Back from a wet Victoria Park. I got there around 10am and training ran overtime to 12.10pm. A long session today. The Tiges were still finishing up as some the Hawks began doing laps.
No sign of Oakley-Nicholls or Casserley. Tambling, Cogs, Knobel, Moore and Chaffey were separate from the main group doing laps around the boundary and 100m straight runs (not sprints). Knobel and Moore left about half way through training while Tambling, Cogs and Chaffey stayed on to do running kick-to-kicks between themselves. Razor also left early before the final drill/pseudo practice match.
The first drill I saw when I rocked up was one the boys have done before. The squad is lined up along the one wing edge of the centre square and split into groups of five. They run as a group of five handballing between themselves to the other wing then split into a 3-on-2 on the way back with the 3 keeping hold of possession via run and handball and the 2 trying to stop them. All done very cleanly without a ball hitting the ground.
The second drill was also one the boys have done a few times before. They're split into four groups and need to mark and short pass between the groups. To speed the drill up they added two footys per group. Once again overall cleanly executed.
The remaining drills were game based ones whereby the attacking side had to compete and enter inside 50 against greater numbers (2 more defenders to be precise). The squad was split into two and the two groups performed the same task at either end of the ground. Each of these groups in turn were split into a midfield and forward/backline groups with yellows vs blacks. I was mainly watching the drill at the Station end so I'll talk about them.
At our end the yellows were attacking. The drill would start on a flank about 80m out with 3 yellows against two blacks near Wallace who had the ball. Off to the left hand side were 3 blacks and to the right a yellow and black pairing. The teams were:
Yellows: Rodan, Sugar, Tuck and Kellaway
Blacks: Raines, Hyde, Newman, Meyer, Roach, Howat and Polo.
Up forward there would be three pairings: McGuane(B)-Krakouer(Y), Thursfield(B)-Richo(Y) and Schulz(B)-Stafford(Y).
Terry would start the drill by throwing the ball to a yellow midfielder and then the yellows had to get the ball forward inside 50 with the blacks flooding back and the extra blacks filling holes. The idea was for the yellows to not only lead but try to drag their direct blacks opponent out of a space so a yellow teammate could lead into it.
Richo was on fire although the passes to him were spot on particularly from Sugar.
After a dozen or so repeats the two groups went into huddles and a couple of guys changed groups. The drill was then repeated with now the blacks on the offensive.
Blacks: Howat, Roach, Hyde and Meyer.
Yellows: Tivs, Hartigan, Kellaway, Rodan, Tuck and Krakouer.
Up forward: Limbach(19)-Gas(2), Pettifer(B)-White(Y) and McGuane(B)-Joel(Y).
The drill restarted with the same 3 blacks vs 2 yellows set-up in the midfield but this time the coach would short pass to one of the blacks so the drill began from a stationary mark or he would kick high to simulate a pack situation.
Meyer had the cleanest skills of the blacks midfield. Nailed an awesome pass between defenders to Limbach on the lead.
Overall though in both groups the defenders were able to stop the attacks most of the time. Usual it was the final pass that let the attacking team down. The Pass being too "loopy" or not to the advatageous side of the leading forward enabling the ball to be punched away. Having more numbers also allowed the defenders to collect any crumbs from split contested marks.
The squad was then brought in to get ready for a full ground length pseudo practice match. The pseudo part being that centre bounce was moved around the square to simulate pack ball-ups.
Yellows: Blacks:
2. Gas 1. Newman
3. Lids 4. Raines
5. Simmonds 8. Roach
10. Stafford 14. Polo
11. Joel 15. Pettifer
12. Richo 19. Limbach
16. Paddy 22. Meyer
18. Rodan 23. Jackson
21. Tuck 25. Schulz
26. Pattison 31. Hyde
27. Krakouer 34. Hughes
32. Tivs 36. Thursfield
33. Hartigan 38. McGuane
35. White 41. Foley
39. Kellaway 42. Humm
43. Howat
44. Graham
A couple of guys were wearing red singlets for the blacks.
Set-upFoley-Tivs Limbach-Kellaway Jackson-Gas
Hyde-White Hughes-Joel Pettifer-Hartigan
Graham-Simmonds, Newman-Rodan, Humm-Tuck, Howat-Sugar, Meyer-David King (#20)
Polo-Paddy Bowden McGuane-Pattison Raines-Krakouer
Schulz-Stafford Thursfield-Richo Roach-Lids
When the Yellows were kicking to the Station end I don't remember a goal being kicked and the coaches weren't keeping score anyway. The final kick forward was still an issue with a number of passes being cut off by defenders at both ends. When Wallace brought the boys into a huddle and they swapped ends, the final kick inside 50 was much better executed as the game went alone.
Despite the Blacks kicking the first goal through Hughes after some good work from Limbach, the Yellows rattled on the next 5 goals in a row with Richo on the end of nearly every pass forward. Sugar nailing many of those passes. The game initially was mostly kick and mark stuff but once the boys started to run and link up with handball receives, the movement of the ball was infinitely quicker and of better quality.
Richo, Sugar, Meyer, Krakouer and Hyde were the most prominent and influential IMO.
The Yellows defenders teamed well and set up a number of rebounds.
Jackson and Gas had a good battle out of the goalsquare. Jackson had an up and down game. Mixed good things with the ordinary (such as kicking into the man of the mark after taking a good semi-contested grab on the lead).
Goals:Yellows 5 (Richo 3, Stafford 1 .... the last one was a quick snap at the other end of the ground so I missed who it was)
Blacks 1 (Hughes)
Training ended with the yellows and blacks doing separate drills. The blacks did some ball-wrestling on the ground where the players would pair up with one player with the ball lying on the ground and the other needing to strip the guy on the ground of the ball. Meanwhile the yellows alos paired up but with the ball on the ground one player had to prevent the other from getting it while keeping their feet. After 5-10 minutes the yellows and blacks swapped. Kingy had a jokingly dig at White because he lost the ball in "record time"
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Photos to come although my camera was playing up today
. No shirts off in the cold and wet Moi and Julz.
