diesel95 wrote:
GWS wrote:
grrofunger wrote:
30 years since a flag.
New season.
New excitement.
New disappointments.
New players.
New coaches?
Will be interesting.
Honestly beyond giving a @#$%&!.
Sorry everyone but this club is breaking me.
I have no idea why we are so pathologicaly [REDACTED] but we are and I’m really struggling with how to be a St Kilda type footy fan.
as cripps said, if we knew what was going to happen it would be boring!
looking back with no animosity myself.
a couple of days after this years GF win, a deserved and powerful win to Lions (which i enjoyed watching in the front bar of the Napier for nostalgic reasons) i then watched our almost scoreless first half featuring half our “first pick” team watching on with injury and the rest of the list rendered immobile under a spell from the bowels of Mordor.
I’ve said many times i rate Brisbane’s list as one of — if not the best — in the game for last 5 years or so. majority of their coaches must be v professional at their jobs also.
Well Brisbane did to Sydney in that GF what they did to us in this years EF and in the 2023 PF from 2Q onwards. don’t forget most AFL-world identities, including lots of former elite level players tipped Sydney for the flag, many citing big Oscar being unable to as ruck as the difference but my guess is most would have found some other reason to back Sydney even if he’d been named to play.
My point is nearly nobody in AFL with expertise in the modern game and observing hundreds of games this season objectively saw that demolition coming. especially not Longmire and co given his stunned mullet post-game presser, (poor guy having to do that for and end of the footy year bonus!)
so opinions are worth only so much, and mine even less than the mean
! But i take heart in the fact that we went really close for a while in the 23 PF against arguably the best team for the last 3 years and even beat them in H&A at least twice in that time. some say we were running on empty in the 23 PF fitness wise, though i’m not so sure about that. i think they just did what they did to Sydney in the GF in the 2nd & 3rd qtr and we couldn’t break out of their sleeper hold until the 4th when it was probably too late.
i look at the talent coming in. real players at senior level in the trade now not injury prone projects from GWS or other clubs overflowing with Acadamy talent. and last years drafts while not having a Nick Watson which we desperately need, have some players in Binns, Lord and Moir i reckon.
i’m glass half full. if we can deal with soft tissue and knee injury issues and reduce to near zero (which i believe is possible i will post more on this later) then we are a credible threat in an ever changing game.
my biggest concerns going forward remain outside the playing list:
- game day flexibility in the coaches box
- MC decision making
- strategic preparation and tactics
- game plan that not just is suitable for September and GFs but a long hard season with no “easy” games to rest players
- sponsorship arrangements that don’t sit well with my values and the putative values of the club.
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## MC decision making:
much was made on TC of the Cottrell, Cerra selection and how our entire season collapsed on that one immoral selection day according to some. i didn’t like the selection at the time but i think it was not a thing that broke the team spirit. nor do i think it accounts for the second half of our season.
what i do think reflected was, not so much picking favorites or names over form, so much as a kind of wishful thinking (or perhaps even some magical thinking?) behaviour within the MC as a whole.
they just assumed players could come in and perform at the level. that may or may not be morale sapping, i honestly don’t know bc i have not sources at the player level!, but it does reflect a lack of process, integrity and logical thinking IMHO.
yes we wanted to get more “first pick” talent into the team, but did they consider “what if they can’t match it in this game without demonstrating they can last week in the VFl?”
even if a player trains well for a few weeks, so what? no matter what they say about “match simulation” it’s not the same thing as premiership H&A games. we don’t know oppo players like we know our own. we don’t know their game day tactics like we know our own. and four points are up for grabs.
let’s see players playing well being rewarded with team stability in 2025, even if small forwards are “on rotation” between VFl, not sure how that gets worked out, we might not even have so many small forwards in 2025 and Nic Austin seemed to say that they want more games for Durds, Motlo & Moir as explaining the Matt Owies (slightly embarrassing) saga. I want those three showing VFL form befofe wlazing into the team at the cost of a fit Matt Owies or anyone else that has earned their spot. Moir is a tricky one bc he tended to go missing in VFL for big chuncks of games, espeically early on, but then selected at AFL level from necessity and seems to be at the level and rise to the occasion. who knows, but we need to show more spine at the selection table and have less "conservative" selections from coaches that seem to be more worried about losing the next game than building a “culture of personal sacrifice for the benefit of other players and the team and club” and cultivating “a squad mentality”. this is what we say we are, let’s prove it from the top at the MC selection table every week.
to the MC: have the guts to back your culture — walk the talk on those little things we do when things are not easy, those sacrifices which you say you rate so highly when making speeches and doing pressers. sacrifice the easy "safe" pick of substituting a well performing lesser player with an unproven better player returning from injury. consider the "culture building” and “less risky" choice of rewarding a lesser player for doing his job the week before rather than pulling him in a like-for-like swap just because on paper you have a better option.
now that would be a squad-first mentality in practice and modelling those things you claim to value most.
the idea that the previously injured, incoming player will play to their maximum ability without demonstrating superior form in the VFL team the week before is not good risk assessment or decision logic. its arguably just wishful thinking and not as "safe" as perhaps our (subconscious) mental conditioning makes it “feel” it is.
a new inclusions returning from months out of H&A games due to injury needs to play pretty close to his best to be sure to play better than the lesser light they forced out. that’s how close performance margins are at the elite level. we don’t have too many Usan Bolts on our list that torch the comp any time they show up.
but we have a few such players. obviously a few players are granted full immunity from such a harsh stance, the leadership group of Cripps, Walsh, Weiters and Charlie, plus I think we have to add a few talls to that list too, Harry for sure, probably Gov and depending on injuries… possibly other KP players as determined by match-ups on the day. all the rewt of the list arent too good to play one game of VFL.
managing a senior player with a week off and not playing it at VFL is the only other obvious exception.
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Plus Austin made it clear Williams will be doing his first preseason ever with the forwardline.
: Owies Motlop Durdin Williams Fogarty Fantasia...Cottrell. Fkn 7 of them on a list of 44. I really dislike playing more than 2 small forwards. And end of 2025 will see the end of Fantasia and Fogarty, leaving us with 24yo Cottrell, 21yo Motlop and 22yo Durdin and maybe Williams if he earns another contract with Carlton, and there's a strong possibility Austin drafts the speedy goal kicking mid in Berry this year....ie a bit of balance.