Robert Walls

[Schneiderman]

Originally posted by Mike_B
So someone please explain how we can go from playing such attacking free-flowing football to such boring stuff most weeks, with virtually the same list?

The same way that Richmond can go from last to second in the space of 9 games, and that Port and Brisbane can play a GF and then 9 games later be way out of the eight and struggling to play consistently, let alone well.

Time changes wll things. Other teams change players and coaches, players who were playing well lose confidence and form. We go from best in accuracy to worst, and all of asudden we have a "bad gameplan." Such is life.

[Reggi]

We are mediocre and boring. I can understand supporters completely losing interest. I didn't hear Walls tonight, on the whole I think hiscomments are accurate and fair.

I reckon a re-run of inspector Morse would be more interesting than us atm. Roosy is going through his bad coaching patch atm. He probabably doesn't think he is but he is. Unimaginitive, staid and stuck in a rut and his players have stayed close behind him

The Schauble thing confounds me. The good thing is we have half a decade of mediocrity to look forward to

[i'm-uninformed2]

Re: Re: Re: Robert Walls

Originally posted by Schneiderman
The bit where he says its "great to see Terry Wallace letting his players play attacking footy". News flash: they lost not only their game last night but arguably their best player..

So Terry Wallace's game plan is responsible for brown's broken leg. Yeah, strategic analysis that is . . . .. . . .

[Mike_B]

Originally posted by Schneiderman
The same way that Richmond can go from last to second in the space of 9 games, and that Port and Brisbane can play a GF and then 9 games later be way out of the eight and struggling to play consistently, let alone well.

Time changes wll things. Other teams change players and coaches, players who were playing well lose confidence and form. We go from best in accuracy to worst, and all of asudden we have a "bad gameplan." Such is life.

I guess my question is what has happened to make us play ultra-cautious football, to take the safe option every time, to not give our forwards who are more than capable the opportunity to show their skills by moving the ball quickly? We did this with virtually the same list in 2003, so you can't tell me it's because we don't have the players...

[Xie Shan]

What made it annoying was that he said it about 28 times. It was right the first time, he did not need to keep going on.

Couldn't have put it better myself! And for those who say not to listen to his crap, he just kept going on and on about it that it was impossible not to hear it - and because the game was delayed i couldn't even listen to the radio!

It's just wrong to say tonight's performance was a result of the "bad gameplan" - it was a result of some shocking errors and dumb footy (Sorry for all the adjectives but you get the idea). Of course a team that only goes inside 50 29 times in a match (the second lowest number since inside 50 stats were collected) is not going to kick enough goals to win.

The team had a shocker tonight, seems like the 3 wins in a row was just window dressing - their confidence is far more fragile than I thought.

[Reggi]

Originally posted by sydfan83
Of course a team that only goes inside 50 29 times in a match (the second lowest number since inside 50 stats were collected) is not going to kick enough goals to win.

Yeah, but seriously why kick inside 50 when you can hadball behind a teammate, or at their feet, or straight to the opposition

[Schneiderman]

Originally posted by Mike_B
I guess my question is what has happened to make us play ultra-cautious football, to take the safe option every time, to not give our forwards who are more than capable the opportunity to show their skills by moving the ball quickly? We did this with virtually the same list in 2003, so you can't tell me it's because we don't have the players...

I dont see us playing any different from 2003 in the main except:

1. We led the goal kicking accuracy then and are last now. If we were to kick an extra two to three goals every game, especially when the pressure is on, whose to say we would be losing as many. Even tonight, when we had 6 scoring shots in a row in that third quarter, the difference would have been being in the lead by two or three goals, versus being down by only 7 pts.

2. We made fewer mistakes then. Leo and Tadgh took risks and pulled them off. Goodes was a revelation. Cressa played great, and held a fragile midfield together.

3. The generic AFL game plan has changed. No coach allows momentum to stay wth the attacking team for long. The flood got employed by both sides tonight the moment two goals were kicked in a row by the opposition. In 2003 we would get four or five under our belt before we forced a response.

4. Noone had any expectations of us winning. This was the case EVERY WEEK. And some of the games we should have won we lost because of the same problem. Except we were meant to finish last, and everyone else was meant to be better than us. This year, this explains the Coll v WCE result, the Freo v Geel result, the Adel v St Kilda result, etc. The underdog has nothing to lose, and we are no longer the underdog (well we may be again soon).

[Mike_B]

Maybe I need to watch a few tapes from 2003 to refresh my memory, but I don't recall us locking up the ball atseemingly every opportunity and forcing stoppage after stoppage, nor do I recall us refusing to back our own ability.

[Reggi]

The key difference is that back in 2003 we took risks

[Xie Shan]

Originally posted by Mike_B
I guess my question is what has happened to make us play ultra-cautious football, to take the safe option every time, to not give our forwards who are more than capable the opportunity to show their skills by moving the ball quickly? We did this with virtually the same list in 2003, so you can't tell me it's because we don't have the players...

Sorry to quote the same post twice, but this seems to be the million dollar question - even this year, when they were more attacking against Essendon and the Western Bulldogs, they were most succesful when they did move the ball quickly and give their forwards a chance! Just look at the 3rd quarter last week.

Can't explain the ultra-cautious football though - I think Tim Lane had the best explanation that because they're not getting the ball inside 50 enough, there's more pressure on the scoring shots that they do get, hence resulting in more behinds, and further lowering their confidence.

I don't think any other team in the competition has confidence levels as fragile as the Swans!

[Schneiderman]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Robert Walls

Originally posted by i'm-uninformed2
So Terry Wallace's game plan is responsible for brown's broken leg. Yeah, strategic analysis that is . . . .. . . .

Think. My point is that attacking footy means jack if you dont win. And sometimes luck works against you regardless. Remember that in 2003 we lost MOL in the last five minutes of a game we won comfortably. Depsite all of the "flair" we had in that year, our finals campaign got sabotaged by that hammy twang.

[Mike_B]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Robert Walls

Originally posted by Schneiderman
Think. My point is that attacking footy means jack if you dont win.

Does defensive footy mean any different? The fact is, if you score more points (ie are more attacking) that makes it more difficult for your opponents to win.

[Schneiderman]

Originally posted by Reggi
The key difference is that back in 2003 we took risks

The key difference is that back in 2003 the risks came off in our favour.

[barry]

Originally posted by Schneiderman
The key difference is that back in 2003 the risks came off in our favour.

... and we played a new style of footy that other coaches hadnt had time to work out.


Those days are over.

[Schneiderman]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Robert Walls

Originally posted by Mike_B
Does defensive footy mean any different? The fact is, if you score more points (ie are more attacking) that makes it more difficult for your opponents to win.

What makes people think its DEFENSIVE. Sure we had a few kicks in our D50 tonight, but nowhere near the number the Port or the Roos have every week. We dropped a man back, but there was no "super-flood" like that Ess v WB game of 2000.

We played on at every opportunity that we could. They flooded back or manned up whenever they could. We made some terrible mistakes. We missed some easy goals. We got the wrong end of many decisions.

Dont think the game plan was any different from the last three weeks, just the execution was well below par.