Post Match. Pies sink Suns. All comments, please

[jatsad]

[Raw Hammer]

From the AFL app:

AFTER talking down the importance of missing his injured stars, Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley has conceded Jordan de Goey is a little different following his match-winning return against Gold Coast.

"I've said all along that personnel is not going to be the difference," Buckley said.

"(It's) whether we play our system, and we're not waiting for the cavalry to come back, but when you see Jordy do his thing you understand how much we've missed.

"It's good to be able to see that evidence on the football field."

Finally! Buckley has admitted that good players win games of football, not systems and processes and a ‘one out, one in’ philosophy.

Play to your strengths! Acknowledge that stars ultimately win games, so play through them, and stop rolling out the ‘everyone plays their role’ rubbish.

[didick]

Ain’t going nowhere in finals with our style of play and our skill deficiencies.

[Clifton Hill-Billy]

That was infuriating to watch for 2.5 quarters and let's not fool ourselves if we play like that on finals we will be out first week no matter who the opponent is. Cox bounce and goal and trash talk after slotting a goal from the boundary line were the highlights. JDG is our only forward we can rely on, the problem is that we rely on him too heavily to score 5 goals to kick a winning score. IQ offence is beautiful but he does learn to defend better. Maynard is back to having multiple goal costing brain farts but can be excused in a winning side. Grundy lifted in 4th quarter but badly needs a rest but if we go to Perth to play wet toast we can't afford to rest him if we need to win to prevent Perth trip. Umpiring was disgraceful, do they even know what holding the ball means anymore or what a 15-20 Meyer kick looks like?

[BazBoy]

Am I seeing Mason finally get it??? How to use your body to get best position to mark the pill

The mark and run goal saw him use his body to put his opponent out of the marking contes

But a few other times during the match made the mark/ run not a one off

Can he repeat it. Hope so

[Sicks Bux]

Good game by Cox. 8 disposals and two goals. However I think some people are getting a bit carried away claiming that he was BOG. Just goes to show that some players are graded differently to others. When a gun player performs week in and week out it's taken for granted. When an inconsistent or emerging player has a solid game "BOG'.

[BazBoy]

I’d have big Mason in best half dozen best as two he kicked and others he put his name on as assistant —JDG went to him immediately to let him know the part he played

He did his part. Others must also do it too

[Abdul The Bull]

I preface this by saying I love the kid and he has huge potential, but IQ got a bath in the first half. This is not the first time that his direct opponent has toweled him up. I hope that he is getting the mentoring he needs to properly develop.

What a difference Treloar makes in the middle. I realised tonight how much we have missed his presence. He is not always pretty and his disposal can be wayward but he gets the pill and, more importantly, gets it forward. We play more direct with him in the side. I cannot get over how 'down' both Pendles and Adams were tonight. We still have big problems in the middle but JDG up forward has given us something to structure around. Grundy has looked very laboured in recent weeks and I hope it's fatigue rather than him carrying an injury. He doesn't look free at all. We had a lot of the team barely getting out of second gear last night which bodes well IF we can gel in the coming weeks. I am concerned that we do not seem motivated and switched on at the moment.

We got away with one last night and I cannot see a quality side allowing us the same opportunities. We need to improve immensely.

[Pies2016]

^^^

Re I Q , a lot of that mentoring comes from playing on better players.
Betts taught him a lesson and he will learn a lot from it.
Sexton has always been a slippery type who doesn’t need many chances to hit the scoreboard.
I thought Rankine would have been the perfect match up for Quaynor because he towelled him up in the U18 championships and they both have similar experience.
The fact that he has been trusted against senior players is a good sign. The club obviously believes he’s up for the challenge

[What'sinaname]

[5 from the wing on debut]

Very poor effort last night. Systems, game plans, processes, structures etc. All spin. It’s the elite with something special that change matches and win them. That’s always been the case and always will be. We have only one player like that on our list and he did it last night. Without him last night we lose, badly, to a tired team of kids who ran out of fit players.
Stephenson has the physical attributes and skill to become similar but that doesn’t look like it will be happening soon. Without JDG and Stephenson at their best we will go nowhere in the finals. I include winning in the first week as going nowhere.

[WarrenerraW]

Happy for the win but typical Collingwood only knows one way and that's the hard way. A better side would've put the suns down at HT, run them ragged and then put the cue in the rack. What do we do? Play slow with a defensive mindset which allows the opposition to double back and flood.

We go sideways, go backwards and ultimately turn the ball over with overpossession, and poor decision making. It's been an all too common feature under NB. There were a couple of instances when we used the corridor and low and behold it worked. The quick and clean ball movement resulted in a goal. It can be done but why we don't do it often enough is beyond me.

If we dish up that sort of performance in the finals then we'll get pummeled, make no mistake. Good teams make you pay. The suns didn't because they're young and relatively inexperienced at the moment. What amazes me is that NB continues to persist with an ineffective game plan. Our only hope is that the players throw his manual out the window and go for broke. The top 4 teams are top 4 for a reason. We're MOR and it ain't good enough. Our first 5 inside 50s in the last quarter went straight to suns players - that's how bad our ball use is. Long high up and under kicks sideways, short kicks back or sideways, handballs to blokes under immense pressure only for someone to slam it forward to an opposition player. Hell I even saw our players spinning around in f***ing circles.

This may seem harsh but it's warranted. We're about to play finals and if anyone thinks this sh!t will win us a GF is kidding themselves. It begins and ends with clean and effective ball use, especially going forward. Now's the time to get serious if we're going to have a crack at winning the GF because so much needs to improve. If we can get it together then anything is possible. Winning finals at the GABBA will come down to who can manage the conditions better.

Cox had a welcome return to form. JDG was incredibly lively up forward. Defense held firm for most of the game bar a few errors. Mids were solid and stepped up when they needed to but need to be cleaner. Treloar will be better for the run and he adds spark going forward.

Anyway we're playing finals now and that's a given. Surely sidebum comes back for the EF? Stevo? They're really the only two changes I'd consider.

[SteveH67]

The team/s that play well in the dew will win the flag.

As discussed on radio this morning, the ball is a like a cake of soap playing on the gabba at night.

The GF will be a night GF this year.

Lions vs Power GF

[Lazza]

[RudeBoy]

I was rapt in the win. Make no mistake, Cold Toast gave everything in that game. In the end it was a good win. Sure we've got room for improvement, but we are coming good at the right time.

Without doubt JDG is our most important player, because he is a match winner. After missing about 2 months, his return demonstrated his class, kicking 4 goals and giving us 3 others.

Treloar was magnificent in the midfield. Sure, some of his disposals are rushed and tend to spray a bit, but last night he was instrumental in straightening us up, with his runs and kick's going forward. Let's hope his hammies hold up as he is our only reliable pack breaker.

Cox put in a stellar performance. When he is on, he is one of our most important players. His job now is to become a consistently good player for us. He doesn't even have to take lots of marks or kick bags of goals, but hitting the packs hard and contesting, opens up scoring opportunities for our smaller forwards.

Despite being beaten early, I thought IQ fought his way back into the game and his marking, run and excellent kicking, were important reasons we won.

It was also one of Daicos' best games. He is looking more and more like his old man, with his low centre of gravity and ability to spin and weave through traffic with ease. After 3 years with us, I was unsure last season whether he'd make it as an AFL player. He is now destined to be a 10 yr player for us.

We ended up winning by 4 goals and remember that they got 2 goals from absolute howlers from the usually reliable Maynard. To my mind, it was like a 6 goal win.

We still have significant room for improvement. Last night Adams and Pendles had relatively quiet games, and we surely need them in top form in the finals. Grundy has definitely been labouring a bit, but still is playing well each week. The week off before the finals should help freshen him up.

Hopefully Sier will return, as his strength and quick hands in close will help us a lot. Sidey, Phillips and Mayne are also certain starters, should they be available for selection. It seems that Howe is very unlikely to make it back in time, but at least we have found a real warrior in Madgen as his replacement.

I'm tipping us to beat Port next week and scare the living daylight out of the other finalists. Make no mistake, in this strange and weird season, despite us finishing outside the top 4, the flag is ours for the taking.