Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

[LostDoggy]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

With Johnson, Hahn, Akermanis, Murphy, Hill and Hall in the side we are lacking run - a third of the squad plays almost exclusively in the front half. Moles HAD to play. Bringing Addison in to replace Morris is fine...but the balance just looks wrong. Looking that the stats, all the heavy lifting is being left to Cross and Boyd - with no Ward, we had to play Moles.
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I was sitting there watching and thinking the same thing. Everytime we needed to win the ball we put Huddo, Boydy, Coons and Crossy in the middle. Then I'm looking at our bench, and looking around the ground, and realising that we had no other midfield ball winners! A measure of how far Wardy has come to be so sorely missed, and Moles was a weird omission with the balance out of whack -- too many 'mercurial' types, not enough grunt, and that's the way it certainly looked all over the ground, just couldn't get clean use of the ball anywhere (everytime we did we pretty much scored, so one or two more ball-winners would have probably tipped the match in our favour).

You know, with that line-up, it was clear we were missing the run of Eagleton too, strange as that statement sounds to my ears. He is more important to our 'balance' than most of us give him credit for.

[LostDoggy]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Actually 6 goals flattered us. They missed a lot of sitters.

We missed a fair few as well, to be fair.

[Missing-Dog]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

I thought Everitt was one of the few who at least showed some run and dash from the back half.
Usually Harbrow, Hargrave or Lake would, but they seemed limited compared to usual

[LostDoggy]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

I thought Murphy was our best. I was really disappointed that we played so poorly for Johnno's 350th game. I know we can't change things now, but I wish he was playing it this week.

[Missing-Dog]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Oh also thought Hahn was reasonable, particularly coming back from his injury so soon. Good effort.
Aker and Johnno seemed a touch slow, hope they step up!
Cross also looks slow and not real effective. Never hurts opposition, (griffen also)
Few seasons ago i had Cross above Boyd, but seems as though Boyd as improved and Cross is in decline.
Cross to his credit still works hard and continues to throw his body at the ball on the bottom of the packs.
Id like to see Moles and Ward back in to help out and to give some added toughness and drive.

[LostDoggy]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Who did Picken play on?

He only had 9 touches and as yet hasn't come under any scrutiny for his performance.

Picken did good I thought, always tried hard, stayed on his feet, made his opponent earn every touch.

Lots of doom and gloom and some accusations of complacency around the traps, but I really didn't think we weren't trying -- the flu affected a third of the team and that's a pretty tough thing to overcome: we were competitive (and even be winning) most quarters except the first and then would concede a couple at the end of every quarter as our energy levels dropped off, which is symptomatic of a flu-affected team.

And I think the game reinforced how important Morris is to our team -- no team can lose its best defender and not think that it wouldn't affect it. Medhurst was a huge influence yesterday. Morris plays on him, no influence.

We have to rebound, and rebound strongly in the next few weeks, but Geelong also lost its first game in its 2007 premiership year (to us!) and turned it around. We have won plenty of Round 1 games over the years and done nothing, so it really is the least meaningful round (if there is such a thing) of the home-and-away season.

[Mofra]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

At one stage they had 15 goals and 12 were as a result of our turnovers.

That isn't surprising at all. Our disposal was terrible, especially compared to our normal standards.
Gilbee used to be an elite kick

[Mantis]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Gilbee used to be an elite kick

Who did Gilbee play on?

[G-Mo77]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Who did Gilbee play on?

Can't remember. I hardly noticed him all day. The only time he stood out was when he missed THAT goal.

[Sedat]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

And I think the game reinforced how important Morris is to our team -- no team can lose its best defender and not think that it wouldn't affect it. Medhurst was a huge influence yesterday. Morris plays on him, no influence.

Don't disagree that Morris is extremely important to our defensive structure, by Shaggy has torched Medhurst for fun in the last few encounters so there can't be any complaints about that match-up on the day. Must have been close to Shaggy's worst game in a Bulldogs jumper under Rocket?

Anyway Morris' loss was a good chance to test our vaunted depth in match conditions and by the sounds of it, Addison didn't pass the test with flying colours. Maybe there's a reason that the likes of Addison, Stack and Callan are perenially on the fringes because they simply aren't quite good enough to step up on a consistent basis at AFL level?

[LostDoggy]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Anyway Morris' loss was a good chance to test our vaunted depth in match conditions and by the sounds of it, Addison didn't pass the test with flying colours. Maybe there's a reason that the likes of Addison, Stack and Callan are perenially on the fringes because they simply aren't quite good enough to step up on a consistent basis at AFL level?

Completely agree about everything you said. Morris is a great flexible option that CAN go to a player if he's breaking out, no one else really has that capacity, so Medhurst had a field day.

Re: our depth, another way to look at it would be that we were playing a top 4 (some say top 2) side, so any 'depth' players would be exposed to a certain extent against that level of quality. Depth only goes so far, and I think if they are serviceable against 90% of teams in the comp they would be doing their job. I think it would be reasonable to assume that the three players you've named would do okay against most teams in the comp from Brisbane/Adelaide down, but shouldn't be expected to do much more than fill a strictly defined role in, say, a big final.

[Dry Rot]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

the flu affected a third of the team

Source? The number of players claimed to have had the flu seems to be going up hourly.

[stefoid]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Oh also thought Hahn was reasonable, particularly coming back from his injury so soon. Good effort.
Aker and Johnno seemed a touch slow, hope they step up!
Cross also looks slow and not real effective. Never hurts opposition, (griffen also)
Few seasons ago i had Cross above Boyd, but seems as though Boyd as improved and Cross is in decline.
Cross to his credit still works hard and continues to throw his body at the ball on the bottom of the packs.
Id like to see Moles and Ward back in to help out and to give some added toughness and drive.

You are so, so wrong about cross. His gut running, defensive efforts, and link play make him one of our most effective onballers, especially in close under defensive pressure of the opposition.

Would it surprise you to know that cross had 5 assists to his name yesterday (most of our side) AND 5 tackles (most of our side)? Or that he was our 2nd best possession winner and contest possession winner behind Boyd?

There is couple of nice stats from pro-stats that I like to look at which tell you how often a player is involved in a piece of play that results in a shot on goal, and how many times a player does something that initiates a chain of possessions that results in a shot on goal, and last year cross was right up there in our top 3 or 4 players for that stat, whilst at the same time being top 3 or 4 in most of the defensive indicators such as tackles and 1%ers.

unfortunately the links contained in the following thead are now stale:

http://www.bigfooty.com/forum/showthread.php?t=662615&highlight=moneyball

[Go_Dogs]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Source? The number of players claimed to have had the flu seems to be going up hourly.

Not what I like to read to be honest. If they were sick, so be it, but keep it quiet - it looks weak imo with these sort of "excuses" being ran so heavily in the media.

[LostDoggy]

Re: Game Day - R1 Western Bulldogs vs Collingwood

Source? The number of players claimed to have had the flu seems to be going up hourly.

Haha.. just like flu!