You’d imagine anything today would be very light.
Hurls / Francis to “Full Back”, to organise the defence. Francis sees the game very well and can do this, but it is a “step up” given he is only a 10 game player at AFL level.
Normally Hooker would have set it up. Basically there are no other defenders with the footy brain to be able to be the General. Ambrose would be the mobile tall, effectively the 3rd tall defender.
This is very important. Effectively there are no runners unless there are goals. Last week the defence lacked organisation.
Cats have a pretty small injury list
Nakia Cockatoo Test
Lachie Fogarty 3-4 weeks
Zac Smith Knee 2-3 weeks
Harry Taylor Concussion Test
Zach Tuohy Knee 1-2 weeks
We should get a better indicator this week for the season ahead as long as more of our top midfielder play majority of the game (Smith, Heppell and Zerrett + Tbell)
Ambrose and hooker match up on completely different forwards
Don’t ask questions WOB.
We know the answer is Hartley and I prefer Ambrose in every single scenario.
Kelly with a lot of info/insight on the JLT.
Same.
Different players but I don’t want another Steinberg situation where a guy’s thrown into a key role in a final in his 2nd or 3rd game.
That was predictable from months out and they kept using pinch-hitters before eventually running out of options.
Get a couple of games into him early, on the 3rd or 4th target.
Except Saad.
in: Zerk
out: whoever
Anyone went to training today?
With Ambrose in there, at least there is 1 player with a 100% defensive mindset, but for the intercept marking specialist, its got to be Francis. Hooker could do both.
We need to get used to the new way of marking. Play from behind and push the opponent in the back. Did anyone in JLT1 get pinged for “in the back” ? I dont think so.
Not in ours, but there was one that was quasi back/side that got called. It’s gone back to the ‘2 motions’ kind of system. Can’t obviously push, but can hold off to keep position.
so we are going to take this game seriously and be playing it like a real game
ok - let’s see what it looks like
Kelly is impressive.
One of the more insightful interviews of recent times. Really did give straight (and in this case reassuring) answers.
Kelly is good to listen to. Hasn’t developed that political veneer, yet.
I think Crow said in the injury report that the players who played limited time were expected to increase their minutes in the next one. I read that as Zerret, Hep, Daniher, Smith, McKenna, Laverde but could be wrong.
With so many in the bench there aren’t many blokes who missed out, and most of those guys played against Richmond VFL on Saturday, so I wouldn’t expect a very different looking side.
I wonder how this will play out for the season proper. If some of these players may need a few games to get to match fitness and not play their best or compete as deep in a match as we’d expect. So the load and responsibility needs to be shared across the team and those who have done more may need to do extra until the others get up to speed.