Bombers vs Cats Review

A Q & A review.

For this week’s review, I’ve decided to take a different approach. I wanted to tap into how supporters are feeling, not just about this week’s performance, but about the season as a whole: the players, the method, the coaching, the setup, and everything in between.

So I put the call out across my platforms, inviting subscribers, followers, and fans to send in their questions. The aim is to explore those thoughts more deeply and offer some perspective on where things stand so far in 2025.

Q & A

“You’ve written a few times last year about changing the game plan with the football, is what you’re seeing now the difference you were hoping to see?”

There was a slight shift earlier this year, though still with some remnants of previous seasons, mainly due to some important factors ahead of the field. But across the last three weeks, that shift has gone even further, and right now, too far.

In 2024, Essendon relied heavily on kick mark to make their way forward, averaging 89.5 uncontested marks a game, the 3rd most behind Brisbane and St Kilda, and the 3rd most in the back two-thirds of the ground behind the same two teams. Only five teams found an uncontested mark at a lower rate per disposal, as this was their preferred way to transition the ball. One of the issues was that it was slow and indirect, they averaged the least metres gained per kick. As a comparison, Brisbane ranked 7th and St Kilda 13th for metres gained by foot.

This year, there were signs early on that things had shifted. Last year, over 58% of disposals were kicks, but after the first five games this dropped to 55.8%, as the handball game became more prominent and took over as the preferred way to move the ball. The 89 uncontested marks from 2024 fell to 82.3 a game, ranking 8th at that stage. But from here, things needed to change for a while.

The clearance advantage that had served Essendon well up to that point was failing, they were +34 at that stage, but over the next four games lost the count by 26. This meant poorer starting positions for their possession chains, forcing the side to begin much further from goal than anyone would want. Nearly 40% of total chains started in the defensive 50 during this period, up from just 33% after the first five games. Because of this, a safer option was desperately needed, so the kick-mark sideways shift was brought back, and the attack by hand had to be put on hold.

From Round 11 onwards, the clearance game returned, field position improved more consistently, and the run-and-dare style of linking by hand made its way back. But this is where it tipped too far.

During this three-game stretch, 53.8% of disposals were kicks, including five quarters where the Bombers recorded more handballs than kicks, three of those in second-half comebacks against Brisbane and Carlton. Geelong, a team quick to spot their opponent’s tendencies, was sure to have taken note — and it all came to a head for Essendon on Saturday.

Quote taken from Essendon vs Geelong Preview

Coming into this game, Geelong have the highest kick-to-handball ratio, while at the other end, Essendon have the lowest. It means the Bombers’ handball game is going to have to hold up under the pressure applied by the Cats, and positioning from Essendon’s defenders will need to be on point, with how much space is being given up, and how quickly the ball is likely to be coming in their direction by foot.

The handball game can feed Geelong’s tackle pressure, which currently sees them as the number one tackling team in the competition. So just passing on that heat to a teammate by hand isn’t going to help things.

But this change in game plan hasn’t only been about more handball and run. When Essendon has looked to go by foot, the intent has clearly been to get more damaging from it.

Up until Round 10, after the loss to the Western Bulldogs, no team in the competition was less likely to turn a possession into a score than Essendon, and no team was less likely to do it by foot.

Since that poor loss to the Bulldogs, three of the four games that followed, including Saturday’s clash with Geelong, have seen the Bombers at their most aggressive by foot all year. And in those games, against Richmond, Brisbane, and Geelong, that shift in intent made them more likely than at any other point this season to turn a possession by kick into a score.

This transformation in method, and what looks like a longer-term plan, has coincided with playing six players with fewer than five games of AFL experience, against a team like Geelong who are settled and seasoned at both ends of the ground. The risks were always going to be high.

Do I want to keep seeing this method? A slightly more balanced version between kick and handball, yes. Will it take time to get that balance right? Absolutely.

“Is Brad Scott the coach to take us all of the way?”

In truth, probably not. Very few coaches survive the entirety of a rebuild as significant as the one Essendon is undertaking and come out the other side with the ultimate success. While he might not be that person in the end, he was the right person that was available at the time — and the right person now. For how long…?

The club was in disarray, on-field, off-field, and structurally. Scott may well be playing a role similar to Brendan McCartney at the Bulldogs or Paul Roos at Melbourne: steadying hands who laid the foundations for the coaches who followed. Both clubs needed someone who could instil on-field professionalism, but just as crucially, understood the importance of getting things right above and around them — culture, leadership, structure, alignment.

The win-loss ledger so far hasn’t satisfied most fans, myself included. But that’s a short-term measure in what’s clearly a long-term project. The focus needs to be on sustainable growth in all departments of the football club, not fleeting results that paper over cracks.

Do I wish it was all moving faster? Of course.

Would I make drastic changes right now? Aside from beginning to shape list decisions for 2026, probably not.

I would’ve preferred some of the decisions now being made had happened a year ago, maybe even two. Not about the list, but about how the team was setting up and the system being implemented. If that had been addressed earlier, I believe the list management calls we’re now facing might’ve been clearer — and made sooner.

“Scott never coaches from the bench. Never ever. I just wonder if this struggling team would respond better if they saw the coach invested enough to get down to ground level.”

If I’m honest, I’m not overly fussed about this. I personally wouldn’t be coaching from the boundary, not at this stage of where Essendon is at, though I do understand the theories around why he should. The biggest one being the ability to access players immediately, in the moment, to better gauge their thought process and motivate.

There’s probably a few small things it does suggest to me. One is whether Scott fully trusts the assistants beside him to run, maintain, and adjust things tactically, both with and without the ball. My thinking behind that is Essendon doesn’t yet have a reliable setup in place that he can afford to step back from and focus more on individuals at ground level.

Simon Goodwin, for example, has a system that’s been matured and mastered over time. His assistants have full control of it. Brisbane’s approach under Chris Fagan is a very basic man-on-man setup defensively, simple and easily managed.

Craig McRae is more of an “emotional” coach. He’s got an experienced lineup on the ground and a style of play that can almost coach itself. He recently said he felt restricted in the box, so being at ground level suited him better.

Then there’s Sam Mitchell — probably the best example for why Scott should consider doing both. He’s split time between the box and the bench and has a young, developing side like Essendon. It’s worked well for him and his team, especially across their last 20 or so games.

It’s a really interesting question. I can definitely see valid reasons for why it can work at times. But there’s also a lot that needs to be managed from upstairs, and the benefit of that vantage point can’t be overstated.

“Why do we consistently let them (the opposition) have free players on the fat side of the ground, allowing them to switch play so easily?”

It’s certainly a frustration of mine.

The majority of the reason is obviously the defensive setup. In my view, until Essendon implements a zone defence — at the very least a good zone defence — instead of its default one-on-one, we’ll continue to see the opposition use the switch kick to change the direction of attack.

In reference to Saturday, it was a mixture of that setup and the inexperience of the players who predominantly played the wings.

The idea behind allowing the short kick to the opposition in the pocket or boundary side is to keep them on the “skinny” side, the more congested area of the ground where numbers have already pushed ahead.

But good teams are like hunters in the wild; they prey on one or two weak links and pounce.

The player with the ball needs to be calm enough to quickly scan where his numbers are and where they’re heading. We all saw this in the first quarter when Clarke wanted to switch to the “fat side” to open up the ground and move it forward, but didn’t sum up the situation, mainly due to inexperience, and kicked it to a direct contest.

One matchup not switched on, whether it’s a lapse in positioning or not being sharp enough to shut off the first outlet, and the one-on-one setup starts to break down. It turns into an awkward mix of man-on-man and zone, and from there, the system begins to fall apart.

Defenders behind the play are then forced into split-second decisions: do they “trade up” and come at the ball carrier, or hold their direct opponent? Whatever call they make, everyone around them has to read it the same way in real time. By then, though, it’s usually too late — the damage was done further up the ground in the early stages of the chain.

Until this lineup and list is capable of setting up a much more efficient zone defence — which still relies heavily on everyone playing their part, positioning-wise — the opposition’s ability to change direction will always be available and encouraged.

Do you think we’re heading in the right direction with our skills, decision-making, and footy IQ? It feels like those areas are at an all-time low, not so much with the younger players, but more with the senior guys. Do you think that core group will actually improve?

There’s a ceiling on how much improvement can realistically happen with skills by the time players reach this level. Once they’re in the system, it becomes more about consistency under pressure and decision-making than suddenly becoming elite, especially by foot. We’re seeing all of that play out right now with a certain individual.

The “past” game plan, and I say “past” because it’s only very recently that things have changed, as mentioned earlier, papered over some of the deficiencies in skill, particularly among the senior group. Now, with a clear shift in how the team is moving the ball, even if that change is still relatively new, those limitations are being exposed. The current system is asking players to move the ball faster, make decisions under greater pressure, and execute more precisely. Some can’t meet that demand, and now we’re seeing that play out.

That’s why this next phase is so important, not just the rest of this season, but the longer-term process of list building. It’s about identifying who can genuinely execute all aspects with the football: skill, decision-making, and composure within the system. As you’ll know from what I wrote earlier, I just wish we were finding this out a year or two ago.

Appreciation.

Thanks to everyone who sent in questions, whether by email, DM, or replies on the socials.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t get to all of them, some because I genuinely don’t have an answer, and others because they’d probably need a whole piece of their own to unpack properly.

Hopefully, I was able to share my perspective and get those points across in a meaningful way.

Really appreciate the engagement, it gives me plenty to think about and helps shape where the focus should go next.