A dose of reality

[Impatient Sainter]

Well be out of the 8 next week and wont return IMO. Adelaide worked us out and like last year we have no plan B or elite players to lift us out of the mire. Injuries and our taxing hard hitting style have caught up with us and we will need a big dose of luck for things to change herein.

[twirlyhair]

YAWN. We’ll finish somewhere between 12th and 16th again and call it a year of improvement.

Worst possible outcome. But that’s ok... so long as everyone takes home a comfy pay packet and sleeps well at night.

How’s Dan’s rebuild going by the way?

Oh SS, keep your chin up.

[freely]

True - it's a dose of reality for me. I was practically buying me grand final tickets! But it works both ways - the first 5 weeks of the season, the players have been hard at it, the game plan's stood up and we've looked the goods. Everybody said the sample size was too small. Fair enough. But now with a dud game and sample size of 1, it ought to be the same story. Let's see whether players and coaches can come up for next week. If we're back firing again minus Lonie and hungry for the contest the way we've seemed to be x5, it was a blip. If not... I'll keep taking the medicine!

[WellardSaint]

a few things don't add up for me.
Ratten and Lade, and Slater, etc appear to have made a big impact on the culture and the group.
Richo seems to have stepped away a little and is more of a 'director of coaching'.

But...playing a guy who is 50/50- Baroose.
AR said "Bruce didn't train all week, but he said he was good to go, as did the medical staff".
OMG. Shades of Weller and Newnes last year.
If you don't pay your opponent enough respect by picking an underdone guy...
Remember about 5 yrs ago when Hawks spanked us by 140 points or so?
Tony74 said the whole team was decimated by the flu all week, Stuv hadn't trained at all that week for starters...

You don't pick Bruce if he's under a cloud. Play Battle up fwd, and bring in Joyce as a backman.
Better a young bloke who can compete and give repeated efforts, than an injured player.

[asiu]

Better a young bloke who can compete and give repeated efforts, than an injured player.

absolutely
... should be the golden rule

turn the injuries into positive opportunity

[guitars4]

Well be out of the 8 next week and wont return IMO. Adelaide worked us out and like last year we have no plan B or elite players to lift us out of the mire. Injuries and our taxing hard hitting style have caught up with us and we will need a big dose of luck for things to change herein.

Pretty fair assessment . Our commitment is good but our execution is ordinary & as you have stated our game plan is based on pressure & it will be very difficult to sustain over 22 weeks especially when playing quality opposition. At the start of the season with injury to key players I thought we would be bottom 2 so I have been pleasantly surprised with how we have fared so far however that doesn't mean we are out of the woods yet. The next few weeks will be very challenging so how we respond will be a real measure of where we are at IMO.

[damienc]

Dose of reality? Not quite. More like expect the expected. If we had beaten Adelaide, quite frankly it would have been a miracle.

I hoped it would happen but never expected that it would.

There are some AFL clubs that have our measure just about every time we play them and Adelaide is one of them.

You could say the Crows are a nemesis but I think that is letting the Saints off too lightly.

Adelaide didn't conjure some black magic they just used good old fashioned footy nous.

Sadly, we are still a bit behind in that department. I watched this game on Fox, as tough as it was to do.

Here are my thoughts:

Adelaide, like all good sides playing an opponent with four wins and one loss, did their homework. They closely examined what we were doing well so far this year and where we were falling a bit short.

They had a plan that they implemented very well to counter and exploit. That's what good sides do and Adelaide, despite their roller coaster start to this season, are still a good footy team.

So what did we do wrong? Many things in my view but I'm no keyboard warrior, nor am I throwing out the toys. I am only going to talk about what I see as one important thing.

This year, unlike last year, we have a game plan but we have no plan B,C or D.

So, if our game plan isn't working because our opponent did their homework, we have no counter.

We don't do things differently. We just keep doing the same thing hoping for a different result. The definition of insanity.

Potentially, we have a good footy team. We are improving. Clearly, we are better than last year.

We'll win more games but we are not finals contenders. We are not smart enough to be called that.

And that is the biggest lesson from this loss. If we truly learn from it, then it was just a bump in the road on our journey.

I'm just not sure that we will.

[damienc]

Does of reality? Not quite. More like expect the expected. If we had beaten Adelaide, quite frankly it would have been a miracle.

I hoped it would happen but never expected that it would.

There are some AFL clubs that have our measure just about every time we play them and Adelaide is one of them.

You could say the Crows are a nemesis but I think that is letting the Saints off too lightly.

Adelaide didn't conjure some black magic they just used good old fashioned footy nous.

Sadly, we are still a bit behind in that department. I watched this game on Fox, as tough as it was to do.

Here are my thoughts:

Adelaide, like all good sides playing an opponent with four wins and one loss, did their homework. They closely examined what we were doing well so far this year and where we were falling a bit short.

They had a plan that they implemented very well to counter and exploit. That's what good sides do and Adelaide, despite their roller coaster start to this season, are still a good footy team.

So what did we do wrong? Many things in my view but I'm no keyboard warrior, nor am I throwing out the toys. I am only going to talk about what I see as one important thing.

This year, unlike last year, we have a game plan but we have no plan B,C or D.

So, if our game plan isn't working because our opponent did their homework, we have no counter.

We don't do things differently. We just keep doing the same thing hoping for a different result. The definition of insanity.

Potentially, we have a good footy team. We are improving. Clearly, we are better than last year.

We'll win more games but we are not finals contenders. We are not smart enough to be called that.

And that is the biggest lesson from this loss. If we truly learn from it, then it was just a bump in the road on our journey.

I'm just not sure that we will.

[Linton Lodger]

Don’t have a problem with the OP surprised many do....
Went to my first live game this year, thought it’d be a good test and it was
I saw us try but in reality our ball movement and skill level was nowhere near Crows - we looked haphazard, scrambly at times and going forward didn’t have a clear plan/purpose
Endeavours there but talents still light on - much like last year from what I saw today so against any quality oppo who can but a target we’ll battle I think
Hannerbury should result in a sacking btw shocking decision

Nah, nothing like last year. Last year we lost that game by 10 goals plus.

On top of existing injuries they lost Geary, Marshall and then Lonie (critical to our forward setup) early. We were poor after the 1st quarter, dumb decisions and execution yet we were still in it half way through the last. In the end, despite a poor performance against good experienced opposition, it should have been closer. If that's our worst, I'm not too worried. Put Carlisle in that team today and we won, depite been scratchy and many having an off day.

We have our two best defenders and possible All Australians (Carlisle & Roberton) out, playing one tall forward short because of those injuries and McCartin's. Hannabery hasn't hit the park yet (and he will) on top of Geary, Marshall and Lonie.

There's a big difference to last year.

I haven't even talked about their spirit. Don't underestimate how seeing Jack Lonie going down would have hit them psychologically. They're tight.

Geary was out before the game started ffs - Rob Harvey retired in 08 we can’t keep using that excuse for not being able to hit the side of a barn and zero system going forward - yes Lonie hurt but again that doesn’t excuse the skill level which is what we saw last year.

We played a side who came to play and skill wise and system wise are way ahead of us. We still carry players that when we hit quality ....really struggle... that won’t get us to top 4 anytime soon

Much to be done

All your comments may be true in regard to Saturday, particularly after quarter time. We certainly came to play in the first. I know we lost Geary last week, then we had the compounding effect of losing Marshall just before the game and Lonie early. You don't think these were massive disruptions? I agree that we were poor after quarter time, but to look at our 6 games this year and suggest its the same old, is just plain wrong.

[thejiggingsaint]

Dose of reality? Not quite. More like expect the expected. If we had beaten Adelaide, quite frankly it would have been a miracle.

I hoped it would happen but never expected that it would.

There are some AFL clubs that have our measure just about every time we play them and Adelaide is one of them.

You could say the Crows are a nemesis but I think that is letting the Saints off too lightly.

Adelaide didn't conjure some black magic they just used good old fashioned footy nous.

Sadly, we are still a bit behind in that department. I watched this game on Fox, as tough as it was to do.

Here are my thoughts:

Adelaide, like all good sides playing an opponent with four wins and one loss, did their homework. They closely examined what we were doing well so far this year and where we were falling a bit short.

They had a plan that they implemented very well to counter and exploit. That's what good sides do and Adelaide, despite their roller coaster start to this season, are still a good footy team.

So what did we do wrong? Many things in my view but I'm no keyboard warrior, nor am I throwing out the toys. I am only going to talk about what I see as one important thing.

This year, unlike last year, we have a game plan but we have no plan B,C or D.

So, if our game plan isn't working because our opponent did their homework, we have no counter.

We don't do things differently. We just keep doing the same thing hoping for a different result. The definition of insanity.

Potentially, we have a good footy team. We are improving. Clearly, we are better than last year.

We'll win more games but we are not finals contenders. We are not smart enough to be called that.

And that is the biggest lesson from this loss. If we truly learn from it, then it was just a bump in the road on our journey.

I'm just not sure that we will.

I agree with you colleague on the majority of your points in this well-articulated and reasoned post..... I only "agree to disagree" with you on being "not sure that we will" (learn from this loss) I believe that the players and coaches will be prepared to do their absolute best to get back to winning ways. I was disappointed at the loss and the manner in which we lost.... but (compared to 2018) I'm far from demoralised.

[The_Dud]

Everyone’s saying Geary being out cost us big time, yet we seemed to handle the Hawks pretty well without him.

The disappointing thing about yesterday was effort more than personnel.

[asiu]

We'll win more games but we are not finals contenders. We are not smart enough to be called that.

thats a hammer ‘n nail routine

very true.

[CQ SAINT]

I think we could have opened up a big lead in the first and held it till halftime. On kicking straight and forcing stoppages we went south from last week and lost the mental battle.

Its also the first real triple threat forward line we have come up against, Himmelberg made it a foursome. We were short to begin with and should have played another tall defender.

I think Billy tried but we were down another tackler and clearance player in Marshall. We looked like we were down a midfielder.

We will give the GWS a good go next week. Reality checked, of course.

[degruch]

Everyone’s saying Geary being out cost us big time, yet we seemed to handle the Hawks pretty well without him.

The disappointing thing about yesterday was effort more than personnel.

I think he goes particularly well on Betts typically. Betts had a lot more latitude without Geary on him (I'm not sure who stood Betts...D-Mac?). His leadership was missing on the backline in particular also, with our inexperienced players failing to fill leading space several times, only to stand their pointing at each other when a Crow took an uncontested mark.

Anyways, not having Geary certainly didn't help, and a taller defender would have been useful (although D-Mac played well) but we were obviously out-coached, out-marked and couldn't get contested ball in the centre to save ourselves.

[Harves Man]

Dose of reality? Not quite. More like expect the expected. If we had beaten Adelaide, quite frankly it would have been a miracle.

I hoped it would happen but never expected that it would.

There are some AFL clubs that have our measure just about every time we play them and Adelaide is one of them.

You could say the Crows are a nemesis but I think that is letting the Saints off too lightly.

Adelaide didn't conjure some black magic they just used good old fashioned footy nous.

Sadly, we are still a bit behind in that department. I watched this game on Fox, as tough as it was to do.

Here are my thoughts:

Adelaide, like all good sides playing an opponent with four wins and one loss, did their homework. They closely examined what we were doing well so far this year and where we were falling a bit short.

They had a plan that they implemented very well to counter and exploit. That's what good sides do and Adelaide, despite their roller coaster start to this season, are still a good footy team.

So what did we do wrong? Many things in my view but I'm no keyboard warrior, nor am I throwing out the toys. I am only going to talk about what I see as one important thing.

This year, unlike last year, we have a game plan but we have no plan B,C or D.

So, if our game plan isn't working because our opponent did their homework, we have no counter.

We don't do things differently. We just keep doing the same thing hoping for a different result. The definition of insanity.

Potentially, we have a good footy team. We are improving. Clearly, we are better than last year.

We'll win more games but we are not finals contenders. We are not smart enough to be called that.

And that is the biggest lesson from this loss. If we truly learn from it, then it was just a bump in the road on our journey.

I'm just not sure that we will.

Wow! This is an outstanding post - very thoughtful and articulate, Damien - many thanks. For what its worth, I agree wholeheartedly.

[Cairnsman]

That’s what this is....

So many people so comfortable with some overrated wins.

This is the same side that scraped past the GC in Rd1 and saved the tearing down of Moorabbin by a point.

First real test - FAIL

Aren't you the bloke that claimed to be an accountant with extraordinary business acumen that came on here last year asking for support to lead a ticket to overthrow the board?

Is that right?

[tedtheodorelogan2018]

So Hawthorn, Essendon and Melbourne weren't real tests?
What a crock of s***!

[SaintPav]

There are no easy games. Every week is a test for a different reason.

As long as we learn from it.

Bring on GWS.

[To the top]

Carlisle (203), King (204), Roberton (194), Marshall (201), Austin (196), Mc Cartin (194), Claravino (196) plus Bruce (197) playing injured.

And we got absolutely smashed overhead AND in the Ruck where their mids received an arm chair ride.

We only had the restricted abilities of Brown (195), the restricted due to injury Bruce, the excellent and progressing defender Battle (193) and Longer (202 and where the less said the better).

Membrey (188) is mid field size.

We added Marsh (194) and Rowe (198) as emergency additions to our List for a reason.

No doubt others will note what Adelaide did to us and seek to replicate.

So do we restructure by adding the quick and tall Joyce (194) to our defence and either Marsh or Rowe to our attack at the expense of mid sized players?

And seeking some Ruck relief for Marshall?

Hoping also both Marshall and Bruce come up?

There are positives with Battle, Marshall, Paton and Parker adding to our AFL Standard resources.

So those we identify as capable at the level are increasing in numbers.

And we have our injuries and others as yet untested at least past past early career development stages.

[Scollop]

The reality is that Cho is still coaching and making decisions which impact the team now and into the future.


Can't wait for tonight's episode of Talking Footy'

What's the bet we hear the the same old cliches and the phrase 'strong response' may get a few mentions

[samoht]

The reality is, we are a fair way off still (our midfield is ranked 17th) - but we have injected some pace and are spreading better. So our overall balance has improved.
There are positives with Battle (who's developing nicely), Marshall, Paton and Parker (I agree with To the Top).

We just need the injured back and firing... and the injury gods to take a sabbatical.

re: blaming the coach --
Without the big fish and astute recruiting ... where would 'the great coach" Clarko be, I wonder? He hasn't been too great, lately - even with O' Meara playing a blinder, they just scraped home vs the cellar dweller.
We need to land an occasional big fish here and there (one would be nice for a change) to keep up with the better teams who are (and have been) doing that on a regular basis - this is also the reality.

[Scollop]

What is there to gain from playing someone injured? It wasn't a final. Adelaide took advantage of Bruce being playing injured.

I reckon he is one of our most important players structurally and I was surprised that Richo didn't give him top votes votes in the coaches association award in round 1 and then zero in round 2 or 3. We need Bruce fit if we are any chance of making finals, so I'd rather he be managed when he's not 100%.

I hope one of the team on Talking Footy asks Richo why he went in with Bruce unfit to play. I hope they ask whether there was a longer term risk in trying to play Bruce for the Adelaide game.

Clarko doesn't go into games with players under an injury cloud. He makes the tough call early and he plans and prepares his players.

[samoht]

Clarko didn’t prepare his players too well against us, then .. or his game plan was not up to scratch.
I am sure Clarko has played Hodge injured in finals.

We are not having luck with injuries again this year... we need to take everything into account.

And we’d be a different team with Carlisle intercepting marks in defence and Roberton is a big, big loss.
Our no.1 pick is not even in the picture.
Injuries make all the difference in a tight competition.

We don’t need to rub salt into our own wounds..... patience is the order of the day.
There will be light at the end of the day.... the sun will shine once again.

[Scollop]

Hawthorn's engine room was decimated before the match started and their guys in the centre were novices

You can't claim that Clarko was outcoached or didn't prepare his players well. They were in front and had the momentum with a handy lead half way through the 3rd quarter

They lost their captain and their Full Back early in the game and Isaac Smith was as good as useless after he got injured. We won in spite of Cho, not because of his coaching

If we play under AFLX rules and there are no coaches, with players choosing the side each week we'll get better results

[samoht]

Ok.. so injuries are an excuse for everyone else?

They can afford injuries more than us.

I’d like to meet them full strength vs full strength!
And with some luck, we will.