Carlton Supporters Club

And Cripps' output was about normal, which proves my point. 30 disposals, 2 goals 1, 7 tackles. The tagger did little to quell his influence, and was effectively wasted. Even with their injuries, the Hawks could cover one man doing this job.

We have very limited resources. We can barely kick 80 points per game with 22 fit players and no taggers - how is playing 2 taggers going to help us ?

Whinging about tagging is one of the classic supporter lines. Through no fault of anyone of us, we are simply not privy to what happens in match committee meetings, in the coaches box etc. We can only react to simple scenarios - understandable but frustrating for all of us. Not playing a tag on Mitchell is part of a larger picture, which we don't know about.

When you have players kicking numerous set shots oof, when you have a team that are serial turnover merchants, when you have a team of kids and numpties struggling with zone defense, clearly Bolton has bigger problems than a tag.

I agree with most of that Paul.  However, Cripps was quieter than usual in the first quarter and that had me thinking that he may have been concussed.  I guess that clocking your opponent isn’t really tagging.

It’s interesting that Bolton is criticised for not tagging Mitchell when almost all other coaches do the same.  As you point out, Bolton has other higher priority issues to address than tagging a bloke who will still rack up possessions.

Ed tagged Smith and did a much better job than Howe did on Cripps.  Clarkson should really have tried someone else on Cripps if he really wanted to curb his influence.  He probably should have had someone on Murphy too as he was second to Mitchell in metres gained.

Mitchell is rarely tagged, and I don’t believe that it’s all down to Buckley dismissing his impact.  Interestingly, Mitchell didn’t attract any coaches’ votes in his previous >40 possession game.  He reminds me of Ablett jnr at his best; a very good player who inflated his performances with inconsequential possessions.

I was happy to see our young blokes going head to head with Mitchell.  That will do much more for their development and the team’s progress than having Ed trying to lock Mitchell down.

Cripps problem is more about the players around him not knowing what to do, or being sucked into the stoppages, than his inability to win the football. Hawthorn would swap Cripps for Mitchell in a heartbeat!

Not sure they would......Mitchell is vastly under rated, he has little class help either other than OMeara...if he stinks it up so much why did we try and make a play for him?
Cripps is tagged every week and subject to intense rotating pressure from different players, I'm sure Clarkson is happy for dummies like Bolton to ignore Mitchell and let him pick up 40 plus each week....

If those Cripps tags are worthwhile how can it be that he leads the AFLCA voting?

It's a mugs game, Cripps like Judd before him wants the opponents to come to him, opposition have the maximum effectiveness against Cripps when they run off him not when they try to tackle him! They hurt us more than he hurts them by ignoring him, they know he won't run and spread, and he rarely pushes forward. If he starts pushing forward more they have to look at him in far more detail, he even stated that is his goal for 2018, and it's sound thinking!

Cripps finished strong and was probably our best player but he did nothing in the first quarter when the game was already over.

Howe: Mission accomplished

Cripps is a bit unit and a great player, hard to stop, but I'd still tag him ..Jacobs from Nth beat him, Buckley use Pendlebury in an effective manner on him IMO, even a 25% reduction in Cripps capacity is worth it IMO.
To leave Mitchell on his own was inexcusable as Roos suggested....

Cripps finished strong and was probably our best player but he did nothing in the first quarter when the game was already over.

Howe: Mission accomplished

It's not a tagging issue.

The defense rests. If the game is already over at 1/4 time, with a scoreline of 4.3 to 0.0, how will tagging Mitchell help ? Isn't the big problem that we can't score to save ourselves ?

Watch the game and check the stats - similar disposals, similar cp, but 35 I50's to 58. We are dead last for I50's, I think we average about 30 odd. When you put it all together, we are breaking down between the arcs, over and over again, and can't organise ourselves fast enough in defense on the turnover.

It's not a tagging issue.