Voss in 2013 (aka 'the Voss megathread')

[iBeng]

Pretty sure if we dont win every NAB game by 40+ Points and win the NAB Cup with a devestating 60+ Win against Sydney or Hawthorn Hamo will come out saying we are terrible. Something along the lines of "Sack Voss, dropped an easy win, rebuildings failing, players are terrible etc"

 

[chopperduck]

Still plenty of noise around from the experts saying Voss will feel the heat very quickly if we don't do well enough. TBH, i think he earnt himself some points last season, considering the natural improvement left in our young side something pretty major would have to happen for him to feel any kind of heat.

 

[whatboutbob]

Still plenty of noise around from the experts saying Voss will feel the heat very quickly if we don't do well enough. TBH, i think he earnt himself some points last season, considering the natural improvement left in our young side something pretty major would have to happen for him to feel any kind of heat.

That middle patch this year looks pretty ominous to me. Voss wouldn't want to get too comfortable if the boys get belted a bit through that stretch.

 

[chopperduck]

That middle patch this year looks pretty ominous to me. Voss wouldn't want to get too comfortable if the boys get belted a bit through that stretch.

No doubt, and i fully expect a wave of negative press through that section, questioning the quality of our team. Our draw goes easy - hard - easy, a good start will help membership, a good finish will help team confidence heading towards finals. Even if we lose the majority of the games in the middle, as long as we don't get smashed every game that will be a victory and improvement on last year. I highly doubt the general media will see it that way. By that time we might be on a roll, getting talked up a bit and if we get smashed in the face the media will have a field day with it.

 

[MacMum]

...so, we get through the easy bit, go into the hard bit in the middle, and if we don't do well there, we are likely to see heat bought down on Vossy....then we get back into the easy bit again...I see.

I just hope the board DO NOT fall for that one....Are we going to be a club that gets rid of their coach (a favorite son, mind you) because things get a bit tough??

I sure as hell hope not......this man has EARNT his right to lead us all the way up that ladder again....NO-ONE else except JB, and that won't be happening just yet..

Some people need to open their eyes and mind, and realise we are not going to win every game, will lose some shockers no doubt....but Voss must come through with us all the way, leading at the helm.

 

[POBT]

The posts above have been moved from the Hammo thread.

I feel like Voss's coaching future is the elephant in the room and the above posts indicate that there is an interest in discussing it.

Can I just make 2 points:

1. We all love Vossy. Please don't think that people questioning him or setting expectations on him are in any way denigrating him.

2. Because of that strong attachment we all have to the coach, this is an emotive issue. Please post constructively or not at all. Suffice to say "Crazy Vossy" type posts will be dealt with swiftly.

 

[POBT]

My view is that the club's 2012 performances earned Voss the right to coach through 2013 without having his contract terminated early. But it doesn't guarantee him another deal, nor does it mean that he's "off the hook" in terms of public and media pressure.

Voss's long term career as a coach hangs on this year, just as it hung on 2012. Until we get repeat years of good/improved performances, that's unforunately the reality for him.

 

[Haso]

I don't think our current board is reactionary enough to sack a coach in the middle of the year. I feel that they will assess the year as a whole and make a call then: re-sign or send on way.

 

[POBT]

I don't think our current board is reactionary enough to sack a coach in the middle of the year. I feel that they will assess the year as a whole and make a call then: re-sign or send on way.

Yeah, worst case scenario might be that they make a decision late in the season and he/they decide that he won't coach the last game or two. But I don't think it will be a mid-season sacking, regardless of how we play.

To be honest, I really don't see us going backward in 2013 anyway unless we have a shocking injury run. And coaches don't often get sacked mid-season just because their side has stagnated. A stagnation in our development is more likely to lead to an end of season "parting of ways" rather than an abrupt dismissal.

 

[dlanod]

My view is that the club's 2012 performances earned Voss the right to coach through 2013 without having his contract terminated early. But it doesn't guarantee him another deal, nor does it mean that he's "off the hook" in terms of public and media pressure.

Voss's long term career as a coach hangs on this year, just as it hung on 2012. Until we get repeat years of good/improved performances, that's unforunately the reality for him.

To extrapolate from your point in your later post, I'd be hard pressed to see in what situation he doesn't get an extension at the end of the year. I feel there's going to be enough innate improvement to show a year on year improvement, which is usually all a club needs to hold on to a coach - especially a club legend. I think it'd take another four win season for a non-renewal, and a season with eight wins or more would almost be an automatic renewal.

I'm hoping that the next contract is for only two years though. One year is destabilising (it's obvious you don't trust your coach) but I'm yet to be convinced Voss has the ability to coach a team deep into the finals. The proof will be in the pudding - with two more years, I'd have expectation of challenging for playoffs in both those years and getting in in at least once.

 

[Dylan12]

I don't think our current board is reactionary enough to sack a coach in the middle of the year. I feel that they will assess the year as a whole and make a call then: re-sign or send on way.

I agree wholeheartedly, but would add that any such decision could be contingitent upon the availability of a potential coaching target the board may have in mind or if a highly credentailed candidate such as a Paul Roos put their hand up. Otherwise, if Voss develops the list and reaches his KPI's, even with only 8-11 wins, I'm all for Voss being offered another 2 year deal at the conclusion of the season.

 

[wantok]

We have a 5 year plan with 3 years to go. Vossy is part of that plan. We would have to win less than 8 games or for him to completely lose the confidence of the players for him to be in trouble.

 

[POBT]

To extrapolate from your point in your later post, I'd be hard pressed to see in what situation he doesn't get an extension at the end of the year. I feel there's going to be enough innate improvement to show a year on year improvement, which is usually all a club needs to hold on to a coach - especially a club legend. I think it'd take another four win season for a non-renewal, and a season with eight wins or more would almost be an automatic renewal.

Leave aside numbers of wins for a minute - if the club doesn't progress at all from last season in that it still beats the bottom clubs but doesn't close the gap on the rest of the comp, is that sufficient to get Voss another deal? For the sake of answering that, assume a few constants - same injury run to last year, the older blokes still playing fairly important roles and the format of the ladder remaining roughly the same (some top sides, some average sides and some easybeats)

I know that is a question that doesn't lend itself to a yes or no answer but, prima facie, a year in which our development stagnates would make it hard for me to support Voss getting an extension.

FWIW, I don't think it is too outlandish a possibility that we may not experience the level of improvement many of us are predicting.

 

[steveys]

I recon vossy will get a full year with the board to reasses at the end of the year. If we win less than 9 or 10 games this year ud think he'd be as good as gone

 

[Mr Ripper]

Hopefully the board aren't so narrow-minded as to judge Vossy's performance purely on win-loss ratio.

 

[dlanod]

Hopefully the board aren't so narrow-minded as to judge Vossy's performance purely on win-loss ratio.

I'd be surprised if they were, but win-loss ratios are a fairly good guide to how a team's going in general and it's useful shorthand in these types of conversations.

 

[possum8]

I think Voss is great for the development of our younger players. He is addressing some of our key issues, that being disposal and clearances by recruiting a dedicated clearance player.

However I am still not 100% sold on his tactics against better teams. I guess we will be able to gauge where we are half way through the season. Personally i would like to stick with him for a few more years as i like what i am seeing this year.

 

[Ironmonger]

I've been wondering whether or not to broach this issue over the off-season, because there's been a nice kind of optimstic vibe which I didn't really want to burst, but so far this thread is pretty encouraging so here goes.

I think Voss still has a great deal to prove about his ability to coach a footy team to success. There's all kinds of really positive feedback on this board from people who are a lot closer to the club than I am, which is great, but purely looking at it from a distance as I do I'm not sure we've come as far as some others think.

10-12 is a respectable win-loss ratio, but I think it flatters us quite a bit. Eight of those wins were against teams we really don't want to be comparing ourselves to, and the other two were narrow wins at home, albeit against genuinely good opposition. We were competitive in few of those 12 losses, particularly interstate games. In fact, we very nearly lost to both Port and Gold Coast outside of Brisbane, which puts some context into what looks at face value to be a healthy 4-7 away record.

So I don't think our 2012 record looks all that impressive when stacked up against the miserable run of seven wins from the forty games that preceded it. Voss' tenure at the club has had a lot more on-field failure than success, although of course there are a lot of mitigating factors.

But drilling down more deeply there are still things that concern me. The inability of young KPPs to regularly play senior football: with the exception of Mitch Clark I can't think of anyone who has had an extended run of games. After four years I think its fair to say that our current coaching staff's record at identifying and developing young KPP talent is not good. In 2013, players like Lisle, McKeever, Clarke, Michael, and maybe Longer and Cornelius can improve that record.

We still struggle at what the soccer fan in me thinks of as 'dead-ball situations' where I'd expect to see the coach's influence. Clearances have been a consistent issue in the last few years, as have kick-ins. I saw a stat the other day that we average 6 fewer scoring shots from turnovers than our opposition, which suggests to me that we're turning over the ball a lot in our back half, which I think indicates that we could improve our structures in that part of the ground. Drummond's departure will make that even harder in 2013 but surely between Adcock, Hanley, Golby, Harwood and maybe McGrath we can find the players to effectively clear the ball from free-kicks, marks and kick-ins in the backline next season.

And the forwardline has been a problem for years, and looks like it will continue to be a problem in 2013. I would argue that Voss has tended to look for short-term solutions, like throwing Leuenberger and Merrett down there. It appears that we were prepared to throw a great deal of money at Kurt Tippett to try and plug that hole, which suggests to me that the club might not really know how it's going to fix that problem.

Voss' appointment looked like a bad decision at the time. He just didn't have the experience to take on that kind of role. Even now, his football experience is limited to one club, and I often find myself wondering if a coach with a more rounded background would have a few more ideas about how to get the most out of the playing group.

A lot of the above is devil's advocate stuff. It's highly subjective. And its easy to find patterns of negativity from the coach of a losing team. On the flip side, there have been some real success stories amongst the playing group in Voss' time, like Redden and Rockliff. Still, I think Voss still has quite a bit to do to prove that he can turn a talented group of young players into a top four side over a few years, and ultimately that's what we need right now.

I feel like if there hasn't been some significant improvement by the end of this season, it might be time to look at what another coach might bring us.

 

[chopperduck]

Upon saying that, we haven't really drafted much in the way of KPF the last few years either, not genuine sized players anyway. Problem is that we've only brought in Clark via draft and lost him, we needed our own Lisle or Ace to have been KP sized. Hoping Lisle or Martin can fill the void of our drafting.

 

[dlanod]

Upon saying that, we haven't really drafted much in the way of KPF the last few years either, not genuine sized players anyway. Problem is that we've only brought in Clark via draft and lost him, we needed our own Lisle or Ace to have been KP sized. Hoping Lisle or Martin can fill the void of our drafting.

To jump back to the pre- and post-2008 era, given the truism of KPPs taking longer to develop it's not necessarily a surprise that we don't really have that KPP strength. Cornelius that year, and most of our KPPs, especially the KPFs, have only joined us after that year.

 

[3KZ is Football]

In terms of where our list is currently at, given age / experience profile of our younger group who have been slated to be our next big things (Rockliff, Redden, Rich and Leuenberger) and the very favourable draw we have been handed this year, I would think expectations are high for this year and so they should be. Irrespective of side discussions about who should be in and who shouldn't, the core of our best 22 looks very very solid to me. Under these circumstances, should the team fail to fire this year, then I think the board would be justified in flicking Voss, even before the season had ended. The other 'wildcard' people have not mentioned is the idea that Voss himself might jump before he was pushed if he felt the playing group were not responding or receptive and the team was dropping games they should be winning and we were languishing at the wrong end of the ladder.

All that said, it will not come to this. There is plenty of this at the club and I think that Voss and the players are set to show it. People should get set for a massive 2013 for the Lions.

 

[wantok]

I've been wondering whether or not to broach this issue over the off-season, because there's been a nice kind of optimstic vibe which I didn't really want to burst, but so far this thread is pretty encouraging so here goes.

I think Voss still has a great deal to prove about his ability to coach a footy team to success. There's all kinds of really positive feedback on this board from people who are a lot closer to the club than I am, which is great, but purely looking at it from a distance as I do I'm not sure we've come as far as some others think.

10-12 is a respectable win-loss ratio, but I think it flatters us quite a bit. Eight of those wins were against teams we really don't want to be comparing ourselves to, and the other two were narrow wins at home, albeit against genuinely good opposition. We were competitive in few of those 12 losses, particularly interstate games. In fact, we very nearly lost to both Port and Gold Coast outside of Brisbane, which puts some context into what looks at face value to be a healthy 4-7 away record.

So I don't think our 2012 record looks all that impressive when stacked up against the miserable run of seven wins from the forty games that preceded it. Voss' tenure at the club has had a lot more on-field failure than success, although of course there are a lot of mitigating factors.

But drilling down more deeply there are still things that concern me. The inability of young KPPs to regularly play senior football: with the exception of Mitch Clark I can't think of anyone who has had an extended run of games. After four years I think its fair to say that our current coaching staff's record at identifying and developing young KPP talent is not good. In 2013, players like Lisle, McKeever, Clarke, Michael, and maybe Longer and Cornelius can improve that record.

We still struggle at what the soccer fan in me thinks of as 'dead-ball situations' where I'd expect to see the coach's influence. Clearances have been a consistent issue in the last few years, as have kick-ins. I saw a stat the other day that we average 6 fewer scoring shots from turnovers than our opposition, which suggests to me that we're turning over the ball a lot in our back half, which I think indicates that we could improve our structures in that part of the ground. Drummond's departure will make that even harder in 2013 but surely between Adcock, Hanley, Golby, Harwood and maybe McGrath we can find the players to effectively clear the ball from free-kicks, marks and kick-ins in the backline next season.

And the forwardline has been a problem for years, and looks like it will continue to be a problem in 2013. I would argue that Voss has tended to look for short-term solutions, like throwing Leuenberger and Merrett down there. It appears that we were prepared to throw a great deal of money at Kurt Tippett to try and plug that hole, which suggests to me that the club might not really know how it's going to fix that problem.

Voss' appointment looked like a bad decision at the time. He just didn't have the experience to take on that kind of role. Even now, his football experience is limited to one club, and I often find myself wondering if a coach with a more rounded background would have a few more ideas about how to get the most out of the playing group.

A lot of the above is devil's advocate stuff. It's highly subjective. And its easy to find patterns of negativity from the coach of a losing team. On the flip side, there have been some real success stories amongst the playing group in Voss' time, like Redden and Rockliff. Still, I think Voss still has quite a bit to do to prove that he can turn a talented group of young players into a top four side over a few years, and ultimately that's what we need right now.

I feel like if there hasn't been some significant improvement by the end of this season, it might be time to look at what another coach might bring us.

Vossy has struggled with some pretty poor cattle which were leftovers of the Gubby Allen and co era. There is no need to go into the performances of some of those draft dynamos as we all know they are mostly not at the club now. He saw the gaps and went for the proven player path but Fev let us all down. Other than him and Xavier Clarke the others have been handy and Stakes desperately unlucky. Anyway that is all behind us now and this year is a tester. We have a good list and a bit of momentum to work with and confidence is a wonderful thing. Like you i want to see evidence of "game management" decisions this year. We have been annihilated at centre bounces/clearances on a regular basis by the good teams in recent seasons. I believe Vossy is the best player I have seen in the last 20 years (including Carey) but I have watched in wonderment when we have bled three goals in a row in rapid succession yet continued to line up at the next bounce in a totally attacking set up when it was time to man up to take the heat out of the game and regroup..I hope Vossy and the three R's have l been to school.

 

[chopperduck]

If anything I think we set up way too defensively at center bounces. A tagger, and two other players playing behind their man, we struggle to get first hands on the ball. But that discussion is for another thread. I think it's hard to judge Voss on his tactical and strategy with coaching when we've had such a young team the past few years. They have really kept it simple, and even if something isn't working, they have left it for player educational purposes. Even Merrett playing forward was a more structural move to keep a mature body up forward and kick to so our mids could keep working. We have a specific game plan and that is still getting drilled into the players. As the playing group matures and improves I think we will see less of the mind bending decisions happen.

 

[iBeng]

Eee, first post in a split thread! *Ahem*

IF we go backwards from the number of wins we had last year I can see some serious heated discussions happening higher up at the Lions about Voss's future. IF. We would have to go from our 10 wins back to 5 for them to start sharpening the old blades.

 

[chopperduck]

With our draw the only way we will drop that far back is if we have major injury problems. TBH, it's our form against teams higher than us on the ladder that should be used as the measuring stick, not the w/l column. Even last year we did struggle against some poor sides, and that will happen due to inconsistency with our still very young team. What we want is to see less of that, and being more competitive in games. This should be a key indicator to me, more so than how many wins we get. When on, we can put up a good fight against the good teams, but it's a big ask for our young team to do that for an entire season.

One advantage we might have with our draw is and easy start means we might be able to warm into the season easier than if we had a tough start. By the time we should be hitting our straps and have our guys running on top of the ground we should enter the tough part of our draw. Hopefully we can keep up the effort during that period, and even if we don't chalk up the W's, we put in better, more rounded performances. Average losing margin of about 4 goals against most of the teams in that round 6-14 stretch would be a win to me, and showing some good improvement. Think our losing margin against the same kind of teams in 2012 was near, if not more than 50.