I didn't hear it that way. I thought he said it could fail in the first 15 mins or it could work. Meaning luck plays a part with these plans.

I took from the press conference that he was pretty happy with White.

You heard right club.

_________________
I hope Essendon* folds.

There's no doubt White subdued Martin on the night. But you can't just view it that way.

We went into the game with numerous negating players which translates to all other areas of the ground. How do you set a zone for your forward entries when you have 3 taggers running around? Most teams set a press as soon as the ball is in their forward line. The remaining 12 players press up and set whatever zone they're trained in. 3,4,5- 4,4,4, whatever it is.
The players spend 6 months setting their zones and suddenly theres 3 holes in it.
Good teams will rebound their defensive 50 if one player is 2 or 3 metres out of position.
What hope have we got when we're trying to set a 12 man zone with 9 players.

You're also allowing the opposition to control the movements of our players. Martin runs inside defensive 50, stands one of our forwards and the Carlton forwards opponent stands off the stoppage and becomes an exit player with zero pressure.
Watching the Bullants on Friday was exactly the same. Our players are attracted to the stoppage and allow their opponents to step out and become running options. FFS, only one player cash win the contested ball. Having 10 in there and allowing their opponents to drop off is Under 10s stuff.

Same for our defensive rebound options. Our defenders are looking for mids to break and create fast movement options. Instead they've got their hands up the Richmonds players bums.
AFL stats tell us Richmond launched 65 chains from defensive side of centre for 27 inside 50s and a total score of 56 points. No Carlton defensive press, no pressure on Richmond players to stay on their opponents. Carlton launched 68 chains from defensive side of centre for 10 inside 50s. So for every time we won the ball defensive side of centre, we got the ball inside 50 just under 1 in every 7 efforts. Ask yourself why. No options, no run. Not enough players with an offensive mindset.

_________________
Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

You blokes need to read body language. He said that and then got defensive when pressed further. He was happy with White's application but the tactic failed to have the impact intended, i.e. shutting down Martin's uncontested possessions at all costs did @#$%&! all.

_________________
29 different attributes,
And only 7 that you like;
20 ways to see the world,
Or 20 ways to start a fight.

Nope.

_________________
I hope Essendon* folds.

Thank you for your bristling and in-depth commentary dane... sorry... cimm.

_________________
29 different attributes,
And only 7 that you like;
20 ways to see the world,
Or 20 ways to start a fight.

What do you put the planning and selection down to BV?

Personally, I think MM is basically a defensive guy who get's more defensive when he's anxious/excited.

First game of the year is as about as exciting as you can get apart from finals.

_________________
I hope Essendon* folds.

He was happy with how it went, it's @#$%&! obvious from the presser.

Body language my fat freckle.

_________________
I hope Essendon* folds.

He didnt play taggers in 2010 when he caught the league out with the press. He knows that taggers throw out the shapes .
He must have some reason for doing it. Can't imagine what it is but we did look ok for a quarter and a half.

Thought he looked injured.
Brave effort to play on.
Maybe he can be cut done slack.

_________________
"I'll tell you what I didn't do;
I never injected anyone."
AD 3/3/14

For the Richmond game I said we'd maul those nuff nuff's and we lost, so its only logical this time I say Westcoast will maul us!

Live long and prosper

I don't blame the players.

You ask why? - B/c for >50% of the time the ball was in our back half, we have ZERO players forward of the middle of the ground

That was a clear structural issue and caused players to handball around rather than kick long and the occasional long kicks out in blind hope. It was pathetic - and the coach is accountable for this.

On tagging - Agree with you that we've been way too defensive - we should have one tagger at most - if everitt, carazzo, curnow and white are all going to play as taggers, then 3 need to be dumped from the team. At the very least everitt/white are flexible enough to play more attacking roles IF released.

We can't play,
Carrazzo, Bell, Curnow and Cripps all in the same team..
Cripps and Carrazzo for me, the other two offer no skill at all..
Need some zip, Buckley, Tutt and Boekhorst offer that..
Will Walker come straight in??
Would like too see Yarran play forward, Docherty, Buckley and Simpson take care coming out of the backline..
We have about 15 quality players then their is a massive hole..
Anyway for me this week,
Simpson Jamison Tuohy
Buckley Rowe Docherty
Carrazzo Cripps Gibbs
Everitt Henderson Yarran
Menzel Jones Casboult
Wood Murphy Judd
I/C; White Boekhorst Tutt or Walker if fit
Sub; Smith
No chance Bell and Curnow will be dropped but they lack skill and pace..
Casboult at least offers a presence in the forward line...
Need class around the goals and Menzel and Yarran will fit that bill..
Just my silly opinion

It's not just about personnel. The past 2 years we've been 17th and 18th for uncontested possessions. i.e. our game style doesn't promote retaining possession. We play the boundary, kick down the line and continually give the opposition an opportunity to win the ball back.
Compare that to the successful teams who do everything within their power to retain possession. How often do you see our players play on? We continually go back, kick over the mark and rely on contested possession to win the ball. That's 90's football.
Watch the successful teams play. They make every effort to avoid kicking over the mark so they can keep the ball low to move it quicker through the air. Our ball movement after quarter time on Thursday was snail like. You can have Carl Lewis and Usian Bolt in your team but if they don't play in an offensive manner, it means jack shit.

I chuckle when I hear the coaches say the players aren't creating and taking a risk. Yet when the risk doesn't work, Mick is the first to admonish them and kick them up the arse.
You can't have it both ways. The coaches can't ask the players to be creative and take risks and then admonish them when the risk doesnt work.
That creates confusion and when the pressure is applied, the players will always revert to "safe" football. That's where we are. When the pressure is applied, no one wants to be the one to play on, to leave his man and give a running option. No one wants to stick his head up.

_________________
Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

How do you explain the end of last season then BV?

_________________
29 different attributes,
And only 7 that you like;
20 ways to see the world,
Or 20 ways to start a fight.

Yep. Watching a professional team is doesn't have to be a novelty.

For round three, we get a two day advantage (effectively one after the long flight home) over Essendon*, who hopefully will be mauled by Hawthorn in round two.

_________________
THEY LIKE TO SEND UP!!!!!!!!

Until each team plays each other the same number of times, the AFL, as a fair dinkum competition, cannot be taken seriously.

He (Mr Swann) said the honour and pride associated with the club's traditional navy blue jumper was priceless.

Watson and Tutt for Jaksch and Thomas. Not sure if you bring someone in for Smith (Buckley?). Wouldn't lose too much sleep if they pick someone else, but no-one else put their hand up in the twos.

We'll win this.

_________________
BLUES 2010: PAV AND JUDD = FLAGS. DOING IT FOR THE LOVE OF DICK PRATT.

HAVE YOU SIGNED UP FOR TALKINGCARLTON SUPERCOACH 2009 YET?

Chris Judd came back in
And Waite played some blinders
In amongst some terrible floggings

_________________
If you allow the Government to change the Laws in an emergency
They will create an Emergency to change the Laws

i was a bit drunk at the game on thursday so i didn't follow all the match ups etc that closely.

but, i had some random observations.

we had carrazzo, everitt, white, tuohy and curnow all doing tagging roles. they all did pretty well against their opponents, but did not hurt them going the other way. the likes of judd, murphy, gibbs, yarran and simpson got their hands on the ball enough but had crucial skill errors and couldn't stem the flow and play tempo footy when the momentum changed. maybe they were a bit rusty (i hope). i don't think the shocking forward structure helps.

on paper, i think our side is not that bad, but when we have 5 taggers we are doomed. everyone calling into talk back radio is saying it, people on this forum are saying it, it's been said now for the last 2 years, and yet the first game we play this year and it happens again. wake up, mick!

cripps played his best game in the nab cup against g-town playing in the middle. 30 touches and a goal, and lots of setting up play to release the runners - so we go into the next game and play him on a half forward flank and wing - out of the position where he does his best. meanwhile, we have murphy in the middle getting bashed around and being ineffective. smothered - too small these days. it's time to put murphy on the half forward flank and play a boomer harvey type role. i can imagine him sprinting in off the front of the centre square and receiving dish offs from cripps.

so next week i think we should stick carrazzo on priddis and have only one other run with player. maybe curnow can go to either gaff or shuey because neither of them like being tagged. we should be able to expose their recent loss of key tall defenders by bringing in casboult, but we desperately need a dangerous small forward (shattered to see eddie and jeff killing it this week while we had no small forwards). one of our forwards needs to drag mcgovern out of the play and whoever gets picked up by hurn needs to become our link up player to hurt him going the other way. that could be any of bell, docherty or everitt. i am in two minds about us having played smith as the sub. on one hand it is good reward for the effort he put in over the off season, but on the other, he clearly was not up to it yet and we effectively ran out with one player down just to be nice.

tuohy jamison white
docherty rowe simpson
yarran cripps judd
murphy henderson bell
menzel casboult jones
wood carrazzo gibbs
I/C buckley curnow everitt tutt

ins: buckley, casboult, tutt
outs: thomas, jacksh, smith