Kicking game

[magdog]

The biggest diff bw the teams yesterday IMO was the kicking games of the 2 teams. Had we been able to match them in this area, we win the game.
Cronk is able to put up dangerous bombs from 40m out....we dink kick into the corners which puts zero pressure and let's them start their set on the 30 when we were starting on our 10 or dragged back into the in goal after well placed and chased bombs.

We also underutilized the grabber against a rushing defense......this was ON all game.....every time we gruberred we got a result.

My wish of Xmas is that Josh and Kris develop a spiral bomb and how to grubber behind the line.....attacking kicks.

Regardless, great season .....and in the GF we were a lot closer than the media will make out.

 

[MAD DOG]

kicking game was 100% though we've lackeda good kicking game all year we've made up on it in 2012 by playing mistake free football. Yesterday was not the case, we did far too many mistakes. Coughing the ball which eventually led to the Storm scoring tries.
But even though our kicking game didnt have many metres, we were not creative enough with the kicks and far too many times kicking it to Slater. During our Manly game we controlled our kicks well by kicking away from Stewart. This was not the case last night.
Fatigue took its toll and a good part of that was from our mistakes which lead to us defending to many sets in consecutive sets.
The Storms big plays that was a kick in the guts to us, was there try right on the half timw hooter (which came from a bulldogs mistake) and Slaters try saving effort against Morris.
This Grand Final was not meant to be. We could have had it, but unfortunately the ball didnt bounce our way.
I believe we made way more breaks than the storm, but going back to the basics.. we had no kicking game and too many mistakes... So close,, so frustrating, but it just didnt happen for us. Imagine if Morris scored THAT try???

 

[storm2012]

Cooper Cronks kicking game was brilliant.Our defence was awesome in the GF.My premier team all played their part in this win.Cammy didn`t have his kicking boots on (that was the only downside for us)

 

[Rockford]

Even when Barba could catch them, they were all dropping about 2-3m in front of the try line all he could do is brace himself for the chasers driving him back in-goal. Brilliant kicking game from Cronk for him to do this time after time from 30-40m out is amazing.

 

[Owey]

I agree totally. The majority of Cronk's bombs landed 5m out from the try line putting us immense pressure with either a play the ball close to the try line or a drop out. And for any bombs that landed in the in goal, the ref's denied us any chance of a quick restart.

For all the pressure we were under, any other team would have had 40 put in them aka woManly and Souffs. Defensively, we were fantastic, but it was the composure in attack and a decent kicking game that we lacked last night.

Storm were the better team but we will get them.

 

[Guardog]

Not controlling the ball killed us. Handing over possession to a team like the Storm will result in what happened to us last night. Control the ball, control the game, win the game.

 

[magdog]

Not controlling the ball killed us. Handing over possession to a team like the Storm will result in what happened to us last night. Control the ball, control the game, win the game.

True. Despite that we were still right in the game up to our eyeballs.
A better kicking game means that we are in a better field position for more of the game, and as a result they would have been in a worse position for more of the game. The Strom were starting nearly every single set on their 30-40m line. We by contrast were off our own line all game, and when they were close enough their kicks put pressure on our boys. Storm's game is predicated on field position. The fact we couldn't control the ball was all the more reason our kicking game needed to be better, sadly it wasn't. An obvious area to work on.

 

[Izzy Forreal]

Kicking game

The biggest diff bw the teams yesterday IMO was the kicking games of the 2 teams. Had we been able to match them in this area, we win the game.

The Storm did give us a "clinically precise" lesson in tacktical kicking but I don't think that was the only thing that cost us. The huge amount of first half posession at our end of the field plus Hoffman's try that was scored from a penalty on Kasiano that should never have been awarded were thye killers.

Our blokes did show signs of coming back in the second half but unfortunatly it was the "catch up football" version not the grind them down, then work a move type that has been so successful.

The one thing that I'm really dirty on is Cummins performance with the whistle. IMO he refereed the blue & white jersey, not the game. But what I'm thinking about today is the great year our players and coaching staff put in and what was achieved

 

[The Hickstar]

Solution: trent hodikson

watch him next year!

 

[Berries]

Talking about the best halfback in the competition, against a 50 game halfback. Cronk shows why he is on 500k plus.

 

[The DoggFather]

Though you are correct about the kicking game, but the biggest difference was the their men versus our boys. They will learn from this and improve in the years to come (if they stay together)