I would argue that the pies actually set-up with a similar structure to what we had/have. Cloke and Dawes is not too dissimilar to Riewoldt/Kos. You say they've borrowed our defensive set-ups - I say they've taken our fwd press. A successful fwd press means that the backs are never under pressure and can be made to look far better than what their ability actually is. ie Gilbert's strength is his marking and his pace. He can use this to the max when he is constantly in a position of outnumbering his opponent and has the space to run. Instead this year he finds himself in one on one situations more and more. He is not comfortable.Johnny Member wrote:Our guys are never one out.bigcarl wrote:Agree moods about the two tall forwards structure. Not certain that kosi should be the second one, but he was okay on Saturday and won't be dropped on that.
Johnnymember, quick delivery benefits all forwards, because it increases the likelyhood of them being one out against their opponent ... Something Geelong managed frequently on saturday
Never.
You've got to remember, even when we were unbeatable, we still weren't wonderful at scoring. We weren't in the top 4 for 'Points For' in 2009, and were barely in the top 8 for 'Points For' last year. And dare I say it, the inability to manufacture goals was what cost us in both GFs.
It was never an issue, until we started to concede goals ourselves. At that point, we started to rely on amazing individual efforts from Roo to kick scores.
Interestingly also, is that the teams who've been above us in 'Points For' over the past couple of years, find themselves in the top 3 on the ladder right now.
So I don't think it was the forward structures that had beating teams. It was the players up there. And that's always a dangerous way to build a team. As we're seeing now, you lose the input of the players, and you're stuffed.
So in summary, at our peak when we nearly went undefeated for an entire season, we still weren't kicking enough scores.
So based on that, I'm far from convinced that the setup we used then was any good. And I'm even less convinced that it works now.
Teams that could kick big scores, borrowed our defence strategy and are now dominant teams.
However we haven't done anything with out ineffective forward setup whilst this has all been happening. We've basically stuck with a model that never really worked that well.
It was our fwd set-up that everyone wants. Why do you think every club has a quick tackling small fwd? We had mini who wasn't quick but could tackle. Once again they took our idea and just bettered it. In 09 we consistently kicked scores of over 100. That is easily efficient enough. The rest takes cares of itself.
To be perfectly honest, it's neither our fwds or our backs that are the problem. Without Lenny, with BJ sadly out of form, with Joey only just going and with not much depth rotating through there, we have one of the weakest midfields in the comp. Therefore delivery to fwds is poor, and backs are under more pressure than they are used to.
Johnny Member - apart from the eagles and swans team in the mid 2000's (who both notoriously had strong midfields and no potent fwd lines) who has ever won a flag without two big fwd targets recently? Lions had Lynch and Brown. Bombers had Lloyd and Lucas. Hawks had Buddy and Roughie. Cats had Mooney and Hawkins/N.Ablett.
I agree that we need to kick more goals, but I would argue that our mids need to show more flair and create/kick goals. That's BJ, Joey, Dal, Peake, Ray, Steven, Armo. The first 3 mentioned are our best mids and we need more from them in this aspect.
