I reckon the Maggies and the Crows had a crack at it last year and were successful to a point. We looked like we tried it a bit against freo over there and it looked good in the second half. Maybe we will grow into it once we get a few other things right.

Jordan's disposal is no longer considered a liability. Has built up his confidence and his judgement. Was always technically sound when it came to his kicking.

I would not class Scotland a poor kick. Having said that he lacks judgement when disposing off the ball and far too often goes for the wrong option contributing to the turnover. I for one am glad he no longer plays in defence because his turnovers were killing us. Far too often he gains possession and rather than give it off quickly to his first available option he hold on to it does his usual wide arc turn on to his preferred foot and kicks it under pressure. Cant teach an old dog the modern team game I am afraid.

I would AJ as an inconsistent kick as is Hadley and Carrots. To be fair Jamieson tends to kick grubbers whilst under pressure resulting in turnovers. We have too many poor kicks in the side to justify transitioning to a tempo game plan. We just cant execute it effectively.

Conundrum

When the Saints game-plan has won them a flag, then come back to.

Every trend in Footy is influenced by the previous Premier, but the next Premier will never play exactly the same way as the once preceeding it. and the reason is the players you have at your disposal.

Geelong have a champion Full-back, solid tall defenders, a stellar midfield and competitive blokes up forward. They win their ball in the middle and back themselves to beat their man.

St. Kilda choke sides for options, move the ball quickly from turnovers and have one of the competitions premier players at CHF to funnel their attacks through (but this hasn't won them a flag).

The Hawks used the rolling zone, covered their lack of talls down back by making sure Hodge was loose, and backed their forwards to kick the higher score.

They both adopted and modified this from Sydney, who backed their midfield to win stoppages at all costs. When the opposition had the ball they forced stoppages to reactivate their advantage. They had a good full-back, attacking half-backs and good players forward. They also had fanatical devotion to the plan.

The next Premier will not play exactly the same way as any of the other recent winners.
They will play a style of game that might reflect this, but also suit the players they have.

alas VB, we do not have an emoticon for irony

_________________
NG
S M C , S F L

Because we lack the discipline required. St Kilda had a mature, high quality list and it still took them a couple of years to perfect it.

I could just imgaine the reaction on here to the boring, flooding football we'd have to endure while the gameplan was being implemented.

More to do with the coach not the playing list. I remember Ross Lyon was laughed at in his first season at the helm. He diligently changed the style of football St kilda played. His focus from the outset was on full ground defensive pressure, defensive/midfield & forward zone set ups and how to link the 3 zones together to play a fluent and adaptable style of footy.

In hindsight you can see that he used the first year to teach and evolve the mindset of his playing list.

St Kilda play accountable pressure zones whether they are defending or attacking. their players are positioned to execute this style of footy. Carlton on the other hand play like headless chooks and get pushed out wide far too often and get slammed when they turn the ball over and or are harrassed when they have the ball.

I'm sorry to say this as a passionate Carlton member but Ratten is not up to it. He is a great motivator of men but I have seen better tactical ideas being used in Under16's footy than what he has managed in close to 3 years.

I cringed recently when I heard him talk about teaching the players to play tempo footy WTF!!! thats just a basic fundamental tactic that's been part of footy for the last 15 years.

st.kilda game plan consists of one thing.

revolt

if he ever gets injured, they are gone.

nope, we are heading in the right direction.

_________________
Got to love the stare Down by Setanta on Llyod

Couldn't agree more. Take Revolt out of their team and put him in ours and I would back us to win every time. The competition is that close.

Every grand final these days is won by a team that can cope with extreme pressure. St.Kilda, Geelong and Hawthorn have shown they can play in that pressure. Collingwood and Adelaide can't, and the jury is out on the Dogs. We've got to develop a list of blokes that can do that before we'll have a chance, and for mine we're not too far off.

Please learn some Carlton history before posting.

Since 1980 we have won 4 flags, 1981, 1982, 1987 and 1995.

St. Kilda have lost 2 flags, oh and so have we 1993 and 1999.

Flogging a bottom 4 team is hardly something to follow.

We want to play well when the chips are down and we are playing finals.

Its a good question VB.

As some have mentioned successful game plans are eventually countered so by the time sides have rushed to duplicate the Swans game plan, teams have worked out you need to either hold on to the ball or split the zone with pin point passing, rather than bombing it long to your forward targets.

Already we're seeing game plans to counter zoning, some of them effective. An interesting part of a game plan that came up in Round 1 was West Coast's kickins. Brisbane were playing an 18 man zone with everyone up to the half back line. West Coast left their forwards in place and then flooded the area they were kicking in to then ran the ball away and licked over their half forwardline where they had free men deeper inside 50.

St Kilda may hold teams to low scores, but they're also scoring low themselves.

I'd rather see Carlton employ game plans that can counter St Kilda's all over the ground pressure, Hawthorns zones and Geelongs high posession game. Be different so that in 3-4 years time the opposition are asking themselves exactly what game plan Carlton are employing to make it so successful and then how do we counter it.

_________________
"The ability to speak doesn't make you intelligent." Qui-Gon Jinn 15-05-2005

"there’s more chance of me becoming the full forward for the [Western Bulldogs] than there is of any change in the Labor Party." Julia Gillard 18-05-2010

So many Blues fans think that its our divine right to return to the top and that St Kilda will always fail, just because they have done so historically.

Geelong were another team that many arrogant pundits thought would never win another flag, now look at them.

There's no such thing as omens and everything that happens happens for a reason

St kilda havent played anyone of note as yet so steady on - swans (who are mid-low end of ladder) + north (rubbish team, my tip for the spoon)

You used the 60 to 1 scoreline as an example but did you consider that North have lost around 1,000 games of experience since last season? - watt (127 games), power (123 games), simpson (306 games), harris (149 games), gibson (65 games), smith (27 games) are all gone - thats 797 games (av. 132/player or 6.5 seasons of footy/player). These players were replaced with an array of 18yos via the draft with 0 games of experience.

During the preseason, the roos then lost petrie to injury (176 games of experience) along with lesser lights (but still top 22 atm) in greenwood (11 games) & lower (34 games). If you add up the above games then that's basically 1,018 games that have been sucked out of a north team that finished 13th last season. Combine that with the loss of a good coach (laidley) that has been replaced with an unknown (scott) and a captain that has possibly played one season too many and its no wonder they got pulverised by the saints.

In terms of game plan and defensive ability St kilda isnt actually anything special - Yes their ball pressure is good but more often than not they are carried over the line by reidwoldt. Overall though they are just a strong team that gets a lot of the ball (like many before them). By denying opponents possession, they are able to get away with a moderate defence (as opposed to outstanding). Their defence lacks KP depth (hudgeton+mcguire gone) - If either of dawson or blake (FB/CHB) went down then I'd suspect you would see goddard being asked to play a key post down back.

If you compare where we are atm with the saints, the saints started there rebuild with the drafting of reidwoldt/kozzie in 2000-1. This year is actually their 10th post#1 pick (reidwoldt/kossie) season. We only started rebuilding in the murphy draft (05-06 - prior years we had no access to early draft picks). This year is murphy's 5th season on the list.

The saints played finals in reidwoldt's 4th season on the list (04) - we played finals in murphy's 4th season on the list (09). Whilst we lost our 1 final last year (saints made preim in 04) we arent actually tracking that badly in terms of our development.

Saints 04 blowout losses - port 46 points, melbourne 57 points, lions 45 & 80 points (net 228 points ie average 57 points/game)
blues 09 blow out losses - crows 44 points, dons 69 points, pies 54 points, crows 72 points (net 239 points ie average 59.75 points/game

Have a look at the flag contenders from 09 that are expected to be around the mark this year - we pushed the saints (9 points) & hawks (4 points), broke even with the lions (1 point shortfall) & pies 3 point shortfall) and beat the cats (35 points) & dogs (43 points). The only side that we truly struggled against were the crows (who have been dismal thus far this year)

The only players of significant that we have lost from 09 are Fev (23 games, 89 goals ie av. 3.9/game) & stevens (17 games, av. 23 disposals, 0.5 goals/game).

Our additions though are significant - mclean+henderson & return of jamison++walker+warnock from injury and have the potential to cover the loss of fev+stevens.

Whilst its early days, mclean's output (av. 27 touches, 1 goal/game) is exceeding that of stevens (different roles) and our more importantly the current forward setup (3 talls setanta+henderson+waite - av. 6.5/game) is matching the 09 setup of fev (av. 3.9/game)+setanta+waite+cloke (combined av. 3/game) (ie 7/game)

For our current team 09->10
backline - will be much stronger if we can avoid significant injuries - particularly given physical development+increased experience
mids - potential to be stronger - mclean freeing up judd, further physical development of murphy+gibbs,
forwards - the great unknown but promising as explained above. We have definitely improved our small forwards though (betts fitter, yarran an upgrade on garlett, robinson stronger)
rucks - will be improved upon last year - warnock is matching hampson/jacobs output last season atm and should improve as he builds match fitness, kreuzer's physical development.

FWIW, I think we are a good chance of beating the saints when we meet in a few weeks time - we should get enough of our own ball and from there be able to create enough scoring opportunities.

You have my vote to be coach brother

_________________
It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

Yes but my point is they kept nearly all teams scoreless last year, and the trend seems to be continuing this year.

It's not just North.

They did it regularly, week in week out last year.

Every time you turn on the TV it was Saints 70 vs Opposition 12

Unbelievable scorelines

_________________
It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

Obviously there's a great deal we can learn tactically from the better sides. But I suspect their defensive 'press' wouldn't look quite so effective without the absolute superstar attacking weapon that is Nick Riewoldt. Likewise with Hawthorn and Buddy and Roughead. It helps a great deal having forwards capable of beating 2 or 3 defenders.

Interesting point about Riewoldt etc. I hadn't thought of that.

_________________
It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it

exaggeration much? Saints just play a low scoring game style rather than blow opposition out of the park

From last years games
1st quarter
saints kept below 3 goals in first quarter - 6 times/25 games (including a few of the above games), opposition kept below 3 goals in first quarter - 14 times/25 games
In comparison, the cats 07 team
cats kept below 3 goals in first quarter - 3 times/25 games (including a few of the above games), opposition kept below 3 goals in first quarter - 14 times/25 games

saints 5 goal+ 1st quarters - 8 times
cats 5 goal+ 1st quarters - 14 times

The cats in 07 had a lot more lopsided scorelines than saints in 09.

Incidentally, for all quarters
saints kept below 3 goals in a quarter - 30 times, opposition kept below 3 goals in a quarter - 59 times
cats kept below 3 goals in a quarter - 24 times, opposition kept below 3 goals in a quarter - 49 times

Throughout the evolution of game plans 1 thing has remained pretty constant.

The team that brings the greatest tackling , contested ball and running intensity usually comes out on top.

You out tackle your opp you will win 90% of games, which is what Saints did last year.
But they were beaten at their own game in the NAB cup GF and the doggies posted a very healthy score.

fitness and mature bodies are obviously a key ingredient, but specific coaching re pressure also paramount