Review Rd 15 Review - Freo Get Back on Track Over the Dons

[DocT]

Fyfe just needs to play Bont close, drags him down at every contest and tires him out. The way we used to do it against Cripps.

I'm not sure Fyfe has the speed/durabilty/mindset and even the strength these days to do that to Bont consistently. Not sure anyone does. AIsh seems to have more of the nullifier mind-set.

 

[Taylor]

Thx Taylor, so you're saying it was a rapid coaching move to fix what is going to be a permanent (relative) weakness in Fyfe's game. So unless we are sure we have ruck dominance - in which case we don't have to prioritise midfield defence - we'd better keep Fyfe out of the midfield. This analysis makes good sense.

Fyfe is best at the stoppage

 

[ignoramus]

Thx Taylor, so you're saying it was a rapid coaching move to fix what is going to be a permanent (relative) weakness in Fyfe's game. So unless we are sure we have ruck dominance - in which case we don't have to prioritise midfield defence - we'd better keep Fyfe out of the midfield. This analysis makes good sense.

Nah, not having this Taylor

*1st CB Fyfe wrestling with Stringer, keeping him out of it, tap goes to Serong who fumbles, Erasmus comes from wing to collect, gets tackled for a repeat stoppage
*ball up, Fyfe following Stringer to fwd side of stoppage, well out of the zone, tap goes straight down to Parish(?) for a clearance (nowt to do with Fyfe), mark I50, shot goes OOB
*throw in, Fyfe and Brayshaw unaccountable, Fyfe receives HO and handballs to Young for clearing 25m handball, eventual OOB
*throw in, Fyfe loose, Darcy roves his own tap and handballs to Fyfe who is pounced on by 3 as he handballs. Essendon player rams his head into Erasmus in the resulting contest and gets a free > I50 > goal
*2nd CB, Fyfe on Stringer, very accountable. Hit out ineffective, but Serong’s man (Parish?) gets away from him collects and gets the clearance. Some controlled ball movement, followed by a lot of scrambling I50 on the part of both sides leads to Essendon goal. Neither Fyfe nor Stringer had anything to do with it

All within the first three minutes of time on. Besides some behinds, the rest of the scoring for the 1st quarter is our way. In any case, for the two majors Fyfe was not in the least the weakness, and was in fact being very accountable.

 

[Taylor]

Nah, not having this Taylor

*1st CB Fyfe wrestling with Stringer, keeping him out of it, tap goes to Serong who fumbles, Erasmus comes from wing to collect, gets tackled for a repeat stoppage
*ball up, Fyfe following Stringer to fwd side of stoppage, well out of the zone, tap goes straight down to Parish(?) for a clearance (nowt to do with Fyfe), mark I50, shot goes OOB
*throw in, Fyfe and Brayshaw unaccountable, Fyfe receives HO and handballs to Young for clearing 25m handball, eventual OOB
*throw in, Fyfe loose, Darcy roves his own tap and handballs to Fyfe who is pounced on by 3 as he handballs. Essendon player rams his head into Erasmus in the resulting contest and gets a free > I50 > goal
*2nd CB, Fyfe on Stringer, very accountable. Hit out ineffective, but Serong’s man (Parish?) gets away from him collects and gets the clearance. Some controlled ball movement, followed by a lot of scrambling I50 on the part of both sides leads to Essendon goal. Neither Fyfe nor Stringer had anything to do with it

All within the first three minutes of time on. Besides some behinds, the rest of the scoring for the 1st quarter is our way. In any case, for the two majors Fyfe was not in the least the weakness, and was in fact being very accountable.

You're right, now look at the start of the second quarter.

 

[DocT]

You're right, now look at the start of the second quarter.

Boy these things get complicated very quickly! No wonder coaching takes a small f*n army and is still so hard and everyone finds something to criticise!
I thought it was fairly well settled that Fyfe, for all his undoubted brilliance, was relatively defensively unaccountable and relatively slow these days and would therefore be relatively a defensive liability at centre bounces if we did not have clear ruck ascendancy. Apparently not...

 

[DocT]

Fyfe is best at the stoppage

I take it you're meaning stoppage vs the CB - I see where you're coming from and agree.

 

[Boppo]

Yeah Bi

I'm not sure Fyfe has the speed/durabilty/mindset and even the strength these days to do that to Bont consistently. Not sure anyone does. AIsh seems to have more of the nullifier mind-set.

Bont would leave Fyfe in his wake.

 

[Boppo]

Yeah Bi

I'm not sure Fyfe has the speed/durabilty/mindset and even the strength these days to do that to Bont consistently. Not sure anyone does. AIsh seems to have more of the nullifier mind-set.

Bont would leave Fyfe in his wake.

 

[ignoramus]

You're right, now look at the start of the second quarter.

I'll happily concede in advance that there will be times that Fyfe will be playing a less accountable role, that the oppo will exploit what opportunities he gives them, etc. That's football at the top level.

But in this instance the question was about Ess being 2.1 to our 0.1, 10 uncontested marks to our 0, etc. 5 mins into the game, and about what changed such that we started doing well. The answer to that question is most definitely not "Nathan Fyfe was exposed for lack of defensive pressure in that first part of the first quarter. He was shifted and later lifted to rectify it but the ball movement early from Essendon was almost always featuring the player Fyfe was standing by when the ball was nearby."

If anything the problem was that Fyfe was in fact playing an accountable role at the CB rather than being targeted for the hit out. (I don't really think this, but that conclusion is better supported by what actually happened in those first few minutes than the alternative hypothesis).

 

[Taylor]

I'll happily concede in advance that there will be times that Fyfe will be playing a less accountable role, that the oppo will exploit what opportunities he gives them, etc. That's football at the top level.

But in this instance the question was about Ess being 2.1 to our 0.1, 10 uncontested marks to our 0, etc. 5 mins into the game, and about what changed such that we started doing well. The answer to that question is most definitely not "Nathan Fyfe was exposed for lack of defensive pressure in that first part of the first quarter. He was shifted and later lifted to rectify it but the ball movement early from Essendon was almost always featuring the player Fyfe was standing by when the ball was nearby."

If anything the problem was that Fyfe was in fact playing an accountable role at the CB rather than being targeted for the hit out. (I don't really think this, but that conclusion is better supported by what actually happened in those first few minutes than the alternative hypothesis).

You can see glimpses on the coverage of Fyfe trailing in to an Essendon player taking a mark on the Casino side wing multiple times, what it doesn't show you is that player taking the mark ran past Fyfe to get to that open space and become a loose extra for the easy kick and mark over.

The challenge is either on Fyfe to work harder if he is capable of that or the coaching group to position him in such a place that guarding space doesn't lead to us losing the ability to bottle up the opposition.

The Bombers certainly targeted Fyfe moving the ball, both at the stoppage but more so around the ground/coming out of our forward line.

Fyfe shifted from the central position at the bounce to the forward position, meaning his opponent would have to run through the entire stoppage to break through and that worked well enough for Fremantle. You'll see the comparison with Stringer running the ball out straight through the guts coming in from the side compared to Fyfe creating a cluster of players around him at the point of the circle closer to our attacking goals where he flicked it out to Serong for a quick kick inside fifty after Serong's man was drawn into that cluster.

I don't think Fyfe is a bad player at all but we need to be smarter about how he is deployed because we can't defend an opposition mid running straight towards goal from the bounce and it starts the contest in general play inside defensive fifty when Fyfe can't close off a player working hard into space.

 

[ilikepotatoes]

Nah, not having this Taylor

*1st CB Fyfe wrestling with Stringer, keeping him out of it, tap goes to Serong who fumbles, Erasmus comes from wing to collect, gets tackled for a repeat stoppage
*ball up, Fyfe following Stringer to fwd side of stoppage, well out of the zone, tap goes straight down to Parish(?) for a clearance (nowt to do with Fyfe), mark I50, shot goes OOB
*throw in, Fyfe and Brayshaw unaccountable, Fyfe receives HO and handballs to Young for clearing 25m handball, eventual OOB
*throw in, Fyfe loose, Darcy roves his own tap and handballs to Fyfe who is pounced on by 3 as he handballs. Essendon player rams his head into Erasmus in the resulting contest and gets a free > I50 > goal
*2nd CB, Fyfe on Stringer, very accountable. Hit out ineffective, but Serong’s man (Parish?) gets away from him collects and gets the clearance. Some controlled ball movement, followed by a lot of scrambling I50 on the part of both sides leads to Essendon goal. Neither Fyfe nor Stringer had anything to do with it

All within the first three minutes of time on. Besides some behinds, the rest of the scoring for the 1st quarter is our way. In any case, for the two majors Fyfe was not in the least the weakness, and was in fact being very accountable.

We saw how the first goal played out very differently.

I saw Fyfe try and break a tackle like he can't anymore, and very nearly get caught holding the ball, before grassing a handball and turning it over.

And the free kick to Hobbs was irrelevant, Langford takes the mark anyway.

I'm not knocking Fyfe here either, pretty certain the first clearance of the game one of Brayshaw or Serong kicked it into each other.

We just weren't clean around stoppages in the first 5 minutes.

 

[ignoramus]

You can see glimpses on the coverage of Fyfe trailing in to an Essendon player taking a mark on the Casino side wing multiple times, what it doesn't show you is that player taking the mark ran past Fyfe to get to that open space and become a loose extra for the easy kick and mark over.

The challenge is either on Fyfe to work harder if he is capable of that or the coaching group to position him in such a place that guarding space doesn't lead to us losing the ability to bottle up the opposition.

The Bombers certainly targeted Fyfe moving the ball, both at the stoppage but more so around the ground/coming out of our forward line.

Fyfe shifted from the central position at the bounce to the forward position, meaning his opponent would have to run through the entire stoppage to break through and that worked well enough for Fremantle. You'll see the comparison with Stringer running the ball out straight through the guts coming in from the side compared to Fyfe creating a cluster of players around him at the point of the circle closer to our attacking goals where he flicked it out to Serong for a quick kick inside fifty after Serong's man was drawn into that cluster.

I don't think Fyfe is a bad player at all but we need to be smarter about how he is deployed because we can't defend an opposition mid running straight towards goal from the bounce and it starts the contest in general play inside defensive fifty when Fyfe can't close off a player working hard into space.

Thanks for that. I find it harder to spot and keep track of those kinds of movements during transition up the field. I take it here you're describing events in the second quarter, though (because Fyfe started forward side of the circle for at least the first two CBs in the first)?

I agree that being smart about how you use your assets is essential. But I also begin from the position that in a relatively even competition (i.e. its not AFL men against under 12s) it is impossible not to lose contests, concede shots on goal, leave an oppo player unchecked, etc. It's impossible not to have weaknesses and impossible to prevent the opposition from at least occasionally exploiting those weaknesses. Not even WC this year has failed to win a clearance and/or kick a point.

I also begin from the principle that weaknesses are corollaries of strengths (and can also be strengths in themselves, if approached in the right way). The positionings, etc. that you described which conceded wins to the oppo at other times resulted in wins to Freo. Fyfe's "inability" to close off a player working hard into space in an around the ground stoppage is also his ability to win the ball, get the clearance, get a hand in to change the path of the ball, etc. The critical question is when the losses from the former start negating the wins from the latter.

I think the things you're describing are part of the explanation of where and how Freo lost certain contests, conceded some scores (though you are also describing events from a quarter where we Freo outscored Ess 5 goals to 3), and I definitely agree that part of coaching/planning has to be thinking about the various trade-offs, how to minimise weaknesses, etc. I just don't think they're the answer to DocT's question.

 

[ignoramus]

I saw Fyfe try and break a tackle like he can't anymore

I saw that as Fyfe doing what he has done for years: holding to draw in multiple players and giving off once they've effectively removed themselves from the contest by committing to the tackle.

He did grass the handball, yes, so happy to concede that his standard trick didn't quite work this time. Is that because he just can't do it anymore, or can't do it consistently enough anymore? I'm not sure either is true, and I'm looking to see what happens over the rest of the season.

 

[Taylor]

Thanks for that. I find it harder to spot and keep track of those kinds of movements during transition up the field. I take it here you're describing events in the second quarter, though (because Fyfe started forward side of the circle for at least the first two CBs in the first)?

I agree that being smart about how you use your assets is essential. But I also begin from the position that in a relatively even competition (i.e. its not AFL men against under 12s) it is impossible not to lose contests, concede shots on goal, leave an oppo player unchecked, etc. It's impossible not to have weaknesses and impossible to prevent the opposition from at least occasionally exploiting those weaknesses. Not even WC this year has failed to win a clearance and/or kick a point.

I also begin from the principle that weaknesses are corollaries of strengths (and can also be strengths in themselves, if approached in the right way). The positionings, etc. that you described which conceded wins to the oppo at other times resulted in wins to Freo. Fyfe's "inability" to close off a player working hard into space in an around the ground stoppage is also his ability to win the ball, get the clearance, get a hand in to change the path of the ball, etc. The critical question is when the losses from the former start negating the wins from the latter.

I think the things you're describing are part of the explanation of where and how Freo lost certain contests, conceded some scores (though you are also describing events from a quarter where we Freo outscored Ess 5 goals to 3), and I definitely agree that part of coaching/planning has to be thinking about the various trade-offs, how to minimise weaknesses, etc. I just don't think they're the answer to DocT's question.

Yes, Essendon kicking to the city end.

And you're right that we won't shut down all avenues to goal and if doing so also shuts down our own then it's pointless.

We need to force oppositions to kick long and rushed, that's what happened against the Bombers as the game went on. Most of which seemed to come from Freddy, Switta and Schultz panicking the opposition into rushing a kick, closing their windows for kicking the ball. That's where Fyfe not chasing was problematic - but you see how much better we look when we win the stoppages so that loose player on the outside get used instead of exposed. A turnover after a bomber ran off Fyfe goes straight to Fyfe and we move it on 80m+ towards our goal.

 

[Footskill]

Fyfe still has important role in our midfield. Seen it at times just with his bigger body and hardness, willing the ball forward. However, he needs to try pass it off quicker than trying to break tackles or just clear the path for the other mids.