Link to Training Report 8 Feb

[MightyMagpie]

http://www.voy.com/51976/328764.html

[cityslick1]

Blocked. Any chance of a copy & paste? Cheers

[Mossi]

DTM did a copy and paste on Big footy here it is:

With some work time-in-lieu owing, and a catch-up meeting with a former colleague beckoning, it was decided to grab a coffee for our chat. When the topic of venue was discussed, the Holden Centre was brought up as a suitable place, the time of the meeting being 10:30am on 8th Feb!

So in between conversation and sips of a latte, I was able to observe some of the training that took place at the Holden Centre this morning during the 45 minute period I was there.

I arrive after warm-ups and it seems that most of the list was out on the park doing some work on clearances and ball movement.

Goldsack was not a part of this and was doing his rehab work, running the boundary at a decent rate (not flat-out by any means, but it neither was a slow jog).

The drill seemed to be geared towards finding options to clear the ball from the defensive area, most notably after a behind had been kicked (or so it seemed - like I said, I only caught a part of this).

Jordan de Goey stood out here during my watch. He seemed to be a player a lot of the ball was channeled through for his team. The other guy who I thought was very prominent was Tom Langdon.


There was a lot of linkage play and it was the first I saw of Aish in action - can't make any significant statement about him at this stage, other than to say that he was tidy with the possessions he had.

Pendles continues to do what we've come to expect of him - steady, measured, great vision and rarely wastes a disposal.

Treloar was involved in some of the play during this session, and I noticed a few heavy tackles that he lay, as well as being able to get a few very closely contested ball out to teammates. Early days for him in terms of his involvement in this sort of training, but you can already see what he able to offer.

The number 3 was out there and involved in whole team training and nabbed a few disposals I noticed out on the AAMI Park side of the ground. Nothing spectacular here, but the fact that he is doing this after a ruined season is encouragement enough.

I think competition between Grundy and Witts will be very interesting this year. Both have something to offer, in my opinion, and while the two players appear to be "different sort of ruckmen" in a direct comparison, the pretty much provided an interesting contest out there today.

In all of the above drills, the coaches would occasionally stop play immediately and then direct for something else to happen...another kick out, or a player nominated to take a kick, etc, so it did get to be a bit "stop-start" at times.

At the end of this session players were brought back into the middle of the ground to be spoken to by the coaches. Then they were back on for a full-ground "match" simulation, with Bucks and Harvs doing the umpiring.

A few players then opted out of the full-team activities, including Treloar, Broomhead, Gault and Cox (and one or two others).

Two players I had yet to see/notice in any significant capacity prior to today were Goodyear and Golds...and both did some nice things (in fact, I initially thought Goodyear was actually Broomhead until I got a clear view of the number on his back...and saw Broomy doing some running work along the boundary).

As I've mentioned in other posts, Varcoe is silky smooth and he just seems to float across the ground effortlessly. His touch today was exceptional (VERY soft hands in receiving the ball whilst in motion), and his disposal exactly what you'd expect - rarely did he waste it. What I was also able to witness at close-range today was his thinking and decision making - as he was about to collect the ball on the boudary he knew three opponents were in his vicinity and also one teammate, and he was able to spin on the boundary and deliver an effective handball to that one teammate (who had cleverly run forward about 8 metres from where the contest was).

Some players were difficult to pick out as they were wearing pink bibs (as opposed to jumpers with numbers on their backs), but prominent in the pink bibs were Levi Greenwood, Tay Adams and Crispy. One piece of play by that team saw a transition from a behind be transferred by five players, resulting in a goal to that team. Both Adams and crispy were involved in that piece!

Swanny was used almost exclusively at half forward from what I could tell - and he was using the space from forward pocket all the way down to the half back line as his "zone of operation".

Some great close-in work (comprising good ball handling, close-range handpassing, and making an option to receive) was executed by Oxley. Again, his disposal by foot when required was very tidy!

There was a great contest on a couple of occasions between Moore and Frosty - very difficult to say who came out on top, but both offered something to their respective teams.

As we've come to expect, there were a few howlers that made their way into the play at time. Tooves for the large part was pretty good to be honest, but on a couple of occasions his kicks were cut off by the opposing team. Browny tried to do a bit much on one occasion, running the ball out of defense before getting caught at centre half back.

One of Blairy's first disposals as he was exiting from the back half was a howler, going straight to the opposition and gifting them a free shot at goal. To his credit, however, he seemed to have a patch were he got leather poisoning and his ability to weave around player to deliver a (often) very effective disposal was noted.

A couple of "top ups were used...Blairy's brother was used and at one point in the game, Tarks ended up donning the jumper and a pink bib to even out the numbers.

I didn't notice Elliott out there today (and I'm pretty sure he wasn't there), and I must admit that I didn't see Reid (but I cannot be sure that he wasn't there).

Marsh, Fas, White, Steel and Marley (who both did some nice things, particular in terms of clearance work in Marley's case), Ramsay and Cloke were all out there.

I also though of an interesting thing as I reflected on some aspects where thing sometimes didn't seem to work out...

We are often critical of situations (particularly in training sessions like these) where players may appear unable to hit their designated targets. One thing we need to remember is that we are watch the team not only train in their offensive habits/skills, but also in their defensive aspects.

Some of those situations where a player may not have hit a target (the aforementioned examples by Tooves or Blair are cases in point) may have been a situation where the player cutting off the pass has been able to read the game and effect a successful interception. The other notable example was in the description I gave of the contests between Frosty and Moore. Again, you want to be able to see BOTH player effect the contest, particularly in a 50-50 situation.

The pressure placed onthe players sometimes impacts on their ultimate execution and this is something we WANT to see...after all, the opposition will have the ball at times during matches and these defensive aspects are vital to a successful team.

It's very easy getting caught up in situations where a player does not deliver to a target effectively or does not take the ball cleanly, but if this occurs due to pressure being applied by the opponent (whose job it is to effect the receiver in this way) then that can only be a good thing.

having said that, there were a couple of situations where a miskick was made when little/no pressure was around.

In all however, it was a reasonable run by the team!

TBM

[MatthewBoydFanClub]

Great report. Nice to read that Treloar has joined the main group for some drills, as every time I've watched, he's done no more than run laps of the ground.

Have a leave pass from the wife who has a regular Friday book club, so should get down to the ground this Friday to watch the guys train.

[3rd degree]

Thanks for the report, some good signs !

[cityslick1]

Many thanks Mossi. Interesting read...

DeGoey sounds like he has been prominent in a lot of the recent training reports, which is great to hear. Having Langdon, and especially Treloar join in and do a few nice things are also big positives. Am not surprised to hear that Varcoe is impressing, and that Cloke is playing high up the ground. All things that I have witnessed this preseason. Elliott still absent is a slight worry, whilst the more game time we get into Moore in the forward line the better, as I think he's a shoe-in to start round 1.

No more injuries between now and the start of the season, and keep building in training and the NAB Cup, and we should start the season in a strong position.