AFL Autopsy RND 2: Loss to the Lions

[CBombers17]

Much better effort overall. We just aren't a good side. I missed a lot of last year when we were up and about, but on paper this is about as well as I would expect this list to perform the majority of the time.

There's too many holes accross the board (we need an upgrade best 22 player on every line minimum), a lack of genuine hardness (and the physical capacity to back it up week in / week out), and our mids are nowhere near skilled enough to match top 4 opponents even when they do manage to stay in the physical contest.

For all the hype they still look years away from it for mine, but today at least the workrate was good and they made it a physical contest which needs to be the standard.

 

[Koopa]

From last week the only way is up, but for one we couldn't quite 100% capitalise on the momentum when we had it and slam on sustained scoreboard pressure to give us some breathing space.

The skill errors absolutely kill you. Plus at the end of the day bad kicking is bad football. The legitimately good teams punish you, even when they aren't at 100% and we found that out. However there were some good signs and endevaour in a patchy performance. Besides, there's no one else viable to fill in for Stewart so we'll just just have to make do with what we've cobbled together and hope Reid,etc get some game time this year.

At the game the boos Joe got were absolutely searing! Ooof

 

[beev]

The forward line is a mess and that is causing all the indecision up field. At one stage five of our six forwards were Francis, Guelfi, Ham, Durham, and Caldwell. Not a natural forward amongst them.

Play Bryan against Melbourne. Keep Wright in the forward line. Play Tex, at least he has some natural forward craft. Take out Ham and Guelfi. Forward six would be Wright, Francis, Stringer, Bryan, Perkins, Wanganeen.

 

[TheGrizz]

Attended the game in person and my main thoughts were that we just weren't clean enough with the ball.

Dropped marks in defence, fumbles, poor handballing and footskills, but most importantly we just didn't nail our shot on goal whereas it felt they couldn't miss until the game was out reach at the end.

There were some isolated moments when players put in some really soft efforts (Stewart on the goal line, Sam Draper had some shockers, as did Ridley and Cox) but the intensity was much better from last week.

Long story short, this year was always about development (we said so much on the Bombercast with Rohan Connolly), so losing to Brisbane and Geelong isn't a huge surprise, but being cleaner with our skills is something we can control and should improve

 

[windyhill]

Is there a clear cut jet like a Walsh or a Horne-Francis in this years draft ?

 

[Lore]

Attended the game in person and my main thoughts were that we just weren't clean enough with the ball.

Dropped marks in defence, fumbles, poor handballing and footskills, but most importantly we just didn't nail our shot on goal whereas it felt they couldn't miss until the game was out reach at the end.

There were some isolated moments when players put in some really soft efforts (Stewart on the goal line, Sam Draper had some shockers, as did Ridley and Cox) but the intensity was much better from last week.

Long story short, this year was always about development (we said so much on the Bombercast with Rohan Connolly), so losing to Brisbane and Geelong isn't a huge surprise, but being cleaner with our skills is something we can control and should improve

Agreed. I’ll be watching the replay at some point in the coming week and will add it to what I saw tonight at the ground before I comment a lot, but all in all I expected to lose tonight and we did generally show some signs of something in the process. Would’ve liked it to be closer for longer but it was almost honourable.

Last week on the other hand was absolutely atrocious. There’s losing and then there’s whatever the heck that was, I’m not convinced any of them even turned up last week beyond Nic Martin.

 

[The Prosecutor]

Is there a clear cut jet like a Walsh or a Horne-Francis in this years draft ?

Yep, Ashcroft. But guess what, he's a F/S for Brisbane.

 

[missfinland]

Is there a clear cut jet like a Walsh or a Horne-Francis in this years draft ?

There is but he is a Brisbane lions father son ! Will Ashcroft, son of Marcus.

 

[ant555]

Attended the game in person and my main thoughts were that we just weren't clean enough with the ball.

Dropped marks in defence, fumbles, poor handballing and footskills, but most importantly we just didn't nail our shot on goal whereas it felt they couldn't miss until the game was out reach at the end.

There were some isolated moments when players put in some really soft efforts (Stewart on the goal line, Sam Draper had some shockers, as did Ridley and Cox) but the intensity was much better from last week.

Long story short, this year was always about development (we said so much on the Bombercast with Rohan Connolly), so losing to Brisbane and Geelong isn't a huge surprise, but being cleaner with our skills is something we can control and should improve

This pretty much says it all. The only shock was how little intensity we showed against the Cats. We where always looking down the barrel of an 0/3 start because we had to play 3 top 4 performers from previous seasons. Apart from the shit skill level this weeks result was within what I would have expected . Did not think we could win but if we had a crack then maybe a 3 or 4 goal loss. Should have been closer.

 

[Cold Sober]

at one point Lions were 8-1 set shots. We were 3-7 or something.

just not AFL level.

Mate , don't disagree at all but, Francis didn't kick all 7 points so I don't know where you're coming from.

 

[Cold Sober]

Overall thought we took our chances away from ourselves.

 

[ant555]

Only 1 rushed behind. So 14 missed shots of various variety.

 

[Lore]

Only 1 rushed behind. So 14 missed shots of various variety.

Not sure if this tells us much but it’s from the AR tracker in the AFL app;

Yellow: goal
Red: behind
Blue: no score

 

[TheGrizz]

Only 1 rushed behind. So 14 missed shots of various variety.

Plus Francis and Wright both put one out on the full each

 

[Mikevk123]

In- Wanganeen, BZT, Bryan, Baldwin, Hobbs
Out- Cox, Stewart, Guelfi, Ham, Smith

B Kelly BZT Hind
HB Ridley Laverde Redman
C McGrath Caldwell Merrett
HF Martin Baldwin Perkins
F Stringer Wright Wanganeen
FOLL: Draper Hobbs Parish
INTER: Heppell, Cutler, Bryan, Durham
Sub: Francis

 

[Lore]

You can also view it one player at a time.

I think what I mostly notice is that we have a LOT of guys having a ping at goal and most of the misses are from part-time forwards/mids/defenders having shots from 45+ metres away. After quarter time they made it a lot harder for us to have a shot from straight in front from 25-30m.


Oh and by quarters as well. First and third quarters we got it to the sweet spot but the second quarter we didn’t get a single shot in a likely part of the ground (the only goal came from the 50m line about 5m from the camera side boundary). Last quarter looks more like the first and third in terms of shot origin, but there are fewer shots each time.

 

[MiguelM]

Ah well, at least we are off the bottom of the ladder.

 

[MiguelM]

In- Wanganeen, BZT, Bryan, Baldwin, Hobbs
Out- Cox, Stewart, Guelfi, Ham, Smith

B Kelly BZT Hind
HB Ridley Laverde Redman
C McGrath Caldwell Merrett
HF Martin Baldwin Perkins
F Stringer Wright Wanganeen
FOLL: Draper Hobbs Parish
INTER: Heppell, Cutler, Bryan, Durham
Sub: Francis

Like but I have Martin instead of Baldwin.

 

[Mikevk123]

Like but I have Martin instead of Baldwin.

Baldwin needs to be a given 2-3 games. At least he can get a goal.

 

[Gadzorks]

Yep, Ashcroft. But guess what, he's a F/S for Brisbane.

Might not nominate for f/s. Whole family moved to Melbourne a few years ago and he loves it. In a recent interview he said he loves being there with his family, his footy, study, friends.

We will be gutted of he doesn't choose us, and some other team will get an absolute jet.

 

[Seb78]

Yep, Ashcroft. But guess what, he's a F/S for Brisbane.

I'm sure he's a great young prospect, but do we really need another midget running around in the midfield?

 

[BratPack]

Is there a clear cut jet like a Walsh or a Horne-Francis in this years draft ?

What would it matter? Even if we got the #1 pick. Dodoro would just trade it for 3 seconds and GWS's 7th midfielder

 

[Keystone agony]

Next week

Ridley - Laverde - Kelly
Redman - Stewart - Hind (Heppell)

Z.Merrett - Stringer* - Durham(Martin)
Draper - Shiel - Parish (Mcgrath)

Caldwell* - Francis - Perkins
Bryan - Wright - Waterman (Guelfi)

Sub: Dev Smith/Cutler

Injuries Hurting:
Unfit Stringer
Langford
Snelling
Tippa
HJ
Shiel

We fumbled a shit tonne. Heppell and Cox look terrible. Cutler also pretty oridnary today. Parish and Zerrett plenty of fumbling as much of the pill they got. They also dont defend. Zacs soft and pretend chases/tackles

 

[faible]

I don’t know how to feel.

We lost by less than expected. But if not for horrendous goal kicking, might well have one it.

Our skills were also very poor at times.

A patchwork forward line doesn’t help, but when you’ve got our players slipping over, missing basic handballs and kicking in to the man on the mark, it’s not great.

 

[Stopher]

For a statistical reference point, we lost to Cats + Lions last season by 98 points combined. This season it was 'only' 88 points, while we have scored 147 points combined in this season's games, compared to 102 last year.

Basically, the same thing happened against these teams last season, yet then we still had Hooker, Tippa, Jones, Langford, Snelling and Stringer wasn't playing his first game back from injury every week. So we are putting a forward line together from scratch, after essentially doing the same to the back line last season!

Anyway, we gave the Dees a shake in a premiership year last season. Let's see how Friday night goes.