Season 2016 - Fremantle

Football Discussion Non Essendon Stuff
1

Fremantle

Coach – Ross Lyon

2015 –
Points For – 11th
Points Against – 2nd

Top 5 Best and Fairest

  1. Aaron Sandilands
  2. David Mundy
  3. Stephen Hill
  4. Nat Fyfe
  5. Michael Walters

2015 Rising Star Noms

None

Ins – Harley Bennell, Darcy Tucker, Harley Balic, Sam Collins, Shane Yarran, Matt Uebergang, Ryan Nyhuis,

Outs – Ryan Crowley, Paul Duffield, Max Duffy, Luke McPharlin, Colin Sylvia, Jacob Ballard, Craig Moller, Thomas Vandeleur

My Prediction

You don’t want to put a line through the minor premier from the year before but Freo is the exception to so many rules. One rule they seem to confirm though it that unless you have quality tall forwards, then you aren’t really involved in September in any serious way.

The forward line is a debacle. Pavlich is running around again almost out of necessity. Been a great player but signs last year weren’t good. The desperation to find a tall forward lead them to try and force the GWS hand with Cam McCarthy which looks like playing out for next year but still leaves them short staffed this year. They have great smalls, Ballantyne and Walters are as good a combination as anywhere except maybe Adelaide. Talk has Fyfe playing as a key forward this year, if this is the case, they may want to work on his set shot, the only real flaw in his game. Bennell should give them a little more spark running through the middle into the forward line if he can keep his head straight

The midfield is good. Fyfe and Mundy are elite and not too far below you have Neale and Hill. They will be expecting more out of Barlow this year who had a shocker last year. They have a fair headstart in having one of the most dominant rucks feeding the ball to them. He is aging though and it will be interesting to see if they start to rest him a little, they have Clark and Griffin as the next rung down but it is a pretty big step down.

The backline lost McPharlin last year. He was a pretty big part of why things worked back there. You don’t want your team to rely on Dawson. As much as you know he will do what you ask, he just isn’t good enough. Alex Pearce looked a player last year and will get some serious minutes this year and Silvagni will play a bit of ball. Will be interesting to see how they structure up. One thing we know is that they will probably find a way to stay tight. Lyon has built his career on it.

So Fremantle are still pretty much the same team as last year. The same team who finished the top of the ladder with the 11th best forward line and failed to make any real impact on the finals series. I can’t see them finishing on top this year but can’t see them falling outside the top four either. So 3-4 for mine. That prediction is made knowing Fyfe played minutes on the weekend. Should his injury mean he misses significant parts of the year then Freo are in a world of pain. He is way too important and they will end up in the bottom rungs of the eight.

2

Are there kids even any good?

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As pointed out in another thread: there's a difference between tanking and not giving a sh*t if you win Say S. Hill has had 35 touches to 3/4 time in a tight game then sits on the bench for the 4th quarter for no reason. THAT would be tanking. Selecting a side to both not play guys in your long term plans or to find out if your kids can play is different

I think they’ve probably gone past not caring if they win to not wanting to win. Most of the Fremantle hierarchy would prefer at this point to finishe 2-20 rather than 10-12. They couldn’t win 10 games if they wanted to from here, but even if they could do it by playing all the kids I don’t think they’d try to and you’d see kids in good form getting rested and whatnot. Doesn’t bother me, if teams want to tank, go wild. There’s incentives to do it but also some risks, and the AFL’s not going to stop them, so who cares?

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As pointed out in another thread: there’s a difference between tanking and not giving a sh*t if you win
Say S. Hill has had 35 touches to 3/4 time in a tight game then sits on the bench for the 4th quarter for no reason. THAT would be tanking. Selecting a side to both not play guys in your long term plans or to find out if your kids can play is different

5
Yeah i dunno WTF is the point of playing barlow in the wafl. Two 40+ possession weeks. Mzungu i dont rate though, at all
WAFL has historically been a possession heavy comp. Van Berlo has averaged 30+ possessions this year and he barely gets a look in. Crozier has been doing similar the past few years and he struggled to get games.

I wouldn’t be surprised if of all those possessions, half were turnovers which is the main problem with Mzungu and Barlow.

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12 months ago they were 9-0.

Incredible turnaround.

They had Sandilands, Fyfe, Hill, Johnson, McPharlin and an in form Pavlich 12 months ago.

Add those guys in with Bennell and I’m sure they’d be a lot better than 0-9.

They also played to their strengths last year. They’ve tried to play the Hawthorn possession / Bulldogs run and gun style and found their list aren’t skilful enough to carry the game plan out.

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Apparently Clint Jones got 57 touches for Perth a few weeks ago.

Probably resulted in 55 turnovers

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Apparently Clint Jones got 57 touches for Perth a few weeks ago.

9

If Essendon beat Fremantle in Perth then there needs to be an inquiry.

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Yeah i dunno WTF is the point of playing barlow in the wafl. Two 40+ possession weeks. Mzungu i dont rate though, at all
Mzungu has his moments but you can't tell me that he doesn't deserve a spot in the 0-9 senior side. He almost didn't need the other 5 defenders back there and he's been doing it for a few weeks in a row.
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Don't think Lyon particularly likes Barlow and I suspect he is gone at seasons end. MZungu is just an average footy player and doesn't offer a lot. Mundy is playing backline because they get no run out of the backline and he can do this, about the only player who can in Freo's side. It may well be tanking but it isn't just typical tanking.

And I agree they are tanking but I think Lyon is doing it in a way that means the AFL are not going to be able to do much about it.

Guy who played 91 games in 4 seasons under Lyon gets dropped while averaging 22 disposals and 7 tackles, and that’s not typical tanking? The only reason it’s not typical is that it’s absolutely brazen. Normally they pretend the player’s injured or something.

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Don’t think Lyon particularly likes Barlow and I suspect he is gone at seasons end. MZungu is just an average footy player and doesn’t offer a lot. Mundy is playing backline because they get no run out of the backline and he can do this, about the only player who can in Freo’s side. It may well be tanking but it isn’t just typical tanking.

And I agree they are tanking but I think Lyon is doing it in a way that means the AFL are not going to be able to do much about it.

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The point is they are ■■■■■■■ tanking and no one is saying/doing anything about it.

The test will come in two weeks. If they lay down against us then it’s too obvious to ignore.

We are a great club and will want win for pride. Regardless of pick one two or 18.

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Yeah i dunno WTF is the point of playing barlow in the wafl. Two 40+ possession weeks. Mzungu i dont rate though, at all

16

I watched a couple quarters of Barlow + Mzungu V the East Perth Eagles yesterday and how either of them isn’t playing in the senior side is a mystery…

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12 months ago they were 9-0.

Incredible turnaround.

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Bennell out for the year with calf injury.

Robbo spends two minutes speculating about whether it really is a calf or something else, then says he’s happy to take Lyon on his word that it’s a calf injury, then says hes hearing other things, then says that its just an injury, then says it’s probably more, then says he accepts what Freo say then says he’s not sure.

So Robbo’s 50:50 on the injury explanation.

Did he get this from Twitter?

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I also suspect Ballantyne is gone at years end.

He’s only 28. Can come here.

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I also suspect Ballantyne is gone at years end.

21
Given he's racked the pool cue at round 8 and put half the list on ice for the rest of the year, I think it's fair to say there's going to be a pretty big cull at the end of the year. Biggest problem is that they seem to have so much dead wood to get rid of, on top of a dozen guys eligible for their pension who should probably retire

They had one player who should have already retired but stayed on thinking they might win a GF this year, the same thought the rest of the club had.