Think we’re due for a players meeting at Ed Curnows house. We were outworked, made poor decisions at critical moments and worryingly we seem to have lost the ability to switch the play, shift the opposition defence and then take on the corridor kick.
Our lack of depth and durability is also killing us - we simply can’t keep carrying 6 players who miss a big chunk of most years (Marchbank, McGovern, Williams, Martin, Cunningham, Fantasia) and expect to compete. 4 or more of that group have to go and we should also stamp the papers of Young whilst we are at it.
Our depth is probably ok as we push the best with half a side out. I'm more worried about the manner of losses. Been very disappointed in the workrate. In each loss we have lost it more than the other side winning it. What was the pressure rating of 145 in the 2nd qtr. Be a near record low. That was the qtr the actual game was lost. Just not switching on as we should. A decent 2nd qtr for us and the Pies were done.
A couple of those 6 we don't need but the rest, well, we need badly right now.
Don't think a loss has hurt this badly since 1999 grand final loss tbh. ..and all went downhill from there.
That GF loss didn't hurt so much. We spent most of the year being crap and somehow made the GF. Miracle just participating.
Tonight's loss was plainly frustrating. Work rate was poor and still just lost by 6pts. Losses pissed down the drain recently all for the same reason. A minute left and still couldn't hold on for at least a draw. After the way we played I would have taken that, but we managed to stuff that up too.
Pies played the big moments well, leading tackle makers were Pendlebury, Nick Daicos and Crisp which would surprise a few people but probably showed even their showboat players like Daicos worked a bit harder than we thought they would. Both teams had a lot of non contributors but I felt some of ours did nothing at all unlike a few of their quiet stars who at least competed. Backline worries me when Weitering is out of the play and we are relying on the likes of Williams, Young, Cowan and Cincotta. Need Saad and McGovern back to provide stability and Kemp is a better player than all four I mentioned and dropping him was dumb imho. Not the end of the world and when we get our main troops back including Martin and Motlop we will be ok. Fantasia and Durdin might not as well have been playing as their contributions were zero.....
Those 2 got 12 touches between then for 0.1. You can't have 2 mall forward literally not touching it.
Pressure rating in that 2nd qtr was 145. That's about a slow as it gets. Just a bit of consistent workrate and we win that, and a couple of the previous losses.
The season thus far indicates we raise this pressure rating in fits and starts - score heavily, or get scored heavily against, depending on this pressure. Our win/loss quarter ration is about 50/50. Again, inconsistency raises its head.
And that's been the story of the season so far......patchy. Picking up the rating when we have needed to have won us games but caused us to piss two games down the drain too where we lost it more than the other side has win it.
She talks about common sense, how about the umpire use some and think to himself: Hang on minute, Cripps is standing the mark but it should be Harry "Hey Harry, come back and stand on the mark please, Patrick clear off please". The umpire in that instance has to have the awareness that unintentionally, the wrong player is standing the mark and if he is so adamant to correct it, then farken correct it. Dont penalise the guy after he looks, sees his team mate standing then leaves to get out of the zone. Alternatively, let it slide and play on. Imbeciles (umpire, Football Boss and interviewer, not a brain between them).
The real common-sense aspect is really, who cares who stands the mark. Surely that's up to the players themselves. As long it is someone. It's surely not that hard.
I wonder if we'll start favourites again!! Doubt it.
Plenty of articles in today's media about our issues. In a nutshell: defensively ordinary, and dropping the aggot on the heads of H and Charles and expecting them to work miracles... ignoring other leading forwards.
Except when we rise the pressure rating to 200, rather than 150/160, then we have no issue. Then we are good defensively and we kick goals in a hurry. A case of switching on more. After the real bake the players got last week watch how much better we are defensively this week.
Been thinking that the last 3 weeks the opposition is scoring very easily against us on transition Listening to Sunday pre game and they were talking about our Defensive transition I think and came up with the following stats.
Adelaide: 25 scoring shots from 49 entries.
GWS: 27 scoring shots from 51 entries.
Geelong: 28 scoring shots from 45 entries.
Better than 50% from each team.
That will not stand up in finals.
Good thing is it is something that can be fixed and worked on during the season.
When we get our pressure rating over 200 no-one in the competition can touch us. Every aspect suddenly becomes strong including defensively. Problem is though we let it drop right back too often and too easily. Can't do 200 all game, 240 against GWS when we crushed them in the 10 min period, but we must keep it consistently in the 180s, not 150s. That's about switching on mentally.
2nd half of the year, when we start to peak, we should see more of that pressure.
If its one thing Vossy knows its that once you get to finals, everything that comes before means nothing.
The way Leigh Matthews used to get his side cheery ripe for finals and dominate despite never finishing top. 2001 - 2004 2nd, 2nd, 3rd, 2nd - Flag, flag, flag, runners up.
Same with Hardwick and Richmond. They went flag, PF, flag, flag. Only year they finished on top was the year they didn't win.
We've played 2 of the best teams in the league the last 2 weeks. Played terrible for majority of the last 8 quarters, with half a side not available and come out of it with a 1-1 record and plenty of upside.
We should fear no side.
Once the second half of the season comes, with players back, heading to a peak I believe we handle anyone. If we want it badly enough this year we can certainly win it. It seems we do.
The positive is we did near everything wrong, defensively terrible, never really switched on properly, little focus on our basics, half the side out and lost by just 13pts.
The negative is we did near everything wrong, defensively terrible, never really switched on properly, little focus on our basics and if that doesn't improve then getting blokes back won't help as it should. Pressure rating spent much of the day in the 160s, only going over 200 when we were a few goals behind.
Last week was similar until mid-way through the 3rd qtr where every changed once we were 20pts down. Pressure rating went from the 150s straight to 240 and stayed there changing the game. Maybe we thought we could get away with it again and didn't.
I followed the pressure ratings the last 2 weeks and it rose massively once we fell behind. Once we raised it both GWS and Geelong had issues with it. Yesterday, not long enough.
Thinking after that presser from Voss that defensively we will be way better next week. Won't be 118 to 105 again.
