Review Qualifying Final v North Melbourne: Friday 8 November @ Ikon Park

[Firewalker]

I thought Newman was decent tonight. As for Kelly, I agree - the difference between her 2023 and 2024 campaigns is stark. Speed is her one-wood, but her decision-making under pressure is poor. If we're going to use her, we need to put her in situations where she can use her strengths without exposing her deficiencies.

Munyard has really surprised me in the second half of the season, I never saw her as a speedy player before but she looks electric on the field at times and has been backing herself in more often. Just wish she could have kicked that goal on the run.

Something has gone wrong with Hatchard. She is almost comically fumbly, regardless of whether there is pressure or not. And her kicking and decision-making have gone to shit. That miskick to a player in the defensive goal square with an opponent on her was unforgivable. It's a shame because even with all the negatives, she's still one of our better players and has the potential to be among our best again. But something needs to change, whether it's her body letting her down or something else.

Levy does fine when the game is contested, but as soon as it gets to the outside she is effectively a traffic cone. Unfortunately all of the best sides in the league (other than us) thrive on uncontested ball, rendering her ineffective in finals. Kustermann has something, I like her defensive efforts and she's clearly got footy smarts, but just hasn't been able to put it all together yet. I just don't see it with Tonon, she seems to make critical mistakes every time it counts, and it's not like she kills it even when the pressure is off. Mueller is alright, not among our biggest problems at the moment.

It's pretty clear that we need replacements for at least two of the four you mentioned, plus Martin. I like Ballard but she's a depth player at best. Who knows with Allen, she's looked alright at times but has barely got on the park for two years now. Jones should come back, at least.

And then there's the players who didn't play tonight. There's not a lot of value in retaining the likes of Varnhagen and Waterhouse. Boileau and Boyle-Carr should be given a chance to show they can develop into quality players, but they'd want to make some serious strides next year. Smith should be delisted, and Henry hasn't been close to selection.

There's certainly no shortage of players to replace!

Newman was poor, nearly everything she done she seemed to be under massive pressure, she just panic handballed to teammates not expecting it back or just straight to the opposition, again when you have a kick like she does to go 7 kicks to 11 handballs is a gigantic waste.

I like Kusterman too but it’s not as a forward or defender (that goal she cost in the 3rd was ugly) and they just refuse to play her in the middle, I still have big hopes for Boileau and especially Henry (one of my biggest disappointments this season is Henry’s injury but whether Clarke would have played her is questionable) I have zero faith Clarke can develop youth properly especially when you look at what has happened to Charlton.

That old team beats talent stuff is starting to be blown out the water recently as that word talent keeps rearing its head after recent losses.

I struggle to believe the coaches think Martin offers more than Boileau

Clarke is a disciple to Nicks’ experience is better mantra.

 

[dplggr47]

Tarlinton 16 minutes on the ground zero impact
Martin 1 disposal for the entire game
Levy 3 touches and a couple of goal costing clangers

Can't go into a final with 3 players having zero or negative impact

Other players were probably running out of legs late in the game. Higher intensity final game and players are just tired. Then you have players that have 16 minutes on the ground and how many minutes on the bench? Why play someone if they can't help with rotations.

Martin's 1 touch was that handpass in the passage of play that led to Gould's first goal. I remember seeing that handpass and thinking, Charlton had to lean forward to catch that and could've easily put her under pressure to stuff it up. Martin could barely handpass a few metres.

 

[Scorpus]

Other players were probably running out of legs late in the game. Higher intensity final game and players are just tired. Then you have players that have 16 minutes on the ground and how many minutes on the bench? Why play someone if they can't help with rotations.

Martin's 1 touch was that handpass in the passage of play that led to Gould's first goal. I remember seeing that handpass and thinking, Charlton had to lean forward to catch that and could've easily put her under pressure to stuff it up. Martin could barely handpass a few metres.

I've liked Martin in the past but she's a quintessential "early AFLW" player. The game has moved on to more natural, athletically gifted players who can kick more than 20 meters

 

[cmndstab]

The other thing with Martin is, like Levy, she is a player whose strengths allow her to be useful in the contest, but not outside of it. Back in 2021-22, she was played as a stoppage midfielder who was able to lay tackles, and win clearances primarily through getting in lower and harder (and usually drawing a free kick). Her inability to kick or handball it long didn't matter so much in there because she had several teammates nearby.

At some point we moved her out of the midfield, from memory it was to allow Charlton to play in there, and Martin has been ineffective ever since. She has been tried in several other roles but can't perform in them. She doesn't score goals, she rarely sets them up, and she doesn't have the pace to apply pressure once the ball leaves the contest. She has no value whatsoever as a marking target, and also can't lead to the ball carrier. As a forward, her value is limited solely to being mildly effective if we can create repeat stoppages inside our F50.

If we're not going to play her in the role she once thrived in, then we shouldn't be playing her at all.

 

[Jars458]

Our skills under pressure were deplorable not even close to good enough for finals football. In the second quarter when we dominated we had no forward structure whatsoever and it cost us the game even though we didn’t deserve to be in it due to our complete lack of cohesion for the rest of the game.Frustrating.

 

[Interloperer]

The thing with Martin is that she has the rare combo of being able to tackle strongly and give repeat efforts. Even if the opposition win a loose ball, they normally have to commit multiple players to do so. She's still "got it" to some degree IMHO, her career best tackles was 10 against Melbourne this year (overshadowed by Marinoff's 19) almost helped Adelaide overcome their opponents from behinds alone.

She's very useful when you have an offensively stacked forward line that plays quickly, and you can have a player like her who can occupy several opponents in a loose ball situation in the event that an attack breaks down.

Since Adelaide don't/can't set up like that anymore. You don't really get that, or maybe not any, benefit from playing her.

Tangentially related. The injury to Eloise Jones seems to be an obvious cause to Adelaide's current inability to just overload one area of the ground with obscene talent. But I also think Hatchard has underperformed and/or not offered much flexibility. And the move to get Charlton around the ball just seems like cargo-cult thinking that good players have to play on ball.

 

[Coopers]

We might be the second best team again this year. We lack a speedy inside midfielder and our bottom six players offer us very little. Hopefully the fix will continue when Brisbane play Hawthorn. I am confident that we can beat the Hawks away, Brisbane not so much.

That's it, the bottom few players are not really good enough and don't contribute enough. Marinoff is like 2 players but she can't make up for 3 others not being at the standard.

 

[Coopers]

The thing with Martin is that she has the rare combo of being able to tackle strongly and give repeat efforts. Even if the opposition win a loose ball, they normally have to commit multiple players to do so. She's still "got it" to some degree IMHO, her career best tackles was 10 against Melbourne this year (overshadowed by Marinoff's 19) almost helped Adelaide overcome their opponents from behinds alone.

That's all she's got though. She can't get the ball and can't dispose of it properly when she does.

She's had one strong game this year. I'd rather be getting time into someone young.

 

[cmndstab]

The thing with Martin is that she has the rare combo of being able to tackle strongly and give repeat efforts. Even if the opposition win a loose ball, they normally have to commit multiple players to do so. She's still "got it" to some degree IMHO, her career best tackles was 10 against Melbourne this year (overshadowed by Marinoff's 19) almost helped Adelaide overcome their opponents from behinds alone.

This is a rare example of what I was talking about before, though. In the Melbourne game we were able to lock the ball in our forward half (mostly because we kept scoring behinds), which created repeat stoppages inside our 50. That brought Martin into the game.

When the game is more free-flowing, the contest moves away from her, and she just can't impact.

 

[Interloperer]

This is a rare example of what I was talking about before, though. In the Melbourne game we were able to lock the ball in our forward half (mostly because we kept scoring behinds), which created repeat stoppages inside our 50. That brought Martin into the game.

When the game is more free-flowing, the contest moves away from her, and she just can't impact.

I think the repeat entries come from quick play (from Adelaide) though.

I consider Martin's poor form the other side of the same reason Ponter has fallen out of games recently. Adelaide are so timid and slow attacking now that opposition defences have flooded back and are fully set by the time Adelaide attempt to move forward.

There's no loose space for Ponter to work in, and having numbers back just lets the better teams exit with efficiency, meaning Martin is functionally useless.

Albeit Ponter's more of a latent threat and should play anyway.

 

[1970crow]

Delisting players like Varnhagen, Allen and Martin will be seen as "tough calls" due to them being premiership players but we need a bit of list turnover. We have too many defenders and not enough genuine forwards.

I also don't see the point of going to the draft to get mature age players like Tarlinton (yes she's 22 but well beyond draft age) if we don't actually rate them to immediately play.

Additionally I think we are giving players like Kustermann and Boileau the "Crows mens treatment" of being largely midfielders that we are introducing to AFLW level in crappy roles like half forward which makes them look bad

We won our flags in a fledgling competition, but only when both Randall and Phillips played full seasons. There was never any doubt that once the competition evolved we'd still be the same and not quite up to it. List and selection philosophies are a total club handicap, if we had an u18 side they'd be no different.

 

[jenny61_99]

Our skills under pressure were deplorable not even close to good enough for finals football. In the second quarter when we dominated we had no forward structure whatsoever and it cost us the game even though we didn’t deserve to be in it due to our complete lack of cohesion for the rest of the game.Frustrating.

Our skills all year have been suspect.

 

[cmndstab]

Our semi final match has been scheduled for 3PM on Saturday, at Norwood.

https://www.afl.com.au/aflw/news/12...ture-ticket-details-venues-times-for-week-two

 

[Cromulant]

35 degrees predicted and the Adelaide 500 on.

2.35 probably means you'd avoid most of the traffic

 

[Firewalker]

Tim Ginever asked Hannah Munyard on FiveAA just now if there’d been any thought to get someone to play a defensive role on Riddell &/or Garner pre-game or during the match and she says no they didn’t discuss doing that… that’ll do me, you think after they had that 20th clearance between them Clarke would’ve thought maybe they should’ve at least had a discussion about it.

 

[dplggr47]

Tim Ginever asked Hannah Munyard on FiveAA just now if there’d been any thought to get someone to play a defensive role on Riddell &/or Garner pre-game or during the match and she says no they didn’t discuss doing that… that’ll do me, you think after they had that 20th clearance between them Clarke would’ve thought maybe they should’ve at least had a discussion about it.

Maybe they don't have any players with the skills to go with Garner or Riddell? Except maybe Noffy because she's got a massive tank, but would be a waste of her talent.

They should be training Martin to be a tagger, since defensive tackling is her skill set. Not sure she has the tank though.

 

[Firewalker]

Maybe they don't have any players with the skills to go with Garner or Riddell? Except maybe Noffy because she's got a massive tank, but would be a waste of her talent.

They should be training Martin to be a tagger, since defensive tackling is her skill set. Not sure she has the tank though.

Said last week I would’ve had Charlton go to Riddell & Randall more head-to-head with Garner, they were the obvious ones for mine. Even during the game when Thompson was stinking it up try her to get her to provide something for the team, they had lots they could’ve at least tried; Martin & Mueller have been tried in the past and are low output players they could’ve even tried if you don’t want to ‘sacrifice’ someones ‘important’.

Munyard made it sound like they believe their midfield is absolute star-studded & they didn’t want anyone to upset that mix, if Friday night didn’t provide them a reality-check I don’t know what will, their midfield literally has one star at the moment (Marinoff) and 3 others (Hatchard, Ponter & Newman) that are so poor without the ball & believe paying any sort of attention to their opponents is not for them. Long gone are the days of Phillips, Marinoff & ‘Prime’ Hatchard being so dominant they didn’t have to worry about the opposition, it’s a middling midfield that Marinoff has to carry especially defensively.

 

[GreyCrow]

Munyard made it sound like they believe their midfield is absolute star-studded & they didn’t want anyone to upset that mix, if Friday night didn’t provide them a reality-check I don’t know

Hmm I've heard that before somewhere