?

Wouldn’t mind those two for Geelong finally recruiting some speed and dynamism over the one paced boring types we’ve recruited the majority of the time lately. It doesn’t matter though it’ll come too late to have any real impact on Geelong’s failed premiership bid of the last few years under Scott and Cook.

I love it too Pat! I think we’re incredibly privileged to be able to share enough aspects of both our indigenous games to come up with our own unique game together. If you look at comments on youtube with highlights from The International Rules games of the past people who don’t know Gaelic Football or AFL are completely in love with it and think it’s amazing! When the best players from both codes are on the park it is a fantastic game to watch, high speed and intensity with real passion and skill.

Stephen it’s a quote from Agent Smith in the Matrix. I was just stuffing around…Cat seemed to think I was serious however so obviously the reference was a bit obscure for some.

The game has evolved past the Hawks. It’s about speed, shutting down space quickly and pressure now, and old players just can’t provide that at the same level younger players can.

Why do you blindly cling to this Idea Geelong will win the Premiership next year Cat? Why, Why!! Why do it? Is it love is that why? Illusions, Cat, vagaries of perception! Temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence that is without meaning or purpose! Although only a blind parochial Geelong mind could invent something as insipid as the love of Chris Scott! You must be able to see it, Cat! You must know it by now! Geelong can’t win! It’s pointless to keep fighting! Why, Cat?! Why?! WHY DO YOU PERSIST?!

Based on the last two Premiers. Hawthorn before that had Cyril, Puopolo, Bruest (who is a midsize forward capable of pressuring) and Gunston an athletic KPF also good at ground level. Even Roughy is really versatile for a big man.

Powa I think they were. Port already have a lot of speed in their team so Lindsay will probably be a back up more than anything in 2018. However if he does actually get his game going and does the team things like apply forward line pressure he could be a dynamic recruit that helps you go deep in to September.

Menzel is relatively slow and lacks defensive pressure, Cocky is injury prone, and Parfitt is one paced. You need at least 3 really fast small forwards willing to put on huge defensive pressure to be an elite team now especially, as I’ve said before, on the wide expanses of the MCG come finals. Not only that you need real dynamic speed all over the ground something Geelong and Adelaide really lack.

We played too tall all year. It wasn’t just because of injuries. We could’ve put Parsons on the long term injury list and elevated with Jones. The stupid thing is we still haven’t elevated him. Scott doesn’t believe in speed rather he still thinks a team built like his early 2000s Brisbane Lions team will cut it in modern footy. Scott believes in KPD’s and KPF’s and big blokes in general as being the key to success. It’s delusional and has been proven so.

Good point Stephen and one I’ve touched on in another article of mine about Geelong’s recruiting strategy. We are too old, slow, and just won’t have the capability to apply the pressure needed to win a flag at the MCG in 2018 – it’s that simple. I’m glad you found the article interesting, thank you.

I never said anything about last year, I clearly spoke in my article about our 2018 set up. If however you want me to reflect on what I would’ve done last year in the Prelim I would’ve put Buzza at full forward, with Jones, Cocky, and Mots at his feet. I would’ve dropped Blicavs and Hawkins for Jones and Z. Guthrie and put Cam Guthrie in Blicavs position in the guts. Not that it would’ve helped much, I reckon we still would’ve been belted but at least we could’ve troubled them with our set up a bit more. As I said and I’ll say again the core of our issues goes to our horrendous recruiting – outside of Danger and at a pinch Tuohy we just haven’t recruited enough players at all with real break away speed or dynamism which are just crucial in modern AFL if you want to genuinely compete for a flag. We simply don’t have a team capable of challenging for the flag or playing in the right way to win one. We’re too slow, tall, and lumbering. We’ll most likely get enough wins playing our contest to contest stoppage obsessed game plan in 2018 to make finals but it’ll fail again come September.

Cat – I don’t think our issue is scoring I said quite clearly in my piece our issue has and will be defensive pressure especially on the MCG especially inside forward 50/the attacking half of the ground. I certainly think we should be moving the ball altogether differently as a team but our poor recruiting limits our ability to do that (hence my other piece on out Thelma and Louise recruiting strategy). As for your ridiculous assertion that Hawkins did better than Riewoldt last season let’s look at the stats. Reiwoldt had more goals, ranked 1st in the league for marks inside 50, 20th for Score involvements (far higher than Hawkins) and had far more 1%s than Hawkins. Hawkins is a liability once the ball hits the ground. Yes he tackles but most are ineffective and allow the opposition to get a handball off or disposal in some way, this is due to his lack of pace and lumbering nature. Hawkins like Tex Walker, and Patton, are the types of forwards who will be increasingly irrelevant in modern footy. Also did you forget Hawkins finals series?? Woeful is a word that comes to mind right up there with Blicavs finals efforts.

You need one quality good KPF in the modern game but they must be athletic in the air and at ground level in order to apply pressure and win ground ball or they’re a liability waiting to be exposed by the better teams.

Fair enough Milo excuse my ignorance if I’m wrong didn’t Soldo and Elton play more of a second ruck role in those games than full time KPFwd’s? Either way you’re right they did play two talls up there more than I thought. Still the majority of the year it was a small forward line and in finals when it counted.

Paul D – I was wrong on that one. No shame in saying that, we can’t always be right. However I did say in another article pre-season that Geelong wouldn’t do anything in finals in 2017 and I was right we didn’t! We won a semi final against a team with a worse record at the MCG in finals in recent times than ourselves (which is saying something) who Longmire said were fatigued from playing an elimination final pretty much every week just to make finals. We were completely smashed in the other two finals. Geelong is going nowhere under Chris Scott I’ve said that repetitively and have been proven right. It’ll be Groundhog Day again next year too. We’ll win enough games to make finals but do nothing in them when it counts, we’ll lose post bye yet again, we’ll lose gimmie games against poor teams like we usually do, and we’ll perform poorly and struggle with our game plan at the MCG. Anyway we’ll see if I’m right come the end of 2018 – I look forward to revisiting your comment.

They played Griffiths in the first two games only against two teams in Carlton and Collingwood that are well known to have shortish young physically underdeveloped defenders. They were trying to use him to expose that weakness in the opposition, once they saw it didn’t work after two games for the rest of the season they pretty much went small. Hardly a compelling case saying injury dictated their small forward line especially considering they won their first two games so why would they change a winning formula and not bring in a tall to replace Griffiths if they were so committed to a two talls forward line? The fact is they’d planned all along for a small quick forward line and played it for at least 20 out of the 23 rounds. Hardwick seems like a pretty honest bloke to me and if injury forced their hand why wouldn’t he just say that?

Here’s the quote from Hardwick about approaching 2017 pre-season. ‘We got our coaches, recruiters, together and the things we came up with was we’ve got really incredible speed here…and that can be a real key to us…and how can we best get that to work for us with a defensive mindset.’ When asked if he expected the way Richmond set up/played to be the new trend, Hardwick responded by saying ‘we took bits out of The Bulldogs game-plan last year, it’s a copycat league..’

Fair call but Richmond finished 13th in 2016. I’m saying the top two teams at the end of the home and away series of 2017 have no chance of winning the flag in 2018. I think it’s a bold prediction but I do base it on reason and logic – we’ll see whether I’m right.

I honestly think he did plan it that way and they would’ve run simulations and planned for a small forward line all pre-season 2017. We’ll agree to disagree. Either way it’s fairly hard to say it didn’t work and change the face of modern footy.

Cat – if Scott and Geelong had any sense they’d drop Hawkins stick Taylor back, play Buzza as the main forward and only KPF up there and put Cocky, Danger/Ablett (swapping), Jermaine Jones, McCarthy, Gregson, and possibly at times Menegola drifting forward at his feet. Stuff Menzel because he provides zero defensive pressure and stuff Parsons who’s too slow.

Stanley, Taylor, sometimes Henderson when Scott gets desperate.

Mate watch ‘On the Couch’ the post Grand Final edition and you’ll see Hardwick say they copied the Bulldogs idea with a small forward line and took it to the next level (paraphrasing).

Yes The Bulldogs played a small forward line that worked for them in 2016 but for some reason they changed that up in 2017 recruiting Cloke and going away from what had been so successful for them. Richmond did the opposite they went ultra small and quick in their forward line far quicker and smaller than the 2016 Dogs. Hardwick and co. read the direction the game is taking and understood the evolution of modern AFL quicker than any other team and it payed off handsomely! Hardwick has been quoted as saying they stole the idea of the small forward line from the 2016 Dogs and ran with it. I think there are still far too many traditionalists coaching AFL teams and in the media who can’t see that the days of tall lumbering power forwards are done. Richmond at this point clearly has the best small forward line in the league and that’s without Shai Bolton having much of an impact yet which I suggest he’ll have more of next year. They’re still a young team with improvement in them and they clearly have a tactical edge. The only way you could try to foil a small forward line is to have a small defence and what team in the league apart from Richmond (ironically enough) has a fast smallish defence?

Guru – I never said Geelong and Adelaide are garbage?!? I just said that come September next year I believe they’ll both be found wanting especially on the MCG due to their lack of pace and insistence on playing two lumbering talls in their respective forward lines.

I was one week early. I forgot we were playing a team with a worse record in finals at the MCG in recent times than us. Still got to love our dismal Prelim result…What’s that now, 3 Prelim losses under Scott? The last two in a row absolute smashing’s with only Hawthorn’s inaccuracy (12 scoring shots to 1 in the last quarter 2013) saving us from a third? Scott now ranks as one of the worst finals coaches of all time and with top 4 finishes he’s clearly the worst by some distance in the modern era. You watch I’ll be proven right Geelong are on the brink of disaster over the next 3/4 years and will never win another flag as long as Cook and Scott are at the helm.