Whoosha is not a good coach. He is a good manager, but a coach does more than just delegate.
All I ever hear in press conferences is “we were forced to make ______ change”, it’s never we looked at what was occurring and therefore changed things around. This is so it looks as though everything he has implemented is fine.
I am as happy as anyone that we are winning, but the best thing Whoosha has done recently is go to ground level and speak to the players, leaving the tactics to those who know how.
The seniors I can forgive cause they’re entitled to it. The juniors I can forgive as they don’t have the benefit of wisdom but there’s a whole generation of complete oxygen thieves that want it all and want it now and have refused to believe all of this takes time.
They are the same types that encourage board spills, the same types that organise or support ludicrous tickets like the new bombers or bring back sheddy. Seriously put up with this conga line of peanuts for too long and now hope they finally shut the fk up and pss off to big footy for the decent circle jerk they can’t get here.
Sticks to his knitting. Consistent message thru media and internally at club. Isn’t innovative but knows his players; knows his limits.
Is not Sheedy or Clarkson but has the club and players rowing together.
If he fails he will fail doing it his way. He is in total control. No excuses. No alibis.
Players have clearly improved significantly through the year.
Our run and gun quality is exciting and paying dividends. Our work rate is amazing. Against Crows we found plenty of space AND kept possession even with manic running.
Remember the (justified) vitriol woosha and team received after round 1 GWS thrashing??? Unfit!! No run!! Look tired!!!
Well, now, accolades and bouquets are due.
I generally just get annoyed at people who are absolutely certain and convinced of their views on Worsfold.
All of us are passionate, and I’d like to think knowledgeable, but I’m of the view that you can learn very little about how good a coach someone is from just watching games (and press conferences). You might be able to learn a bit - but my view is you absolutely cannot learn enough to have an iron clad view one way or the other.
More generally - I do get annoyed with older people who have such fixed views on things. Yes - they have experience, and with that hopefully wisdom, but that doesn’t afford people the right to have a completely closed mind.
I’m getting older, and wiser I hope. I’m mid (soon to be late) 30s. But as I do get older, the only thing I know I’m sure about is that I’m not sure about anything.
A B grade actor collared the free world in the eighties with less idea than dubya and trump combined but had the wherewithal to surround himself with the right people. He ended up looking pretty good for the most part.
Worsfold isn’t dumb by a long shot. He isn’t anywhere near the incompetent patsy people make out on here. And I’ll say that even if we lose to Gold Coast next week. West coast got a window which got a flag. Now whether that was by his own coaching intuition or through the right people in the box who knows but havent we just moved with the times here? Isn’t this the philosophy Hardwick and Buckley instituted, or by extension their clubs supported? And no disrespect to you, as I enjoy your contribution, but it doesn’t matter a jot if he’s up or down or attached to a lazy Susan suspended from a Blackhawk helicopter in the sky. That right there is optics. We sat on here squealing he does fig all in the box. He just sits there. He doesn’t show emotion. He doesn’t make enough changes, pick up the phone, punch walls. Bomber Thompson sat there eating a foot long during the cats reign and we thought it was a hoot. And he was allowed to do that cause by that stage his players drove it. And that’s what Worsfold wanted and I think it’s showing. He moved to the ground just to show us the club was listening and to give those who demanded it something to keep them warm at night. It wasn’t the reason for the turnaround. Nor was having Silicon Valley sitting in the box for the last few weeks.
Truth is we have absolutely no idea what’s going on. Zero. I don’t know if they have win a day in the box type raffles anymore but it might be worth entering one for a few on here. But based on what I’ve seen I think there’s some evidence to support a work in progress is reaching is conclusion.
Yes all this is with the benefit of hind sight but also harbouring a little bit of faith. If this goes on to something beautiful that’s awesome, but some people need to step back from their emotional peaks and troughs and look at what he’s done irrespective of where we are in the ladder. I posted a while back I had an inkling rutten and co where driving the real change behind the scenes, and Worsfold was carrying the can with the media who out right don’t deserve anything more than the vacuous answers he gives. Sheedy used to do it and we loved it. Gave them nothing but marshmallows and martians but sucked up all the attention away from the players and the club. And thats the media’s fault. They’ve demanded it ends with the coach. They demonstrated that with hird in the most brutal way possible. And Worsfold has practically laughed at them since day 1. The day the bans came in. The only time I have agreed with that foppish hat wearing polo enthusiast wankr is when he said thank god for John Worsfold.
He looks great when we’re sailing and a doofus when we’re struggling. That’s the unwritten part of the job description, but the undeniable reality once you’ve got the job. In the next couple of weeks, he’ll continue to look like a god and minor thanks will go to rutten, skipworth, x and Doris the tea lady mentioned previously. But they’re the group that’s giving him a platform to stare down the media and by large the AFL world, much like Regan assembled an inner sanctum that gave him the platform to stare down the Soviet Union.
That may sound a ridiculous comparison, but watch the media ramp it up over the next few weeks and tell me we didn’t need that type of person - there’s bound to be an article or two asking if certain players should be playing finals based on lasting effects of anything that wasn’t actually detected at any stage. I’ll get flamed for that but I don’t give a ■■■■.
We’re flying and I want us to rip September a new ar$e. 15 years is way too long. So I think we’ve got our ■■■■ together and that’s with important players out. If you don’t agree with that go pss up a flag pole and sit it out while the rest of us enjoy it.
I’m a farkin highly decorated, obscenely qualified, uniquely experienced, dedicated professional at my craft who has come to realise it’s all a complete sham. The only thing I know is I know fark all about everything, and that a few of you peanuts are even worse than me.
People wanted us to tag damaging players, myself included, but until we unlocked Clarke we didn’t have a good tagger.
It was like blaming Woosha for not having a marquee forward or a defender that can shut down Ben Brown, it’s obvious we need one but is easier said than done. No one was calling for us to try Clarke as a tagger…
And we know Hooker gets good results up forward, but at what cost to the back line.
Woosha has played heaps of kids and moved on a heap of players, people just seem to forget that because it doesn’t suit their narrative.
I reckon the coaches would have been across the same potential strategies as blitz but they might have needed certain things in place prior to implementing them.
Our knowledge of what happens leading up to, during and then after a match is limited. We see and hear bits. There are things the club is happy to share. And there is stuff the experts pick up through what they see and what they have been told. As for What Worsfold reveals at a press conference, I’d guess it’s only some, but not all. Do you really expect him to give away all the inside information? You try to hang on to as much info as you can in the hope it gives you an advantage.
As for reacting and not being proactive, I thought from his presser he discussed how they had planned for not having a recognised ruckman and the options that had devised if things went a particular way.
Yes, I agree it appears Worsold is a not a micro manager and instead draws upon his delegates. There is nothing wrong with that approach. Heck, we are paying good money on these assistants, and it’s not just to place the cones and blow a whistle at training.
My take is that Worsfold is very comfortable in who he is. A two-time premiership captain and a premiership coach. You can understand why. He is happy to be a team person.
He is clearly about empowering people and them taking responsibility for their actions - hence his great teams are player-led mantra.
As a club I believe you have to decide on a path and then stick to it for a decent amount of time to give it a proper chance to see if it will work. Chopping and changing just because you don’t get instant success will be a road of pain.
Worsfold at Ess is like the draft.
You get the best you can when it’s your turn to chose AND depending on what the club needs at that time.
Sometimes it works out well ( Beveridge, Hardwick, Clarkson) sometimes not so good (Pagan at Carlton, Richardson, McCartney, Neil Craig anywhere, Blight at StKilda, Watson at St kilda, Malthouse at Carlton)…
After the saga someone like Worsfold was about the only option. Or Sheedy!!! Imagine giving a first time ‘L plate’ coach that job!!!
The club is now settled, competitive, almost hated but respected again.
Players want to come to our club again. 5 yrs ago no one wanted to know the EFC.
Yes, winning a final, and more, is now required. Many clubs have been rebuilding for decades (Melb, StKilda, Bulldogs till 3 yrs ago Richmond for over 30 years) without the almost fatal period that we had to endure with our saga.
Worsfold IS the best post saga coach we could have hoped for. Anything more is a bonus He is not Jock McCale, not Sheedy, not Clarkson, not Barassi. But he is what we needed and may yet deliver the ultimate.
