Bevo's contract

[Bulldogs201616]

His fate could be decided by the half way mark especially with the injuries.

[AshMac]

I think we’ll know by midway through the season. Personally I think the message isn’t getting through and the gameplan is too sporadic and confusing for anyone outside our top 10 players who work through it with pure skill.

id like to see a fresh perspective in the coaches box. I think last year was a fail overall with glimpses of great footy - but not enough of it which is the story of his coaching tenure since 2016.

[GVGjr]

I think we’ll know by midway through the season. Personally I think the message isn’t getting through and the gameplan is too sporadic and confusing for anyone outside our top 10 players who work through it with pure skill.

id like to see a fresh perspective in the coaches box. I think last year was a fail overall with glimpses of great footy - but not enough of it which is the story of his coaching tenure since 2016.

I understand this perspective but he seems to keep the game plan fairly simple and that the playing group understands what is expected of them.
Last year was disappointing and we were always chasing a position in the finals due to the slower start and a couple of embarrassing loses.
My main criticism is that he is to embracing of players not meeting the standards and that he needs to be a bit harder on the group.
This doesn't have to be massive change but more or less sticking to the standards.

[Stevo]

Bevo is a victim to his commitment to the playing group. It all sounds good in theory but over his time since the flag he's traditionally been slow to addressed problematic players.
Sure Stinger, Dahlhaus, Hunter and Smith all got traded and some others retired early but they all would have caused a lot of problems for the group before their departure and his inactivity to address problems cost us Dunkley.
It's going to be a rocky season for us and the coach as everything will get amplified.
Lade will want to start working on his communication skills because at sometime during the season there is a fair chance he's fronting the media as an interim coach.

[AshMac]

I understand this perspective but he seems to keep the game plan fairly simple and that the playing group understands what is expected of them.
Last year was disappointing and we were always chasing a position in the finals due to the slower start and a couple of embarrassing loses.
My main criticism is that he is to embracing of players not meeting the standards and that he needs to be a bit harder on the group.
This doesn't have to be massive change but more or less sticking to the standards.

I agree with that sentiment about darling players and not rewarding form in lower leagues for those out of favour or punishing those who don’t turn up to afl game day.

I honestly can’t figure out our game plan other than a high press. I find the sporadic ball movement an complete lack of cohesion in the forward line look chaotic and disorganised and the general team doesn’t flow as one.

[SonofScray]

I agree with that sentiment about darling players and not rewarding form in lower leagues for those out of favour or punishing those who don’t turn up to afl game day.

I honestly can’t figure out our game plan other than a high press. I find the sporadic ball movement a complete lack of cohesion in the forward line look chaotic and disorganised and the general team doesn’t flow as one.

Cohesion between the lines and in transition certainly isn’t part of the game plan. I hate the SEN pundit “what’s their brand” type of discussions but we are really hard to categorise and have been for a while.

When things are humming, we can be miserly, and persistent team with a good amount of sting moving the ball.

The best parts of Bevo’s best teams have been when the pressure in close has been stifling. Super entertaining to watch and appreciate.

[Critter]

To me, Bevo's bacon was saved last year by the appointment of Daniel Pratt as backline coach. Under his stewardship, we went from underperformers in 2023 to AFL best performers in 2024. An excellent effort that I contend was the main factor in us making the final eight.

Midfield in 2024? Not so well - 12th in Contested Possessions; 10th in Centre Clearances; 14th in Stoppage Clearances; and 15th in Hitouts to Advantage -for an overall 13th ranking. And a very poor Elimination Final performance was the cherry on top.

We've gone with Brendon Lade again this year. For Beveridge's sake, I hope Brendon has spent his summer in introspection and has built up an arsenal of smart coaching ploys. I'm not sure another year of same old, same old is going to cut it.

[Bornadog]

Midfield in 2024? Not so well - 12th in Contested Possessions; 10th in Centre Clearances; 14th in Stoppage Clearances; and 15th in Hitouts to Advantage -for an overall 13th ranking. And a very poor Elimination Final performance was the cherry on top.
.

where did you get your stats from? Are they averages?

I have as totals - Stoppage Clearance- 2nd to Lions, Centre CL as 7th, Overall Cleances 4th and CP as 8th but these are based on total games with us having 24 and Lions etc 25, 26, 27 games. Agree we are down on a few stats.

HTA, I only have Tim 's stats not Team totals. Tim came in at 10th, but with fewer games due to a short finals series - 6 behind the Big O

[mjp]

I agree with that sentiment about darling players and not rewarding form in lower leagues for those out of favour or punishing those who don’t turn up to afl game day.

I kind of think footy sides pick themselves.

When you say 'not rewarding form in lower leagues...who?

I don't really get the 'darling players' piece either.

I honestly can’t figure out our game plan other than a high press. I find the sporadic ball movement an complete lack of cohesion in the forward line look chaotic and disorganised and the general team doesn’t flow as one.

I don't think the game-plan is massively complicated or hard to recognise. To me, if all the players switched jumpers you would have recognised the 2024 Bulldogs because they were pretty consistent in what they did.

- Structure first - we (have been) a 3-tall (forward and back) side who play 1x ruckman and an extra (from forward) at BTA stoppages. The extra gets INSIDE the stop - inside the winger - and the winger generally becomes responsible for outlet cover. The forwards roll-up/round-up the spare...1-ruckman supported by one or more of the tall forwards at CBD and potentially by a 5th inside mid at around the ground stops. Defensively we play a 2-kicker structure (Dale is one, Bramble was most often the other in 24) who have a high set license and we play an anchor when ball is in forward half - Jones is the usual.

- Style - Yep, defensively it's a high press with a hotline bias (anchor) and we try to 'wedge' the oppo on the skinny side to create repeat entries. We are a forward half intercept (mark or gb) team who try to re-enter within (guessing now) 3-seconds of taking possession by kicking high to a tall...again, we try to enter skinny to deny the oppo the fatside outlet as we are not set up to defend from there. Down the other end, our ruck is the LDL option with secondary targets coming from a pair of forwards - one who remains connected to the Ruck (approx 15m behind - usually Naughton) and the other maintains a corridor bias to support the switch (Darcy). 3rd tall is the forward anchor and tries to lengthen the ground/spread the oppo...As the year went on we played a 4th small forward and the focus seemed to be on having a 3-3 or 2-4 fwd line with the smalls being pressure focussed players (West, McNeil, VDM)...there responsibility was primarily surrounding the exit points - skinny and fat - and taking away the short kicks that would enable the oppo to set up their spread....

[josie]

Thx for that analysis mjp. Do you or other woofers reckon we should change that plan, given who we’ve got? And how do we counter some teams like Hawks who have beaten us badly in last few seasons?

[mjp]

Thx for that analysis mjp. Do you or other woofers reckon we should change that plan, given who we’ve got? And how do we counter some teams like Hawks who have beaten us badly in last few seasons?

There are elements of every game plan that are frustrating...or is it just individuals making a sub-optimal decision under oppo pressure? Or maybe a skill error?

Last year:

Hawthorn beat us by 37 and we beat them by 7.
The year before we beat them by 29 and they beat us by 3.

Last year we were poor against Port. 100%. We were poor against Brisbane. We were poor against Melbourne - in terms of team's having 'the wood' on us, maybe it's PORT - we haven't beaten them since the 21 Prelim???

Back to 2024 - The biggest losing margin in those 3x "POOR" games? 48 points.

After the Brisbane game - which was not good - we won 8/10 including wins over Carlton (with no Jones, Naughton or Treloar), Geelong, Sydney and GWS - all of whom played finals.

I totally get the "Bevo's been there too long" discussion - and maybe this is his last year and I'll be OK with that...I just think the angst over the coach - and obviously Cornes is up front driving the bus - is just not based in facts. We all talk about how good the list is and how we should be better - and then that conversation is followed by criticism of half the players in the list 'cos they are no good - the things said about VDM, McNeil and Gardner in particular by Dogs supporters have been not great. Well - if half the players are 'no good' is it really the coaches fault? Maybe it's Sam Power's / Milesi's fault for bringing in the wrong blokes? Maybe plain good luck (zone (Jamarra) and Father Son (Darcy)) has been covering up the failures of the list/recruiting team?? Maybe the removal of Maple from his role has left a gap that was never truly addressed...maybe we are finally coming out of that situation??

I don't think any of these things are completely true. Yes - we should have played better early last year - the loss to Melbourne was terrible and the one to Essendon so disappointing - but teams lose games. The recruiters have assembled a pretty good group and are trying to turn over things at the fringes - and every team needs super-stars AND foot soldiers...

As a total club we prob just need to be 'better' - players, coaches, support staff. Bevo is part of this but not all of this...and if we play better this year some of it - but not all of it - will be down to him...same as if we play worse!

[josie]

Thanks mjp.

One player Port has that I don’t think we have had is a high quality tagger. Red headed chap - name eludes me (Drew?) who is reasonably talented, reasonably quick, very good defensively & good tagger & can find his own ball. Perhaps we’re hoping M Kennedy can be that for us. Reason I mention this is in our big losses we seemed to have no little or answers when there’s a pattern of us being trounced in the middle (which I know is a result of multiple causes).

And Bevo traditionally doesn’t tag elite oppo players either, although that might have changed a bit last year (maybe not a hard tag but more concerted efforts to curb influence, IIRC Gallagher looked like he might have been tried in this type of role, possibly others too).

[Uninformed]

I kind of think footy sides pick themselves.

When you say 'not rewarding form in lower leagues...who?

I don't really get the 'darling players' piece either.



I don't think the game-plan is massively complicated or hard to recognise. To me, if all the players switched jumpers you would have recognised the 2024 Bulldogs because they were pretty consistent in what they did.

- Structure first - we (have been) a 3-tall (forward and back) side who play 1x ruckman and an extra (from forward) at BTA stoppages. The extra gets INSIDE the stop - inside the winger - and the winger generally becomes responsible for outlet cover. The forwards roll-up/round-up the spare...1-ruckman supported by one or more of the tall forwards at CBD and potentially by a 5th inside mid at around the ground stops. Defensively we play a 2-kicker structure (Dale is one, Bramble was most often the other in 24) who have a high set license and we play an anchor when ball is in forward half - Jones is the usual.

- Style - Yep, defensively it's a high press with a hotline bias (anchor) and we try to 'wedge' the oppo on the skinny side to create repeat entries. We are a forward half intercept (mark or gb) team who try to re-enter within (guessing now) 3-seconds of taking possession by kicking high to a tall...again, we try to enter skinny to deny the oppo the fatside outlet as we are not set up to defend from there. Down the other end, our ruck is the LDL option with secondary targets coming from a pair of forwards - one who remains connected to the Ruck (approx 15m behind - usually Naughton) and the other maintains a corridor bias to support the switch (Darcy). 3rd tall is the forward anchor and tries to lengthen the ground/spread the oppo...As the year went on we played a 4th small forward and the focus seemed to be on having a 3-3 or 2-4 fwd line with the smalls being pressure focussed players (West, McNeil, VDM)...there responsibility was primarily surrounding the exit points - skinny and fat - and taking away the short kicks that would enable the oppo to set up their spread....

Thanks for the rundown coach. I got a bit lost after 'see-ball-get-ball'. You'll still play me next week though won't you?

[NAUGHTY100]

I kind of think footy sides pick themselves.

When you say 'not rewarding form in lower leagues...who?

I don't really get the 'darling players' piece either.



I don't think the game-plan is massively complicated or hard to recognise. To me, if all the players switched jumpers you would have recognised the 2024 Bulldogs because they were pretty consistent in what they did.

- Structure first - we (have been) a 3-tall (forward and back) side who play 1x ruckman and an extra (from forward) at BTA stoppages. The extra gets INSIDE the stop - inside the winger - and the winger generally becomes responsible for outlet cover. The forwards roll-up/round-up the spare...1-ruckman supported by one or more of the tall forwards at CBD and potentially by a 5th inside mid at around the ground stops. Defensively we play a 2-kicker structure (Dale is one, Bramble was most often the other in 24) who have a high set license and we play an anchor when ball is in forward half - Jones is the usual.

- Style - Yep, defensively it's a high press with a hotline bias (anchor) and we try to 'wedge' the oppo on the skinny side to create repeat entries. We are a forward half intercept (mark or gb) team who try to re-enter within (guessing now) 3-seconds of taking possession by kicking high to a tall...again, we try to enter skinny to deny the oppo the fatside outlet as we are not set up to defend from there. Down the other end, our ruck is the LDL option with secondary targets coming from a pair of forwards - one who remains connected to the Ruck (approx 15m behind - usually Naughton) and the other maintains a corridor bias to support the switch (Darcy). 3rd tall is the forward anchor and tries to lengthen the ground/spread the oppo...As the year went on we played a 4th small forward and the focus seemed to be on having a 3-3 or 2-4 fwd line with the smalls being pressure focussed players (West, McNeil, VDM)...there responsibility was primarily surrounding the exit points - skinny and fat - and taking away the short kicks that would enable the oppo to set up their spread....

Brilliant work mjp , as an average follower of football and like uniformed stated ( see ball get ball ) , that analysis unfortunately was over my pay grade , id probably get it if you sat me down and explained it step by step , but right there is a great example of why every one should be a full member , analysis like that are priceless , as the saying goes im a much smarter man after reading that , keep the good work comming mjp , and we all should challenge him now and then because i know from experiance mjp will give you the ins and outs of your argument and explain whats really happening .

[mjp]

Whilst all of that is super flattering and I'm happy to read it - I get stuff wrong all the time. Believe what your own eyes see - don't take my interpretation of stuff...the cues I'm watching for might not be real or relevant which means the whole thing is wrong.

If you read something like 'Footballistics' or 'Time and Space' those books will give you a much better idea of how everything works than I ever could. Time and Space is a bit old now but it still provides a great run down of how game-styles and team structures have evolved over time...