 AFL Injuries Report? Once again some interesting stuff. The trend over the last 10 years has continued with strain type injuries (hamstrings, groin strains, calf strains etc) continuing to represent between 25% and 30% of all games lost to injuries.

Everyone knows that Essendon had the worse record for injuries in 2012, whoops WRONG. They had the worse record for strain injuries but Collingwood and West Coast lost a heap more games to injuries. Losing 4 players with ACLs will do that to you.

Now except for the lunatic fringe, no one would suggest that broken bones, concussions, dislocated shoulders and ACLs are due to under/over training. The dramatic fall in games lost to injuries by the Crows in 2012 compared to 2010 and 2011 had very little to do with the number of games lost to strain-type injuries and everything to do with the reduction in games lost due to collision-type injuries. (Porplyzia 21 games, Scott Stevens etc)

Now can someone explain to me why the change in coach was the reason for the fall in games lost to these type of injuries?

 

[Messiah]

Now can someone explain to me why the change in coach was the reason for the fall in games lost to these type of injuries?

These data are quite consistent with the hypothesis of fatigue causing non-strain type injuries due to worsening proprioception with fatigue (Hiemstra, et al., 2001).

eg. see
http://www.intechopen.com/books/bio...fluencing-proprioception-what-do-they-reveal-

Additionally, it has been suggested that the higher number of injuries sustained during the last third of practice sessions or matches could be correlated with fatigue-induced alterations in lower limb neuromuscular control and joint dynamic stability due to changes in joint proprioception.

I think this is the case in AFL as well.

There is also the spectre of the central fatigue hypothesis looming ...
It was reported that central fatigue may reduce the accuracy of motor control and interrupt voluntary muscle-stabilizing activity to resist imparted joint forces (Miura, et al., 2004)

Decreasing proprioception with age is also why old people fall over ...
The repercussions of muscle fatigue on elderly proprioception deserve singular interest, as altered proprioceptive input due to fatigue could result in deficits in neuromuscular and postural control, leading to increased risk of falls and consequently increasing the risk of osteoporotic fractures.

Under Neil Craig the Crows consistently gave away half-time leads to lose matches - indicating fatigue relative to the opposition.
This did not happen last year, with different training methods and game plans. Surprise, surprise, collision/joint/fall injuries declined too.

Hiemstra LA, Lo IK, Fowler PJ2001. Effect of fatigue on knee proprioception: implications for dynamic stabilization.J Orthop Sports Phys Ther 3110598605

K. Miura, Y. Ishibashi, E. Tsuda, Y. Okamura, H. Otsuka, S. Toh, 2004The effect of local and general fatigue on knee proprioception. Arthroscopy 204414418

 

[cmndstab]

Why do you think people are so frustrated by Craigy and like to denigrate him? (even now!)

I've actually put some thought into this over the last while. We enjoyed some moderate success under Craig's tenure and overall he left our squad in a good position when he left. He doesn't deserve anywhere near the vitriol he gets directed his way, even to this day as you point out.

I think it's a combination of people having extremely high expectations (which is fair enough) and people just having an inherent distrust of sports scientists, which Craig was labelled as for his entire time as coach. Despite being a 350+ game player in the SANFL, people saw him as some kind of mad scientist rather than a down-to-earth footy person and were almost waiting for him to fail. It's the same kind of attitude that absolutely loves it when a lawyer gets trapped in a technicality, or an academic gets proven incorrect, or a policeman gets caught committing a crime. When other coaches struggle, people talk about how their plans aren't working, or whatever. With Craig it was always "he's trying to turn the side into Crowbots, his gameplans are too complicated, he can't interface with his players" as though he was some kind of machine.

It also doesn't help that the media was in love with the guy. Nothing makes you go from simply disliking someone to absolutely hating them more than hearing everyone carry on about how good he is.

I don't think his man management was anything close to "goddamn awful". Hell, I'd rate it as above average. His ability to adapt to changing situations, or rather, his willingness to adapt to changing situations, was a flaw, no question there. That ties into his gameplan which I don't think was awful as much as it became entirely predictable and he wasn't willing to mix it up.

One of the things Sanderson often mentions that I like the most is about how he wants us to be difficult to play against. Almost any time we lose a match he brings out his favourite quote "we weren't difficult to play against". It's so simple sounding that it almost seems like a throwaway line, but it's actually one of the most important components of competitive sport. It can be so easy to focus on what you need to do right, on how you want to play, that you forget that there's an opponent out there - and preventing them from playing well is just as effective, often more so, than playing well yourself. Whenever I play any competitive sport, I'm always thinking first about how to nullify the opposition and take them out of their comfort zone, well before I start thinking about how I'm going to put my best form forward. I think that was Craig's main failing. He was always focused solely on what we were doing - outwardly so. He's constantly talk about how he didn't care what the opposition did, and that we were only interested in what we did. And so he refused to adapt to the strengths and weaknesses of opposition sides (token efforts to send Rutten to FF against the Bulldogs aside ), refused to react when a particular player was having a blinder, refused to change things when we had been worked out.

Sanderson, on the other hand, is focused on ensuring that anything we do stifles and frustrates the opposition. He doesn't want us to handball out the back of a pack so we can try to get an uncontested possession and execute it perfectly. He doesn't want us to sit and wait for the right opportunity to deliver the ball inside 50 to a free player. He wants us to smash into the opponent to make them second-guess their attack on the ball. He wants us to get the ball in as quickly as possible to intimidate the defenders and keep them on their toes. I think that's one of the fundamental differences between the coaching styles of Craig and Sanderson and a change I really appreciate.


As for the change in the handling of Walker and the like? It was necessary in the end, so it's good that it happened, but I don't think that means that Craig's handling of Walker was poor. Just that it had reached it's shelf life.

 

[Allefgib]

For me personally the sports science aspect was never something I thought alot about.

A few things I'd suggest are in the mix based on what I still here people discuss:
- how he got the job
- game style relied on opposition mistakes (even at peak in 05/06)
- inability to win finals
- physically pushed players to breaking points
- frustratingly able to get the best from the hardest workers, but arguably not from the most naturally talented
- poor expectation management
- inability to be flexible
- saying things fans struggled to connect with e.g. Goody was our best captain ever; 30+ guys going to improve, what toughness is etc.
- never actually learning from something

 

[cmndstab]

Some fair points there...

How he got the job never bothered me. While it's obvious that the process was a farce, it's also obvious that he was far and away the best choice.

I don't mind a game style based on opposition mistakes. As I mentioned before, I was more concerned about Craig's insistence on focusing only on what we do, with this idea that "if we do everything right, then it doesn't matter what the opponent does".

The finals argument is a tough one. No doubt we underperformed in that aspect under Craig, though I'll never understand how some people thought it was reasonable to expect us to go 50/50 in finals. To go 50/50 you generally need to win the premiership every second or third time you make the finals. All in all I'd say there were three finals losses we had that should just never have occurred - St. Kilda in 05, Hawthorn in 07, Collingwood in 08 - which were made all the more frustrating for being in the first week of the finals each time.

I don't mind the model of trying to push players close to their limits. What Craig lacked was a proper system for monitoring the status of his players. As much as it would be nice to say that Sanderson is just better at keeping tabs on his players and knowing when to back off, the reality is it has been the introduction of a few new faces, Nick Poulos and Mark Upton in particular, that have seen the improvement in this area. That said I can see why people were pissed when we had 15+ players on the injury list. I'll never forget the week we actually had an injured player on our emergency list because we literally had no uninjured players left on the senior list to fill that spot.

Craig's ability to extract talent was curious. He got some excellent footy out of the old hands, and also out of new players. The one area he seemed to struggle with were the players who were aged between 15-20 when he arrived. Never could quite figure out what went wrong there.

I couldn't give a damn about "expectation management". Flexibility was more of an issue, and one of the primary ones that cost him his job in my opinion. Not learning anything, or at least, not learning the important things, was the other primary issue.

Not connecting well with the fans was an issue, though not one I shared. I loved the way Craig would speak about issues. I would hold out each year for his season opening presser. Generally there was nothing wrong with what he said - it was more that people were holding out to hear something else that would go unsaid. To this day, I have no issue with him talking about expecting the 30+ year olds to improve (despite being proved horribly wrong in hindsight), but I don't understand why he wouldn't have also mentioned our young players in the same sentence. I have no issue with him elevating Goodwin's status in the ranks of our former captains, but why wouldn't you phrase it in terms of him deserving to sit alongside former captains such as Ricciuto and Bickley rather than failing to mention them at all? In the end though it wouldn't matter if he had come out and ranted complete gibberish if we went and won the premiership each year. People would still have loved the guy. Not one of the major issues.

 

[Elite Crow]

Ahhh, the Bickley Bounce. Am I allowed to bump some of the Big Footy comments in that magical 6 weeks under Bicks. Let me see, we beat the 15th, 16th and 17th teams, lost at home to Richmond who leap frogged us to 12th, had a competitive home effort against Geelong and then went to Perth for a 95 point arse licking.

Like everyone else I was happy to see Patty spend more time in the midfield (although he spent a lot of time up forward against the Eagles). Yes E.C., absolutely irrefutable evidence that it was Mark Bickley that turned Patty from a plodding forward pocket into a midfield superstar.

I'm not referring to the team bounce. I'm referring to Danger moving to the midfield under Bickley and the stats show his 20 plus possession games improve significantly. He had over 20 against Port, he didn't playing under Craig. He had over 20 against Geelong a very good side and he had over 30 in a losing game against Richmond. Dis it all you want but Bickley played Danger in the midfield as opposed to a forward playing some minutes in the midfield. So did he get fit all over a sudden under Bickley?

 

[Elite Crow]

A coach has a lot of freedom to move a player around when he only has to keep them up and running for six more games.

Dangerfield's midfield time increased, albeit it slowly, over his time under Craig's reign. It could have been increased more quickly, I agree, but it's not as though Craig had him pigeonholed as a permanent forward.

As with everything, hindsight shows us how things could have been done better, but I think Craig's approach to Dangerfield's first few years was much closer to optimal than those who called for him to be primarily a midfielder from the get go.

Stabby I have to say a big wtf to your first sentence. That's clutching a bit isn't it?

As for the rest Im not referring to Dangers first few seasons, I'm referring to 2011 when we were smashed in the midfield and we had a midfielder playing up forward, sometimes at the expense of a forward in Tex. Craig didn't move him into the midfield on a permanent basis, Bickley did and Danger showed then he was ready. I remember listening to Rehn at the time. He said holding back Danger was rubbish and to play him in their ASAP. Bickley did, Craig didn't.

 

[skoobydoo]

Being asked to work on your deficiencies is frustrating for anyone. That doesn't make it unnecessary.

None of us know the personal one-on-ones between Craig and Walker and it was probably just as frustrating for Craig as Walker. However from an outside view Craig treated Walkers development quite differently, and IMHO quite crudely, compared to the other developing youngsters. Winning the heart, mind and soul of players is the key to successful coaching......but also the nature of coach and player personalities means you can't win them all.

 

[Team DJ]

Stabby has whacked it on the head there. Great thoughts, couldn't agree more.
Everything youve written there is spot on to why me and many other passionatley dislike him.

 

[cmndstab]

Stabby I have to say a big wtf to your first sentence. That's clutching a bit isn't it?

As for the rest Im not referring to Dangers first few seasons, I'm referring to 2011 when we were smashed in the midfield and we had a midfielder playing up forward, sometimes at the expense of a forward in Tex. Craig didn't move him into the midfield on a permanent basis, Bickley did and Danger showed then he was ready. I remember listening to Rehn at the time. He said holding back Danger was rubbish and to play him in their ASAP. Bickley did, Craig didn't.

I don't think it's really clutching, no? An interim coach, who knows full well he's never seriously going to be considered for the full job, has six weeks to make a bit of a mark (perhaps auditioning for a future senior coaching bid somewhere else?) and has free reign to do what he likes in a season that is never going to end in a finals berth. Let's just Dangerfield in the guts and see how he tracks. Let's throw Johncock up forward every game. Let's try things out. It's not like he had to keep it going for 23 rounds. I don't think much can be drawn from that at all.

Nobody ever doubted Dangerfield could come in and play a game or two in the midfield. It was about managing him for a whole season.

Dangerfield never played up forward at the expense of Walker, that's rubbish. Walker was dropped when he was playing terrible footy. Dangerfield played up forward periodically. The two were unrelated.

Rehn is the master of saying stuff that sounds profound yet doesn't hold up under scrutiny. There's a reason we didn't even give the guy an interview for the senior coaching role.

 

[Elite Crow]

I don't think it's really clutching, no? An interim coach, who knows full well he's never seriously going to be considered for the full job, has six weeks to make a bit of a mark (perhaps auditioning for a future senior coaching bid somewhere else?) and has free reign to do what he likes in a season that is never going to end in a finals berth. Let's just Dangerfield in the guts and see how he tracks. Let's throw Johncock up forward every game. Let's try things out. It's not like he had to keep it going for 23 rounds. I don't think much can be drawn from that at all.

Nobody ever doubted Dangerfield could come in and play a game or two in the midfield. It was about managing him for a whole season.

Dangerfield never played up forward at the expense of Walker, that's rubbish. Walker was dropped when he was playing terrible footy. Dangerfield played up forward periodically. The two were unrelated.

Rehn is the master of saying stuff that sounds profound yet doesn't hold up under scrutiny. There's a reason we didn't even give the guy an interview for the senior coaching role.

There's been more than one interim coach get the gig full time and I'm sure Bicks backed himself in if he finished the season strongly. You are only guessing as to the motives of why Bickley played Danger in the middle, but what we know for sure is he did.

Craig dropped Tex after the Melbourne debacle in 2011, if I remember correctly it was him and Petrenko (the sub) who were the scapegoats for that pathetic performance. Prior to that Tex had kicked 13 goals in 6 games, not bad for a young forward. Who did Craig play as the leading forward against Gold Coast? Danger. So instead of giving Tex a chance to beat up on Gold Coast he went with Danger up forward instead who went on to kick 6.

As for Rehn, you are selling him short. He was spot on with a lot of his observations, not only about Danger but also about focus on pressure acts and not the opponent and always handballing out of a contest which became predictable. Coincidentally Sando changed both.