Crouch

[B.M]

Just saw that bit of the Amazon doco on AFL.com where Nicks is getting into the Adelaide midfield for lack of accountability and not defending. He seems to be directing a lot of it towards Crouch, who tries to defend himself.

Couple of things I took from it

Coaches are so hell bent on defence first, that’s the reason footy is the way it is, and the rules committee have to try and invent ways to make the game attacking

Crouch is a natural ball hunter and doesn’t look to defend when the ball is in his vicinity. Bit like Tom Rockliff.

[Impatient Sainter]

Just saw that bit of the Amazon doco on AFL.com where Nicks is getting into the Adelaide midfield for lack of accountability and not defending. He seems to be directing a lot of it towards Crouch, who tries to defend himself.

Couple of things I took from it

Coaches are so hell bent on defence first, that’s the reason footy is the way it is, and the rules committee have to try and invent ways to make the game attacking

Crouch is a natural ball hunter and doesn’t look to defend when the ball is in his vicinity. Bit like Tom Rockliff.

When your team is losing by 100 points defence should be the priority. Thankfully Crouch wont have to worry about that, but his attitude to the review is a concern. Can see why he wanted out its obvious the coaches werent happy with him.

[B.M]

Sometimes you are losing by 100 points because you’re not getting your hands on the footy.

And sometimes being too defensively minded makes you reactive rather than proactive at stoppage.

It’s a fine balance, some mids natural instinct is to attack when the ball is in dispute - Crouch is one of those

The best Mids in the comp hardly defend, other players defend them
Dusty, Danger, Fyfe, Bont, Pendles - rarely defend.
Want an easy kick, play on Dusty!
However while your getting a few kicks, he is tearing the game apart!

[kosifantutti]

[vacuous space]

I wonder if Ben Keays' commitment to defence can make up for losing the 17 contested possesions and 7 clearances Crouch had that game.

[Joffa Burns]

Well Brad had the courage of his conviction and took "Stevie" at his word, he packed his bags, put his shoes in it and walked out.

[stevie]

Lol at the crows They are s*** fir more reasons then one mid not defending. All starts from their weak leadership with tools like Walker. Sloan isn’t any type of leader either. What a f****** rabble

[B.M]

Yes he did walk

And for a mid who is apparently a pitiful defensive player, they still wanted pick 2

The Saints would know all his attributes and limitations as well as anyone, as a prospective recruit, do they think he would be researched and analysed to the enth degree?!

[Vortex]

I'm glad he's on our list.

[The Billings Method]

Be careful what you wish for, Matty Nicks. Their loss is our gain.

[B.M]

I’m glad he’s on our list too

He has it 30 times a game, that’s 30 times they don’t have it!

Steele, Crouch, Ross, Jones, Clark, Gresham, Sinclair, Higgins

Deepest midfield (not best) I’ve seen at stk

Best midfields

Ditterich - Griffiths - Smith - Stewart
Everitt - Harvey - Burke - Thompson
Gardiner - Dal Santo - Jones - Hayes

[Vortex]

I’m glad he’s on our list too

He has it 30 times a game, that’s 30 times they don’t have it!

Steele, Crouch, Ross, Jones, Clark, Gresham, Sinclair, Higgins

Deepest midfield (not best) I’ve seen at stk

Best midfields

Ditterich - Griffiths - Smith - Stewart
Everitt - Harvey - Burke - Thompson
Gardiner - Dal Santo - Jones - Hayes

Stop it BM. You're getting me excited.

I'm so looking forward to seeing how our midfilder goes this year.

[whiskers3614]

I'm glad he's on our list.

Yes, we wouldn't want Carlisle and Hannabery running out of playmates!

[SaintPav]

You really need to stop sucking on those lemons.

[saynta]

I’m glad he’s on our list too

He has it 30 times a game, that’s 30 times they don’t have it!

Steele, Crouch, Ross, Jones, Clark, Gresham, Sinclair, Higgins

Deepest midfield (not best) I’ve seen at stk

Best midfields

Ditterich - Griffiths - Smith - Stewart
Everitt - Harvey - Burke - Thompson
Gardiner - Dal Santo - Jones - Hayes

Griffiths was more of a HBF and really only got to play centre when Stewart was unavailable but then was usually BOG.

I would go with Ditterich-Payze-Stewart-Smith.

[Saintmatt]

Just saw that bit of the Amazon doco on AFL.com where Nicks is getting into the Adelaide midfield for lack of accountability and not defending. He seems to be directing a lot of it towards Crouch, who tries to defend himself.

Couple of things I took from it

Coaches are so hell bent on defence first, that’s the reason footy is the way it is, and the rules committee have to try and invent ways to make the game attacking

Crouch is a natural ball hunter and doesn’t look to defend when the ball is in his vicinity. Bit like Tom Rockliff.

That snippet of the video needs to be watched in the context of what Adelaide was trying to do last season. Can anyone remember all of the hullabaloo around Nicks being so fanatical about telling all and sundry in the pre-season (and his 1st press conference) that he wanted to defend first and that will be their brand etc? Almost to the point that most ppl were wondering whether they were interested in scoring at all. Whether you like him or not - David King was regularly saying that it's ok to defend but not to the expense of also trying to win a game yourself.

Anyway - in that context - I can see why the Crows coaches were getting in to Brad. Brad's instinct is as a ball hunter. Adelaide clearly wanted a different type of player and Sloane missed a couple of months after R1 (so he couldn't do it), Brad was their most experienced mid and didn't have the natural tools to implement the gameplan. Personally, I think he's an easy scapegoat for Adelaide ... their leadership is rubbish and they have an average to poor list.

I'm rapt to have Brad at our club - he can't get out of the way of the footy and will regularly get it going our way. Crouch under Paddy is a tantalising prospect in giving our forwards quick entries. Crouch and Steele makes for a formidable inside combo with Gresh or Higgins outside with Clark, Sincs etc.

Also - f#ck Adelaide. Fake 'club' with a high proportion of c0ckhead supporters of the highest order.

[CQ SAINT]

Yeah. f*** Adelaide.

[cwrcyn]

I'm not convinced that Crouch is going to lift our midfield to another level. Clearly, he knows how to find the ball, but his foot skills are mediocre. I'll wait and see and I hope my doubts will be erased once we get to round 6.

[Yorkeys]

Nicks didn't hear Crouch say : my team mates were piss poor at the contest, sometimes you have to assume your mates will win a contest - hindsight is brilliant and you are a crap coach. Nicks wasn't listening, he was thinking: I can make an example of Crouchy because he will wear it and I can impress the others. The ones that can't win a contest. The moral: Crouch is an instinctive player and Nicks is not a particularly good coach. Wonder who he debriefs on now. Sloane backed his coach without hesitation and will meet said Crouch head to head in 2021; they can discuss.

[skeptic]

Without the context of the whole meeting and what else was said...

It comes across as a little scape goaty for my liking

Blamed him directly... didn’t really listen to what he had to say and then threw an ultimatum that seemed over the top in response to one play in one contest

It kind of reminds me of arguing with your boss about the best way to do a task and when it’s clear you’re right, they throw the old do as I say I’m the boss in your face.

Really crappy approach to developing a positive culture IMO

[Vortex]

Without the context of the whole meeting and what else was said...

It comes across as a little scape goaty for my liking

Blamed him directly... didn’t really listen to what he had to say and then threw an ultimatum that seemed over the top in response to one play in one contest

It kind of reminds me of arguing with your boss about the best way to do a task and when it’s clear you’re right, they throw the old do as I say I’m the boss in your face.

Really crappy approach to developing a positive culture IMO

I also felt uneasy watching that but didn't know why at the time but you seem to have articulated it well. And for the privilege of agreeing to have a meeting like that filmed the club also gets to humiliate Couch further AND publicly by posting it online. Breath taking incompetence.

I wonder if Mathew Nicks went to the Mark Neeld school of coaching. I remember the story of some management experts watching a video of Mark Neelds addressing his group shortly after his appointment, might have even been his first address, and remember said experts claiming Neelds had broken every rule in the management and leadership rule book.

Our coach, aka "Cuddles" is the polar opposite to Mathew Nicks...

[SaintPav]

Without the context of the whole meeting and what else was said...

It comes across as a little scape goaty for my liking

Blamed him directly... didn’t really listen to what he had to say and then threw an ultimatum that seemed over the top in response to one play in one contest

It kind of reminds me of arguing with your boss about the best way to do a task and when it’s clear you’re right, they throw the old do as I say I’m the boss in your face.

Really crappy approach to developing a positive culture IMO

I also felt uneasy watching that but didn't know why at the time but you seem to have articulated it well. And for the privilege of agreeing to have a meeting like that filmed the club also gets to humiliate Couch further AND publicly by posting it online. Breath taking incompetence.

I wonder if Mathew Nicks went to the Mark Neeld school of coaching. I remember the story of some management experts watching a video of Mark Neelds addressing his group shortly after his appointment, might have even been his first address, and remember said experts claiming Neelds had broken every rule in the management and leadership rule book.

Our coach, aka "Cuddles" is the polar opposite to Mathew Nicks...

Yeah, I remember that very well. It was a vision thing......not.

Neeld didn't really waste any time putting the playing group offside.

He didn't even try and get buy in from the leadership group first. He just played bad cop.

1950s mentality.

What was he thinking?

Badly advised I would suggest.

Shocking performance.

[SaintPav]

Well Brad had the courage of his conviction and took "Stevie" at his word, he packed his bags, put his shoes in it and walked out.

Well, “Stevie” told Brad to go your own way and Brad said, sure I want to stop dragging my heart around.

[skeptic]

Without the context of the whole meeting and what else was said...

It comes across as a little scape goaty for my liking

Blamed him directly... didn’t really listen to what he had to say and then threw an ultimatum that seemed over the top in response to one play in one contest

It kind of reminds me of arguing with your boss about the best way to do a task and when it’s clear you’re right, they throw the old do as I say I’m the boss in your face.

Really crappy approach to developing a positive culture IMO

I also felt uneasy watching that but didn't know why at the time but you seem to have articulated it well. And for the privilege of agreeing to have a meeting like that filmed the club also gets to humiliate Couch further AND publicly by posting it online. Breath taking incompetence.

I wonder if Mathew Nicks went to the Mark Neeld school of coaching. I remember the story of some management experts watching a video of Mark Neelds addressing his group shortly after his appointment, might have even been his first address, and remember said experts claiming Neelds had broken every rule in the management and leadership rule book.

Our coach, aka "Cuddles" is the polar opposite to Mathew Nicks...

Interesting take...
I remember having a strong dislike of Neeld shortly after he took on the role. He was asked a question to the effect of who was doing really well in the off-season or who had surprised him (positively) after a pre-season match... or something like that.

His response was to the effect that he wasn’t going to make snap first impressions at that time... just got me thinking that if you can’t so much as give a meaningless platitude to a pointless question without making it awkward, how will you deal with it when there’s actual pressure at play. I guess in that instance the question answered itself

Def agree with you that it was a very bad look for AFC

[SaintPav]

Without the context of the whole meeting and what else was said...

It comes across as a little scape goaty for my liking

Blamed him directly... didn’t really listen to what he had to say and then threw an ultimatum that seemed over the top in response to one play in one contest

It kind of reminds me of arguing with your boss about the best way to do a task and when it’s clear you’re right, they throw the old do as I say I’m the boss in your face.

Really crappy approach to developing a positive culture IMO

I also felt uneasy watching that but didn't know why at the time but you seem to have articulated it well. And for the privilege of agreeing to have a meeting like that filmed the club also gets to humiliate Couch further AND publicly by posting it online. Breath taking incompetence.

I wonder if Mathew Nicks went to the Mark Neeld school of coaching. I remember the story of some management experts watching a video of Mark Neelds addressing his group shortly after his appointment, might have even been his first address, and remember said experts claiming Neelds had broken every rule in the management and leadership rule book.

Our coach, aka "Cuddles" is the polar opposite to Mathew Nicks...

Interesting take...
I remember having a strong dislike of Neeld shortly after he took on the role. He was asked a question to the effect of who was doing really well in the off-season or who had surprised him (positively) after a pre-season match... or something like that.

His response was to the effect that he wasn’t going to make snap first impressions at that time... just got me thinking that if you can’t so much as give a meaningless platitude to a pointless question without making it awkward, how will you deal with it when there’s actual pressure at play. I guess in that instance the question answered itself

Def agree with you that it was a very bad look for AFC

Sounds like he just didn’t know how to sell the club or sell hope to supporters.

Fu.ckwit