bondiblue wrote:
Beijing Blue wrote:
robertbb wrote:
What separates us from the top teams is, in this order:
1) Intensity and work ethic ("lapses")
2) Ball handling, resulting in turnovers.
The first can be instilled and developed as part of culture.
The second can be improved... a bit...
I would add strength (men against boys) and poor skills as significant as well.
A few of our players are still light weights and some middle weights who
can't hold their ground against more seasoned bodies.
Kids like Cats captain Selwood and the likes, Hodge, were
aggressive ball at all costs players and if they can inflict pain and injury in a game of attrition, they would.
We need to develop a bit of mongrel. IF players can be conditioned to become this if they are not blessed with white line fever, then that's th job of the psychologist: over to you Tara. Tara seems to be too nice and new age to focus on those qualities we seem to lack.
I hope we come out of this lockdown a different team: I doubt it.
Interesting comments, and valid but two comploetely different scenarios.
Hodge, Lewis, Selwood were/are all happy to take one for the team if they have to. Trouble is, they rarely have to because the umpires are bluffed by them and the MRP is unwilling to suspend anybody anymore unless he (or she) is a relative unknown or the victim is absolutely poleaxed.
If some opposition player is getting too much of the footy, a stray elbow or backhander is always on. Maybe a slightly late tackle or slightly late and high and a trip to the tribunal for a fine. We know coaches like Clarkson, Matthews, the Scotts send players out to hurt the opposition because after they retire, players go on to Open Mike or some other Fox show and tell us in not so many words. You know, wink, wink, nudge nudge....
I was and am in favour of the automatic suspension rule. Punch? Guilty = 1 week. High impact, medium force, out of the play just add weeks, they don't decide whether a suspension is warranted. In ONE week, there would be no more sly punches or jumper punches. None. No more elbows, late high hits. NONE.
"But it was just a tap in the guts while he was running past, your honour." "That's OK, advocate. 1 week for starters.... Now lets assess the impact, shall we?"
Players like we have without the strong bodies get bullied on field by the likes of the above. Martin has caused two broken larynxes. "By gee he's hard to tackle, isn't he eh, Dermott?"
Selwood we know about. Ablett had to go weeks in a row before they decided he wasn't outside the law. "Yes it was a punch/elbow to the head but it wasn't that hard. The other player got up again straight away. What's more he hasn't been reported for more than 300 games and this would put a stain on an otherwise impeccable record"
The Dows and O'Briens of the world are probably intimidated by the players they know will belt them behind play or push them into the fence, jump into their back, give them a short one to the ribs and so on and they don't have the confidence or size to retaliate. Nor should they have to. Cripps retaliated on behalf of Dow or someone once last year and got a free kick reversed that cost a goal. Result? You have to let your small players get knocked around without defending them. How can that be right?
It shouldn't be up to teams to recruit bullies. It should be up to the system to punish them when they get caught out, which they often do.
Remember Chris Grant? The pundits are gnashing their teeth decades later because he only punched one person in the mouth for the entire year. He was robbed! Yeah! Lets give everybody one punch in the face to the player of their choice per year, shall we? Because of the Grant furore, twenty two years later, Brownlow favourites are getting off because the judge is too scared to apply the laws of the game in case they get pilloried. How can someone punch someone else in the guts so hard he vomits and the force be declared insufficient to warrant suspension? They might just as well do away with the no punching rule altogether.
Well at the end of 2018 the AFL declared there would be zero tolerance of punches in 2019. The VERY FIRST round, Robbo and Whateley were all over the MRP for not suspending either Liam Ryan or Ben Cunnington for striking. Both guilty, both fined and fine reduces for early guilty plea. Try getting an early guilty plea if it's an automatic suspension.
FIX THE SYSTEM. Don't make small, skilled players scared to get the footy in case they get sniped at by a Selwood chicken wing, a Gary Ablett elbow to the face, Dustin Martin fend off to the throat, Toby Greene boot to the face, Nat Fyfe elbow to the face, Lachie Neale off the ball incident....
Smaller players have to learn to take fair bumps and tackles. Most of the players I have known who were undersized said they didn't mind a bump or two from the side because they could just ride it and bounce off. We love that side of footy. race for the footy, a side to side bump, a gather, a great, strong tackle and maybe a bruised knee when it hits the ground. The Dows will handle that. The O'Brens will handle it. The Fishers. They aren't scared of that. They are conscious of the fact that they might cop one behind play or in a pack just hard enough to knock the wind from their sails and double them over, maybe make them vomit but that the perp will play again next week.
Rant rant.
In short, yes, some of our mids are small and get knocked off the footy by bigger opponents. That happens to everybody where Newton's laws of momentum come into play. It doesn't mean they are too small, it just means they will get knocked off the footy by bigger players from time to time. BUT that's not the issue. They should be confident enough to go for the footy without wondering whether or not they are going to cop a sly one from someone who knows he won't be suspended. It affects their confidence.