What I noticed vs Essendon...

[CureTheSane]

Firstly, they dominated the midfield.

Every time we kicked out of the opposition goalsquare, I was fearing the worst, as it seemed to come straight back.

And I also noticed the we couldn't get it past our CHF line much at all.

I was actually shocked that we came within 10 points.

My view of the whole game is this.

1. We were lucky not to be pumped in the first quarter.

2. in the seond & third quarters, we stopped them pretty much.
Well, we slowed down their scoring and made a contest, but we never looked like we would gain any real ground.

3. In the last quarter, even with the umpiring decidsions, luck ran our way for once.
I'm talking about things like the ball bouncing towards one of our players rather than straight to Essendons every single time.
Essendon got tired, and we played quite well.

Had we won, it would have been great, but one of the steals of the year.

Hopefull the boys can take that last quarter form into next week, because I'll be up for the Richmond game, and it would be nice to see a win

[Cheer Cheer]

Re: What I noticed vs Essendon...

Originally posted by CureTheSane


And I also noticed the we couldn't get it past our CHF line much at all.

I am surprised by these comments as O'keefe and Hall were our two best contributors on Saturday and were dominant in their postions, in which the got alot of the possesions around the half forward line.

IMO the midfield generally got killed again like last week.

[Bleed Red Blood]

I thought our major worry was still our clearences.

Also with Barry being played on Lloyd(masterstroke). I thought we should have had Williams in defense to make up for Barry not doing the rebounding.

Also if Barry was going to play on Lloyd all along why did they bring in Rogers?

[ScottH]

Essondon, also had a lot of hard chasers when we did break clear, Rioli and Lovett-Murray chased hard when we went forward a number of times.

And I was surprised at the lack of pace that Hall, showed against Fletcher. Fletcher ran away from Hall easily, very quick for a lanky bloke.

[Rizzo]

There was definitely a breakdown between CHF and getting the ball within range.

[BAM_BAM]

Re: Re: What I noticed vs Essendon...

Originally posted by Cheer Cheer
I am surprised by these comments as O'keefe and Hall were our two best contributors on Saturday and were dominant in their postions, in which the got alot of the possesions around the half forward line.

that's just it, most of their possessions were up the ground around HF as the ball wasn't coming into the 50m. Most of their set shots or even running shots from were from out that far. That was the part of Pebbles game that let him down, which is disappointing as generally he's a great kick from out there.

[Cheer Cheer]

ROK kicked a couple of OOBOTF - which was disapointing as he was on the right side for a left footer if that makes sense.

I suppose what I'm saying is that since we had a lot of the ball on the CHF line - it is disapointing that we didnt get it in more quickly to a Doyle Goodes Davis instead of mucking around with it on the HF line.

Credit to Essendon though they ran back hard to block up space generally.

[NMWBloods]

Re: What I noticed vs Essendon...

Originally posted by CureTheSane
Firstly, they dominated the midfield.

Every time we kicked out of the opposition goalsquare, I was fearing the worst, as it seemed to come straight back.

Yep - we really struggled to get the ball out from the kickouts, but when we did do it fluidly, we managed to get goals out of it.

And I also noticed the we couldn't get it past our CHF line much at all.

Partly because Hall had to come up so far because of our midfield wasn't working, hence we had less power at the HF line.

I was actually shocked that we came within 10 points.

My view of the whole game is this.

1. We were lucky not to be pumped in the first quarter.

I thought we controlled most of the first qtr. With 3 minutes to go we were 2 goals up and Schneider missed a very gettable shot. Essendon rammed home 3 goals in the next 3 minutes.

2. in the seond & third quarters, we stopped them pretty much.
Well, we slowed down their scoring and made a contest, but we never looked like we would gain any real ground.

The rain helped slow the scoring. We had our share of the ball in the 2nd and 3rd qtrs, but we were wasteful and indirect.

3. In the last quarter, even with the umpiring decidsions, luck ran our way for once.
I'm talking about things like the ball bouncing towards one of our players rather than straight to Essendons every single time.
Essendon got tired, and we played quite well.

I thought we dominated about 20 minutes of the last qtr, and were breakeven for about 10 min.

Had we won, it would have been great, but one of the steals of the year.

Hopefull the boys can take that last quarter form into next week, because I'll be up for the Richmond game, and it would be nice to see a win

I'm not sure how much of a steal. I think we controlled about 1.5 qtrs. Essendon controlled maybe 2-2.5 qtrs. If we had been less indirect and wasteful, plus the umpiring had been better, we could easily have won, and I've seen games stolen in more lopsides circumstances.

[Destructive]

Re: What I noticed vs Essendon...

Originally posted by CureTheSane
Firstly, they dominated the midfield.

Every time we kicked out of the opposition goalsquare, I was fearing the worst, as it seemed to come straight back.

And I also noticed the we couldn't get it past our CHF line much at all.

I was actually shocked that we came within 10 points.

My view of the whole game is this.

1. We were lucky not to be pumped in the first quarter.

2. in the seond & third quarters, we stopped them pretty much.
Well, we slowed down their scoring and made a contest, but we never looked like we would gain any real ground.

3. In the last quarter, even with the umpiring decidsions, luck ran our way for once.
I'm talking about things like the ball bouncing towards one of our players rather than straight to Essendons every single time.
Essendon got tired, and we played quite well.

Had we won, it would have been great, but one of the steals of the year.

Hopefull the boys can take that last quarter form into next week, because I'll be up for the Richmond game, and it would be nice to see a win

Yep, agree with all of that.

Even though we came back in the last quarter, I always knew we were'nt going to get there.

Our centre clearances are absolutely shocking, if we can work on them we might find ourselves actually demolishing teams instead of either losing by less than 2 goals or winning a tight one.

I know I'm not alone when I say - UP THE GUTS!!!!! instead of round the wings all the time.

We seem to be mucking around with the ball too much. Keep it on the go and hussle hussle hussle might see some better results.

We also have a problem with having one really bad quarter in a game. Concentration is the name of the game.

Here's hoping we really give it to Richmond.

[Gunn]

In a nutshell we lost badly in the centre clearances and stoppages. This put us always on the back foot. Having lost the centre clearances in particular, we had the ball a lot in our defensive half, often it got there fast. When we had the ball in our defensive half Essendon played man on man across the whole ground. This made passing by foot risky and difficult. All this was compounded by the fact we had little run out of defence from our HBL. Had we had Taigh and Leo (or anyone else)running past players in defence to take a hand ball we could have broken up there man on man defence. Unfortunately we were very static. Taigh? I hardly noticed him. Injured?

A hallmark of all our bad quarters/games is static play, particularly in defence.

Unlike the back half I thought our forwards were anything but static and really kept us in the game. Barry Hall was outstanding with his run to make an option.

[ScottH]

Originally posted by Gunn
Taigh? I hardly noticed him. Injured?

Only 3 kicks for the day, not a good day at the office for him.

[Bleed Red Blood]

Re: Re: Re: What I noticed vs Essendon...

Originally posted by BAM_BAM
that's just it, most of their possessions were up the ground around HF as the ball wasn't coming into the 50m. Most of their set shots or even running shots from were from out that far. That was the part of Pebbles game that let him down, which is disappointing as generally he's a great kick from out there.

Wern't 75 percent or so of our goals outside fifty and none in close?

[NMWBloods]

Originally posted by Gunn
When we had the ball in our defensive half Essendon played man on man across the whole ground.

This is the main thing.

I was going to write a preview on the Richmond match and include some stats about our first 6 games. Some of the things I have noticed:

In 3 games our opponents have played more of a zone-style defence (Brisbane, Fremantle, Kangaroos).

In 3 games our opponents have manned up across most of the ground (Geeling, Melbourne, Essendon).

We have struggled in the latter case each time.

In the "zone" case we have 32% more possessions than our opponents, but only 6% more in the "man" case.

In the "zone" case we average 123 long kicks against 97 long kicks in the "man" case. Basically we work the ball around, often from one flank to the other with long kicks, trying to find a gap in the defence. In the latter case we tend to chip it around more working it for.

We have 150 handballs in the "zone" case against 102 in the "man" case. This tends to reflect our running game, with more space to take advantage of working the ball forward, often through the corridor.

In the "zone" case we are +5 on clearances, but in the "man" case we are -6 on clearances. We seem to struggle under pressure to get the ball out of stoppages.

In the "zone" case we lay less tackles (58 v. 66), which probably reflects us being second to the ball, however they are more efficient, with 51% effective compared to 42%.

Against the "zone" we get more I50s (50 v. 44) and we get more D50 rebounds (36 v. 27). We really need the open spaces provided by a "zone" defence to get our running game going.

That's all I have to note at the moment.

[Bleed Red Blood]

Originally posted by NMWBloods
This is the main thing.

I was going to write a preview on the Richmond match and include some stats about our first 6 games. Some of the things I have noticed:

In 3 games our opponents have played more of a zone-style defence (Brisbane, Fremantle, Kangaroos).

In 3 games our opponents have manned up across most of the ground (Geeling, Melbourne, Essendon).

We have struggled in the latter case each time.

In the "zone" case we have 32% more possessions than our opponents, but only 6% more in the "man" case.

In the "zone" case we average 123 long kicks against 97 long kicks in the "man" case. Basically we work the ball around, often from one flank to the other with long kicks, trying to find a gap in the defence. In the latter case we tend to chip it around more working it for.

We have 150 handballs in the "zone" case against 102 in the "man" case. This tends to reflect our running game, with more space to take advantage of working the ball forward, often through the corridor.

In the "zone" case we are +5 on clearances, but in the "man" case we are -6 on clearances. We seem to struggle under pressure to get the ball out of stoppages.

In the "zone" case we lay less tackles (58 v. 66), which probably reflects us being second to the ball, however they are more efficient, with 51% effective compared to 42%.

Against the "zone" we get more I50s (50 v. 44) and we get more D50 rebounds (36 v. 27). We really need the open spaces provided by a "zone" defence to get our running game going.

That's all I have to note at the moment.

You and your stats....

[CureTheSane]

Up the guts.

Generally when I hear people yell this I hope the team doesn't try that.
Frought with danger, especially if the team is not trained in how to do so well.

However, you could make a case for it in a game like the Bombers one, where we had nothing to lose and everything to gain.

In that circumstance, risks need to be taken, IMO