Tackling Dusty: Have opponents discovered how to subdue Martin?Daniel Cherny
The Age
5 April 2019Martin won the Brownlow Medal, the Norm Smith Medal and reached iconic status as a Richmond premiership hero.
He was still an All-Australian last year, and also polled 19 Brownlow votes, but his air of invincibility gradually wore off. Unquestionably he remained elite, but he couldn't scale 2017's heights.
Two rounds into 2019, critics are chipping away at his status. Martin had 30 disposals in the opening-round win over Carlton and picked up one coaches' association MVP vote, but was uncharacteristically brought down in a tackle by Blues youngster Zac Fisher.
The following Monday night, Nine's Footy Classified pondered whether opposition clubs had figured out how to stop Martin's trademark fend-off, showing footage of Fisher employing a pre-emptive slap to Martin, which host Craig Hutchinson suggested had been pioneered by West Coast's Elliot Yeo in a game last year.
Then in the second-round loss to Collingwood, Martin was restricted to 18 disposals by Magpies stopper Levi Greenwood, who had also helped curtail Martin in last year's preliminary final.
But Martin's offensive struggles were arguably less of a talking point than the fact he was offering very little defensively, having not laid a tackle in the first two rounds of 2019.
Richmond assistant coach Justin Leppitsch laughed during the week when asked if he was surprised that Martin hadn't applied a tackle this season, suggesting it had come as no great shock.
But Leppitsch tried to deflect the blowtorch onto other Tigers whose roles centre more on defence, given Richmond laid just 32 tackles overall against Collingwood.
"[Martin's] ball-winning ability and what he does around the contest can't be underestimated – it's such a big thing for us," Leppitsch said.
"There's other guys in our team that are there to tackle that haven't been doing it, so collectively as a group we need to lift. It's not just one particular person."
"Everyone gets looked at differently. Dustin's not there to go to full-back and spoil. Everyone has different parts of their game they've got to do.
"We are graded differently in a lot of ways. But he still has to join in when it's his turn, don't get me wrong."
Asked to assess Martin's start to the season, an assistant coach from a rival club commented: "Dusty is an interesting one. His role has changed slightly. He isn't a true midfielder, he is a forward who goes to stoppages.
"If you watch his work in general play, he [heads] forward of the ball. His work defensively is non-existent. I think he had five disposals inside defensive 50 last year! He hasn't had a possession in D50 this year."
His work defensively is non-existent.
An AFL assistant coach
Champion Data stats back up that assertion. Along with his empty tackles column, Martin is also yet to kick a goal this year despite routinely starting at centre bounces (he is ranked second at the club for centre-bounce attendances, Cotchin is first) before heading forward.
An opposition perception about Martin's lack of tackling was intriguing.
"Zero tackles so far this year ... for someone who spends a lot of time at stoppage is baffling. To me it shows either [his] changed role and his coaches don't expect that of him or [that] he's weighting his game on the offensive things too much. I would be surprised if it's [the former]," the coach said.
"He's getting less of the ball because of his role change but I still think he tries to do too much with every possession instead of doing the basics."
How Martin responds to this period looms as one of the fascinating subplots of the season.
Martin's manager Ralph Carr is backing his client to succeed.
"Dustin is a champion of the AFL game and has a lot of pride in his game and treasures playing for the Richmond Football Club … I have never seen him fitter or more determined to play great football," Carr said.
"If you look at Dustin's nine years with Richmond he has maintained an honourable consistency."
https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/tackling-dusty-have-opponents-discovered-how-to-subdue-martin-20190404-p51awb.html
