turn the sprinklers on

[daniel f]

gee it really looked like our boys hadnt touched a wet ball all year last night.living in melbourne im not sure how the weather generally has been in sydney this year but surely they have had a few rainy days to train in,on the flipside alot of clubs now train indoors at the first site of rain,lets find an oval somewhere in sydney turn the sprinklers on and do a match practice,this is something the two perth sides have done many a time with good results when they have known they were going to play in wet weather the following weekend.just a thought but surely after last nights display we need to try something different to get the players more used to these conditions

[Bron]

But it bucketed in Brissie and we won, that's why I wasn't so upset about the rain (before the game).

[daniel f]

gee what a difference

Originally posted by Bron
But it bucketed in Brissie and we won, that's why I wasn't so upset about the rain (before the game).

thanks bron that blows my theory out of the water,id forgotten completely we had rain last week,not sure what to put it down too then,our skill level was pretty poor thas for sure,maybe its as simple as being beaten by a better team on the day,or maybe does anyone think that the big crowd and finals atmosphere may have got to some of our younger players?

[liz]

The main difference between the two games was the pressure skills applied. The Lions went through a few phases were they decided to try to impose themselves physically but in the main they let our boys have space to play. Collingwood applied far greater pressure to us throughout the whole game. In fact, it was probably the pressure more than the rain which caused the ordinary skills, because the Hawks did a similar thing to us in the dry.

Our skills in space have improved ten-fold this year - remember when we'd routinely kick straight to the opposition when in the clear in years gone by? But there is still a bit of work to do on the skills under pressure. Part of it comes down to our relative lack of size and will take a couple of years and many gym sessions to address. Plus we could do with a big strong centreman or two to complement our fleetier players, to help increase the pressure we place on the opposition in return.

[daniel f]

very insightful

Originally posted by lizz
The main difference between the two games was the pressure skills applied. The Lions went through a few phases were they decided to try to impose themselves physically but in the main they let our boys have space to play. Collingwood applied far greater pressure to us throughout the whole game. In fact, it was probably the pressure more than the rain which caused the ordinary skills, because the Hawks did a similar thing to us in the dry.

Our skills in space have improved ten-fold this year - remember when we'd routinely kick straight to the opposition when in the clear in years gone by? But there is still a bit of work to do on the skills under pressure. Part of it comes down to our relative lack of size and will take a couple of years and many gym sessions to address. Plus we could do with a big strong centreman or two to complement our fleetier players, to help increase the pressure we place on the opposition in return.

very true about the great pressure applied by coll players but even when we did have space it was back to the bad old days were we kick it ten metres over our players head or like happened at least two or three times last night we kick the ground as we kick the ball,hopefully it was a one off

[Mike_B]

Originally posted by Bron
But it bucketed in Brissie and we won, that's why I wasn't so upset about the rain (before the game).

It didn't actually bucket at all in Brissie during the game. There was the occasional bit of mostly misty rain (lighter or the same that most of the rain for the first half last night).

What I find bemusing is that we played in the wet last week and were much more direct. How could we have forgotten how to play with a wet ball in just 6 days?

[daniel f]

Originally posted by Mike_B
It didn't actually bucket at all in Brissie during the game. There was the occasional bit of mostly misty rain (lighter or the same that most of the rain for the first half last night).

What I find bemusing is that we played in the wet last week and were much more direct. How could we have forgotten how to play with a wet ball in just 6 days?

just a thought but maybe the big build up and huge crowd,finals like atmosphere was a bit too much for some of our inexsperienced players,hopefully they can learn from it

[anniswan]

I think they were stage struck

[footyhead]

Originally posted by Mike_B
It didn't actually bucket at all in Brissie during the game. There was the occasional bit of mostly misty rain (lighter or the same that most of the rain for the first half last night).

What I find bemusing is that we played in the wet last week and were much more direct. How could we have forgotten how to play with a wet ball in just 6 days?

Mike please read Lizz's excelent post on the pressure applied by the pies. It seems like for all our skill and pace we still lack a little somthing in the skill and hardness under intense pressure department. Well if we improve in the areas we are lacking we certainly will be an awsome team one day!

[vagary]

Originally posted by anniswan
I think they were stage struck

you might be right. they lost the last time the crowd record was beaten.

elaborating on the sprinkler idea, they should hire elvis the helitanker and get it to dump water at regular intervals over an scg training session.

[scurrilous]

Originally posted by Bron
But it bucketed in Brissie and we won, that's why I wasn't so upset about the rain (before the game).

Brisbane isn't a renowned wet weather football team either.

[sfan]

Having gone to the Brisbane and Collingwood games over the last two weeks, the rain in Brisbane was short and sharp for a few minutes in the first and last Quarters. The ball did not seem to get slippery.

Against Collingwood it looked like the ball was coated in butter and the players mishandled on many attempts. I thought in the 1st Q we tried to play dry football with a lot a slick handballs. They got back in the game when they kicked longer to packs and got some goals with pressure on the Collingwood backs.

Maybe they have learnt that you need to play a longer kicking game when the weather is wet.

[chewyonyourboot]

It never rains in Sydney!

But seriously, I think the problem was that a lot of our players are very young and inexperienced. They do have trouble when an opposition side starts to play physically...Add this to the large crowd and you have a team that was a bit overwhelmed by the occasion..

But we'll learn from it! Things can only get better from here and the experience will I think, be one that can be learnt from