Round 13: Dockers v Swans

[Ludwig]

All we did was negate that pressure. We did nothing about bursting away from that pressure. Every tactic invited that pressure. The extra at the ball was inly to negate their advantage through Fyfe and Mundy. We Wee being destroyed at stoppages.

The problem is that when one team comes with intent to play a very high pressure game, calling it negating if you wish, there is no response except to try to match the intensity, or you will just be overrun. So any side that can effectively play a high pressure game can dictate the nature of the game. The exception is to execute all aspects of the game to a high level, then you can open up the game, like Hawthorn did during their threepeat days. Richmond are very effective of getting the ball moving forward quickly and relentlessly, so it's difficult to apply pressure in numbers, because the ball is moving away from the last contest very quickly, avoiding congestion.

Freo are not so great offensively, but they can apply pressure and keep it going all game. So that's the game they played against us. Should we be surprised?

We simply can't win enough contests in the pressure cooker to get our offense rolling. I thought we tried to play the kind of footy that is taking us in the right direction. So many times we had the ball in defence and Freo had all the outlets blocked when our player looked up to find an open man. Then we kicked to a contest and we were beaten at most of those.

[wolftone57]

How come Reid gets pushed out of the marking contest time after time!

Because he is a weak @@@@?

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[wolftone57]

I get your frustration but how is it we have so many around the footy yet they always have a player on the defensive side of the pack to take it away.

What happened after half time was we started playing ab extra onballer, Bell. Mostly it negated the impact of Fyfe and Mundy. But a couple of their other boys got off the leash at times. But the reality is that they attacked out of our back half and destroyed us that way. In trying to negate we actually made them stronger.

Longmire had no other plan other than to negate them. It wasn't about attacking. That is the problem. One Dale Ron Barrassi used to say the best form of defense is attack and he is right. The sooner AFL coaches wake up to this the better the game will be

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[Markwebbos]

Positives only:
- Good game from Melican on Taberner. Real position of need and it's great to see he still has it. Thickish silver lining.
- Another good one from Rowbottom. Hard bloke. Didn't get much help inside
- Stephens tackles well and doesn't panic
- Much improved from Florent
- Kinda feel we might see Buddy next week.

[resists negatives]

-Thought Blakey is going much better in his new role. 4 clearances, 15 disposals, 417m gained. They are a hard side to play against and were better than us.
-Swans won the inside 50s 43-34

[Mel_C]

Last week we beat GWS by moving the ball forward quickly and using the corridor. Why would you change that this week? Two goals for an entire game is disgraceful. This hasn’t helped my lockdown mood at all.

The pressure that Freo applied affected our game and they worked hard when we had the ball to run and man up. But I agree we didn't use the corridor enough. Maybe Freo set up so we couldn't use the corridor. It's hard to tell watching the game on the tv. The other thing I noticed was that when we had the ball there didn't seem to be any movement further up the ground. This happened a lot last year too.