reports from AAMI- 13/3/09

[sunsaint]

Did Montagna play today? Who played in our midfield?

Montagna played
onballers would have been
Dal Santo
Ball
Steven
Montagna
then rotate in Goddard, Ray, Clarke, Geary, McQualter, Jones.
SO apart from Hayes that was a full strength midfield.

Sorry to burst you bubble SS but I think you will find that Rucks are also considered as midfielders and we were missing both of ours and we were playing against probably the best ruck combination in the league - oh and gram missed as well

I dont consider Gardiner to be part of our regular on-field list, so yes King was missing. Gram is not a regular in our center line either, he is just being touted a 2-3rd string on-baller for 09. With the abscence of Dempster we really cant afford to have Gram and Fisher missing from the backline.
AS they say bubbles are very fragile elements in physics.
POP

[saintbrat]

http://images.slatterymedia.com/photogr ... b_code=all

photo's up on slattery AFL photos

[matrix]

well that was friggin fun.
maxs calf was strapped from top to bottom at the end of the game, and either didnt start or played bugger all, i cant remember.
begley (? spelling?) had a lovely shiner too on his right eye i believe

[Devilhead]

Did Montagna play today? Who played in our midfield?

Montagna played
onballers would have been
Dal Santo
Ball
Steven
Montagna
then rotate in Goddard, Ray, Clarke, Geary, McQualter, Jones.
SO apart from Hayes that was a full strength midfield.

Sorry to burst you bubble SS but I think you will find that Rucks are also considered as midfielders and we were missing both of ours and we were playing against probably the best ruck combination in the league - oh and gram missed as well

I dont consider Gardiner to be part of our regular on-field list, so yes King was missing. Gram is not a regular in our center line either, he is just being touted a 2-3rd string on-baller for 09. With the abscence of Dempster we really cant afford to have Gram and Fisher missing from the backline.
AS they say bubbles are very fragile elements in physics.
POP

You might not consider Gardiner being part of our regular side but you find he will be there with King come Round 1 and you will also find that Gram this year will be a regular in our midfield rotation much more than say Jones.

As for Dempster well he plays a stopping role and will be very hard to replace however someone like Gram is a very different animal as I don't think I have seen him lay a tackle in his life - Dempster more than likely will be replaced by Begley or Baker and anyway he could be back sooner than you think

POP

[jay young]

I was there saints played bad poor skills poor coaching why do coaches week after week let k cornes just so loose all the time . Coaches let the saints play up the ground too much when we went forward only nick was up there , need to improve very quickly in fact at the end of the season the club should make these guys work night shift with no pay in bakeries foundrys chrome platers wrecking yards make them assertive men not fancy smancy athletes with coffioured headcuts . rubbing back cars in panel shops will make you into a man . Introduce them to some gutsy loud punk rock like the saints radio birdman stooges mc5 gg allin not garbage like justin timberlake and top forty unoffensive crap on these ipods . HARD YAKKA IS NEEDED.

[S.A Saint]

from today's game the there are only 2 positives from me...
Gwilt during the second quarter was used across the half forward line and presented quite well only only player that had good disposal of the ball...i believe he is our 3rd tall...

the other 1 is luke ball can kick over a jam tin now and slotted a beautiful goal from around 40 out with ease

[saintbrat]

good to hear from people who were there jay

but could you put some enters into your post..

[matrix]

have to agree there bally tried his guts out all day.
dal got touches, but again sat off the pack, copped a couple of knocks but was fine.
joey was a diff player from what we know he can do.....
kozi??...well lets just say he didnt get delivery and leave it at that

[S.A Saint]

going by todays game and the importance of ruck work i really do believe that we need to play king and gardi together...

lade and brogan gave port so much supple today and protected their on ballers beautifully...

if these 2 are fit then we must play them it will add so much to our midfield...kosi was pretty much destroyed today in the ruck and can only be used as a roaming forward or a ff....

[saint66au]

joey was a diff player from what we know he can do.....

He was specifically listed as "among our best" by Saints Media in their wrap up of the game..you saw it differently?

[matrix]

agree king and gards were missed......
i missed kozi today too

[matrix]

he did ok......
but not what we know he can do.
seriously the best wouldnt have been hard to get into today.
we were very VERY ordinary, port made us look like we were standing still, and i think sometimes we were.

oh well, shite happens, its what practices matches are for....i got to see the boyz so its not a total loss to me.

[rodgerfox]

So let me get this straight....

We were outpaced. Outmuscled. Couldn't score. Copped injuries and relied on our gun player too much?

[SydneySainter]

For any concerned...it was a FRIENDLY. I'd think about that before anyone starts brewing up any "sack RL threads".

[sax]

I was at the game today. Unfortunately I live a bit away from Adelaide, so couldn't get to my computer any earlier. I'll give a little summary, think of it what you will.

Before anyone gets too flustered about the score, remember three things, it was a trial match, Port were full strength and the teams we play rd 1 & 2 were playing straight after us.
Port were switched on, they played with more intensity and skill. Our guys made ALOT of skill errors, especially in the second quarter.
A positive is we did outscore them in the second half.
I think Tom Lynch showed quite a bit, as did Steven in patches.
LOTS of rotations. 32 degrees in Adelaide today so you have to expect it.
But saying that, we used the bench twice as much as Port. So I think players couldn't get into the game as they'd probably like.
Roo looked very underdone and as was stated in an earlier post, we were SMASHED in the ruck, hence the clearances also.
Max didn't look good. Probably 2-3 weeks at least. In saying that, I think Dawson did ok, he's no Max, but Ross needs to play him at FB, not CHB. He's lost away from the square. Really has beefed up though. Don't know what happened to X!
The highlight of the day for mine was Luke Ball kicking a set shot goal from about 45m out and it went through at half post height. Also had a few explosive runs. It shows that MAYBE the real Luke Ball we know and love might be back.
In conclusion, it was a crap game of footy, but hey, no points on offer and Sydney and Adelaide didn't see the real St. Kilda (We hope).
For Mine Best: Goddard, Dal Santo, Ball, Milne , Lynch, Gwilt

[Teflon]

Thanks Sax.

For anyone who saw the game - was it one of those defensive, players behond the ball slogs (Port dont seem to me to play that way that often)....I know it was one sided and we were smashed with no ruck.....but were there signs we tried to move the ball on with some speed ?? or did we continue to chip sideways only to bring the ball into fwd 50 from wide off the flanks expecting fwds to kick goals fromthe boundary??

I ask cause to me THIS is our major worry.

tks

[matrix]

port ran like f***...
but saying that they did go backwards a lot when chances up forward were open.
they created a lot of loose men by running and creating space.
they have some very fast players, couple of newies i dont know that just accelerated away from our boys

[sax]

Thanks Sax.

For anyone who saw the game - was it one of those defensive, players behond the ball slogs (Port dont seem to me to play that way that often)....I know it was one sided and we were smashed with no ruck.....but were there signs we tried to move the ball on with some speed ?? or did we continue to chip sideways only to bring the ball into fwd 50 from wide off the flanks expecting fwds to kick goals fromthe boundary??

I ask cause to me THIS is our major worry.

tks

1st half we made mistake after mistake so you couldn't tell what we were trying to do, every time we got the ball we turned it over.
The thing I found is we were taking to long to go forward, we were taking alot of time and letting Port get numbers back. That was the 1st half.
Third quarter we were a different team, we moved the ball with more purpose and more direct, hence we kicked 5 straight I think in that quarter. Last quarter was pretty even.
For me though, the most worrying signs are 1- Our skill level is shocking, we really struggled to hit targets today, and 2- Our amount of handballs! To me, footy is still a simple game, with tall forwards like ours, and a guy like Milney around their ankles, wouldn't you want to get it in there quickly!

[Teflon]

Thanks Sax.

For anyone who saw the game - was it one of those defensive, players behond the ball slogs (Port dont seem to me to play that way that often)....I know it was one sided and we were smashed with no ruck.....but were there signs we tried to move the ball on with some speed ?? or did we continue to chip sideways only to bring the ball into fwd 50 from wide off the flanks expecting fwds to kick goals fromthe boundary??

I ask cause to me THIS is our major worry.

tks

1st half we made mistake after mistake so you couldn't tell what we were trying to do, every time we got the ball we turned it over.
The thing I found is we were taking to long to go forward, we were taking alot of time and letting Port get numbers back. That was the 1st half.
Third quarter we were a different team, we moved the ball with more purpose and more direct, hence we kicked 5 straight I think in that quarter. Last quarter was pretty even.
For me though, the most worrying signs are 1- Our skill level is shocking, we really struggled to hit targets today, and 2- Our amount of handballs! To me, footy is still a simple game, with tall forwards like ours, and a guy like Milney around their ankles, wouldn't you want to get it in there quickly!

Thanks sax.

Interesting to read that - it also confirms what others have said - for some reason we are struggling in first half...only to become some differennt side in qtrs 2/3.......this is occuring with tomuch consistency for it just to be coincidence - what the f@rk could cause this?

Our skills - apart frm Dal/Goddard - IMHO have not been great for some time. We simply are not as skilled by foot IMO as a Port. I do believe the no 1 recruiting concern Ive had for some time is recruiting so called "athletes" ahead of footballers or just players (see Jones, Mqualter, L Fishers even Blake) and others who dispose of the ball ordinary...we have a lot of them.

[esaint66]

Tom Lynch effects the spoil at centre half forward

He is amazing at doing this he will chase his man half way up the ground to win ball and will do anything to keep it in the 50. He also has great pace and a beautiful grab.

Great to hear he played so well after feeling a little under the weather during the week.

Have to have a chat with him when he gets back.

[Shaggy]

Its a practice match. Yes of course the players would have been trying.

Yes it is a worry.

But it doesn't take much for a turnaround particularly when blokes like Lenny have to come back.

Its a good wake up call for the team and the coaches. Doesn't hurt to learn a lesson before it counts.

[Longwayfromhome]

OK. We got flogged by 10 goals. Why?
Was it simply because we lost the clearances. Was it because our forward line is a non entity? No Roo, no forward line.
I can live with the injury to Max, I can't live with the inability of a St kilda team to kick more than nine goals per game.
Look forward to no more than a mid field effort this year. To hope for a top four finish is fantasy at it's best.
Hope I'm wrong.
Go Saints

[Longwayfromhome]

Where does Kosi sit in out current team ?
Not a full forward and maybe not a ruck option. Maybe he really is a top reserve player at best !
The coach says he is judged harshly, I say you are judged by the performances you offer week in week out.
See you later Justin.
Time for some one else to shine.

[Teflon]

Where does Kosi sit in out current team ?
Not a full forward and maybe not a ruck option. Maybe he really is a top reserve player at best !
The coach says he is judged harshly, I say you are judged by the performances you offer week in week out.
See you later Justin.
Time for some one else to shine.

A tad harsh after a nothing praccy match where delivery (as its been for a while) was supposedly attrocious.

I suspect if we moved the ball a but quicker - as we keep hearing the coach say he wants - Kosi might just get a chance.

[matrix]

our disposal was pretty ordinary....
couldnt hav hit a barn door with a handful of marbles today.

but like others have said......practice match, and hopefully a lot is taken away from the game.
we did have max, lenny gram and both rukman out ( against brogan and lade ).