Autopsy The good, the bad and the oh dear v St Kilda

[Hearts to hearts]

Actually shocked how many people are suggesting Colby isn’t played in the back half. He’s had by far his best two games. Showed he is very capable of playing Harry’s role. Gives us something a little different to Harry as well because he is just so penetrating. He’s also not ready to play mid yet.

Give him the keys, he will have a great year and grow in confidence like Harry.

That’s fair. I don’t know if they can work out a way to keep him there and also not wind up with him having to defend one on one against much taller stronger players. I guess I also like seeing Hardeman, Archer, Bergman and (when he’s better) Goater defending.

 

[Masked Avenger]

We just don't work hard enough to prevent uncontested options all the way up the field. It takes a lot of sprinting to keep up and our players don't do it. Aside from a guy who's played 8 games.

View attachment 1979714

Stands out like dogs balls. The mark differential says it all.

I'm not sure it's just a work ethic thing tbh Bill.

As a Club, we never stood in the athletes line - unlike the Collingwoods, Carltons, Brisbanes of the world.

Whether it be speed or endurance we're getting murdered in that space. Chalk line stuff.

With rapid ball movement and spread, you can't have the likes of McDonald, Simpkin, Tucker, Shiels, Powell, Curtis, Phillips (when he plays) Archer, Drury and Zurhaar all in the one team.

Good sides cope with 4 or 5 - not half the team though.

 

[Jeremy Jordan]

• Xerri is ruining our mids. Absolutely cooking them, to the point they may as well not line up in the centre square. If I see him take another ball from the ruck and hack kick it straight to the opposition I will spew up. Or another brainless fist into the oblivion. The stat sheet flatters him so much, he is actively sabotaging our team and ruining our only competitive advantage. The worst part is we’re chips in with him for the next 5 years.
• I know what Clarkson is trying to do (having his best ball users across half back like he did at Hawthorn), but i am 100% done with seeing McKercher in defence. We need competitiveness and strength back there. It’s a lamb to the slaughter whenever he’s forced to defend.
• Stat of the day: Stephenson had more jumper changes in the first quarter than he had disposals. And finished the half with equal numbers in those two areas.
• Wardlaw was epic. Looked at the stats post game and couldn’t believe he didn’t have more. But man, I feel so sorry for him. The smother to CZ overrunning the ball summed it up.
• Pending how he pulls up, we have to persist with Archer. Brings a competitiveness we just don’t have otherwise.
• Our team defence is absolutely horrific. No organisation. Not even just on turnover, but on slow ball movement as well. Uncontested marks in the 50m should never ever happen with slow ball movement, yet happens all too often with us.

McKercher in defence doesn’t need to end. I actually think it’s the best spot for him right now. He actually gave us dash out of there for a few of our attacks.
The fact is most defences allow an attacking defender. Someone who gets the 6th best forward and who starts drives from defence. The issue is that role is currently given to Fisher, who is beyond putrid at it. Gets the worse forward, but does SFA on attack (actually, sorry, he does something. Turns it over).
Push Fisher somewhere else, forward or magoos. Try 5 actual defenders, plus Colby down there.

 

[Ischenko]

McKercher in defence doesn’t need to end. I actually think it’s the best spot for him right now. He actually gave us dash out of there for a few of our attacks.
The fact is most defences allow an attacking defender. Someone who gets the 6th best forward and who starts drives from defence. The issue is that role is currently given to Fisher, who is beyond putrid at it. Gets the worse forward, but does SFA on attack (actually, sorry, he does something. Turns it over).
Push Fisher somewhere else, forward or magoos. Try 5 actual defenders, plus Colby down there.

Exactly. Play Fisher at half forward or not at all, bring in another genuine half back and good user who can also give us some drive in Bergman, and keep Colby down there to give us run.

Wing rotations Scott, Tucker (defensive/stopping jobs - did he get put on Hill yesterday? Both Hill and Wood killed us at times), Ford.

 

[William Caresser]

Stands out like dogs balls. The mark differential says it all.

I'm not sure it's just a work ethic thing tbh Bill.

As a Club, we never stood in the athletes line - unlike the Collingwoods, Carltons, Brisbanes of the world.

Whether it be speed or endurance we're getting murdered in that space. Chalk line stuff.

With rapid ball movement and spread, you can't have the likes of McDonald, Simpkin, Tucker, Shiels, Powell, Curtis, Phillips (when he plays) Archer, Drury and Zurhaar all in the one team.

Good sides cope with 4 or 5 - not half the team though.

Yes whether it's the athletic profile of our list, our inadequate preseason conditioning, or not working hard enough on game day, we can't compete on the spread. Suspect it's a combination of all three.

We supposedly recruited mature age outside 'run'. Stephens, Tucker, Fisher (and Shiel). And they run good 2km times in preseason. But when you look at the sprints each week for 2024, it's usually Bailey Scott or McKercher and four opposition players.

Stephens, Tucker and Fisher haven't provided consistent, high end outside run. They haven't sprinted enough to man up or spread in attack. Add guys like Simpkin who run good 2km time trials but don't sprint enough on match day. They just stride around, lagging their opponents and not providing outlets. Also interesting that when we played WA side Freo in R.2, Zurhaar appeared in the top 5 for sprints only never to appear again.

I'd be putting the acid on those 2km time trial heroes to actually sprint on game day. They're in cruise mode but clearly our preseason didn't prepare our mature age good runners to actually sprint consistently for 4 quarters.

2km time trials get you 7 or 8 minutes into the first quarter and don't involve sprinting. Wish Clarko would go old school and bring back 100 x 100M x four sessions next preseason, 45 second rest, repeat if cruising. Our players need it - they really do.

 

[shintemaster]

• Xerri is ruining our mids. Absolutely cooking them, to the point they may as well not line up in the centre square. If I see him take another ball from the ruck and hack kick it straight to the opposition I will spew up. Or another brainless fist into the oblivion. The stat sheet flatters him so much, he is actively sabotaging our team and ruining our only competitive advantage. The worst part is we’re chips in with him for the next 5 years.

I really don't think this is the thing to stress about. If he is replaced with a superior option in 2-3 years we replace a player like Free as backup with Xerri or he gets moved on for some value. Long term deals for structural needs aren't that big a deal for the right price IMO and would help prevent us being in such a bad state to start with.

 

[amaz199]

Watching back the replay, we looked pretty productive early. Breaking tackles, getting the ball out to loose options and trying to split the defensive zone. At times we did slow down and kick long, but I think this was only when we had the numbers up the ground.

The only issues are that we desperately miss Logue and Kal Dawson. I suspect Comben may go back to playing forward and Corr won't be dropped (he looked ok anyway).

 

[Hojuman]

Watching back the replay, we looked pretty productive early. Breaking tackles, getting the ball out to a loose options and trying to split the defensive zone. At times we did slow down and kick long, but I think this was only when we had the numbers up the ground.

The only issues are that we desperately miss Logue and Kal Dawson. I suspect Comben may go back to playing forward and Corr won't be dropped (he looked ok anyway).

We miss Logue, K.Dawson, Goater, Bergman.
In that scenario Sheezel, McKercher, Fisher, Scott / Tucker aren't playing down there or in the case of 2 of them, not at all !

 

[amaz199]

Pink playing forward somehow worked which is an indictment on how bad the Saints are but there's that lol

 

[amaz199]

We miss Logue, K.Dawson, Goater, Bergman.
That scenario Sheezel, McKercher, Fisher, Scott / Tucker aren't playing down there or in the case of 2 of them, not at all !

Yeah it's probably why we are struggling in transition. The backline is a mix up of ingredients that no one has tried yet.

 

[Hojuman]

Yeah it's probably why we are struggling in transition. The backline is a mix up of ingredients that no one has tried yet.

Rd.1 2025:
Archer K. Dawson Bergman
Goater Logue Hardeman / W.Dawson

Maybe even trade in a distributor.

 

[Colby Cheer Squad]

I'd be putting the acid on those 2km time trial heroes to actually sprint on game day. They're in cruise mode but clearly our preseason didn't prepare our mature age good runners to actually sprint consistently for 4 quarters.

2km time trials get you 7 or 8 minutes into the first quarter and don't involve sprinting. Wish Clarko would go old school and bring back 100 x 100M x four sessions next preseason, 45 second rest, repeat if cruising. Our players need it - they really do.

Maybe you only heard about the 2km time trial results that were mentioned in preseason social posts by the club. I agree that 2km time trials are largely irrelevant to playing football and I think they are only useful for the fitness coaches to ascertain the general condition that players are in after their return from break.

I went to a few sessions at LaTrobe and saw them do 70m repeat sprints in a knock out format where they had to clear a minimum time for each leg or be eliminated. There seemed to be about 30 seconds break in between each leg. The idea was to see who would last the longest and complete the most genuine sprints. This seems to be along the lines of what you are looking for but perhaps it doesn't help the players who are eliminated early to improve their sprinting capacity. There was another format where they set up a rectangle with about 50m on the long legs and 25m on the short legs and they would have to sprint 50, then jog 25 and sprint 50 and so on. There was no dropping out of that one.

 

[LB2Snake]

Xerrri is the ultimate “Cooler”.

 

[Colby Cheer Squad]

Pink playing forward somehow worked which is an indictment on how bad the Saints are but there's that lol

Yes I think it shows more than anything that the structure of having two capable tall forwards is essential. That's not to say that Pink is the answer but we need someone at least 195cm who can find his own space and mark the ball and just generally compete.

 

[amaz199]

Yes I think it shows more than anything that the structure of having two capable tall forwards is essential. That's not to say that Pink is the answer but we need someone at least 195cm who can find his own space and mark the ball and just generally compete.

Eventually, Comben will have to play forward.

As much as we despise Corr, he won't be dropped. He's staying there as long as his contract runs.

 

[The Dougster]

I saw patches of something today.

That's the Wardlaw effect

 

[William Caresser]

Maybe you only heard about the 2km time trial results that were mentioned in preseason social posts by the club. I agree that 2km time trials are largely irrelevant to playing football and I think they are only useful for the fitness coaches to ascertain the general condition that players are in after their return from break.

I went to a few sessions at LaTrobe and saw them do 70m repeat sprints in a knock out format where they had to clear a minimum time for each leg or be eliminated. There seemed to be about 30 seconds break in between each leg. The idea was to see who would last the longest and complete the most genuine sprints. This seems to be along the lines of what you are looking for but perhaps it doesn't help the players who are eliminated early to improve their sprinting capacity. There was another format where they set up a rectangle with about 50m on the long legs and 25m on the short legs and they would have to sprint 50, then jog 25 and sprint 50 and so on. There was no dropping out of that one.

It comes down to the athletic profile, commitment of the players and physical maturity in these exercises in determining if it'll translate to competitiveness in season. And are the exercises onerous enough? Whatever the reasons, safe to say we lag every other team in outside high intensity run by some margin.

You can accept that first to third year players need preseasons to improve this. Obviously there are exceptions and McKercher has exceptional athletic traits. But how is that a first year player is outworking the outside, mature age players we recruited to match outside opposition players? And is outworking the older players who've been there long enough. I don't buy the young list excuse when it comes to this.

 

[Jonnoo]

Was a bit sad seeing the Goat in his moon boot yesterday hobbling around the stadium, hopefully his recovery is 100% and the current know how on Achilles recovery is followed to a tee

 

[Psicosis]

That’s fair. I don’t know if they can work out a way to keep him there and also not wind up with him having to defend one on one against much taller stronger players. I guess I also like seeing Hardeman, Archer, Bergman and (when he’s better) Goater defending.

It’s give and take. Sheezel concedes goals in that role as well. It’s on the defensive system to support him. I think we should be able to cover one attacking defender. The issue was when we had Sheezel, Colby, Fisher and Scott all doing it.

For me, him gaining the confidence of getting the ball 30x a game far outweighs him getting the occasional poor match up on turn over.

 

[TennisPlayerAndy]

It comes down to the athletic profile, commitment of the players and physical maturity in these exercises in determining if it'll translate to competitiveness in season. And are the exercises onerous enough? Whatever the reasons, safe to say we lag every other team in outside high intensity run by some margin.

You can accept that first to third year players need preseasons to improve this. Obviously there are exceptions and McKercher has exceptional athletic traits. But how is that a first year player is outworking the outside, mature age players we recruited to match outside opposition players? And is outworking the older players who've been there long enough. I don't buy the young list excuse when it comes to this.

As has been pointed out as nauseum, the mature players we have are just not good enough. Tucker, Corr, McDonald, Simpkin, Fisher. It’s a horrific 26-30 yo cohort. Zurhaar could be thrown in as well.

Whether that be training or playing, they are so far off the required standard.

And that is made clear in match day results.

Then there is the handicap applied through horrid set up’s (defensive ‘zone’), playing four small defenders who can’t defend, playing one key forward with glacial ball movement which results kicking long to 3v1.

The whole thing is a shitshow.

We don’t score through playing a fluid system, it’s through moments of individual brilliance or catastrophic errors by opposition defenders.

 

[Hojuman]

That's the Wardlaw effect

" Wardball " ?

 

[flojo]

I really don't think this is the thing to stress about. If he is replaced with a superior option in 2-3 years we replace a player like Free as backup with Xerri or he gets moved on for some value. Long term deals for structural needs aren't that big a deal for the right price IMO and would help prevent us being in such a bad state to start with.

Yeah thats why I think Goad will probably over take him. But these ruck take over 5 years to brew to be decent enough to be able to do it for a whole game. basketball background so should have nice crafty taps.
And even just average ruckmen tend to be the most tradeable journeymen as they keep their value and fill holes till someone better in the list presents.

 

[danj]

How did I get tagged in this?

You know what you did

He really doesn’t but I do

 

[Possession]

Late to this one: the Saints fans cheering Webster whenever he got the ball was impressively gross. What a pack of ferals.

 

[the_cleaner]

has anyone got a timestamp for the wardlaw smother?