Bombertalk

How much has not manning up cost us this year? Not too much seeing as we won three games against teams with midfields rated higher by the media.

But it will start to be costly.

No one wants to man up or even chase. The midfielders jog towards the defensive end while opponents sprint. If they see an open man, they just point and yell for someone else to do it (I even noticed this at Bendigo's game this week). The half backs often don't man up either which is even more costly.

Everyone is guilty. Stanton seems to be one of the worst although I seem to notice it with Peverill a lot, even though he has this reputation as a good tagger!? But forget I mentioned any individuals because every one is guilty.

It's not good enough.

I couldn't agree more. When we have the ball, our midfield is good. When we do not, we are disgraaceful. Hence when a team gets a run on, there is nothing we can do to stop them. It happened to us against Carlton and it happened again yesterday.

Everyone is crapping on about how good Stanton is, but the truth is his lack of interest in being accountable through the middle costs us more goals than he creates. Watson is in the same boat, although he at least tries to man up. He's just too slow to get the job done though. Hird doesn't man up either, although considering his play making abilities, I can accept this in moderation. Pev generally mans up, although lacks the pace when the ball is out in the open. Something needs to be done as it's costing us game after game at the moment.

I don't know where you guys get the fantastic idea that midfielders chase their direct opponents. Have you ever seen Buckley, Voss, Cousins, Judd, Crawford or even Hird chase down their direct opponent?

By the way, while Stanton, Lovett, Winderlich, Hird etc have the ball, where are their opponents?

As for manning up - nothing shits me more than seeing an easy kick out from full back. To me, there is no excuse for allowing a loose man accepting a kick out, 50 metres away. Happens every time.

On the kick out, Cloke did a good kob manning up on whoever the target was on his side of the field... and it hurt us all day long.

One of the guys I was watching the game with was constantly saying "Man up! Why aren't they manning up?" and he's not a Dons fan. It was pretty abysmal at times yesterday.

considering collingwood went man on man - it shouldn't have been that hard to man up!

it has been a simple 1%er that we have been poor at for the last few years, along with spoiling instead of marking from behind.

at least we have improved our tackling.

I 've been saying this for a long time. Forget this zoning crap, just man up for goodnes sake. Am sick & tired of the opposition kicking out & marking uncontested. Find a man each & make a contest every time.

BenDoolan wrote:I don't know where you guys get the fantastic idea that midfielders chase their direct opponents. Have you ever seen Buckley, Voss, Cousins, Judd, Crawford or even Hird chase down their direct opponent?

Stupid argument. You don't have to man up on the same guy every play, but when your team doesn't run back hard and leaves open men even after taking a good look at them, it hurts.

j-mac wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:I don't know where you guys get the fantastic idea that midfielders chase their direct opponents. Have you ever seen Buckley, Voss, Cousins, Judd, Crawford or even Hird chase down their direct opponent?

Stupid argument. You don't have to man up on the same guy every play, but when your team doesn't run back hard and leaves open men even after taking a good look at them, it hurts.

Yep, you make a fair point. I was responding to gringo mainly as he made references to Stanton and his direct opponent in another thread.

Looking at Hawthorn's performance gainst Geelong in Tassie - I expect them to give us an absolute belting unless we start to play more accountable footy.

Hawthorn have modelled their improvement on the Sydney style of manning-up, team tackling, numbers at the ball and runners in support.

Essendon's improvement has come from fast running from the half-back line delivering to a forward line with 3 genuine targets.

If Hawthorn shut us down - and Blind Freddie can se that will be their goal -
then our unaccountable brand of football will be costly.

BenDoolan wrote:

j-mac wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:I don't know where you guys get the fantastic idea that midfielders chase their direct opponents. Have you ever seen Buckley, Voss, Cousins, Judd, Crawford or even Hird chase down their direct opponent?

Stupid argument. You don't have to man up on the same guy every play, but when your team doesn't run back hard and leaves open men even after taking a good look at them, it hurts.

Yep, you make a fair point. I was responding to gringo mainly as he made references to Stanton and his direct opponent in another thread.

Where did I mention anything about Stanton's direct oppoent? I couldn't care less who he mans up on in the middle, as long as it's somebody. My point is he doesn't man up...on anyone, be it a direct opponent or otherwise. He seems to think he's above manning up, and it costs us games.

j-mac wrote:How much has not manning up cost us this year? Not too much seeing as we won three games against teams with midfields rated higher by the media.

But it will start to be costly.

No one wants to man up or even chase. The midfielders jog towards the defensive end while opponents sprint. If they see an open man, they just point and yell for someone else to do it (I even noticed this at Bendigo's game this week). The half backs often don't man up either which is even more costly.

Everyone is guilty. Stanton seems to be one of the worst although I seem to notice it with Peverill a lot, even though he has this reputation as a good tagger!? But forget I mentioned any individuals because every one is guilty.

It's not good enough.

Sorry I disagree with you. I like how our players back themselves.
Also our tackling has been a highlight this season so far.

gringo wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:

j-mac wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:I don't know where you guys get the fantastic idea that midfielders chase their direct opponents. Have you ever seen Buckley, Voss, Cousins, Judd, Crawford or even Hird chase down their direct opponent?

Stupid argument. You don't have to man up on the same guy every play, but when your team doesn't run back hard and leaves open men even after taking a good look at them, it hurts.

Yep, you make a fair point. I was responding to gringo mainly as he made references to Stanton and his direct opponent in another thread.

Where did I mention anything about Stanton's direct oppoent? I couldn't care less who he mans up on in the middle, as long as it's somebody. My point is he doesn't man up...on anyone, be it a direct opponent or otherwise. He seems to think he's above manning up, and it costs us games.

So Stanton should man up someone elses opponent as well as his own....yeah right, gotchya.

gringo wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:

j-mac wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:I don't know where you guys get the fantastic idea that midfielders chase their direct opponents. Have you ever seen Buckley, Voss, Cousins, Judd, Crawford or even Hird chase down their direct opponent?

Stupid argument. You don't have to man up on the same guy every play, but when your team doesn't run back hard and leaves open men even after taking a good look at them, it hurts.

Yep, you make a fair point. I was responding to gringo mainly as he made references to Stanton and his direct opponent in another thread.

Where did I mention anything about Stanton's direct oppoent? I couldn't care less who he mans up on in the middle, as long as it's somebody. My point is he doesn't man up...on anyone, be it a direct opponent or otherwise. He seems to think he's above manning up, and it costs us games.

Which games has it cost us?

BenDoolan wrote:

gringo wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:

j-mac wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:I don't know where you guys get the fantastic idea that midfielders chase their direct opponents. Have you ever seen Buckley, Voss, Cousins, Judd, Crawford or even Hird chase down their direct opponent?

Stupid argument. You don't have to man up on the same guy every play, but when your team doesn't run back hard and leaves open men even after taking a good look at them, it hurts.

Yep, you make a fair point. I was responding to gringo mainly as he made references to Stanton and his direct opponent in another thread.

Where did I mention anything about Stanton's direct oppoent? I couldn't care less who he mans up on in the middle, as long as it's somebody. My point is he doesn't man up...on anyone, be it a direct opponent or otherwise. He seems to think he's above manning up, and it costs us games.

So Stanton should man up someone elses opponent as well as his own....yeah right, gotchya.

Again, I didn't state that Stanton needed to man up his direct opponent, or that the midfield need to all have direct opponents. I simply said that we are unaccountable through the middle and need to man up when we don't have the ball. I've made the assumption that you can read Mr Doolan, which I think is a reasonable assumption given your appetite for posting on this website. Accordingly, I'm not sure where you've got the idea that I said that Stanton, or our midfielders generally, need to have a direct opponent and stay with them the entire game - although, I don't think this would be a bad idea from time to time. My argument is simply that they are unaccountable through the middle, which they are.
It cost us the game against Carlton – period.

If our midfield had manned up against Carlton we would have won the game. Not manning up in the middle was also a key reason why we lost to Collingwood, although not as prevalent a cause as it was against Carlton.

gringo wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:

gringo wrote:

BenDoolan wrote:

j-mac wrote: Stupid argument. You don't have to man up on the same guy every play, but when your team doesn't run back hard and leaves open men even after taking a good look at them, it hurts.

Yep, you make a fair point. I was responding to gringo mainly as he made references to Stanton and his direct opponent in another thread.

Where did I mention anything about Stanton's direct oppoent? I couldn't care less who he mans up on in the middle, as long as it's somebody. My point is he doesn't man up...on anyone, be it a direct opponent or otherwise. He seems to think he's above manning up, and it costs us games.

So Stanton should man up someone elses opponent as well as his own....yeah right, gotchya.

Again, I didn't state that Stanton needed to man up his direct opponent, or that the midfield need to all have direct opponents. I simply said that we are unaccountable through the middle and need to man up when we don't have the ball. I've made the assumption that you can read Mr Doolan, which I think is a reasonable assumption given your appetite for posting on this website. Accordingly, I'm not sure where you've got the idea that I said that Stanton, or our midfielders generally, need to have a direct opponent and stay with them the entire game - although, I don't think this would be a bad idea from time to time. My argument is simply that they are unaccountable through the middle, which they are.
It cost us the game against Carlton – period.

If our midfield had manned up against Carlton we would have won the game. Not manning up in the middle was also a key reason why we lost to Collingwood, although not as prevalent a cause as it was against Carlton.

I'm assuming YOU can read also mr gringo. If you bothered to read my comments in the other thread, you will notice that I expressed the reasons why we lost against Carlton AND Collingwood.......obviously to deaf ears and blind eyes.

You have NOT explained anything. All you have said is that we were "unaccountable through the middle" (explain who and how and give examples). "We need to man up" (explain who on who, if they don't have to man up on their direct opponent as you allude to).

Start putting some f****** meat on your bones gringo, because all you have said is sweet f*** all.

We didnt man up against Freo or the saints and we won.

The style of football we are playing, we are going to get caught on the rebound.

We dont play the shut down game like Sydney or Adelaide, rather try and play a similar type of game to West Coast where we have to back ourselves. Obviously it doesnt hurt WC as much because they are far superior to us in just about every aspect of the midfield, but if we are to lose by 20 points id rather it be 140-120 than 70-50 (ala Sydney and Adelaide scoring)

tom9779 wrote:Sorry I disagree with you. I like how our players back themselves.
Also our tackling has been a highlight this season so far.

Never said I don't like the players backing themselves, but how about helping out the defenders and at least trying to pressure the opposition midfields?

Tackling has been good, but more tackles could be laid in the middle if the midfiedlers chased and you don't even need to get a real tackle on a player to put his kick off.

Rossoneri wrote:We didnt man up against Freo or the saints and we won.

The style of football we are playing, we are going to get caught on the rebound.

We dont play the shut down game like Sydney or Adelaide, rather try and play a similar type of game to West Coast where we have to back ourselves. Obviously it doesnt hurt WC as much because they are far superior to us in just about every aspect of the midfield, but if we are to lose by 20 points id rather it be 140-120 than 70-50 (ala Sydney and Adelaide scoring)

We'd get hurt on the rebound if we did play a shut down game, because once the other team gets it the midfielders stop or jog back. There should be some desperation to stop the other team and get the footy back.