Exactly.
Why are we not doing this? We are not North Melbourne, we have millions available.
It’s what I’ve said before about Gale. They are smart businessmen/women but they run the club like a football club with the main goal being to win the flag.
We run our club like a child care centre.
6 Likes
You better apologise for that or you will hurt their feelings!
2 Likes
Nah man, splashing the cash on ‘names’ like Hird, Thompson, Worsfold, Stringer, Shiel etc. just to sell memberships is half the reason we are where we are.
Not that all these guys didn’t/don’t have anything to offer, but splashing the cash in lieu of an actual long term plan has been our MO for too long.
5 Likes
You need your best 22 playing 95% of the time, something of which we never have.
Look at the teams finishing up top say last 5-10 years. It’s minimal injuries and the whole list getting that continuity.
As soon as you have some of that best 22 missing 1-2-3 weeks at a time here and there your in trouble.
Of course it helps when you can take a guy like Tom Lynch from the bottom club and strengthen a top clubs list for nothing.
It says alot about our club that an apology was needed.
The writing was on the wall this year when they released the membership photos and you had 3 blokes cuddling each other.
Child care
3 Likes
In my opinion I50’s is what we need to rectify. As we all know we start all our ball movement from the back(we are second for rebound 50’s) and by doing so you are allowing the opposition more opportunities to take the ball off you whilst also allowing the opposition the opportunity to turn the ball over deep in your defence.
Looking at the heat maps you can see the obvious difference from Richmond’s two main forward targets opposed to ours. Ours have to go up the ground chasing kicks because we start our attacks so deep.
7 Likes
What was interesting about Richmond is how they spread the field and had players remain in F50. It meant here was always options up field.
3 Likes
Sums it perfectly
1 Like
It was just shear hard running combined with every player knowing where to be in any situation. No energy was wasted in running to unnecessary possisions.
To beat Richmond you need the following:
- Players of equal skill, determination, guts and willingness to run to the contest.
- Whole of Field, one on one tactics. This way they cannot outnumber at the fall of the ball.
- You have to be harder longer, tougher mentally longer, disciplined longer, and they will crack.
- Oh and having your best or nearly best 22 available for the majority of the year would be nice.
- The Best Sports Medicine, the Best Doctor’s, the Best Trainers, simply the best of everything remotely to do with getting, keeping and retaining players ultimate mental and physical fitness. Without this, don’t even bother. Oh that will cost money and the Business … oops… the Footy club wants to get rid of debt first. F*** that
- No nuff-nuff supporters
1 Like
I joined Blitz on Nov 17, 2003.
We were closer to a flag then than we are now.
End rant.
8 Likes
People would be surprised to know that Richmond’s Disposal Efficiency is 72% to our 71.6% and Clangers are average 58.3 to our 56.4.
They just know that you don’t turn it over in the back half of the ground like we do.
1 Like
I’m not, we need to build more depth and continue to develop our younger players but our list is plenty good enough.
It’s everything else that needs a lot of work. Fitness, coaching, leadership, culture, and mist importantly a willingness to work harder than anyone else.
Reverting back to the first post re: Dodoro, IMO his drafting has been fairly solid - you could argue with the earlier picks he hasnt quite nailed an outright elite player since JoeDan and instead perhaps has gone the ‘safer 100 gamer - but doesnt tear the world apart’ type option but the list below is more ‘hit’ than ‘miss.’
2nd round or later;
Ridley pick 22
Zerrett pick 26
Redman pick 30
Fantasia pick 55
Guelfi pick 76
AMT rookie pick
McKenna Cat B rookie
All above are best 22 bar ridley whose just about knocking on the door anyway
First rounders;
McGrath pick 1
Parish pick 5
Francis pick 6
Langford pick 17
LaVerde pick 20
Sam Draper rookie draft
Still too early to assess McGrath but its looking like he may yet justify his pick 1 ‘status’ despite Taranto and McClugg having better seasons.
Parish is an interesting one - definately best 22 but a comparable player to Luke Parker, Dan Hannebury and Keiran Jack whom were picks 30, 40 and a rookie upgrade respectively.
Francis looks like he’ll be a gun full stop. Lets hope mentally and physically he’s up to it because he definately has the talent and a good read of the game.
Langford and LaVerde are interesting one’s. Not sure if they’re in any teams best 22 but solid depth players in a very shallow draft outside the top 10.
There’s too few, very good players late in the 2014 draft but those picks have more than likely been fluked like Harris Andrews at pick 61 or Jeremy Finlayson at 85 (mind you he did SFA yesterday).
Sam Draper hasnt played an AFL game but for another club to offer him a big contract despite this suggests he’s already paid dividends.
Recent draft misses;
Alex Morgan pick 29
Yestin Eades pick 60-something
Josh Begley pick 31
Kobe Mutch pick 40-something
Apologies to Begley and Mutch for putting them in this category as theres still time yet to prove themselves but im going off this season (and last season for Mutch). In saying this, Begley’s AFL debut is up there with the best debuts ive prob seen in a while.
This post has gotten out of hand so i wont even touch on BZT or our recent trades but it seems Dodoro’s earned his keep
1 Like
If you look at most of Richmond’s games, the disposal efficiency is generally below average. They might only go at 71% themselves, but they will strangle the opposition to around 67% or something like that. Sides that try and take them on by hand get chewed up and spat out. You have to take the tackling component out of the game. Mark/kick is the best way to do that, but you have to be pin-point accurate with the kicking over short distances. They also fold back in numbers so that if you blindly bomb long into the F50 they’ll intercept and get you on the counter. Our game style appears to be one not compatible with beating them, which we haven’t done since 2014. The new regime at EFC know what this looks like. I hope a pre-season of completely overhauling the game style, drilling them so they know the ball movement and defensive patterns inside out, getting them fit enough to be able to carry this out for 4 quarters week after week, then seeing who can implement it and who can’t will show us what we need moving forward.
5 Likes
Smooth once again on the money. Notice he didn’t say we need to draft more star players.
2 Likes
We also take 15 weeks to learn a new game style so 2020 is a write off.
1 Like
Yep, disposal efficiency alone is not a good measure because it doesn’t paint much of a picture in isolation.
I listen to a few of the champion data podcasts and something Richmond are very good at is possession retention rate. It doesn’t have to be pretty but it gets to a teammate.
Around mid year they had the top 5 players for possession retention and SPP was in that group surprisingly.
I’m big on Moneyball theory and don’t tend to get carried away with one or two massive blunders from particular players as sometimes you can overlook the good they do.
Quite a few on here keep saying Richmond have a few jobbers but I disagree. They are effective when it matters and that’s why they are not only one of the best defensive sides but also why they are one of the highest scoring.
Before they even paid off the Saga debts, they have been putting aside resources for more buildings, womens teams, womens change rooms, the NT, academies. At least they are making use of available subsidies for the buildings, but inclusivity and outreach can be costly.
Just look at the mission statement.
1 Like