North Melbourne v Sydney Match Thread

[thommoone]

whos crying, im telling it like it is, noone else has the balls to admit it. We do not often instigate these flood fests. Today was a prime example.
Reason i dont like the roos is because there fans are W@NKERS

 

[thommoone]

Note, Tas is a prime example, i congratulate you on ur win, and you attempt to run in the loss
Always have been nad sportsman u lot!
Im walking away now.
But i will say u lot deserved it

 

[Tas]

Geez, this game was painful to follow in print. I'd hate to see what it actually looked like.

It was the kind of game you could go have a 20 minute crap and you wouldn't have missed much of the scoreboard action, unless it was the last quarter.

In previous years we let teams get away with playing ugly flooding football by trying to beat them with a normal game plan. It wont work. The only way you can counter it is by holding them upswell when they rebound it.

It is why Sydney beats the likes of Brisbane, frequently aswell, because Brisbane do not go to plan B. We can not afford to drop games to teams like Carlton, Sydney and Bulldogs this year if we expect to play finals football so we need to adapt.

We have leading forwards, not the best in the league either, floods really take them out of the picture. The Swans were not going to go into that game with the pygmy backline and play one-on-one football on Rocca, Hale and Thompson. They got a lot of players back into defense so you have to do a lot more than just give in and let them rebound the ball easily out of defense due to congestion.

 

[F/D]

Note, Tas is a prime example, i congratulate you on ur win, and you attempt to run in the loss
Always have been nad sportsman u lot!
Im walking away now.
But i will say u lot deserved it

Of course we deserved it we WON.

 

[Tas]

Note, Tas is a prime example, i congratulate you on ur win, and you attempt to run in the loss
Always have been nad sportsman u lot!
Im walking away now.
But i will say u lot deserved it

Well, you have a funny way of congratulating the team with "Cant stand the roos. I wouldn actually mind if they rolled over and died, Laidley is an awlful boring coach".

Fair dinkum would hate to see you have a crack at us if that was being a sportsman.

 

[kelman]

Geez, if every predicted top 8 team we beat is condemned as average, it is going to be a very bare finals series

 

[Ice goddess]

Who kicked all Sydney's points?

 

[Yianni]

We kick backwards to force their entire team, which is in our forward 50, to get out of there. What is the point in bombing into the forward 50 when there are 40 players in there just to let them run it out of defense?

That's exactly right Tas.

Sydney had NOONE in their forward 50, they had pushed pretty much their whole team into our half of the ground. It would have been folly to bomb it in. So we just chipped it around and waited for them to attack the ball.

If anything, we were ENCOURAGING attacking play by not getting sucked into the Sydney tactics. I agree with you, you can't beat that style of play by playing a normal game plan unless you have a dominant forward, and I'm talking about someone like Carey who can mark against 3 players. We don't have that sort of player anymore so the options are (i) play attacking football and get cut up on the rebound; or (ii) play ugly and win.

We did (i) last year and missed the finals. This year we seem to be doing (ii). This won't just be an issue with North. The flood has been very prevalent in the start to this season. Countering it takes patience. I'd rather be effective and a winner than a purist and a loser.

 

[David Votoupal]

Not a good display from us but at least we could've held on to a lead. Well even that we couldn't get right!

 

[Abaddon]

the Kangaroos play a very scrappy, unattractive brand of footy. they lack any real talent (Wells an exception), but they make up for it in shinebonehead spirit.
Last week they flooded and scrapped, and from all reports today's game was similar.
They tend to play above themselves early in the season and don't have a gameplan that will standup in the long term let alone finals.
But to their credit they've won they're first 2 games, and thats all the coach can ask of his players.

 

[Tas]

Who kicked all Sydney's points?

Hall was brilliant for the Swans, being serious, he ran and ran and ran and really tore Brown a new hole. Unfortunately for him Archer was standing about 25m in front of him so Hall had to go very wide, in fact, all their forwards went very wide. Swans took a lot of shots from outside 50m and didn't really have a lot of luck today. Last year they were kicking them from everywhere, no so good today.

They pretty much spread the points all over, Goodes, Hall, Davis all had pot shots from well outside 50m or from close to the boundry.

 

[kelman]

the Kangaroos play a very scrappy, unattractive brand of footy. they lack any real talent (Wells an exception), but they make up for it in shinebonehead spirit.
Last week they flooded and scrapped, and from all reports today's game was similar.
They tend to play above themselves early in the season and don't have a gameplan that will standup in the long term let alone finals.
But to their credit they've won they're first 2 games, and thats all the coach can ask of his players.

Much, MUCH better list than the Blues.

So much better.

 

[Tas]

the Kangaroos play a very scrappy, unattractive brand of footy. they lack any real talent (Wells an exception), but they make up for it in shinebonehead spirit.
Last week they flooded and scrapped, and from all reports today's game was similar.
They tend to play above themselves early in the season and don't have a gameplan that will standup in the long term let alone finals.
But to their credit they've won they're first 2 games, and thats all the coach can ask of his players.

Wells didn't have a sniff mate after quarter time. Funny how we can win games without the only talented player in our team not getting a touch.

 

[Tas]

Listen up people, we warned you in advance this was going to be an ugly game because the opposition wasn't going to play a one-on-one game. We just did what it requires to beat a flood with the tools we have at our disposal. Can not really ask for any more.

 

[BulldogMike]

Good win by North Melbourne who begin the year in traditional form of winning many of their opening games and no different this season sitting at 2-0. Sydney are a awful side to play and all as you can hope for te Roos to do is win and they did that so good on them for a good hard fought win.

 

[speedy]

Flooding only seems to be a problem when teams like the bulldogs and north win. Sydney are the kings of the flood/possesion football yet last year their play was branded as exciting by some.

People that think north instigated the flood in the carlton or sydney game have no idea about footy.

 

[benno87]

Some seriously sour Carlton and Swans fans here, If you took a moment to think about it, Laidley has learnt a lot from 2004, and has created a game plan that beats teams that push 17 players into our forward line.

Even though our midfield was aweful today, I am becomming more confident in Laidley's coaching every week. Really takes time to think about what he is doing.

Big task next week against the Saints with no Rawlings (More than likely) to take out Hayes. But it'll be fresh to see us play an offensive team for once this season.

 

[Tas]

Good win by North Melbourne who begin the year in traditional form of winning many of their opening games and no different this season sitting at 2-0. Sydney are a awful side to play and all as you can hope for te Roos to do is win and they did that so good on them for a good hard fought win.

I'll take any wins early this year, irrespective how we win. We have St Kilda next week so that will be a much tougher game despite Reiwoldt being out. We have Collingwood and Hawthorn after the Saints so might be a positive start again this year.

After that we have Adelaide and Port away in successive weeks, Bulldogs then another three tough games in Geelong at skilled, Brisbane at Gabba and Melbourne.

If we can get to 5 or 6 wins at the half way mark I think we will have a good shot at making the finals, our second half of the season is not as tough. Very early days though and consistancy is still our greatest challenge.

 

[Tas]

Some seriously sour Carlton and Swans fans here, If you took a moment to think about it, Laidley has learnt a lot from 2004, and has created a game plan that beats teams that push 17 players into our forward line.

Even though our midfield was aweful today, I am becomming more confident in Laidley's coaching every week. Really takes time to think about what he is doing.

Big task next week against the Saints with no Rawlings (More than likely) to take out Hayes. But it'll be fresh to see us play an offensive team for once this season.

Swans are offensive, they just generate their offense from the backline rather than the midfield. They have a very defensive midfield, players that are very good at restricting the opposition. They play to their strengths but it just is frustrating to watch. If a quarter of the teams flood then you better have plan B which will hold up against one.

 

[Milenko]

Yep, thats right. Played two of the three heavy flooders in the comp in the first two weeks, what do you expect?

You've played 2 of the 4 heavy flooders.

Adelaide have jumped on the flooding bandwagon this season.

 

[Tas]

You've played 2 of the 4 heavy flooders.

Adelaide have jumped on the flooding bandwagon this season.

Wonderful.

St Kilda are not afraid to flood either so will be interesting to see what they do if we get the jump on them next week. Mind you, they have flogged us comprehensively the last few times so maybe they will be confident enough not to bother.

 

[benno87]

that di end up occuring and there was the problem. all of a sudden we have a crowded forward line where roos were constantly flooding
I hate too watch this, especially when it results in the roos winning it. i was getting used to beating the roos for a few years but now, rnd 19 and today remind me how much i hate losing to them. Cant stand the roos. I wouldn actually mind if they rolled over and died, Laidley is an awlful boring coach, realise that it is not the swans but there oponents that often slow the game up.
Wish pagan was still there, then it would be god to watch, aaaaaaaarrrrrrrgggghhh!!!!!!!!!!

Kangaroos 12. 10. (82) def. Sydney Swans 7. 17. (59)

What else matters? Laidley out-coached Roos today, deal with it.