saintsRrising wrote:bigcarl wrote:
fand don't revert to excessive, ultra-defensive numbers behind the ball whenever the pressure comes on.
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Why not?
All Malthouse's "war" talk boils down to in the main having a numerical advantage at the ball, or where the ball is going. If you have a number advantage, and all other factors are reasonably equal, then you win "battles', or games of football.
The press is going no where.
Our defensive game was a plus last year, and not a negative.
What we need to improve is our ball-use and movement, reducing turnovers and improving goal scoring effectiveness. More players that can rotate thru the midfield will help too.
You are correct that our defensive game has been and is excellent. However our scoreboard pressure is just average and needs a lot of work.
If are going to tweak the gameplan to become more attacking, let's have some forwards who actually stay in the forward line and kick goals.
... and get it to them quickly.
It's a matter of degrees and we take the numbers back too far at times at the expense of anything resembling a forward structure.
Under pressure and in big games we tend to revert to excessive numbers behind the ball. The last quarter against the Cats in the qualifying final was an example.
Rather than landing the killer blow we went into "don't lose" mode. It worked ultimately, but it would have taken only a goal at the right time to stop the rot.
Kicking a goal is more effective than merely not conceding one.
