Are we a BASKETBALL team now?

[Dry Rot]

Inspiration from coaches only lasts 5 minutes. It has to come from within!

You know a fair bit about this coaching caper. If you were Bevo, what would you be doing now? Go back to basics? Get clearances, tackling and defending right?

[Happy Days]

We aren't a basketball team because basketball teams routinely score over 100 points and are fun to watch.

[jeemak]

I commented in the game day thread, the lack of physicality at the centre bounces seemed to set the tone. We tended to let them out without any willingness to to slow or even startle them. We really needed to assert some physicality and force multiple stoppages, because WCE seemed to have the answers on the spread.

It was frustrating that our players, who seem to be getting dumber by the minute, couldn't register this as a basic that needed to be taken care of.

[Twodogs]

Rather curious oversight in the story, isn't it?

My personal favourite is Yabby Jeans' "You've got to pay the price" at HT in the 1989 GF.

I only wish Al Pacino's "Inches" speech from Any Given Sunday was a real coach's speech. Its one of my favourite cinema monologues of all time.

I saw a thing on YouTube that is like a compendium of famous Australian footy coaches half time address's but I don't think that "you've got to pay a price" was on it. Think they went with another Alan Jeans. He had a gift for communicating an idea and a question and a challenge and a dig at you with half a dozen words. One day I fluked a seat right behind John Kennedy and Dermott Brereton not long after Dermie had retired. Dermie leant over to Kennedy and said "I'm going into the media, teach me how to read what's happening on the field" I was captivated. I assume it was a bulldogs/Hawthorn game but I couldn't tell you for sure but I can tell you almost verbatin what Kennedy said about the game.

One thing in that Any Given Sunday speech, at one stage Al Pacino says "I want you to turn to the man next to you and look deep into his eyes" and of the two guys they film at that particular moment one of them is wearing sunglasses!

Inspiration from coaches only lasts 5 minutes. It has to come from within!

Yep. If you are relying on somebody else to provide you with the motivation or inspiration to give your best then you are in the wrong game.

[westdog54]

Yabbies other famous one was in (I think) 1983 when the players got in a circle and pledged "no matter what, we will do it today".

[Twodogs]

Yabbies other famous one was in (I think) 1983 when the players got in a circle and pledged "no matter what, we will do it today".

I don't think it's that either? It might have been the sausages analogy. "Footballers are like sausages. You can grill them, fry them or curry them but in the end they are still footballers"

[Remi Moses]

The guarding of space is seriously another thing that is infuriating.
40 odd tackles ! BTW basketball is more physical than what we dish up

[anfo27]

The guarding of space is seriously another thing that is infuriating.
40 odd tackles ! BTW basketball is more physical than what we dish up

Yep, guarding space doesn't work when the player with the ball is under no pressure.

[Sedat]

Contested ball and clearances aren't the be-all and end-all to success - Hawks 3-peated with a game plan that regularly lost both measurements. But defensive intensity to win the ball back from the opposition is a non-negotiable, and that has been completely missing from our last 2 weeks.

[Greystache]

Contested ball and clearances aren't the be-all and end-all to success - Hawks 3-peated with a game plan that regularly lost both measurements. But defensive intensity to win the ball back from the opposition is a non-negotiable, and that has been completely missing from our last 2 weeks.

It depends on your skill level.

If you're highly skilled you don't have to get your hands on the ball as much because you can burn teams with efficiency. Especially if you can intercept the ball in defense. That was the Hawthorn model.

If you're a low skill team you have to win volumes of footy and batter teams to death with repetition. That was our model.

Currently we're not trying to win volume but have the worst skills in the AFL. Hence we're dead last with a percentage of 47%

[Ozza]

Contested ball and clearances aren't the be-all and end-all to success - Hawks 3-peated with a game plan that regularly lost both measurements. But defensive intensity to win the ball back from the opposition is a non-negotiable, and that has been completely missing from our last 2 weeks.

They didn't lose the tackle count though. Although the Hawks didn't necessarily win contested ball of clearance counts - they were always right up there in the pressure indicators.

[Sedat]

It depends on your skill level.

If you're highly skilled you don't have to get your hands on the ball as much because you can burn teams with efficiency. Especially if you can intercept the ball in defense. That was the Hawthorn model.

If you're a low skill team you have to win volumes of footy and batter teams to death with repetition. That was our model.

Currently we're not trying to win volume but have the worst skills in the AFL. Hence we're dead last with a percentage of 47%

100% right with regard to skill level - the Hawks had this in spades. But they also harrassed and tackled incessantly when they didn't have the ball - many of their defensive intercepts were created further up the ground with their pressure on the opposition ball-carrier.

Our lamentable skills certainly aren't helping but the defensive pressure has dropped off astronomically compared to our high watermark of 2016 finals.

[bulldogsthru&thru]

100% right with regard to skill level - the Hawks had this in spades. But they also harrassed and tackled incessantly when they didn't have the ball - many of their defensive intercepts were created further up the ground with their pressure on the opposition ball-carrier.

Our lamentable skills certainly aren't helping but the defensive pressure has dropped off astronomically compared to our high watermark of 2016 finals.

What i don't understand is that all of the above, and everything on this forum and everything the media and armchair expert is saying, is pretty fundamental. Surely the club isn't so daft to be missing all these basic points. Is there something completely revolutionary that Bevo has implemented and the young list is completely incapable of following at the moment? I mean, i'm just at a loss for the inexcusable inability to perform the games fundamentals.

[bornadog]

What i don't understand is that all of the above, and everything on this forum and everything the media and armchair expert is saying, is pretty fundamental. Surely the club isn't so daft to be missing all these basic points. Is there something completely revolutionary that Bevo has implemented and the young list is completely incapable of following at the moment? I mean, i'm just at a loss for the inexcusable inability to perform the games fundamentals.

What do you expect with Richards, 1 game, Naughton 2, English 4, Gowers 2 and another 4 played with less than 30 games. Yes its the old young card, but it is fact. We haven't been this inexperienced since Rhode days.