2017 Rd 9: Post Game Patter: Carlton vs Fremantle

[sydneybluesfan]

Once Lyon woke up and figured out he needed to stop our "everything old is new again" short kicking style, the tide was always going to turn. Obviously other factors (e.g injury) were at play.

I'll be curious to see what happens in coming weeks when opposition teams adopt the same tactics. That style of play requires almost innate understanding between team mates, very precise skills, and good speed over the first 10-20 m to get some separation from your opponent. Once the other team figures out we play this way, they will always go man on man.

Too add to that, it also appears that it works quite well when moving the ball from defence thru to the centre of the ground, but we really struggled after quarter time to move the ball forward of centre. Opposition sides have plenty of time to man up and flood back, so finding a target is almost impossible. So we bomb it in, and the opposition [Johnson yesterday] just take intercept marks.

You still need fast link players who can carry the ball through the midfield to put the backmen out of position and make this plan work, otherwise we will continue to score 10 goals at best per week like we have for 3 years and we will win 5-6 games at best. We are struggling to fill these roles at the moment, as the kids don't have the tank to play that role consistently.

I am optimistic about the ability of the last 2 draft crops, but until we can turn at least one into a genuine, consistent goal kicking forward threat, and we trade in at least 1 established forward, we will keep bouncing along the bottom like we have for 3.5 years.