The Bulldogs Bite
30-06-2008, 02:18 AM
Honestly believe we are changing the guard as far as a forward line structure is concerned. Not exactly that you must have all 6'ft blokes who can run, kick & mark - but the days of having a gun CHF/FF to win you games of football is basically gone.
I don't intend to harp on about this too much because it's not a success until a flag is won, but my point is, other clubs will have to now seriously start looking at the types of players they recruit for their forward half. We have a very wide spread of capable goal kickers - our forwards are all consistent players that are able to kick 1-4 goals a game and set others up. Jonathan Brown commented on this, saying it's impossible to stop because we have so many options.
It's "nice" to have a gun FF, but I'm not so sure they are helping their sides. If you take a look below you'll notice a familiar pattern;
Lions: Brown & Bradshaw combo - lethal - but two players can't kick 16+ goals every week. The Lions lack fire power even though they have two of the best KPF's in the comp.
Blues: If Fevola fails to kick less than 5, they're not going to win many games. They've improved from other years but even so, they've won their last few games because of Fevola. Against the better sides, Fev's impact is minimized and Carlton lose.
Richmond: Richo's had a different role this year, but only because having him up at FF meant they had no other options. If he didn't kicka bag, it was hard for them to win. They've changed that around, trying to develop Hughes, Morton etc. and have had some success.
Fremantle: Pavlich is a superstar, and to a lesser extent Tarrant. Again; if Pav doesn't play well and kick 5+, Fremantle struggle. They really don't have too many other options.
St. Kilda: Riewoldt, Kosi & Gehrig prior to injury. It worked about three, four years ago. Not now. Too top heavy and they really struggle to kick winning scores, hence their defensive tactics. Riewoldt & Kosi are average goal kickers too - so it hurts them. Milne's their other one but he's largely inconsistent. Key - restrict Roo/Kosi & the game's won.
Hawthorn: They could be excused for not being put on this list, but there's enough evidence to suggest that they rely on two men to forge a winning score at the end of the day. They're lucky both Franklin & Roughead are in career best form, but the two games they've lost has been because both were restricted. Williams is not as dangerous as he was & Rioli (understandably) has dropped off a bit. They aren't in dire need of more goal kickers, BUT, going into a Finals series it's not great to rely on two players so heavily. They've struggled every time these two haven't blitzed it and that has to be a worry. Hodge kicking goals is really helping them, though.
Obviously you could add a couple of other sides (Eg. Essendon) but you get the point. If you take all of the above into account and you match them to The Dogs, Cats & Swans - you see why these three teams are ahead of the rest. Dogs have Minson, Cats Mooney & Swans Hall to act as the FF/CHF in the setup and whilst they rarely 'dominate' games, they usually contribute every week either kicking a few or in Minsons case, setting them up. These three sides have a wide range of scorers and it proves much harder to handle. Franklin, Roughead, Fevola, Pavlich Brown etc. are all better KPF forwards than Minson, Mooney & Hall - they're all absolute superstars and ARE hard to stop, but the point is, when they are - their teams really struggle. The Pies are unlucky they've had injuries but their set-up works too. Rocca/Cloke to contest with Didak, Davis & Medhurst - it's a dangerous & hard to stop forward line.
With all this being said, I think this is where football must go - if you want to win a premiership, you really can't afford one main target to such an extent that it hinders the rest of the side when they aren't performing. Whether that's something that's coached (IE. Not instructing them to kick it to the gun FF 80%+ of the time) or whether it's to do with recruiting, I'm not sure - it might end up being a bit of both - but I don't think you can ignore the facts. 5 or 6 forwards are harder to smother than 1 or 2, and I think we'll see a real push for this in the coming years.
It's basically our weapon this year and along with other obvious factors, why we're better than we were in '06 (relying on Johnson). Whilst Geelong did this last year, I think we've further emphasized on it this year and therefore believe it's going to be a trend or pattern that other teams are going to HAVE to follow if they wish to keep up.
I don't intend to harp on about this too much because it's not a success until a flag is won, but my point is, other clubs will have to now seriously start looking at the types of players they recruit for their forward half. We have a very wide spread of capable goal kickers - our forwards are all consistent players that are able to kick 1-4 goals a game and set others up. Jonathan Brown commented on this, saying it's impossible to stop because we have so many options.
It's "nice" to have a gun FF, but I'm not so sure they are helping their sides. If you take a look below you'll notice a familiar pattern;
Lions: Brown & Bradshaw combo - lethal - but two players can't kick 16+ goals every week. The Lions lack fire power even though they have two of the best KPF's in the comp.
Blues: If Fevola fails to kick less than 5, they're not going to win many games. They've improved from other years but even so, they've won their last few games because of Fevola. Against the better sides, Fev's impact is minimized and Carlton lose.
Richmond: Richo's had a different role this year, but only because having him up at FF meant they had no other options. If he didn't kicka bag, it was hard for them to win. They've changed that around, trying to develop Hughes, Morton etc. and have had some success.
Fremantle: Pavlich is a superstar, and to a lesser extent Tarrant. Again; if Pav doesn't play well and kick 5+, Fremantle struggle. They really don't have too many other options.
St. Kilda: Riewoldt, Kosi & Gehrig prior to injury. It worked about three, four years ago. Not now. Too top heavy and they really struggle to kick winning scores, hence their defensive tactics. Riewoldt & Kosi are average goal kickers too - so it hurts them. Milne's their other one but he's largely inconsistent. Key - restrict Roo/Kosi & the game's won.
Hawthorn: They could be excused for not being put on this list, but there's enough evidence to suggest that they rely on two men to forge a winning score at the end of the day. They're lucky both Franklin & Roughead are in career best form, but the two games they've lost has been because both were restricted. Williams is not as dangerous as he was & Rioli (understandably) has dropped off a bit. They aren't in dire need of more goal kickers, BUT, going into a Finals series it's not great to rely on two players so heavily. They've struggled every time these two haven't blitzed it and that has to be a worry. Hodge kicking goals is really helping them, though.
Obviously you could add a couple of other sides (Eg. Essendon) but you get the point. If you take all of the above into account and you match them to The Dogs, Cats & Swans - you see why these three teams are ahead of the rest. Dogs have Minson, Cats Mooney & Swans Hall to act as the FF/CHF in the setup and whilst they rarely 'dominate' games, they usually contribute every week either kicking a few or in Minsons case, setting them up. These three sides have a wide range of scorers and it proves much harder to handle. Franklin, Roughead, Fevola, Pavlich Brown etc. are all better KPF forwards than Minson, Mooney & Hall - they're all absolute superstars and ARE hard to stop, but the point is, when they are - their teams really struggle. The Pies are unlucky they've had injuries but their set-up works too. Rocca/Cloke to contest with Didak, Davis & Medhurst - it's a dangerous & hard to stop forward line.
With all this being said, I think this is where football must go - if you want to win a premiership, you really can't afford one main target to such an extent that it hinders the rest of the side when they aren't performing. Whether that's something that's coached (IE. Not instructing them to kick it to the gun FF 80%+ of the time) or whether it's to do with recruiting, I'm not sure - it might end up being a bit of both - but I don't think you can ignore the facts. 5 or 6 forwards are harder to smother than 1 or 2, and I think we'll see a real push for this in the coming years.
It's basically our weapon this year and along with other obvious factors, why we're better than we were in '06 (relying on Johnson). Whilst Geelong did this last year, I think we've further emphasized on it this year and therefore believe it's going to be a trend or pattern that other teams are going to HAVE to follow if they wish to keep up.