Sure, if the marking options are either good enough or at least in form enough to be good enough.
We didn't struggle to score, highest scoring team in the H&A and best conversion rate inside 50.
We didn't struggle to score... until we did.
The problem is they don’t take marks.
I agree with a lot of that but I wouldn't restrict Warner's midfield time to the second half alone, more to shorter bursts on the edges of the scrum interspersed with front half time.I think Chad Warner and the rumours surrounding him will be an interesting challenge for Cox first up.
I hope he's brave enough to put that to the side and move Warner out of the midfield, even if it risks increasing the appeal of moving west for Warner.
Of course, that's assuming that Cox and the selection committee have any plans to do that next year, but moving him forward and giving the likes of Mills/Sheldrick/Cleary more time in the midfield ticks so many boxes for mine.
Strengthens us at the contest️
More speed and x-factor forward of the football
More defensive accountability
Maximises the relevant players' attributes
IMO Warner's best games this year were off the back of second half bursts from him. He hasn't really proven himself as someone that can dominate for four quarters, and that's fine - he doesn't have to. A move to the forward line and then rotating him through the midfield in the second half seems like the perfect way to get the best out of him.
And when we weren't performing it wasn't because we were playing 3 tall forwards. It was because our players looked tired and stopped trying.
I don't think having three talls per se was our big issue. Our setup sucked a lot of the time from mid season on. Didn't mark or bring the ball to ground. As has been done to death allowed the ball to waltz out so no repeat shots.
Will it?
Yeah, I worded it poorly. I meant he should play primarily forward and rotate through the midfield in the first half and then start to feature there more prominently later in games as his speed and explosiveness become a bigger factor.
We can play 1 tall but I don't think it will make the difference.
All teams get trapped in their defensive half if you're against a half decent defensive structure, as in most finals. The release valve is going long and taking a contested mark, or letting your smalls go to work crumbing at ground level. We don't get that release valve because when we go long, we can't take a mark in the air or crumb it on the ground. Opposition defenders just intercept and have a field day banging it back in over and over and putting our defence under pressure.
We can't even get it past the half way line. How will a small crumb when it doesn't even hit the ground?
Swapping a tall who isn't taking marks with a crumbing player would give us... an extra crumbing player. As opposed to having a tall who isn't taking marks and also not having a crumbing player.
In the first half of the season we were pretty decent at putting the ball to advantage. Later we got careless and the worst of all was in the GF where it looked like we were kicking it to the opposition.
With all due respect this is just not accurate. And I've seen our drop off in performance being attributed to Mills & Parker quite a few times on here.
First TRACK WATCH report from Lachie McKirdy
The key message was to make sure they responded positively. “Body language” was repeatedly shouted at the players during their breaks between sprints: “You can be tired, but you can’t look tired.”
