Did Horse get a pass mark in his first game?

[Rod_]

Just a request for an assessment on Horse's moves tactics and coaching on the day.. Did he make enough of the right moves?


Seems to me that he did a lot of things right..

Only complaint is the Mummy - Seaby interchange timing.. He had to do it sometime

Rod_

[DeadlyAkkuret]

If you're comparing it to our round 1 games over the past 5+ years then he most certainly did pass, but even if you just judge it on it's merits I think he did okay.

Longmire wasn't out there missing what should have been easy goals and wasting opportunities, so based on the fact we should have had the game wrapped up by 3 QT one would have to assume he coached us pretty well. If he had switched Goodes into the midfield for the final quater and we won the game, then I'd give him an A+.

[Bas]

He's half way to the glue factory on that performance.

If he doesn't start using an electric cattle prod on the players at half and 3/4 time then I say good riddens!!!

A coach should speak their language.

[Hartijon]

He needed to shift Goodes who was being effectively nullified.Goodes neeeded to go to his midfield running role for both team reasons and because he was being taken out of the game.That and his use of Seaby needed addressing.I give Bailey top marks for coaching. Horse with a better team than last year did not get as much out of them.I give him a C.Bailey a B

[caj23]

Way too early to judge but the signs weren't promising

Seaby sub was a massive fail and I doubt we'll se a ruckman used by any club again this season, plus all of the frustrating things from the last couple of seasons are still there including:

goal kicking yips
inability to kick away from an opponent who is on the ropes
Goodes stationed in the forward line in the 2nd half when he was being blanketed by his opponent

[CJK]

Horse OUT. lol

[Triple B]

I'm not sure he got the Pettard matchup/solution right.

I'm only watching from the TV, so may have this wrong, but did the Ranga go to Pettard first-up? My biggest gripe was after Pettard played his little cameo, he appeared to switch Mattner off Green (who was almost kickless such was the great job Marty was doing) to keep Pettard from single handedly grabbing the game away from us. Who bobs up and soccers thru the vital goal, Green!!!

BTW, pretty sure we should have done a better job of killing that ball as well, but that's another thread.

[ernie koala]

The jury is out at this stage... 3 things I perceived as errors
1) Seaby should of been in the 21 or at the very least should of come on late in the 3rd term when Mummy was out of juice.
2) Rohan on to a fresh Pettard, should of been a more experienced player...ie Mattner or Shaw
3) Goodes should of gone to the midfield in the 3rd term. At the time he was getting beaten as a forward and our midfield was getting smashed at contested possessions.
All very easy in hindsight I know, but he is a well paid senior coach with plenty of experience.

[jono2707]

Wow tough crowd - first game away from home against a young fast team that is on the way up. Apart from the sub blunder, which is fair enough as its a new and strange rule that no one is particularly comfortable with, we did ok. Can't blame the coach for us missing some very gettable shots at goal. Yes there were a few things that may have been done differently with hindsight, but I agree with Rod that Horse did a lot of things right.

[magic.merkin]

I'm not sure he got the Pettard matchup/solution right.

I'm only watching from the TV, so may have this wrong, but did the Ranga go to Pettard first-up? My biggest gripe was after Pettard played his little cameo, he appeared to switch Mattner off Green (who was almost kickless such was the great job Marty was doing) to keep Pettard from single handedly grabbing the game away from us. Who bobs up and soccers thru the vital goal, Green!!!

BTW, pretty sure we should have done a better job of killing that ball as well, but that's another thread.

Yeah Rohan was on Ricky P when he came on. I remember because they were getting into the shoulder charges pretty enthusiastically and then Ricky was involved in 3 scoring plays in a row and I though Gaz may have lost that battle :d

[caj23]

Wow tough crowd - first game away from home against a young fast team that is on the way up. Apart from the sub blunder, which is fair enough as its a new and strange rule that no one is particularly comfortable with, we did ok. Can't blame the coach for us missing some very gettable shots at goal. Yes there were a few things that may have been done differently with hindsight, but I agree with Rod that Horse did a lot of things right.

If we are serious premiership contenders then we can't afford to drop winnable games like that. The fact is that Melbourne are not serious premiership material in 2011.

I think we have a right to be disappointed that alot of the problems from last season don't appear to have been rectified, but it was only the first game and it is still too early to judge, but the question was posed and its worth a response.

The Seaby sub was diaboically stupid, as soon as it was announced on the coverage I commented to my mate that it was a mistake. How a bloke who has been an AFL assistant for 10 years and has had 6 months to work on a strategy couldn't see that to I'll never know.

Goalkicking isnt directly Horse's fault and we may be harsh for judging him on that, but if a team has an easily recognisable weakness, I would expect that the senior coach would do something about addressing that issue.

On a positive note for Horse our kick ins look to have improved and there seems to be a strategy/plan that wasn't there last year.