Tag: Chris Scott

Round 1 Preview: Get over it Richmond, move on

Richmond’s Nathan Broad didn’t have quite the same level of fun as his teammates, this off-season.

It is finally here, Round 1, marking the official end of the off-season, dominated by one team, guess who?

Yes, if you’re a fan of any of the other 17 teams, you’ve no doubt enjoyed the last six-months, a Tigers lovefest across all forms of media. Damien Hardwick recounting on a daily basis how he had to change his methods after the 2016 disaster. Dustin Martin suddenly becoming a marketable face of the league, and for some reason, Bonds underwear. Alex Rance again trying to drum up some publicity with a faux retirement. Jack Riewoldt’s wedding. Brendon Gale being Brendon Gale, etc. etc.

After the Bulldogs broke their premiership drought in 2016, I didn’t think the level of coverage on a single team could be topped, that the media could spend more time focusing on a single team, but alas they have. And I get that there will be a greater focus on the reigning premiers, it makes sense. You’re going to hear about the Tigers more than say, North Melbourne, who no one ever has any interest in, particularly this year. However, at some point, enough is enough, surely.

The entire 2018 season has been built on Richmond, from the marketing by the league, to the marketing by major TV networks, to which players are constantly being promoted. And I pray and hope, it all falls apart and quickly.

Richmond have eight marque games on either Thursday or Friday night, with the ANZAC Day eve game against Melbourne on a Tuesday night thrown in for good measure. Can you imagine if the Tigers put up a Bulldogs-like premiership defence? Wouldn’t it be glorious. A slow start, in-fighting, injuries, turmoil and the return of supporters threatening to microwave memberships and burning down Punt Road, the good old days.

Anyway, what else has been going on outside of Richmond? Well the AFL has botched Tasmania and how to handle sex scandals inside AFL House. Collingwood are still a dumpster fire. Jeff Kennett is back, that’s just what we need. And some Melbourne players didn’t want to go on a pre-season camp, which means according to some meatheads in the media, we should write off their entire season before it even begins.

I do enjoy the likes of Wayne Carey and Cam Mooney calling Melbourne players soft for going to the AFLPA to voice their concerns regarding training habits at the clubs. It’s not like that’s the reason the AFLPA exists and I mean they don’t even go around king hitting opponents off the ball, now that’s toughness.

So, the season begins tonight, which means it’s still prediction season. Some general thoughts for the 2018 season. Sydney’s midfield will return to being a powerhouse. I don’t like the Port Adelaide hype but it’s more deserved than the Essendon hype. Free agent and trade acquisitions seem to guarantee success in the eyes of some, the Bombers have major holes. The Dees will play finals and are the best chance at replicating the Dogs and Tigers of years before. For some reason, I’m bullish on Fremantle, I like what they’re building despite their deficiencies up forward. Gold Coast not having a home ground for half a season is an absolute travesty, although Stuart Dew seems like a competent coach. Geelong will do what they do every year under Chris Scott and fall short in the finals and North will be irrelevant, again.

Some major predictions;

Premiers – Sydney
Runners Up – Adelaide
Wooden Spoon – North Melbourne
Brownlow – Bryce Gibbs

Ladder

  1. Sydney
  2. GWS Giants
  3. Adelaide
  4. Richmond
  5. Melbourne
  6. Geelong
  7. Port Adelaide
  8. Hawthorn
  9. Collingwood
  10. Fremantle
  11. St. Kilda
  12. Essendon
  13. Western Bulldogs
  14. Gold Coast
  15. West Coast
  16. Brisbane
  17. Carlton
  18. North Melbourne

Season Wins Over/Under

Adelaide (15.5) – Over
Brisbane (6.5) – Under
Carlton (6.5) – Under
Collingwood (10.5) – Under
Essendon (12.5) – Under
Fremantle (9.5) – Over
Geelong (14.5) – Under
Gold Coast (5.5) – Over
GWS Giants (14.5) – Over
Hawthorn (10.5) – Over
Melbourne (12.5) – Over
North Melbourne (6.5) – Under
Port Adelaide (13.5) – Under
Richmond (13.5) – Over
St. Kilda (9.5) – Over
Sydney (15.5) – Over
West Coast (10.5) – Under
Western Bulldogs (11.5) – Under

And now, onwards to Round 1;

Richmond (-30.5) vs Carlton

The Tigers coronation in front of 80,000 insufferable Richmond supporters with 10,000 Carlton supporters asking themselves why they bothered to turn up and be surrounded by these people. Despite all the optimism around Brendon Bolton and this improving Carlton list, they only won six-games in 2017 and went 1-9 from Round 14, giving Bolton a 2-18 record between Rounds 14 and 23 across his first two-seasons. They’ve also lost two of their best five players from last year with Gibbs at Adelaide and Sam Docherty being lost for the season with an ACL tear. Hopefully the Blues will stick with Richmond for a half or longer, but a six to seven goal loss is on the cards.

Adelaide (-2.5) vs Essendon

It’s probably no different to any other season, but there seems to be a lot of injuries on the eve of the year. Adelaide haven’t escaped the injury bug with captain Taylor Walker being ruled out of their opener and Brad Crouch looking at almost two months on the sidelines with groin soreness. The Bombers lost Marty Gleeson in the JLT series with a serious ankle injury and small forward Orazio Fantasia will miss several games. These odds are much closer than they should be and the Crows will cruise.

Brisbane (+24.5) vs St. Kilda

The Saints are a strange case, in the words of Damo Barrett, “where are they at?” St. Kilda are stuck in no man’s land, sort of good enough to sneak into the finals, but won’t do any damage. As all clubs seem to love doing, the Saints went and re-signed Alan Richardson despite him not having achieved a thing. Even with this extension, the heat will be on if they’re sitting at home in September once again. They have an easy start against the Lions, who are still a year away from being competitive.

Fremantle (+26.5) vs Port Adelaide

The pre-season buzz team finally gets to roll out their star studded new recruits. Rockliff, Watts, Motlop, Thomas, McKenzie, the assembling of a new dream team at Alberton Oval. If I was making a premiership push off the back of a free agency/trade spending spree, I wouldn’t have picked the two flakiest players in the game. Jack Watts hasn’t played at a consistent level at any point across his entire career and Motlop’s best football was four-years ago. I say bring back Aaron Young, a victim of the modern game where kicking goals as a forward is seen as a negative.

Hawthorn (-1.5) vs Collingwood

Another year begins with Nathan Buckley in charge of a team with no key position talent, injuries and little chance of doing anything. It’s going to fun putting up with another year of a media circus at the Westpac Centre when Collingwood start 2-6 for about the 5th year in a row and journalists are calling for Buckley’s head. At least Cyril Rioli is supposedly going to be back for this game, yay everyone celebrate, Cywil is back!

Gold Coast (Push) vs North Melbourne

It’s hard to find a game so irrelevant in Round 1, but here we go. Fitting that the game is being played in Cairns.

GWS Giants (-17.5) vs Western Bulldogs

There’s been a lot of buzz around the Giants with many believing they’re a legit premiership chance. I do like the Giants and they’ll be up there again, but what exactly have they done to get better? The Giants were a long way off last season, despite their preliminary final finish. In the final month of their season, including Round 23, they lost to the other three preliminary finalists by an average of 39-points and none of those losses were particularly competitive. They did face their fair share of injury issues last year and a fit Stephen Coniglio is a big plus, but their improvement rests on the next group of youngsters from the more recent drafts and how quickly will they get better, if at all?

Melbourne (Push) vs Geelong

I have no idea who will win this game and being a pessimistic supporter, I assume the Cats will be jumped by a hungry side who are surely desperate for finals. Geelong has an injury list the length of your arm and even with Gary Ablett seemingly making his return, Paddy Dangerfield won’t play. He won’t even be there biggest loss for the Round 1, Lachie Henderson’s injury is disastrous for Geelong. They had two legendary defenders retire and have done nothing to replace them. Good luck relying on Harry Taylor as your number one key defender.

Sydney (-17.5) vs West Coast

Short of Geelong’s dominance at GMHBA Stadium, no team had a greater advantage at home than the Eagles at Subiaco. That’s now gone, with the dimensions of their new stadium being closer to Etihad Stadium. They will still no doubt have their ridiculous advantage from umpires each home game, but they’ll be facing a similar challenge to visiting teams, becoming accustomed to the new ground. They don’t get an easy opening against the Swans who will be locked in from Round 1 after the calamity in 2017. An away win first up.

Season Record

0/0 (N/A)

One last note, the over hit on every game in Round 1 last year. The first round generally sees a lot of high scoring, just something to remember.

Geelong cannot rush the re-signing of Chris Scott

Chris Scott’s current contract comes to an end after 2017.

Most Geelong fans would have felt sense of dread on preliminary night in 2016 when the sole inclusion to the team Lachie Henderson, who was coming off a three-week layoff with injury, started forward.

Sure enough, Sydney embarrassed the Cats with a 10-minute onslaught of physical pressure and precision disposal which Geelong couldn’t match and by quarter time the game was over.

Maybe the extent of the mismatch was surprising, but Geelong fans have come to expect finals failures under Chris Scott, particularly early in finals where the Cats never seem to be prepared for the intensity and the pressure of a massive contest.

For all of Geelong’s home and away success under Scott, their finals record is poor, after 2011 very poor. The Cats have played finals four times since 2011 for two-wins and six-losses. This record creates a quandary for Brian Cook and the Geelong board with the end of Scott’s current contract approaching.

With a year to go on his contract, Scott signed a two-year extension in 2014 and that deal expires at the end of this season. There have already been rumblings that an extension is in the works and may even come before the 2017 season begins. Geelong doesn’t have to look too far back in AFL history to see what a mistake that could be.

Richmond, Fremantle and Brisbane all jumped the gun prior to the 2016 season, extending Damien Hardwick, Ross Lyon and Justin Leppitsch for multiple years beyond 2017. All three decisions proved to be disastrous as both the Dockers and the Tigers tumbled out of the finals and the Lions finished last, sacking Leppitsch in the process.

And if you think Geelong are different to those situations, there are a lot of similarities between Fremantle of 2016 and the Geelong of this year. Falling out of the top four is a real possibility and it wouldn’t be shocking if they missed the top eight entirely.

Aside from not being prepared for the contest or Sydney’s pressure and some questionable coaching decisions, the Cats major downfall on preliminary final night was a complete lack of midfield depth which was shown up against the league’s best midfields.

To combat the likes of Luke Parker, Daniel Hannebery, Josh Kennedy, Tom Mitchell and Kieren Jack, Geelong had Joel Selwood and Patrick Dangerfield and very little else, an issue which plagued them at various times throughout last season. It was fitting that the pair both collected 39-dispoals, with the next best Cats players in terms of disposals being Jimmy Bartel and Corey Enright who both collected 26-disposals and who also both retired.

Alarmingly they haven’t addressed the gaping divide between Dangerwood and the rest of the midfield and if anything, the gap has become bigger. Aside from a few standouts performances from Cam Guthrie, Josh Caddy was the side’s third best midfielder yet was valued below Scott Selwood and Sam Menegola and was shipped off for peanuts to the Tigers.

Steven Motlop bore the brunt of the criticism for the rest of Geelong’s midfield, however for someone who arrived out of shape in preseason; his numbers were strong and like Guthrie produced some best-on-ground displays. There were others who produced less than Motlop

Ultimately this lack of midfield depth comes back to development and to a certain degree drafting which just hasn’t been a priority for Geelong as free agency and trading has become the club’s primary source of list building.

Development falls on the coach and a look back at Geelong’s draft strikerate under Scott isn’t very impressive. The Cats have participated in six National Drafts since Scott took over from Mark Thompson and development of in-house players has been a problem.

They’ve only had three first round picks under Scott, which is a problem in itself, but none of the three players are club standouts. Jackson Thurlow has shown the most of the trio and is primed for a big bounce back season after missing 2016 with a torn ACL in the NAB Challenge. Nakia Cockatoo and Darcy Lang are the other two first-rounders and both remain on the fringes of Geelong’s best team and neither played in the preliminary final debacle against Sydney.

Joel Hamling was their first pick in the 2011 draft and never played a game, Jarrad Jansen was a second-round pick who also never played a game and few others are even still on the list.

Mix that with the stagnation of Mitch Duncan, George Horlin-Smith, Jordan Murdoch who are still with the team and Shane Kersten and Billie Smedts who have moved on and it creates a big gulf of talent which hasn’t been replaced from the premiership years.

To counter, Geelong has turned to the trade table, which is always a gamble. From the side who took on Hawthorn last Friday in Launceston, six were traded from others clubs and that doesn’t include Scott Selwood and all of these were recruited in their prime and haven’t been developed by Scott or Geelong.

Taking all those reasons and shoving them aside for the moment, there’s one bigger reason to wait on an extension, it’s simply okay to wait.

Richmond jumping the gun on Hardwick’s extension highlighted a club’s fearfulness of losing a coach driven by media hysteria. There was no need to re-sign Hardwick prior to the season and there’s no need to re-sign Scott now.

Another finals collapse or even worse, a drop out of finals, would be an embarrassment if they had already extended Scott. Hold your cards, play the season out and make an informed decision at the end of the year, because Geelong may have already peaked under their current coach.