AFL Autopsy RND 7: Beaten by the Cats

[BLA60]

Today was never likely to be a 4 pointer.

Thanks AFL fixture team.

Atleast we kept in the fight, tried some things.

But there would still be plenty of vision worth showing on basic mistakes and poor judgement.

Keep tracking on the direction we are going. It's a good one.

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

 

[jmoo wan]

quality stuff! is that our own Kyptastic ?

 

[cAsEy_18]

Merrett absolutely remains our #1 option for using the ball going forward/inside 50 for us, but Martin is becoming a close 2nd. Want the ball in that guys hands as often as possible in important parts of the ground.

 

[eth-dog]

quality stuff! is that our own Kyptastic ?

Yes

 

[Kyptastic]

quality stuff! is that our own Kyptastic ?

That's me, although on reflection I pretty much stole it from Brad Scott's presser

 

[jmoo wan]

That's me, although on reflection I pretty much stole it from Brad Scott's presser

and then eth-dog stole it from you. It's the ciiiiiir-cle of life!

 

[jannissary]

could've lost that by far more tbh, didn't play well but at least we didn't lose by 80+ like we could've

 

[Kyptastic]

Here's one positive.

Geelong had 31 R50s and only scored from 3 of them. We had 44 and scored from 7.

Our full ground defence is holding up. It's come a massive way from last year.

 

[Stopher]

In hindsight, the poster from Durham was our chance to make a move. Would have made it 25 points with a lot of momentum and plenty of time left in the game. Oh well.

 

[Dudoro]

Love Tippa as much as the next person, but he’s not up to AFL level at the moment. Davey should be playing ahead of him. Didn’t even think he was bad last week. Especially when you drop a first year player and there’s a VFL bye so he doesn’t get a chance to play a game.

 

[scottmclaren]

Love Tippa as much as the next person, but he’s not up to AFL level at the moment. Davey should be playing ahead of him. Didn’t even think he was bad last week. Especially when you drop a first year player and there’s a VFL bye so he doesn’t get a chance to play a game.

I get your point but from his 6 possessions he had 5 score involvements which does have an impact.

 

[srobbo]

Look we were never winnng this game on the short turnaround which is why we had to win Anzac Day. Anyway Port is winnable if we bring our absolute best & are switched on for 4 qtrs like we were against Melbourne.

Davey has to come back in for Tippa & it’s time to unleash Voss as well.

 

[MiguelM]

Here's one positive.

Geelong had 31 R50s and only scored from 3 of them. We had 44 and scored from 7.

Our full ground defence is holding up. It's come a massive way from last year.

Listening to the radio it seemed many of Geel goals scored from turnovers. Anyone got a stat on that?

Teams are not going coast to coast like they were last year.

Scott was asked about the across goal turnovers (BZT in particular) and said he encourages players to take the game on and those errors will be less over time. Love that he back the players.

IMO, turnovers are completely fixable, it is just execution/confidence but the intent is good if it comes off.

 

[Its Manbearpig]

My main issue (aside from brain fades and disposal efficiency) is the decision not to have our best defensive midfielder in Setterfield at the CBAs at the start of the game. It took Brad six goals to make the adjustment. I was Jack’s complete lack of surprise when we suddenly looked decent in there again. What’s worse is he had the last quarter of ANZAC day to learn from the same mistake.

Love the reference there, but I won't talk about it

 

[fairbump_playon]

Agree the fixture was impossible. But with a few late goals the final margin was super flattering. That’s a 50 point loss and even then the cats had the cue in the rack for 3 quarters.

The short break is a legit excuse, but it’s just not helpful to imagine yesterday showed much improvement on what happened in round 1 last year because it was fundamentally the same type of bullying.

 

[Squeaky]

Agree the fixture was impossible. But with a few late goals the final margin was super flattering. That’s a 50 point loss and even then the cats had the cue in the rack for 3 quarters.

The short break is a legit excuse, but it’s just not helpful to imagine yesterday showed much improvement on what happened in round 1 last year because it was fundamentally the same type of bullying.

Particularly early in the game. We were witches hats.

 

[Mercurial89]

My main issue (aside from brain fades and disposal efficiency) is the decision not to have our best defensive midfielder in Setterfield at the CBAs at the start of the game. It took Brad six goals to make the adjustment. I was Jack’s complete lack of surprise when we suddenly looked decent in there again. What’s worse is he had the last quarter of ANZAC day to learn from the same mistake.

My only assumption is setterfield in was the defensive plan, with the other one being the offensive plan.
I get wanting to start on the front foot early, try and win the game, with the switch made when that doesn't work. I get the logic if this was the case.


Two Biggest takeaways for me though were all day we had two-three players all going for the ball, So many times we would fumble because we had two sets of hands on the ball trying to win it, and it would spill to the wrong side and they run away from it.

Secondly, We could not impede them with the ball, Holmes and danger looked like the same player when tackled, easy handballs out with strength. But when we were tackled we stayed tackled. The size/strength issue is one we need to work on both with the players we have and those we bring in without sacrificing running ability.

Agree the fixture was impossible. But with a few late goals the final margin was super flattering. That’s a 50 point loss and even then the cats had the cue in the rack for 3 quarters.

The short break is a legit excuse, but it’s just not helpful to imagine yesterday showed much improvement on what happened in round 1 last year because it was fundamentally the same type of bullying.

Pies were equally as flat the looked awful early, crows just couldn't get any reward for their dominance.

 

[ant555]

Martin has said he's keen to get in there so who knows? He's 190cm and only 21. He could develop into that player

Would need to put some size on

Plenty of the 1st quarter centre clearances were from Stringer's direct opponent.

When we're on top, he can be a benefit in there. But for all of his stats from today; it was his first 20 minutes that killed any chance we had.

Yes they where but when Setterfield went in with Stringer and Parish we started to turn it around. Two big blokes playing on big blokes.

 

[ant555]

Have had another look at the game. It was really the big dogs taking on the little dogs. We are just so undersized across the board compared to them.
BZT had really no chance against Hawkins when we could not stop their contested footy. Parish did what he does but he could not win the footy when we went too small in the middle. Martin played well but was pushed about a bit in the contest. Mass got mugged.

Hawkins took more contest marks than us. 3 contested marks for the game. The rucks may have dominated the hit outs but they where effectively useless at anything else. Horrible . Flip could not have marked on if he had a bucket to catch it it and Draper seems to have a habit of trying to fend off and mark with one hand at times. If we are ever going to be any good we will need a couple of players who can stand in a pack and take the odd contested mark. Right now we have none.

Geelong position so well. Maybe it is their size but the never all rush in. They back themselves to win contested footy while always having a 5 and 10 meter outlet players. Part of why we look a bit average in defense was we had to be in at the contest to try and win it but when they got the footy out they had numbers on the outside.

Some very poor foot skills hurt. Hawkins got 4 of his goals from easy inside 50 entrance from turnovers. When we matched them for clearances Hawkins was not in the game.

Should have started with Setterfield / Stringer and Parish in the middle. Once that combo did get in there the damage was limited.

Shiel was great at half forward.

Weideman playing solid footy. Leading at the ball and holding a few marks. Doing what we need him to do.

Walla made it through the game and did a few good things. Maybe cost us a bit on their rebound but it was good to see a whole game from him.

At least we did not lay down. The things I wanted to see this year was a good start , improved team defense and better all round effort and we have produced that so far. We where never really in the game but we did not just let them walk over us like last year. Some of our system worked.

 

[ant555]

Here's one positive.

Geelong had 31 R50s and only scored from 3 of them. We had 44 and scored from 7.

Our full ground defence is holding up. It's come a massive way from last year.

It is interesting to watch how we defend. The turnovers aside initially we look bad because we allow easy kicks out of the 50 and along the wing so people are yelling find a man and you look thinking this is a bit easy. However when you watch from the top level you can see that a lot of the time our blokes are trying to keep the corridor a no go zone and we are actually forcing sides to kick to where we want to defend . The playing through the middle push straight back inside their 50 so we have decent numbers. A lot of footy comes into their 50 from wider positions. Does not always come off but it has drastically limited the number of transition scores against us.
There will be a bit of refinement as we go along where we force the opposition to be kicking more footy to wide 50 contests but what will also be interesting is it will be made for blokes like Reid and Cox to play intercept if we can get them up and running in defense.

 

[frodos gardener]

Something I’ve picked up on is our rucks have been telegraphing their taps which effectively renders any advantage useless. Draper in particular at centre bounces points his palm in the direction he’s tapping to well in advance and smart opposition midfields are reading off this and sharking them. Dangerfield was onto it from the first bounce. Whoever is the ruck coach hopefully is into this as it’s a simple fix and can shift HOTA in our favour quickly too.

 

[ant555]

Something I’ve picked up on is our rucks have been telegraphing their taps which effectively renders any advantage useless. Draper in particular at centre bounces points his palm in the direction he’s tapping to well in advance and smart opposition midfields are reading off this and sharking them. Dangerfield was onto it from the first bounce. Whoever is the ruck coach hopefully is into this as it’s a simple fix and can shift HOTA in our favour quickly too.

Sam has always done it which is why I have always said Bryan is the better tap ruck of the two.

 

[outersanctum]

Watched the replay and actually feel better about it than I did even last night. We lost some key matchups early and Scott took a little too long to adjust imho.

However the only real difference in the game was Danger and Hawkins. That might seem overly simplistic but the reality is that Danger was damaging when he got the centre clearances.. that first quarter he was not only getting the clearance but then making such good decisions and hit Hawkins 3-4 times and really got them going.

When we had our period on top (and we actually did for long periods) we just didn't have the same penetration up forward.. Parish was very very good but he doesn't hit leading forwards like Danger.. and he didn't have Hawkins and Cameron to aim at.. so even when we were winning most clearances.. it wasn't resulting in quick goals.

Also whenever we would get a little run on, or find some momentum.. Cats would throw danger back into the midfield and that was that more often than not. Despite playing 65% game time.. Danger was the most dominate mid.. it says something.

It just shows that we are 2-3 real superstars away from being able to match it. Merrett, Parish are very very good.. but they do not rip a game apart enough/often enough yet to do that damage.

The last point I will make is how disappointed I am in McGrath. He is a fine player.. he is very solid.. but geez when you get that #1 pick.. you need more than a solid half back flanker.. we really really really needed to nail a gun and we didn't. Andy goes missing far too often when the pressure is on. Such a shame.

 

[faible]

could've lost that by far more tbh, didn't play well but at least we didn't lose by 80+ like we could've

Nice of Chris to put the cue in the rack early so as not to embarrass his little brother Brad.

 

[dank420_]

Still way more annoyed about Anzac Day.