The Defensive Myth

[tig_prmz]

In my opinion there has been definite development and improvement in our D overall. It's still not up to the standard of even the top 8 sides, however we are at least turning up to the confrontation now, where as not that long ago **teams were pouring through our middle and commentators were calling our forwards 'soft'.** Any time a team came within 30 metres of our line they would score. We could never defend a well placed high ball in the past (not 100% convinced we can now either).
Sounds like an obvious comment but, attack and defence go hand in hand. If we are constantly on the back foot and are losing the wrestle at the ruck (allowing quick ptb's) then we start to tire, the other team gets momentum and starts rolling through us. With this comes no space for our halves to attack and our players become too worn out to break the line when they do get the ball. Then comes dumb decisions, further fatigue and poor ball control, turnovers, penalties etc etc.
Those saying they don't care about defence are oversimplifying the game, and those massaging the stats to suit their arguments can perhaps show me stats on how many teams have made the top 4 in the last 15 years with negative F/A.

i think soft forwards myth ended when potter took over. remember the gavet, taupau, ava and sue bench forwards time? we barely conceded tries down the middle. not 100% sure but we probably have kidwell to thank for that.

our problem in defence has been on the edges for a long time. in the potter days, it was due to injury when we had akaoula and corey paterson on the wing and now it's due to incompetence where we stack up the middle but leave our halves and centres exposed.

 

[ricksen]

Not sure about the 'soft' tag, but we still give up too much yardage through the middle for my liking. Linespeed falls off too often, and we're poor in the wrestle, allowing teams to get quick play-the-balls and the resultant follow on. On the other hand, we're rarely overly dominated with ball in hand, and can bash our way out of trouble more often than not.
As per SJ, we definitely have issues defending kicks as well.
It's a multi-faceted issue, and far more complex than 'lol Niquama sux' (actual quote from facebook the other day) as some would believe.
There's definitely been improvement, but I suspect most at the club would have seen us being further down the path than where we are, when they started planning long term at the beginning of last year.

 

[gallagher]

We will be much better without Farah next year in every sense.

The way we are currently playing musical chairs re positions I have no idea how you come to this conclusion.

Ballin and Liddle, thats why he said NEXT year.

 

[851]

Oh please we all get it The arguement has been about accountability.

That has proven to be a myth perpetrated by the coach to oust Farah, there is no such thing. :astonished:

 

[stryker]

Oh please we all get it The arguement has been about accountability.

Top post Telltails…someone gets it!

 

[stevetiger]

our problem in defence has been on the edges for a long time. in the potter days, it was due to injury when we had akaoula and corey paterson on the wing and **_now it's due to incompetence where we stack up the middle but leave our halves and centres exposed._**

I'm not sure if it's incompetence because you'd think the coaching staff get this. I think it's basically our defensive structures. If we don't stack up the middle teams may go through us.

The myth if anything is that the issue is all Naiqama. It's the structure, Moses, Naiqama and Nofo that all contribute to our poor right hand side defence.

I don't see an easy solution to the problem. I'd be inclined to stick with it and hope that it improves especially in the big games.

 

[Gary_Bakerloo]

Of course. But why is our Canberra loss considered an outlier and their loss isn't?

I just did the hypothetical scenario based on Wests' performance and when you remove the result, the f/a is basically at zero. Now irrespective of other teams' have performance in any given year, I reckon if your f/a is zero, you would be close to 8th with a ~50% win record. That's an improvement on 15th position.

Because it does not suit their agenda.

Simple

Guilty as charged - I don't care about Souths or other teams for that matter.

 

[dimitri]

All comments are fair but the real elephant in the room is injuries.

Look at the Table and you will see a direct correlation between the amount of players used by any club and their position on the ladder. The 2 grand finalist are almost always the 2 teams with least players used in a season. Its been like that for years.

The constant tinkering of players, be it for injury, form or personality, is doing no favours to the cohesion of the team or the defensive structures in place.

 

[Pokies]

Back to 15th for points conceded after last night, hopefully souths and the chooks concede a few tries this weekend and we can claw our way back to 13th best defensively.

Defense at the Wests Tigers… Please that's a myth

 

[Eddie]

13th, 14th or 15th.

it is all a terrible result considering Taylor's mantra when he came into the club.

Thats why I'm struggling to trust him.

His Number 1 and only goal was to fix the defence.

I would like to see blokes keep spinning that though.

 

[851]

13th, 14th or 15th.

it is all a terrible result considering Taylor's mantra when he came into the club.

Thats why I'm struggling to trust him.

His Number 1 and only goal was to fix the defence.

I would like to see blokes keep spinning that though.

That and accountability, which also does not exist, I have never rated him and nothing I have seen has changed my mind.

 

[stevetiger]

13th, 14th or 15th.

it is all a terrible result considering Taylor's mantra when he came into the club.

Thats why I'm struggling to trust him.

His Number 1 and only goal was to fix the defence.

I would like to see blokes keep spinning that though.

I said the same thing in another thread but I'll state it again. Taylor just spoke dribble. Some morons bought his dribble. Who knows maybe Taylor even believed it when he firstly came to the club.

The point is that at some point Taylor and the coaching staff realised that you can't just focus on defence.

We need to judge the team on winning games. Defence is a part of that but so is offence.

Against Penrith we just got out muscled. It was made worse because Rankin replaced Teddy and the whole team is a bit of a mess because Taylor refuses to play Robbie. If we had though Teddy and Robbie in the team we still probably lose that game because our forwards didn't aim up. I should qualify the forwards comment because it wasn't just the forwards. The Penrith wingers torn us a new one. They belted it up and we had nothing.

 

[Harvey]

Perhaps his biggest step in fixing the defence happened this week, with Kidwell being shown the door. If we can find a defensive coach as good as Sandercock was for attack. It would be a big step forward.

 

[Telltails]

:frowning:

Perhaps his biggest step in fixing the defence happened this week, with Kidwell being shown the door. If we can find a defensive coach as good as Sandercock was for attack. It would be a big step forward.

Just out of interest Harvey then what does JT himself really offer us as a coach ?

 

[Geo]

Ah good to see steve is back to his normal self…

47 missed tackles puts way to much pressure on the attack which leads to 10 errors 7 penalties conceded a 73% completion rate...

You ain't winning too many when you have to score off every 3rd completed set..That's no Myth...

 

[innsaneink]

Lol.
Much easier to only have to score 3 tries Steve, when you can keep the opp to two

 

[Harvey]

:frowning:

Perhaps his biggest step in fixing the defence happened this week, with Kidwell being shown the door. If we can find a defensive coach as good as Sandercock was for attack. It would be a big step forward.

Just out of interest Harvey then what does JT himself really offer us as a coach ?

What is the role of any NRL coach these days? They are basically man managers. Strength and conditiong is responsible for fitness, there is an attack coach, a defence coach, we also have a football manager who looks after recruitment, selection is apparently a group effort.

The coach should be getting the players up for the games, developing gameplans and fronting thew media.

 

[cktiger]

:frowning:

Perhaps his biggest step in fixing the defence happened this week, with Kidwell being shown the door. If we can find a defensive coach as good as Sandercock was for attack. It would be a big step forward.

Just out of interest Harvey then what does JT himself really offer us as a coach ?

What is the role of any NRL coach these days? They are basically man managers. Strength and conditiong is responsible for fitness, there is an attack coach, a defence coach, we also have a football manager who looks after recruitment, selection is apparently a group effort.

**The coach should be getting the players up for the games, developing gameplans and fronting thew media**.

Yep, that's working for good old JT.

 

[Muffstar]

:frowning:

Perhaps his biggest step in fixing the defence happened this week, with Kidwell being shown the door. If we can find a defensive coach as good as Sandercock was for attack. It would be a big step forward.

Just out of interest Harvey then what does JT himself really offer us as a coach ?

What is the role of any NRL coach these days? They are basically man managers. Strength and conditiong is responsible for fitness, there is an attack coach, a defence coach, we also have a football manager who looks after recruitment, selection is apparently a group effort.

**The coach should be getting the players up for the games, developing gameplans and fronting thew media**.

Yep, that's working for good old JT.

Yeah agree CKT, three games to go, we need to win, semis in sight for the first time in a few years. Taylor's job for next year is based on how we go this year (supposedly) and we get busted up all over the park. If it is the coaches job to lift the players then Taylor is not doing that, they looked flat last night and it showed on the score board.

Penrith looked ready for semis footy last night, and we didn't.

 

[Gary_Bakerloo]

I said the same thing in another thread but I'll state it again. Taylor just spoke dribble. Some morons bought his dribble. Who knows maybe Taylor even believed it when he firstly came to the club.

The point is that at some point Taylor and the coaching staff realised that you can't just focus on defence.

We need to judge the team on winning games. Defence is a part of that but so is offence.

How often has this been explained?

What has been the culture of Wests Tigers? Basically from the Sheens days, it was offence oriented. No problem if we concede 4 tries, we will score 6\. The balance was wrong.

Hence, the focus was weighted to defence to change the mentality - that was last season.

This season we have won matches this season by 3 tries to 2 or whatever and that's why JT is always saying they're the type of wins we are aiming for at Wests Tigers. It's not dribble, it's someone explaining that the staff are trying to change the culture of the club because other than 2005 and maybe 2010, the previous culture brought the club nothing in terms of achievement.

To put it in a nutshell for you, the challenge for this season was to continue trying to change the culture of the club whilst at the same time under the strain of some poor decisions by previous management (salary cap). To have been chance of making the 8 with 3 matches remaining under these circumstances is a credit to the team and the coaching staff.

That said, the constraint of previous decisions reduces further next season and JT has to keep working on the culture. Hence, making the finals next year would be a minimum requirement, in fact, it is part of the club's strategic plan to be in the finals next season.