Round 2 Postgame Analysis

[Stripes]

Coaching from the sidelines
R2


I’m no expert but here is my take on last weeks game from a strategy/coaching perspective.

General Observations

Positives – Team never gave up and ran out the game, Schulz presented well and kicked straight, Thursty continued to improve, Lids was good once he moved into the centre and Tambling fought hard in the middle.

Negatives – Opposition destroyed us around the stoppages and almost doubled our clearances, King was exposed one out in defence resulting in numerous goals, our man of man game was exposed, we were forced to kick to Richo who was outnumbered and we were forced to play their game.


Opposition Strategies

The Roos came into the game seeking to achieve four goals in particular –

1.   Win the clearances.
2.   Flood the contests.
3.   Reduce our scoring options.
4.   Expose our small defenders.


Win the Clearances
The Roos most important strategy in ensuring victory was not necessarily isolated to this game but was particularly critical in securing the result. The opposition ruckman would tap to the back of the contest where his midfielders would be waiting.

The midfielders around the drop of the ball would shepherd their direct opposition allowing the ball carrier to handball back to the free midfielder who fanned out or ran in from the outside the square. We have been exposed in this manner many timed previously.

Our lack of intensity and predominately, our lack of size around the contest was continuously exposed in the ruck dwells. Our midfielders tried to match the Kangaroos midfielders tackling but we were not strong enough.

Flood the contest
The opposition backman and forwards pushed into the centre of the ground and around the contest leaving only one or two players up either end. In many instances almost every player on the ground was along one wing.

This tactic did two things – exposed our forwards and backs plus it reduced the room for our quicker players to run into. The Roos knew that our strength lay in our moment of the ball, running in waves and breaking the lines but by flooding the contest our players were forced to kick to stationary players, to contests and to kick long.

This tactic also ensured their was more congestion and body on body contests where our smaller size was exposed.

Reduce our Scoring OptionsThe opposition defenders moved up into the centre of the ground attempting to run off our forwards and seeking to draw them away from the F50. TW sought to expose the opposition defenders why attempting to leave Rich in the forward line one out against his direct opponent but at least two defenders remainder around the F50 arch and ran back to assist when we moved forward.

As a result our midfielder were forced to target Richo because there was no other options and because the midfielders were being continuously crowded and pressured with the additional opposition players crowding the contest.

Expose our small defenders
Early in the game the midfielders specifically looked for Corey Jones who was playing first on Raines then on Kingy, exposing their height and lack of reach.

As previously mentioned, the opposition forwards later moved up the ground leaving a midsized forward alone one out in the goal square against one of our small defenders.

This ploy was particularly useful on King who provides a lot of our run and carry out of the backline but is not a traditional nullifying back man. By isolating King is the goal square it exposed his size and reach and gave him no one to handball the ball of to even if he did win the ball at ground level.

Unchangeable CircumstancesIn the situation we are currently in as a club we have a young undersized list which is frequently exposed around the ball or in contested football due to lack of experience and our smaller body mass. This is not a situation we address immediately.

Similarly, without Johnson this magnified the size discrepancy around the contest where we not only missed his size but also experience and leadership. Cogs would also assist with this downfall if he was match fit and confident.

Simmonds is small for a No 1 ruckman and we need to find a 200cm + ruckman in the future to give our midfielder first use of the ball.

All around the ground we lack size and experience and we currently lack consistency in our list as new players are frequently trialled and positions challenged for. When the list is more settled it will mean the players will understand each other game more and we will have less confusion.

 
Possible Solutions
‘Everyone is a genius is hindsight’ as the old saying goes but here are a few things that may have assisted in nullifying the opposition tactics could have been -

Shepherd/Block/Run & CarryWhile we are attempting to do the latter more and to run in waves through the centre we are not shepherding or blocking for each other.

In the Roos game we lost our run and carry because there was no space to run into and no players running Up until now we have looked to receive the handball over the top of the opposition or to the side of the opposition but IMO this causes more pressure and turn over’s. 

If two players were approaching an opposition, if the players not carrying the ball instead of running ahead to receive the handball actually blocked the approaching player allowing the ball carrier to continue running into space this would give us more time, less pressure and less handballs which reduces the possibly for skill errors/turn overs.

We needed to create our own space on the weekend through working for each other instead of just looking to receive. Handballing or kicking to a stationary target is route with danger but running in waves and protecting the ball carrier allows for less pressure and better delivery to the forwards.

This should be an ongoing strategy throughout the year as should our forwards blocking for each other and creating space for each other to lead into. We just don’t do it!


Retaining positionWe need something to kick to. Richo alone versus six opponents is just ridiculous yet we have done it for years and continue to do it even now. We need other opinions and most of all we need a ‘Forward Team’!

When the Roos ran our forwards out of the forward line we should have let them go. By racing after them we were automatically playing defensively and allowing them to call the shots. If we had began to hurt them in the forward line they would have been forced to man up.

We need at least three players in the F50 at all times and probably 4. We needed crumbers! We just don’t have them. Every other team gets at least 3 to 4 goals from their small forwards but we rarely get any. Browny, Petts and even Lids are lead up forwards who like to take the big grab. We needs someone like Edwards, Collard or Connors to play this role.

Last week we should have had Schulz and Hughes playing a two pronged attack from the square with Richo at the 40m mark to give the midfielders someone to link up with. Petts should have been on the forward flank and Browny crumbing (if he stills has the agility to do so).

Stoppages
We needed to figure out how to free up players such as Foley. We needed to screen and block for each other around the ruck contest instead of looking to nullify them continuously.

We also needed to gang tackle. All the best teams hit the opposition hard and they work together to hurt the other team and cause spillages/turn-overs. We choral.


Anyhow I would love to hear how other people saw this game and what they would have done about the strategies. The witty one liners are most welcome too


Stripes

[Lozza]

Have to agree with everything you say, your point about crumbing forwards is something i have thought for the last few years. We have Richo who is constantly double teamed and in some cases up to four defenders on him yet we still dont get many crumbed goals. It would be an interesting statistic (if anyone out there has such stats) to see which club has scored the least amount of crumbed goals in the last couple of years, i would bet we would be very close to the bottom on this scale.

Considering Richo is constantly outnumbered why dont we use this to our advantage and even get him to tap the ball out rather than try to mark it. At least this way it would put the defenders in two minds and thats what we need to do, create a situation whereby opposition defenders actually have to think about our strategy. Against North we just bombed the ball as high as we could into the 50 metre arc but sometimes we missed targets by 20-30 metres!. Surely we can create a better structure than we have, unfortunately Browny is out of form at the moment but i think this isnt helped by the fact that the service into the 50 arc has been abysmal.

The basics for a forward is that if you make a good lead and the oncoming teammate passes the ball 1-2 metres off the ground there is virtually no way that a defender can stop the forward taking the mark. Lets face it at Richmond we might in Lids have one player who can deliver from midfield in that manner, our overall field kicking is atrocious and with this issue it is very difficult to play possession football by foot. Making the situation even more difficult is that we struggle to hand pass with any accuracy either. The amount of times a running player has to miss a step in order to receive a handball is ridiculus. You only have to watch the better teams such as Geelong, their handball is perfection, the ball hits a running players chest without them changing stride. This is vital when running the ball through the midfield but time and time again we throw in a high looping handball which puts the player under immediate pressure.

Unfortunately i think another problem is the team at the moment has to a certain extent become brainwashed into being too unselfish. Kingy on a couple of occasions ran to 50 and probably could have run another 25 metres and had a shot but dished off only to see a turnover resulting in another wave of attack down the wrong end. There were other situations where players needed to take on the opposition to open things up but took a bad option which resulted in a poor disposal and yet another turnover. If our disposing of the ball is a skill issue then maybe we need to look at strategies to reduce our disposals rather than seeming to increase them with disposals for the sake of disposals rather than being constructive, why expose our weakest area, play a more direct game and i think we will quickly see the results. I think the players need to take a bit more responsibility and be a bit selfish sometimes in the right situations, these players are professionals, surely by now they should make the right decisions 99% of the time.

[Smokey]

Good post Stripes - I agree with what you have written.  I think the flooding achieved a very outcome for North to win the game and that was it nullified our main advantage - our pace.  They were primed to hit the ground running in the 1st quarter and once they established a break the slowed the game at every opportunity.  They knew (from painful experience the week before) what would happen if they allowed us space to run so they shut that down and very effectively stopped us from winning.  As I said in another couple of posts - our coaching panel had their pants pulled down and butts spanked severely on Sunday and hopefully they can learn a lot from that, especially now that they have a side that is actually competitive in a lot areas for most of the game.

[Ox]

they knew if they won the first they would win the match.
it's our way..........

[mightytiges]

Excellent summary Stripes 

The opposition backman and forwards pushed into the centre of the ground and around the contest leaving only one or two players up either end. In many instances almost every player on the ground was along one wing.

When North had the ball they flooded the centre corridor and then moved the ball along one wing by 1 or 2 players leading into the space on the same wing. Our options were to either go into a spreaded zone (which is what North did to us) and force North sideways by switching the play or 1-on-1 stick tight ball-side our direct opponent and not give give them so much space in front of them as we did. North also did the sucker trick of having a player(s) run from the wing back into the corridor to free up the space for other Roos to run from the centre corridor to the wing and mark miles in front of his direct Tiger opponent left in his wake. Dopey us followed the same direct opponent (15m behind of course) instead of swapping over to the oncoming Roo going the other way which would have denied the space. We have some dumb players  .   

When we had the ball in defence North would spread right across the middle of the ground in a zone which as you said Stripes slowed us down and forced us wide. 

Simmonds is small for a No 1 ruckman and we need to find a 200cm + ruckman in the future to give our midfielder first use of the ball.

Agree. McIntosh gave Simmo a bath. We have Putt (202cm) and Gus (200cm) but they are still young and raw/unknown.

If two players were approaching an opposition, if the players not carrying the ball instead of running ahead to receive the handball actually blocked the approaching player allowing the ball carrier to continue running into space this would give us more time, less pressure and less handballs which reduces the possibly for skill errors/turn overs.

True.

And it's just not the approaching opponent, it's also the opponent chasing or coming from the side. It doesn't matter which, the supporting teammate without the footy needs to block/shepherd. If he does receive the ball then the player who gave it to him needs to immediately do the shepherding. We do neither (we're not last in 1%ers for nothing) which leaves open and isolates the player with the ball which is why he ends under unnecessary pressure and usually turns over the footy via being tackled or hurried into a dodgy disposal. You see it in rugby union also. Leaving your teammate isolated with the ball under pressure is a recipe for disaster and in fact the rules are designed to punish the isolated player.

[Stripes]

I agree completely with you mightytigers and smokey.

We need to create space. Its as simple as that. For our style of play we need room to run and we need room for our forwards to lead into.

Every oppostion now have the blueprint (if they didn't already) and will try and crowd and pressure us as possible.

The only way we can do this is either hope teams give us space because they are attempting to play a more free flowing game themselves or...

we shepherd/block and create diversions to lead oppositions away from areas. We need to work for each other - another big reason we are not as successful as we could be.

If the opposition is attempting to bottle us up and flood/zone the middle we need some players to work directly with the ball carrier and block/shepherd the opposition away to relieve the pressure on the ball carrier, give space and time to deliever the ball. The rest of the players need to spread, run, lead and give the ball carrier options.

Standing still is not an option.

This weeks game should be interesting.

Stripes

[Mr Magic]

You should drop your CV into the club stripes.

[Stripes]

You should drop your CV into the club stripes.

They couldn't pay me enough

If I was working for the Tigers I would make sure I scanned the forums because the posters often make a lot of sense and have a lot of intelligent suggestions. They also give you a very honest appraisal of what the general supporter is feeling too, which can be good and bad. 

Stripes