Hardwick's post-game presser / We fumbled & bumbled & made too many skill errors

[mightytiges]

A snippet on Ch7 of Dimma's post-match presser:

* Probably a bit lucky to be still in it at half-time but you make your own luck.

* We got some good looks early but we just ran into their pressure. And we didn't use the ball well into our Forward 50.

* Gave away 28 turnovers in our forward half in the first half. That's an extraordinary number and it's due to our own ball use and skill errors. Only had 8 in the second half.

* We fumbled and bumbled in the contest while they were much cleaner. They've had strong contest numbers in the first few rounds. We've been okay in that area but tonight we needed to be much better and we weren't.

[the claw]

SHEESH  yes freakin SHEESH. How many times have we heard this. How long do we have to wait for the penny to drop.

I should leave it at that and let supporters work it out for themselves for that matter old Hooch as well.

Heres a heads up ROLE PLAYERS.

Talk about lack of skill and polish  there's another heads up.

How about logic. If you play a whole pile of players who are only good for  one thing then the opposition do what they like with no fear with the things those role players are no good at.

The lack of enough players with hurt factor is there for all to see.

[Lozza]

A snippet on Ch7 of Dimma's post-match presser:

* Probably a bit lucky to be still in it at half-time but you make your own luck.

* We got some good looks early but we just ran into their pressure. And we didn't use the ball well into our Forward 50.

* Gave away 28 turnovers in our forward half in the first half. That's an extraordinary number and it's due to our own ball use and skill errors. Only had 8 in the second half.

* We fumbled and bumbled in the contest while they were much cleaner. They've had strong contest numbers in the first few rounds. We've been okay in that area but tonight we needed to be much better and we weren't.

Fumbled and bumbled seems to sum us up over recent seasons, just don't seem to be clean at all, our skills have gone backwards and the best teams are way ahead of us. We know where the bar is, just have concerns whether we have the cattle to get there.

I think our frantic game style that brought us 3 premiership cups just covered up the fact that we weren't the most skilled team around. Since the stand rule and the 666 were introduced I think there is more focus now on foot skills especially which isn't our strong point unfortunately.

[Tigeritis™©®]

Pies pressured and harassed Daniel Rioli and completely and effectively was able to curb his influence on the game out of half back by pressuring and harassment. He had a 48% disposal efficiency and turned it over a team high 8 times.

Nick Daicos on the other hand had a pretty bruise free night 33 disposals @ 88% efficiency. 

[yandb]

Who was playing on Daicos?

Mansell?

[Andyy]

Who was playing on Daicos?

Mansell?

Dunno but he was getting quite lippy in the second half and I would have been happy for Mansell or Ross to just pop him one in the mouth and cop a long holiday.

[Buddysucks]

We are missing Lambert and the way he played his role. We can break away from pack when we win the ball and we certainly aren’t pushing the ball forward at all costs. Last night
was a throw back to the Joel and Patrick Bowden days, sideways and backwards, then turn it over in our back half.

[TigerLand]

Lozza and Buddysucks bang on here.

System is system but it was based on manic pressure and we don't do that anymore or as well as we did so we fall back on skills, which we've never been elite at and haven't drafted for it so that's where we are at.

The game has evolved to rewarded most skillful teams, which is fine but we must adapt and guys like Short, Rioli, Clarke are the keys going forward. Daicos is comps best player because of his foot skills, he isn't tough, not quick but extremely good kick of the ball. It's also why Pendles has been able to extend his career as his skills have become are more valuable commodity.

It's also shown a bigger issue in that our wingers are unfortunately not as valuable as they once were. Players like Langdon, Sidebottom, Isaac Smith are more valuable and impactful types then your Pickett's, McIntosh bigger bodied winger's who could join in the contested pressure brigade.

Our biggest challenge is ensuring we develop well and get the ball in the hands of our best users behind the footy. Without that we get belted.

[Broadsword]

Hardwick was pretty combative in his post-game. Considering we should have lost by 10 goals he didn't want to hear it -- we just turned it over and didn't take our chances apparently. Not sure about anyone else, but that is not a satisfactory explanation of the game for mine.

[Buddysucks]

For me, that’s why Dusty still needs to be in the midfield and we need to get the ball in his hands as much as possible.

[Broadsword]

For me, that’s why Dusty still needs to be in the midfield and we need to get the ball in his hands as much as possible.

Ken oath I agree. He's only 31 for God's sake. Should still be carving it up in the middle. The way he's talked about now it's like he's a zimmer frame wielding role player.

[Gigantor]

The old standard saying in our game is .. bad kicking is bad football , we kicked badly so did they . They controlled the game etc so should have and did win . Against Carlton we dominated territory but could  only manage a draw .I tend to agree with Dimma sloppiness all round cost us dearly.

[WilliamPowell]

Hardwick was pretty combative in his post-game. Considering we should have lost by 10 goals he didn't want to hear it -- we just turned it over and didn't take our chances apparently. Not sure about anyone else, but that is not a satisfactory explanation of the game for mine.

He's always like that after a bad loss and it was a BAD loss.

He is right we did turn it over, gifted them shots at goal. Fortunately, their finishing was as abysmal as are field kicking

Just over 4 mins he spoke for. With wins it is 7-8 mins

Although I would love for him to publicly say a lot more about how bad we were. He hasn't since 2016. Last night was stock standard after a loss, particularly a bad one

[Tigeritis™©®]

SHEESH  yes freakin SHEESH. How many times have we heard this. How long do we have to wait for the penny to drop.

I should leave it at that and let supporters work it out for themselves for that matter old Hooch as well.

Heres a heads up ROLE PLAYERS.

Talk about lack of skill and polish  there's another heads up.

How about logic. If you play a whole pile of players who are only good for  one thing then the opposition do what they like with no fear with the things those role players are no good at.

The lack of enough players with hurt factor is there for all to see.

Nothing wrong with “role players” as long as you’ve got the game plan to suit the players in the team. If you don’t think what I’m saying is correct then just watch seasons ‘17, ‘18, ‘19 & ‘20. We had a game plan that suited our team and classic role players that contributed when called upon.

How else would the likes of Castagna, Caddy, Townsend, Ellis, Butler, Pickett etc. ever be premiership players? 

Our game plan was built upon a defensive system that caused turnover and with our speed, getting it forward at all costs as quickly as possible. Once in our forward 50 we pressured, tackled and harassed the opposition into submission and we broke them and we got three premierships out of it.
Skill was never really our thing and it never mattered in terms of success.
That didn’t mean we didn’t at times look ordinary when we had an off day and our system or pressure was non existent.

All that until Geelong and the AFL worked out how to stop us and brought in the stand rule to dismantle our system. It worked.

On top of that we have lost the ability to pressure, tackle and harass the opposition like we used to and we look mediocre.

We’ve had role players all along and we were successful because we didn’t skimp on the fundamentals of our game which was high pressure and harassment with great tackling ability. It used fluster even the best teams into submission and we broke them especially in finals.

Now that we have players that aren’t capable of that pressure for whatever reason then we look mediocre slow and soft.

I don’t blame role players I blame (in non specific order of importance)
1) fitness
2) the inability to get that pressure mindset into the next crop of players
3) the AFL changing the rules to stop us.
4) aging and retired role players
5) substandard tackling technique.

[the claw]

Our small fwds including Dusty a total of 8 players so far have managed just 11 goals between them in three games.

Our two pressure fwds Mansell and Rioli have laid just 11 tackles between them.

As for pressure stats well i just can't buy into them. You can trail behind a player in a chase have no impact and be credited for that chase.
Its not worth mentioning if your opponent runs off hb and delivers the ball to a teammate..

We saw what happened to Dan Rioli how poor he was when he just a pressure fwd. Your fwds have to be both damaging with ball and be able to tackle and pressure . They cannot be good at one and poor at the other.

Our ball use and our tackling are deplorable and if honest we are lucky to have 6 points imo those 6 points are papering over the cracks.

What continues to concern me is we are going backwards when it comes to regeneration of players.

Last year Ralphsmith played 13 games so far just 1 and that was forced thru injury, Sonsie played 7 great games and is yet to appear. He is one who would help greatly with the skill problems.
Cumberland 9 games last year well really 8 as he was sub for one game he has so far had just a 1/2 of footy and only played because of injury.  Clarke played three very promising games is classy would help with skills but has just one game, again only because of injury.
Miller 11 games just 1 game this year.
Gibcus well no ones fault because he is injured but it still does not help.

Fair dinkum the expectation should be all these kids play regular afl footy this year and we go some way to regenerate the team which needs to happen if we are going to be a genuine threat imo.

This all leads to one thing.The total lack of trust in our kids to perform there is no desire to play them in front of some aging favorites and ordinary role players.