Synbad wrote:
It doesnt help you win... what it does do is it hides your deficiencies for 6 minutes..... confuses you and then youre going backwards...
C'mon mate, seriously. You of all people should know the benefits of tempo footy, surely.
The issue isn't with the style of football. It's about negating the opposition when they start to gain momentum - something that unfortunately quite a few teams manage to do against us. It isn't necessarily about 'snuffing the clock' (man - that sounds dirty... lol) - and more about slowing down the pace, letting the team catch their breath and thoughts, not giving the opposition the chance to boot another 3-4 goals (which is more than capable with a team the the Cats) while our young guys are struggling.
The issues are when to use it, and how effectively you use it. There's no good playing this style of football at all if your foot skills are crap, and although we aren't the slickest team out there I'm just glad that Carlton sides of 2-3 years ago didn't play tempo football as much as we have this season - if you look at times we did in the past, sloppy possession and turnovers basically forfeited the benefits of tempo football.
Simply out, tempo football used correctly can have it's advantages - but unless you are very good at it, you run the risk of oppositions kicking goals on you - effectively while you are not attacking at all and therefore no chance of scoring.
The team hasn't screwed up with it too many times this year, in fact - I think we used it against both Collingwood and more importantly West Coast to good effect.
Don't get me wrong, it's ugly and I hate it (especially in the dying minutes of the last quarter, our team or someone else!) - but it does have it's uses.