Round 6 vs Geelong Cats @ GMHBA - Match Thread

[giant]

Ward dead unlucky for mine - Neale, realising he is going to get done for HTB, clearly contributes to that. Talk about a hornet's nest! The law of unintended consequences plays out again!

[Markwebbos]

Also shows the problem of letting the injury determine the punishment with Fox. If he’d had concussion right away, would the Duncan bump have been treated differently? I’d assume yes.

[MattW]

Also shows the problem of letting the injury determine the punishment with Fox. If he’d had concussion right away, would the Duncan bump have been treated differently? I’d assume yes.

No, the ruling was made on the action itself, not the result. From the afl site:

'Duncan braced for contact and made high contact with Fox, but Christian ruled the Geelong midfielder's actions were not unreasonable.

"Fox approaches from the opposite direction and attempts to knock the ball forward," the AFL explained in a statement.

"In doing so, Fox runs past the ball and lowers his body position before contact is made with Duncan.

"It is the view of the MRO that Duncan’s actions were not unreasonable in the circumstances. No further action was taken."'

MATCH REVIEW: Tom Jonas, Callan Ward learn fate, Mitch Duncan in the clear

[stevoswan]

No, the ruling was made on the action itself, not the result. From the afl site:

'Duncan braced for contact and made high contact with Fox, but Christian ruled the Geelong midfielder's actions were not unreasonable.

"Fox approaches from the opposite direction and attempts to knock the ball forward," the AFL explained in a statement.

"In doing so, Fox runs past the ball and lowers his body position before contact is made with Duncan.

"It is the view of the MRO that Duncan’s actions were not unreasonable in the circumstances. No further action was taken."'

MATCH REVIEW: Tom Jonas, Callan Ward learn fate, Mitch Duncan in the clear

"It is the view of the MRO that Duncan’s actions were not unreasonable in the circumstances." This is the line I have trouble with. It is assumed that Duncan cannot avoid contact. This assumption is basically correct but they also therefore conclude his action of shaping to bump is also reasonable.....that assumption is dead wrong. It is as if Christian agrees with Jobe Watson's ridiculous commentary of this incident that "a player has the right to defend himself".....what by deliberately bumping an opponent in the head? This is where there adjudication falls down badly for mine. IMO, Duncan could have taken different and safer action to avoid contact with Fox's head! He didn't attempt to avoid Fox's head at all, in fact he basically attacked it. If this is reasonable, the game claims of 'protecting the head' is a complete joke.

[Blood Fever]

"It is the view of the MRO that Duncan’s actions were not unreasonable in the circumstances." This is the line I have trouble with. It is assumed that Duncan cannot avoid contact. This assumption is basically correct but they also therefore conclude his action of shaping to bump is also reasonable.....that assumption is dead wrong. It is as if Christian agrees with Jobe Watson's ridiculous commentary of this incident that "a player has the right to defend himself".....what by deliberately bumping an opponent in the head? This is where there adjudication falls down badly for mine. IMO, Duncan could have taken different and safer action to avoid contact with Fox's head! He didn't attempt to avoid Fox's head at all, in fact he basically attacked it. If this is reasonable, the game claims of 'protecting the head' is a complete joke.

Christian's role is the ultimate jobs for the boys situation. He is all over the shop. Cannot understand how he has lasted in the job. Maybe he is just a convenient whipping boy for the AFL who take a hands off approach.

[neilfws]

I just think we are being outmuscled in some of our games. We just don't have the big bodied players we need and when we play hardened and experienced teams like Geelong, our youth and inexperience and lack of hardness shows.

It doesn't help that our structures are all stuffed because we have such significant players missing. Even having Buddy in the forward line would have helped because he would have taken a couple of Geelong defenders with him

I've been waiting for all the games to finish, so as I can back up these very good and relevant thoughts with numbers.

Of the nine games this round, if we use average values, Geelong vs Sydney had the highest disparities in player attributes: age (3 years), games (52), height (3.3 cm) and weight (3.5 kg).

If we used median values, to account for the fact that some numbers are very skewed by a few large values (such as games), we still see the highest disparities in age (3.1 years), height (4 cm) and weight (4 kg). Games difference comes down to 23 when median values are used, placing that game right in the middle of the nine. Other matches from the round with quite large differences in games experience were GWS v Brisbane and Fremantle v Western Bulldogs.

So yes: less experience, younger, smaller. Add to that essentially no regular defence, structural problems all around the ground, 5 marks inside 50 to 22 - this game was never going to end well. I didn't envisage quite the smashing that ensued but in hindsight, perhaps it was more likely than not.

My hope is that the players are not too scarred! and able to carry some lessons into the next game.

[Roadrunner]

I've been waiting for all the games to finish, so as I can back up these very good and relevant thoughts with numbers.

Of the nine games this round, if we use average values, Geelong vs Sydney had the highest disparities in player attributes: age (3 years), games (52), height (3.3 cm) and weight (3.5 kg).

If we used median values, to account for the fact that some numbers are very skewed by a few large values (such as games), we still see the highest disparities in age (3.1 years), height (4 cm) and weight (4 kg). Games difference comes down to 23 when median values are used, placing that game right in the middle of the nine. Other matches from the round with quite large differences in games experience were GWS v Brisbane and Fremantle v Western Bulldogs.

So yes: less experience, younger, smaller. Add to that essentially no regular defence, structural problems all around the ground, 5 marks inside 50 to 22 - this game was never going to end well. I didn't envisage quite the smashing that ensued but in hindsight, perhaps it was more likely than not.

My hope is that the players are not too scarred! and able to carry some lessons into the next game.

Excellent analysis Neil! Question is: where to from here? We can’t change the above in a hurry, so we just have to be patient, I’m afraid, and suffer a bit in the meantime while hoping such a defeat doesn’t occur again!