Review Round 1, 2021 - Brisbane Lions vs. Sydney

[irish]

So bad on every line , attitude terrible , Lochie not in the game from the start, letting stef go could prove to be a monumental mistake. Looked to me the players thought this game was a continuation of last season and a flick of the switch and we would take control as the swans were poor , however this is 2021 and they have improved and done their homework , we haven’t !

 

[Johnny Bananas]

letting stef go could prove to be a monumental mistake.

I don't understand why people keep saying this. We finished 2nd last year with Stef missing almost every game, and when he returned he was playing like the worst player in the 22. Stef playing wouldn't have prevented Sydney always having a free man through midfield and getting uncontested marks galore in our backline.

 

[lioninthesand]

That was Leppa era stuff. A little bit worried about this year, I feel like we have been 'up' for 2 years, might be some adversity coming our way. Losing is fine, but the defensive effort and pressure was utterly appalling - there's no too harsh way to describe it.

No-one played well. Clugg should have a week in the VFL for his appalling defensive efforts. Broken tackles, not chasing, giving up on effort.

Neale had a go when it suited him.

Mids as a collective were an embarrassment.

Bailey our supposed BEST - burnt his team mates 3 times, greedy. He also gave away 5 lazy free kicks. He was exciting and our best, but still a bad game all round.

A majority of our players like the fun stuff and can't be assed with the hard stuff.

Nothing worth smiling about after last night. A wounded Geelong will destroy us infront of their home crowd next week.

The only positive I can see is - we have been up for so long, a reality check might do us well a few of our blokes need to be humbled by the looks of things.

 

[jackess]

I don't understand why people keep saying this. We finished 2nd last year with Stef missing almost every game, and when he returned he was playing like the worst player in the 22. Stef playing wouldn't have prevented Sydney always having a free man through midfield and getting uncontested marks galore in our backline.

Tends to happen whenever any player leaves

 

[LionsMaw]

I dont think any Swans fan thinks we are elite farrr from it i think its a combination of both you certainly weren't at your best but we didn't allow you to be.

Heck we started 1-4 in 2014 and made the GF 0-6 in 2017 and were half a game from top 4.

You will be more than fine.

I know we'll be fine. We'll certainly end up better than the swans.

 

[Fagenslions36]

Zorko is not a leader . He is an immature little sook . Was absolutely embarrassing last night when he clocked old mate round head then staged for a free . I can’t see us winning a flag with him captain , goes missing when needed most time for a change next year .

 

[Johnny Bananas]

Zorko is not a leader . He is an immature little sook . Was absolutely embarrassing last night when he clocked old mate round head then staged for a free . I can’t see us winning a flag with him captain , goes missing when needed most time for a change next year .

Must say I'm getting tired of his antics. I'd rather Neale be captain honestly.

 

[M Malice]

The 3 oldest players on our list are Dayne(32), Mitch Robbo(31) and Birch(33), this will be Mitch Robinson

5

Mitch Robinson

Age

35

Ht

184cm

Wt

89kg

Pos.

Mid

Career

Season

Last 5

D

19.9

5star

K

11.2

4star

HB

8.7

5star

M

4.1

4star

T

4.7

5star

CL

3.2

5star

D

15.8

4star

K

11.3

4star

HB

4.5

3star

M

3.9

4star

T

1.9

3star

CL

1.8

4star

D

13.2

4star

K

8.0

3star

HB

5.2

4star

M

4.0

4star

T

3.6

5star

's and Grant Birchall

14

Grant Birchall

Age

36

Ht

193cm

Wt

89kg

Pos.

Def

Career

Season

Last 5

D

21.9

5star

K

12.6

5star

HB

9.3

5star

M

5.8

5star

T

1.6

4star

MG

250.0

4star

D

13.3

3star

K

9.2

4star

HB

4.2

3star

M

4.3

4star

T

1.3

2star

MG

250.0

4star

D

14.0

4star

K

7.6

3star

HB

6.4

4star

M

2.6

3star

T

0.6

3star

's last season, I'm reasonably confident Zorks has at least 1 more season in him. I'm with JB though, a transition to Lachie as captain next year would be a good move.

 

[DERRINALPHIL]

After tonight, I don't think it is too unreasonable, with or without an attitude adjustment, that it is highly feasible that the best we can hope for after 4 rounds is to be 1 and 3, with 0 and 4 a distinct possibility. I don't think we're any chance against Geelong and Footscray, with both games up the bush.

In a two horse race you are always a chance but you have no chance of getting into the Doggies game and there were a few 170 dollar tickets available for the Geelong match which have probably gone.

No chance of a sane attendance limit (or no limit)

 

[Kernel Kurtz]

Swans were brilliant with their ball movement, precision passes and always had a spare man.

The way we defended when we didn't have the ball just looked completely off - Trust this is the sort of thing our coaches can sort out. Hopefully by next week.

Depends on how you look at it.
To me it looked like we were way too slow and too big down back.
Is it the player choice of the coach or was it a bad performance by the best players available.
I'd put it down to our backline been out out cohesion given Dizzy is missing, then add a small defender like Answerth .
This is abit worrying tbh.
Watching that game Tom Berry would of been useful.

On another note , it was so good to get back to our own seats.
And we watched the last two quarters of the girls game, certainly the highlight , really impressed.

 

[whizkizz]

After tonight, I don't think it is too unreasonable, with or without an attitude adjustment, that it is highly feasible that the best we can hope for after 4 rounds is to be 1 and 3, with 0 and 4 a distinct possibility. I don't think we're any chance against Geelong and Footscray, with both games up the bush.

That's a bit glum. I'd say at best we can start the season 3-1 from here.

 

[The Zork]

I really wonder if opposition coaches identify that quite a few of our players are below average tacklers.
Makes it really hard to defend.

12 players with 1 or less last night which is not going to win you many

 

[Sanchez365]

Pretty disappointing all around as has been said by many. I don't think I can really name anyone on the ground that I thought had a positive impact. There was definitely some sketchy umpiring in that last quarter, I think a run of play with 4 free kicks to Sydney every time it looked like our pressure was gonna make them turn it over. Still, the game was well and truly dusted by then.

I thought that Hickey dominating Omac for most of the game was a worry. At one point in consecutive center bounces (after Sydney goals) they moved Fullerton and then Danniher in who also got comprehensively beaten. It's clear with fages liking to be able to change his opposition match up, Fullerton and Danniher are really going to get toweled up by prospective rucks. I can see the concern for losing Steph here, but he really was deplorable at the end of last year. Time will tell here.

The forward line I thought as a general rule did not too bad, we seemed to get a decent amount of shots on goal, we have even more avenues to goal and still scored 95 points with Hipwood and Cameron having average games and Fullerton taking a smoko behind the shelter shed all game.

The backline was under siege but everyone looked out of sorts. I reckon Andrews lost more 1v1 contests last night then he did all year, and it was also noticable that our defenders for some reason didnt playt o the normal strat of killing the ball to the boundary line to reset. Not sure if this was a direction to keep things attacking, but the amount of times a 15m spoil from a defender went straight forward and hit the chest of a swans player who immediately rebounded was staggering. But that just leads to the real issue...

The midfield was pure garbage. I don't think I've seen worse defensive running from our mids for years. By half time you had 3-4 swans players streaming towards goal and their lions opponents trailing almost 10m behind. You won't win games of footy playing like that. We were definitely gambling on getting in and under at the coal face to down hill ski and with Neale and Lyons doing almost nothing we got exposed badly. The lack of Rayner as that additional big bodied mid to go inside was noticable and I was hoping they had a plan to replace him but that didn't happen. As good as Sharp was at getting around the ground, we desperately need to change that extra outside run for another inside bull. I expect Ely Smith to get a game and we can only hope Cockatoo can get over his niggles asap. I was surprised to not see McCarthy thrown in there a bit more, I feel he's more naturally suited then a Cameron at center bounces. Even for his indescretions I thought Zorko was clearly our best mid and was the main one that turned it on in the second qtr that led to our run on of goals. People ragging him as the captain should go back and watch that second qtr to see why.

Hopefully tonight was an abberition but I'm feeling even less confident against the cats next week. Our only hope is Danger getting rubbed out but I'm almost positive he will weasel his way out of a suspension.

 

[mpal6]

Must say I'm getting tired of his antics. I'd rather Neale be captain honestly.

I'd prefer to give it to Harris Andrews and make Lachie his deputy.

Harris has been VC for 3 years now, should be ready to takeover and lead.

 

[luthor]

Tends to happen whenever any player leaves

We've never been the same since we got rid of Cheynee Stiller

 

[martinson]

Depends on how you look at it.
To me it looked like we were way too slow and too big down back.
Is it the player choice of the coach or was it a bad performance by the best players available.
I'd put it down to our backline been out out cohesion given Dizzy is missing, then add a small defender like Answerth .
This is abit worrying tbh.
Watching that game Tom Berry would of been useful.

On another note , it was so good to get back to our own seats.
And we watched the last two quarters of the girls game, certainly the highlight , really impressed.

The backline looked slow and out of position because of lack of pressure on the ball carrier , but in any case we need more zip in there getting the ball out. And a run down tackler. Harris and Payne looked like they had lead in their boots.

I don't think any overreaction is warranted . There's no one else who would've reversed last night's result ,it's on the guys who played to not serve that up again.

Re Stef ,he wasn't fit last year. He shed a few kilos and looked like he was back to his best against Collingwood, that's all. He'd be more than handy over a 22 match season. We just need Oscar to not get injured.

 

[mpal6]

The backline looked slow and out of position because of lack of pressure on the ball carrier , but in any case we need more zip in there getting the ball out. And a run down tackler. Harris and Payne looked like they had lead in their boots.

I don't think any overreaction is warranted . There's no one else who would've reversed last night's result ,it's on the guys who played to not serve that up again.

Re Stef ,he wasn't fit last year. He shed a few kilos and looked like he was back to his best against Collingwood, that's all. He'd be more than handy over a 22 match season. We just need Oscar to not get injured.

Was worried for Oscar in Q4 when he stayed down.

Might be worth getting a mature ruck through SSP by adding Cam to long term injury list.

 

[CarterS]

I think there are going to be a lot of upsets this season with the new rules.

 

[25 years on]

This isn’t just an effort issue. The change in rules has resulted in our last years game plan being totally ineffective. Our game plan was based around kaos entries into forward 50 and letting our quick forwards go to work or at least create stoppages. We would then press up and lock the ball in with repeat forward 50 entries. Our forward 50 entries were always deep and usually approx 10 m either side of point post. Our kicking didn’t need to be precise it just needed to be good enough to achieve game plan.

The world has changed with other teams now doing shallow forward 50 entries and getting easy marks and shot on goals. Also, defending kick ins is so much harder so keepimg teams in there forward 50 is very hard.

I think we will struggle this year,

I totally agree, instead of a long kick and hope from 80 into the 50, a short kick and mark to 60 mts and with the new rule a much more accurate kick and mark to 30mts out.

 

[darooda]

I know we'll be fine. We'll certainly end up better than the swans.

Don’t get salty about it. The swans outplayed us pure and simple. Throwing in childish jabs to a remark that had no malice in it is just childish.

Well played swans.


Sent from my iPhone using BigFooty.com

 

[25 years on]

We had an off night but Sydney played particularly well. If they can keep that intensity up through the season then they'll be a massive improvement on 2020, so I'll be watching them closely now.

I have to say though I'm going to take a while to warm to this season. The rule change about the man on the mark thing is actually frustrating me more than anything when I see the kicker just wheel around and the ump calls play on late. May as well just move the mark another 10m backwards with the amount of advantage that is gained.

It’s not the rule change that matters as much as how quickly teams adapt to it that counts.

 

[martinson]

It’s not the rule change that matters as much as how quickly teams adapt to it that counts.

We certainly didn't last night whereas they utilised it. Of course you've got to have your cattle on song to utilise anything.

 

[royboys4eva]

Good luck finding 5 players to vote for after that insipid performance. Linc had a crack. Zac was super early and will be a gun but faded a bit like most of the side. McCluggage needs to bounce back Friday night at Geelong. He is a wonderful young player but in the hit out against the Suns and last night he didn't look interested and made poor choices when he did get the pill. Berry impressed me so much when he first came into the side and he has had some setbacks with injury and glandular fever but he really needs to go to the next level. He is a tease at times.

Robbo has been a great servant for this club - but I fear his time may have come. Just can't find the ball anymore and a player who bashes and crashes like he does often hits the line quicker than others.

Birchall gets exposed far too often for pace. He needs to be a player who comes in for injuries otherwise he can be a leader in the reserves side.

Payne will be a good player in time but right now I would be playing Adams more on the opposition monsters and allow Harris to play the floating intercept defender. Harris was very average last night.

Feels like clubs have worked out that Richy plays off his man and many times last night they kicked to his opponent.

Ely Smith has earnt the right to play seniors now. He comes in for Mitch. Gardiner who we badly missed last night if fit comes straight in for Bitchall. Adams for Payne and free up Harris.

Sharp might be raw but he was far from our worse. He might be a good emergency sub with his run.

 

[Milux]

That was brutal to watch. Absolutely brutal. Congrats to Sydney. We didn't show enough respect and felt like they just expected it to happen. Gonna be a tough review session for the boys on Monday.

 

[Lion_LegacyXL]

Our backs look terribly slow, if Noah is fit we have to bring him in for birchall. Gardiner would be a massive in for us, he wouldn't of been the difference last night but he would of halved a few more contests than payne, birchall.

End of the day our mids got slaughtered, the lack of pressure in the middle we had last night no back line would of coped.

The flag is not won in games played in March, too many our of guys had howlers which isn't going to be happening every week.

It was also sad seeing Andrews last night, he looked really lost and not his usual reliable self. It was hard seeing reliable operators like Neal making basic mistakes that he wouldn't of made the last 2 seasons.