Round 13: West v Norwood, Saturday 23 June @ City Mazda Stadium

V


Saturday 23 June
City Mazda Stadium

Reserves: 11:25am
League: 2:10pm

West Adelaide are coming off the bye, and a loss to Centrals at Elizabeth prior to the week off while Norwood are coming off a huge win over Glenelg at Norwood. Will West Adelaide be able to bounce back from their Elizabeth reality check, or will Norwood inflict another reality check on Westies.

This is obviously very tough for the Bloods, but they'll possibly have Fort Caruso back, Rory Laird is almost certain to come in and Brad Crouch will be available at last.

They should field a very good 21.

I have a feeling this is going to be very close or these two teams will be poles apart, most likely in Norwood's favour.

So Norwood by 1-2 or by 8-9 goals.

West urging fans to get along. They seem quite innovative at times with promotions West. Well done.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/sport/afl/bloods-challenge-legs-fans/story-e6freckc-1226401483716

This game is going to see were west are as far as becoming a top three side, a must win for the bloods at home if we are to become a force in the sanfl

Every time i pick the bloods we lose.The legs by 48pts.

I'm not so sure that this game will necessarily tell us too much about West's prospects this year. It's likely to be wet, it's only half-way through the season and Norwood have only lost one game. Apart from that, most sides apart from the top 2 seem to lose every other week.

I'll take more notice in another few weeks time.

Wet on Sat okie dokie Legs by 24pts

regardless of the weather this game will tell us if West are the real deal & a genuine contender against the top two teams or as i feel just in the pack fighting for a third to fifth spot with most other teams...............Norwood comfortably for mine by lets say 6 goals

What effect do you think a possible wet day will have?

Norwood will be very hard to beat, but West will be looking to natone for their last poor effort at Elizabeth.

It's a triple-header.

League: 1st v 3rd

Reserves: 1st v 2nd

18's: 1st v 2nd.

Any idea what is wrong with Willets R&B?

well well well i hope coach Bassett says ''we were lucky'' because obviously they were, well we have learnt that West are capable of matching it with the pace setters so they'll look forward to meeting them again, i just wonder when two negative teams play at footy park, that spaces open up that we don't see open up at the suburban grounds, bad luck to West who led basically all day but at least they go home with belief going into the future

Well, a remarkable game of football, not so much for the standard of play, but for the final result. West jumped out early, took control of the game and Norwood looked very tentative, making many errors and giving away too many free kicks.

West only returned 1-6 for their efforts, keeping Norwood in the game even though they hadn't scored. The second quarter continued with both teams locking the game down making scoring a rare commidity. West continually had more players where the ball was and hurt Norwood everywhere but the scoreboard.

The third quarter was a real arm wrestle with neither side giving an inch, however a late goal by West appeared to give them a likely match winning lead, 4-10 to 1-4.

At 3/4 time, Andy Collins said, "There's nothing worse than losing because you didn't run the game out". Bassett asked his players to abandon their carefully structured game plan, throw caution to the wind and take a few chances.

Batsanis began with a long goal, followed by a clever snap by Luke Brown, suddenly Norwood were within 2 goals. The struggle continued for some time until Dawe kicked a nice goal drawing the Legs to a 5 pt deficit.

West took the ball out of the middle and drove it long. With the ball locked in their forward zone, it looked as though time had run out for Norwood. One last forward thrust saw Rodan working the ball through the pack, a West player tackled him and was drawn forward in the tackle resulting in a free to Rodan.

The siren sounded as he went back to take his shot. From 40 metres out n a slight angle, his kick never wavered as the wet ball sailed between the posts for a Norwood victory.

For 3 quarters, West were clearly the better side but couldn't put Norwood away. Although not at all impressed by Norwood first 3 quarters, I was impressed by the way Norwood clawed themselves back into the game when all appeared lost.

Tough game to watch, but an exciting finish, especially if you support Norwood. Amazing to read the stats after the game, for all West's dominance, Norwood actually had more of the footy.

Best players for Norwood were Cachia, Terlich, Batsanis and Brown. For West I thought Schmidt, Caire, Ferguson and Bricknell were their best.

bayman wrote:well well well i hope coach Bassett says ''we were lucky'' because obviously they were, well we have learnt that West are capable of matching it with the pace setters so they'll look forward to meeting them again, i just wonder when two negative teams play at footy park, that spaces open up that we don't see open up at the suburban grounds, bad luck to West who led basically all day but at least they go home with belief going into the future

Actually, Bassett said precisely that after the match. Unfortunately Norwood v West Adelaide games are not pretty, and very difficult to watch. The two most AFL-style coached teams in the SANFL. I don't like it, but what can you do? Interesting that Bassett realised it was wet at 3/4 time, decided to play some wet weather footy in the final term, and it paid dividends.

Adelaide Hawk wrote:
At 3/4 time, Andy Collins said, "There's nothing worse than losing because you didn't run the game out". Bassett asked his players to abandon their carefully structured game plan, throw caution to the wind and take a few chances.

Andy Collins - The Prophet.

Still shattered at the moment.

Unlike some West supporters I am not going to blame umpires for the result. We kicked 4 goals in 4 quarters of footy and you don't deserve to win matches with that ratio.

I thought Ferguson was clearly BOG on the day. Tippett was very good as usual and Slattery played his best game for the club. For Norwood they didn't really have too many outstanding players but thought Terlich was probably their best. Batsanis also played a good game but probably wasn't as effective has he has been the other times I've seen him.

When you have kicked 4.10 to 3/4 time and you lead by by 24 points in those conditions YOU should never lose.

To only kick 4 goals in 3qrts from 14 shots meant we kept Norwood.

We play Port & Sturt int he next 2 weeks and they are MUST wins.

Very Disappointed and there are no Excuses from what I saw.

Simply you never lose a game that you have dominated for 3 qrts

I haven't felt so gutted after a game of football since 1991 when the umpires gave the Crows a win after the siren against Fitzroy (I was a Fitzroy supporter).

I can't explain what happened or make any rational comment at this stage.

Really feel for the West faithful today... Footy is such a cruel game sometimes

Southee wrote:Really feel for the West faithful today... Footy is such a cruel game sometimes

yep dont reckon footy gods like us

When the dust settles, the two points went to Norwood, after West should have put them away early.

They didn't, but the dominated the game for a long time.

During the game, I pointed out to several good football judges the structure of each team. It gets boring reading about West's 'flooding' style, but the evidence is indisputable that Norwood flood at least as much and this was clearly evident today, as I pointed out to them.

Having said that, Norwood are top and West third, so perhaps that's where the game is right now.

From a West point of view, the signs are very encouraging, IMO. Long gone are the days when we'd be happy with a 1 point loss to the top team. It's not all about 'flooding', our defence was excellent and repelled most attacks, with Tippett and Ferguson both playing very good games.

Our ball movement in the first half was excellent and a return of 8.3 instead of 3.8 would have put the game away.

We didn't do that, though, so we have to cop the result, even allowing for a last second 50/50 free and credit to Norwood for the last quarter fightback.

There's still a long way to go in both the season and West's development. By September, I think we'll be playing some pretty good footy.

blackandred's write up from bloodntars.com

As Chrissie Amphlett of the Divinyls told us it’s a fine line between pleasure and pain and so we found out today as the Bloods went down by a point after leading right up to the final siren. David Rodan had been awarded a free 30m out on a 45 degree angle at the 27 and a half minute mark. Westies were 5 pts up and as Rodan went back the final siren sounded. He then calmly slotted the ball through to the joy of the Norwood supporters and the despair of the West faithful.

Westies had outplayed the top team for the first 3 Qs and had held their opponents to one solitary goal. The downside was that the Bloods had kicked only 4.10 in this time and despite playing so well and creating so many scoring chances had failed to put the game away through some poor kicking. Norwood were making lots of mistakes and with no Jericho and Ben Warren they lacked tall forwards. Opportunities like this don’t often occur.

With hindsight, we lost the game in the 1st Q. We started well and had a goal on the board inside the first minute. We then proceeded to kick 6 points, many from set shots and some went out on the full. 1Q WA 3.8, N 0.0 and there can’t have been too many quarters this year that the ‘Legs have failed to score.

Westies continued their fine work in the second. Norwood got their first goal at the half way point but couldn’t go on with it while Westies goaled via J Beech and Brad Fisher. We were strong in defence and creative in attack putting together all the best passages of play with Norwood struggling under our pressure tackling and strong marking. Half time WA 3.8, N 1.3.

Only one goal was scored in the 3rdQ, a fine shot from Nat Caruso from deep in the SW pocket late in the Q but Norwood only managed one point and we extended our small lead. In 3 Qs of tough footy we had kept the top team to one goal. WA 4.10, N 1.4.

Perhaps we thought we could sit on our lead as we did against the Eagles a few weeks ago but Norwood had other ideas as they started to run the ball at every opportunity. They peppered their forward line creating scoring chances while we struggled to get the ball forward of centre being content to create stoppages. Norwood kicked 4.3 in this term to our 2pts and after 27 and a half minutes of heart-stopping footy the siren sounded with Westies still up but with the ball in the hands of Rodan. The rest, as they say, is history. The final score of N 5.7 to WA 4.12 tells the story of the game, we had 16 shots and Norwood 12.

When the mud dries on this game there will be talk of how unlucky we were to lose. How well we played against the top team and how gallant/unlucky we were in defeat. This may all be true but the facts remain that we kicked poorly, we failed to apply scoreboard pressure, we didn’t take advantage of Norwood’s poor form and we were too defensive in the last Q when the game was there to be won.

Ryan Ferguson was best on the ground by a street. He marked strongly all day and held Norwood out time and time again setting up forward entries with cool handballs or accurate kicks. It must be especially devastating for him to lose the way we did. Scott Bricknell played well as did Shannon Green and Chris Schmidt but it was a pretty even effort. It’s difficult to say if the tactics of playing Webb and Lobbe in ruck, dropping Willets and having 3 young runners like Laird, Silverlock and Rankin worked. Clearly Rankin struggled with the physicality of the game and his decision making was poor. Willets strength may have been handy in the goalsquare in the conditions, as Brady Dawe proved in the last Q. Schiller and Hill didn’t play.

The umpiring was interesting to say the least. It may have favoured West early but Norwood had a great run in the last Q. Maybe this only goes to show that the team that plays attacking footy from in front get the frees. The final count showed Norwood with 23 frees to West 15 which will surprise Norwood supporters.

redandblack wrote:blackandred's write up from bloodntars.com

The umpiring was interesting to say the least. It may have favoured West early but Norwood had a great run in the last Q. Maybe this only goes to show that the team that plays attacking footy from in front get the frees. The final count showed Norwood with 23 frees to West 15 which will surprise Norwood supporters.

It sure does. We rarely come out in front of the free kick count. Champion data had Norwood ahead 20-15.

The main issue for these two sides is they are just both too defensive. A side that kicks 1 goal to 3 q time will struggle when it matters .

Norwood will need to find some attacking flair come finals time and should also burn that red guernsey . That looks woeful. Looked like a poor crowd too considering the promotion.Any numbers ?

waddayamean wrote:The main issue for these two sides is they are just both too defensive. A side that kicks 1 goal to 3 q time will struggle when it matters .

Norwood will need to find some attacking flair come finals time.

I agree with that. I don't think either side will win a flag with the footy they played today. I've been saying since early in 2011 that Norwood's game style is way to complicated, and Tim Weatherald (a former Norwood player under Bassett) said the game style is so finely structured that it can fall apart if one player isn't playing his role. That unnerves me like you wouldn't believe.

Norwood got back into the game for one reason. At 3/4 time, Bass realised his game plan was failing, and that it was raining. He then remembered his days in under 10s, threw the game plan in the bin, and instructed the players to take risks. West had us covered up to then, and this threw them into disarray. For the first time in the match, they didn't know exactly what Norwood were about to do.

In normal circumstances, there is no way Luke Brown would have snapped that 3rd goal, he would have turned around and looked for a player to handball to. Just goes to show what can happen when you allow a player to do the instinctive thing.

I am hoping Bassett learnt something from the final quarter today.