Autopsy AFL 2024 Round 7 - Cats v Blues Sat April 27th 4:35pm AEST (MCG)

[Generalissimo]

Nobody can understand what ruck infringements are for anyway. It seems like a bloody lotto.

Saw a few where Pittonet was just grabbing hold of Stanley and swinging him around, only for Stanley to get pinged for some abstruse technicality.

It was glorious to behold Dunstall and King apoplectic with rage when Stanley actually got a free from one of those incidents.

 

[MC Extra Dollop]

No they werent got smashed on every statistic.

It's interesting, because this isn't new this season for Geelong. We're routinely getting well-beaten in what have traditionally been key statistics and indicators: disposals, clearances, inside 50s.

Since round 2 against Adelaide, we're at -157 for disposals, -31 for clearances and -25 for inside 50s. Take out the circle work game against North and it becomes -38 for clearances and -41 for inside 50s.

So is Geelong just one of the arsiest teams ever in pulling out these wins, or is something else going on here? Is it a quality/quantity debate? Well, to pull out a couple of stats where Geelong IS consistently outperforming its opposition:

1. For all the opposition inside 50 dominance, Geelong has marked inside 50 more than its opponents over the past six weeks on average. And while the picnic against North didn't hurt this stat, our opponents have only topped us here twice: the Bulldogs by one and Brisbane by two. So for negative 41 inside 50s over the past month and a half, we're still getting more marks in that area of the ground.

2. Following on from the above, we're going at nearly 7% more efficient than our opposition inside 50.

3. Our opponents are committing almost six more turnovers per game and - as we've all seen - Geelong's pretty clinical at making opponents pay for mistakes.

4. We are out tackling and outperforming our opponents in one percenters, a general 'we do the unfashionable stuff well'.

5. This gets a bit chicken/egg, but we're controlling the scoreboard. Over the past six weeks (and it was the same story in round one), we've led on the scoreboard for about 11 hours and 17 minutes, compared to 1 hour, 21 minutes for our opponents (it's around 12 minutes total, outside the Brisbane game). Our opponents in 2024 have almost never controlled the scoreboard at any time (especially after quarter time) and you could argue it follows that when you're controlling the scoreboard, the game is on your terms.

 

[Gavin Excell]

Nobody can understand what ruck infringements are for anyway. It seems like a bloody lotto.

Saw a few where Pittonet was just grabbing hold of Stanley and swinging him around, only for Stanley to get pinged for some abstruse technicality.

It was glorious to behold Dunstall and King apoplectic with rage when Stanley actually got a free from one of those incidents.

Yes nobody knows with ruck infringements.
King and Dunstall were amusing yesterday with who they wanted to win. A poster earlier suggested King had a substantial bet on Blues and was angry.
Feeling for the bloke

 

[Gavin Excell]

It's interesting, because this isn't new this season for Geelong. We're routinely getting well-beaten in what have traditionally been key statistics and indicators: disposals, clearances, inside 50s.

Since round 2 against Adelaide, we're at -157 for disposals, -31 for clearances and -25 for inside 50s. Take out the circle work game against North and it becomes -38 for clearances and -41 for inside 50s.

So is Geelong just one of the arsiest teams ever in pulling out these wins, or is something else going on here? Is it a quality/quantity debate? Well, to pull out a couple of stats where Geelong IS consistently outperforming its opposition:

1. For all the opposition inside 50 dominance, Geelong has marked inside 50 more than its opponents over the past six weeks on average. And while the picnic against North didn't hurt this stat, our opponents have only topped us here twice: the Bulldogs by one and Brisbane by two. So for negative 41 inside 50s over the past month and a half, we're still getting more marks in that area of the ground.

2. Following on from the above, we're going at nearly 7% more efficient than our opposition inside 50.

3. Our opponents are committing almost six more turnovers per game and - as we've all seen - Geelong's pretty clinical at making opponents pay for mistakes.

4. We are out tackling and outperforming our opponents in one percenters, a general 'we do the unfashionable stuff well'.

5. This gets a bit chicken/egg, but we're controlling the scoreboard. Over the past six weeks (and it was the same story in round one), we've led on the scoreboard for about 11 hours and 17 minutes, compared to 1 hour, 21 minutes for our opponents (it's around 12 minutes total, outside the Brisbane game). Our opponents in 2024 have almost never controlled the scoreboard at any time (especially after quarter time) and you could argue it follows that when you're controlling the scoreboard, the game is on your terms.

A poster Geelong board has pointed out that in majority of games this season, geelongs qtr time lead is what they end up winning the game by

 

[Mr Meow]

It's interesting, because this isn't new this season for Geelong. We're routinely getting well-beaten in what have traditionally been key statistics and indicators: disposals, clearances, inside 50s.

Since round 2 against Adelaide, we're at -157 for disposals, -31 for clearances and -25 for inside 50s. Take out the circle work game against North and it becomes -38 for clearances and -41 for inside 50s.

So is Geelong just one of the arsiest teams ever in pulling out these wins, or is something else going on here? Is it a quality/quantity debate? Well, to pull out a couple of stats where Geelong IS consistently outperforming its opposition:

1. For all the opposition inside 50 dominance, Geelong has marked inside 50 more than its opponents over the past six weeks on average. And while the picnic against North didn't hurt this stat, our opponents have only topped us here twice: the Bulldogs by one and Brisbane by two. So for negative 41 inside 50s over the past month and a half, we're still getting more marks in that area of the ground.

2. Following on from the above, we're going at nearly 7% more efficient than our opposition inside 50.

3. Our opponents are committing almost six more turnovers per game and - as we've all seen - Geelong's pretty clinical at making opponents pay for mistakes.

4. We are out tackling and outperforming our opponents in one percenters, a general 'we do the unfashionable stuff well'.

5. This gets a bit chicken/egg, but we're controlling the scoreboard. Over the past six weeks (and it was the same story in round one), we've led on the scoreboard for about 11 hours and 17 minutes, compared to 1 hour, 21 minutes for our opponents (it's around 12 minutes total, outside the Brisbane game). Our opponents in 2024 have almost never controlled the scoreboard at any time (especially after quarter time) and you could argue it follows that when you're controlling the scoreboard, the game is on your terms.

I hope but doubt that the current AFL coaches are as moronic, brain dead and ignorant as the stereotypical BigFooty poster we have seen in this thread. Sadly, I don't think that will be the case.

 

[JustaBattler]

Poor kicking is poor football. Carlton can't afford to miss easy set shots against any team let alone a Geelong that was playing as well as they did yesterday.

The umpires had nothing to do with the end result.

The Carlton players missing due to injury had nothing to do with the result - and that is a good thing for Carlton supporters to consider - because some of the players wearing the Navy Blue yesterday wont be representing the team as the weeks progress.

Carlton forwards had more than enough opportunity to put a score on the board- and didn't.

Simples.

Well done Geelong and good luck for the yea sorry to see Dangerfield cop a hamstring injury - he was in strong form.

 

[Mr Meow]

Poor kicking is poor football. Carlton can't afford to miss easy set shots against any team let alone a Geelong that was playing as well as they did yesterday.

The umpires had nothing to do with the end result.

The Carlton players missing due to injury had nothing to do with the result - and that is a good thing for Carlton supporters to consider - because some of the players wearing the Navy Blue yesterday wont be representing the team as the weeks progress.

Carlton forwards had more than enough opportunity to put a score on the board- and didn't.

Simples.

Well done Geelong and good luck for the yea sorry to see Dangerfield cop a hamstring injury - he was in strong form.

Classy, classy post. You are hereby granted presidency of the Carlton supporter base. Carlton have more upside for sure. The only thing they really got wrong was poor kicking. They'll sort that out by finals time.

 

[WalshistheGOAT]

They certainly have a few out, but 11 of the starting 22 is nonsense

It's not 11 but I'd say 8 are pretty well locked in b22 for us. The rest are either fringe or not really worth mentioning as they'd give us only the slightest improvement overall.

But really it's not the reason we lost last night, the team we had out there was strong enough to win, our senior players just had a horror show in front of the big sticks and lacked composure down back aside from Weitering.

Overall, aside from being annoyed that we pissed away so many easy opportunities, I'm confident we have what it takes to beat the Cats in a rematch. Get a few names back, be more efficient inside 50 and the umps have a better first half and I think we walk away winners next time if we can continue our contested ball domination.

A contrast to our game in 2022 where it felt utterly hopeless against them, was like men against boys stuff that day.

 

[Skeppersap]

It's interesting, because this isn't new this season for Geelong. We're routinely getting well-beaten in what have traditionally been key statistics and indicators: disposals, clearances, inside 50s.

Since round 2 against Adelaide, we're at -157 for disposals, -31 for clearances and -25 for inside 50s. Take out the circle work game against North and it becomes -38 for clearances and -41 for inside 50s.

So is Geelong just one of the arsiest teams ever in pulling out these wins, or is something else going on here? Is it a quality/quantity debate? Well, to pull out a couple of stats where Geelong IS consistently outperforming its opposition:

1. For all the opposition inside 50 dominance, Geelong has marked inside 50 more than its opponents over the past six weeks on average. And while the picnic against North didn't hurt this stat, our opponents have only topped us here twice: the Bulldogs by one and Brisbane by two. So for negative 41 inside 50s over the past month and a half, we're still getting more marks in that area of the ground.

2. Following on from the above, we're going at nearly 7% more efficient than our opposition inside 50.

3. Our opponents are committing almost six more turnovers per game and - as we've all seen - Geelong's pretty clinical at making opponents pay for mistakes.

4. We are out tackling and outperforming our opponents in one percenters, a general 'we do the unfashionable stuff well'.

5. This gets a bit chicken/egg, but we're controlling the scoreboard. Over the past six weeks (and it was the same story in round one), we've led on the scoreboard for about 11 hours and 17 minutes, compared to 1 hour, 21 minutes for our opponents (it's around 12 minutes total, outside the Brisbane game). Our opponents in 2024 have almost never controlled the scoreboard at any time (especially after quarter time) and you could argue it follows that when you're controlling the scoreboard, the game is on your terms.

In a thread full of sore losers whinging about umpires, this is a brilliant post with some actual insight. Well done!

 

[Mr Meow]

It's not 11 but I'd say 8 are pretty well locked in b22 for us. The rest are either fringe or not really worth mentioning as they'd give us only the slightest improvement overall.

But really it's not the reason we lost last night, the team we had out there was strong enough to win, our senior players just had a horror show in front of the big sticks and lacked composure down back aside from Weitering.

Overall, aside from being annoyed that we pissed away so many easy opportunities, I'm confident we have what it takes to beat the Cats in a rematch. Get a few names back, be more efficient inside 50 and the umps have a better first half and I think we walk away winners next time if we can continue our contested ball domination.

A contrast to our game in 2022 where it felt utterly hopeless against them, was like men against boys stuff that day.

Excellent points. Conversely, we are just happy to be able to challenge the 2023 prelim finalists after having a difficult year the season prior and being no match for Carlton a year ago.

 

[STPer18]

If Messi gets the ball 70-80m out from goal it's all over red rover.

 

[Gavin Excell]

It's not 11 but I'd say 8 are pretty well locked in b22 for us. The rest are either fringe or not really worth mentioning as they'd give us only the slightest improvement overall.

But really it's not the reason we lost last night, the team we had out there was strong enough to win, our senior players just had a horror show in front of the big sticks and lacked composure down back aside from Weitering.

Overall, aside from being annoyed that we pissed away so many easy opportunities, I'm confident we have what it takes to beat the Cats in a rematch. Get a few names back, be more efficient inside 50 and the umps have a better first half and I think we walk away winners next time if we can continue our contested ball domination.

A contrast to our game in 2022 where it felt utterly hopeless against them, was like men against boys stuff that day.

Agree with that summation. Have the resources/game plan to reverse the result

Yesterday had a real finals flavour about it. Despite the poor kicking at goal by Blues, was quite a high standard affair.

 

[dazbroncos]

I think the umps just need to let them wrestle. As long as there is nothing blatant like high contact or two hands in the back it should be all is fair.

I reckon 80% of the time they blow the whistle and no one knows which way the free kick is going let alone what it’s for, not even the ruckman.

agreed...

And Hawkins would have another 800 goals to his name for the amount of FA given bc he is stronger across his career would be nearly uncountable.

GO Catters

 

[Mr Meow]

kreuze_missile did you manage to catch the match, mate?

 

[FootyLad0]

so wrong... its like the degree of wrong cant be calculated.

But what can be calculated is that GFC needs 70k at G to make money and anything above that is theirs where as the make $ from dollar 1 at KP.

KP games net the club about ! million per game - no other venue comes close.

So your premise is just wrong... but so wildly wrong its staggering.

GO Catters

I get soooo freaking mad when MCG tenant club fanbases spout this crap.

Everyone knows Geelong make TWICE in revenue and pure profit alone is incredible. Theres no LOGICAL reason to move the game to the MCG. The AFL DICTATE that we play Home games at the G, therefore to breakeven (not profit, break even) we pick the highest drawing clubs.

If we picked say a non VIC team to play at the G we’d lose a butt load of money.

As you said, need roughly 70k (probably closer to 75k-80k with new Kardinia capacity) to just stay above water playing at the G.

I’m glad you called them on the bullshit.

 

[Footy_Fan2007]

3 free kicks 3 goals. Completely ruined this game

McKay got a few cheapies in front of goal. Not our fault he didn’t take his chances.

Also you should be fuming at Williams for taking a huge dive and acting for a free kick while he allowed Henry to kick a goal.

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/carltons-zac-williams-called-out-for-diving-in-geelong-loss/news-story/ca3a6db93cf3d41d5e619b3ad0c0e1be?amp

 

[FootyLad0]

Also you should be fuming at Williams for taking a huge dive and acting for a free kick while he allowed Henry to kick a goal.

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/carltons-zac-williams-called-out-for-diving-in-geelong-loss/news-story/ca3a6db93cf3d41d5e619b3ad0c0e1be?amp

That was deplorable, and their coach is one of the toughest ever in Michael freaking Voss.

Vossy would have probably choked Williams out if he pulled that crap while Vossy was playing. An absolute blight on the game.

Should be big fines for staging and after multiple offences, a suspension to let the message sink in.

Flopping or staging is not tolerated.

 

[Footy_Fan2007]

That was deplorable, and their coach is one of the toughest ever in Michael freaking Voss.

Vossy would have probably choked Williams out if he pulled that crap while Vossy was playing. An absolute blight on the game.

Should be big fines for staging and after multiple offences, a suspension to let the message sink in.

Flopping or staging is not tolerated.

I think that one absolutely deserves a fine. Worst one we’ve seen for a while.

 

[Mr Meow]

I get soooo freaking mad when MCG tenant club fanbases spout this crap.

Everyone knows Geelong make TWICE in revenue and pure profit alone is incredible. Theres no LOGICAL reason to move the game to the MCG. The AFL DICTATE that we play Home games at the G, therefore to breakeven (not profit, break even) we pick the highest drawing clubs.

If we picked say a non VIC team to play at the G we’d lose a butt load of money.

As you said, need roughly 70k (probably closer to 75k-80k with new Kardinia capacity) to just stay above water playing at the G.

I’m glad you called them on the bullshit.

Whether they like it nor not, every "home" game won at the G is extra sweet for us.

It's worth that costing us a few wins along the way.

 

[carlton_99]

McKay got a few cheapies in front of goal. Not our fault he didn’t take his chances.

Also you should be fuming at Williams for taking a huge dive and acting for a free kick while he allowed Henry to kick a goal.

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/carltons-zac-williams-called-out-for-diving-in-geelong-loss/news-story/ca3a6db93cf3d41d5e619b3ad0c0e1be?amp

The umpiring all game was poor - people are acting like I am the only one that has said it. By all reports David King on the broadcast said Carlton were playing against two teams. Maybe take it up with him...

 

[MC Extra Dollop]

Yes nobody knows with ruck infringements.
King and Dunstall were amusing yesterday with who they wanted to win. A poster earlier suggested King had a substantial bet on Blues and was angry.
Feeling for the bloke

He'd want to have some pretty compelling vision on First Crack to back up his statements during the game. Because "They're playing against two teams, including the ones in green" is quite an extraordinary thing for a professional commentator to say during a national broadcast in this day and age.

The Henry infringement on Williams in the third quarter and the deliberate out of bounds that wasn't called against Guthrie (he probably was hoping Dempsey would get a finger on it, but didn't look like he did) were howlers in my view: pretty much everything else fell under the usual 50/50, could get it, but often don't category for me. And, interestingly, both howlers were well after King's statement. Geelong's players made some howlers too: they're human, not corrupt.

We always hear about 'the message it sends' to the grassroots game when an incident like Jesse Hogan's punch last week gets an all-clear because he didn't hit him very hard. Well, what about the casual observations from commentators that umpires are favouring one team or another? If you wonder what that sort of thing does, we'll just check out every Gameday thread on this forum.

We're nearly at the point here on BigUmpiring that the thread titles for today's games ought to be:

Round 7 Sunday 28 April
1pm - People First Stadium
Bryce, Wallace, Young, RAAAYZA

4pm - MCG
Johnson, Gavine, Toner, McGinness

 

[Wish Wellingtons]

The free kick counts tell us nothing about how well/bad a game was officiated, or whether one side was favoured by the umps.
Stating this is not the same as saying that all stats are misleading.

Literally every team's supporters yell ball within half a second of a player being tackled. It's called atmosphere, cheering your club and a little bit of trying to subconsciously encourage the umps to blow the whistle.
A bit like yelling chewy on your boot back in the day (where has that little gem gone?). Nobody thinks that the player actually has chewy on his boot, or that their words will influence the kick.

Enjoy the win. It was a good one.

Inside 50s is a useless stat. A Geelong inside 50 is generally to a loose player who has outrun their opponent off the turn over. A Carlton inside 50 is lobbing the ball to Curnow or McKay for the 30th time of the match and praying for a contested mark or a crumb from a non existent small forward.

Possessions are mostly meaningless in 2024. Geelong will never (rarely) have an individual player get a 30 possession game. Brisbane had the top 7 possession winners last week, didn't help them a bit.

 

[FootyLad0]

Whether they like it nor not, every "home" game won at the G is extra sweet for us.

It's worth that costing us a few wins along the way.

I tried explaining the logic to my Lions supporting partner and she was gobsmacked.

We just kept going in circles because she couldn’t understand why a football team should be forced to play “Home games” at their opponents Home ground.

She wasn’t a big supporter around 2004 as she grew up early on League but when I explained what happened to the Lions with their “Home” Prelim being moved to the G to play us she was dumbfounded.

This is the thing, people who come from outside the sport hear about the weird little things like “Home games” at an opponents Home ground and can’t understand why they’d do it. I explained to her reasons thrown out are

1. AFL is a business and want to make money
2. AFL want as many people going…refer to point 1
3. Contracts that are in place with certain stadiums to fill games number requirements.

She kept telling me how bullshit that was and “what is even the point of Home games if it’s not at Home?”

I just had to throw my arms up and go…”idk I feel the same way”

 

[FootyLad0]

The Henry infringement on Williams in the third quarter

You mean when Williams barely had any contact with Henry, initiated the contact, threw his head and neck back and to the side and flopped to the ground?

The same one he was getting called out for last night and all today soo far?

The disgusting flop that should be a fine for staging?

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/carltons-zac-williams-called-out-for-diving-in-geelong-loss/news-story/ca3a6db93cf3d41d5e619b3ad0c0e1be?amp

 

[FootyLad0]

The umpiring all game was poor - people are acting like I am the only one that has said it. By all reports David King on the broadcast said Carlton were playing against two teams. Maybe take it up with him...

David King hates Geelong so that’s a biased viewpoint.