Up to date training information for Aussie Rules / AFL Football.
From these 2 games we look at:
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Given, potentially, the bottom 5 teams in their 1st 6 games, the AFL set them up to start with momentum and then see what they can do with it.
Losing on just the 2nd game to the Eagles certainly put a stop to that, at least for the time being.
The Eagles have been slowly revving their game style up to that of Andrew McQualter and even though the results haven't been there, their KPI's to how they want to play definitely have.
Pressure, ground balls, forward surge and territory is their blueprint - taking a huge leap out of the Richmond playbook through their premiership years, and now it seems some of their draft picks seem to be coming along for the ride.
West Coast still might finish 2nd bottom this year, and they'll be better than their record actually suggests I reckon, but North must be very disappointed to allow a 60pt turnaround in this game - and so they should be.
The dominated hit outs 54 - 27 but only marginally won clearance 46 -37 and once it turned into a chaos game, then North will be North.
Today we look at:
After that though the Hawks made all the adjustments that mattered and just took it away from the Swans ending with +64 possessions, +43 marks and their back 6 having 46 intercept possessions showing out very poor efforts going forward.
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The Dogs look outstanding with a better defense but their offense is also better than last year which is a truly frightening prospect.
The Giants are going to be inconsistent this year with the outs they have the young replacements they have in instead, at least until some of those injured players get back anyway but the Dogs under the lid could be the hardest trip in the AFL this season.
The Swans were looking as good as the Dogs until the news of Gulden's surgery and 3 - 4 month recovery time came through although our revamped game time and development of some players from the injury-riddled part of last year has me thinking we can handle his loss better the 2nd time around.
Injuries are the theme today it seems as we come to the Lions, missing 7 - 8 of their Grand Final team from last season in the early part of the season and no one's depth can withstand that and they've played the 2 best teams so far in the 1st 2 rounds so they'll be fine I suspect.
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AFL in 2026 has come with a bunch of rule changes but also with a shift in how teams are moving the ball on offense.
Yes, the stand rule allows for play tempo to be maintained but teams are already on the run anyway, they're now just more confident continuing to go fast and not hold the ball up.
The biggest change for mine has been the use of handball through the center of the ground that some teams were doing previously (GWS/Hawks especially with their high half forwards) but it is widespread now and in a variety of ways.
Last week I highlighted how Sydney were using space through the center of the ground and I doubled-down on watching for it this round and it was pretty clear at times.
Like most tactics/strategies, once you see it you canlt stop seeing it!
Today we look at the following teams and how they are using the most important space in football today:
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Coach AFL just put this up on their Facebook page today - a training activity (we've got to move on from drills that are predetermined and based on routine - language matters!).
They've been dormant for some time but have fired back up of the back of the Coaching Forum but it should never stop delivering to community coaches.
Here's the training activity:
The Positive's:
The Negative's
Pretty much every training activity I see, and that includes a lot of them I saw at the Coaching Forum miss maybe the most vital part of designing training activities - affordances.
Affordances are opportunities for action.
You receive the ball and there's 1 player covered and 1 wide open - the affordance for action is to play to the open player...but what if defensive pressure is closing in on me? That affordance for action is not as strong as it would be if there wasn't any defensive pressure.
In front of me is space, space that I can run and carry through and get away from that defensive pressure.
I now have 2 affordances for action - kick or run and carry.
What training must focus on is on players being able to recognise these affordances in game-like situations and it's that decision making process that carries over into games.
If you're coaching from the sidelines and telling players to kick the ball as soon as they get it, they will never see the affordance of an open player or space to run and carry through, really putting the onus of player development squarely on you, the coach.
The hard and fast rule of both players having to touch the ball takes away affordances the initial player might have which is to keep playing forward once they receive, rather than looking sideways or backwards to make sure everyone gets a possession.
A better way is to add a scoring system around this so if each player can touch the ball before transitioning then award 2pts for every transition v 1pt for a transition where they don't.
This keeps both options, and most importantly all affordances, open to be used as the ball carrier sees fit.
Here's what I would do with this to make it a more complete training activity by building this out.
First, I need to settle on my intention and that can be the coaching focuses on the original image - first give, adjusting and protecting the ball.
I've never been sold on first give/first option as it's only the 1st option, it's not always the best option.
I'd possibly shift to a draw the defender towards you and then give and possibly keep it at that to really narrow the focus.
Alternatively, you can run at the defender if they are sagging off and make them focus on you, freeing up your teammate as well.
Going back to my Coaching Forum report from last week, let's use the concept and sill framework from Austin Stubbs.
The concept is drawing the defender and how to do that initially (wait for them, run at them, deceive) and the skill is the handball to your teammate (which hand to use, footwork, execution, outcome)
This might translate to only handball when the defender is within 2m of you and then seeing how they go about achieving that - you don't want to give the answers if they can learn them themselves which has greater learning retention then simply being told.
What might end up happening is a that the ball simply moves in a clockwise fashion as the defender will possibly always be a step behind being so disadvantaged.
To break this pattern up add a defender to the half-way line where they can go from side to side but must remain on the line - the ball will now have to be moved diagonally at some point.
My next step would be to bring those end players into the activity and bring in another defender so it will now be a 3v2 in each half and you can make a handball count before the ball can be passed to the opposite end
Again, I'm still staying with my original intention and the cues around it - don't go away from them, keep the focus narrow.
Another aspect you can add in is that 1 player from 1 half can run and carry the ball into the other half to again open up the affordance of run and carry if it's there, and once they pass off then they simply return to their original half.
I don't do laps - unorganised coaches send players on laps.
To make organisation easy during the session think about how can build out your first training activity into something else in minimal time.
In this case we can add kicking into this by simply extending the playing area and shuffling a few players around.
Let's keep the 3v2 in each half but then add back in the end line player but also some neutral wingers.
The end line player can cover the width of the end lines to receive and the wings can cover the entire length lines to receive.
Each end is now essentially a 5v2 which is a low complex way to start.
As we've moved to kicking then the intention has to change but it doesn't need to be turned upside down as the same concept as before can be used with different cues.
In a possession game you want to move the defenders which is done by moving the ball.
With the stand rule back in effect you really want to make that defender have to stand, so you now take them out of the game until you've kicked the ball - this could be your intention: make the defense stand the mark.
Once you've forced them to that then moving the ball will be pretty easy as there's only 1 defender to cover 4 players.
Pretty quickly I'd suggest adding another defender to each end and possibly extending the area again as we still want kicking success.
A rule might use here is that only middle players can transition the ball to the other end, either to the middle and outside players or only the middle players.
Each layer slowly increases the complexity of the training activity which keeps your players on high alert, engaged and solving problem after problem and using the variability of repetition without repetition to do so.
Finally you can take the half-way line out and play 10v6 end to end full field.
Double finally you can then add more defenders in but if offense is your intention, then keep it a +1 or 2 on offense.
New Year, New Football.
The pace of the game has definitely sped up for the time being although I suspect by rounds 5 - 6 coaches will have gone to work to slow it back down in an attempt to gain more control of different game variables.
In the meantime though, let's enjoy the show.
GWS completely stifled anything the Hawks wanted to do on Saturday afternoon, and with some clearance dominance (rare for GWS), we were able to witness what their team defense can actually look like when they're not defending from deep in their defensive 50...and their mid 50 trapping was very, very good.
The Dogs looked like they would continue the trend of not being able to front up against the big teams and even with Brisbane being +46 in disposals, +13 inside 50's, +6 in clearance and +47 in marks, what certainly looked like a Brisbane win by the stats, was turned away by the Dogs' back 6 when they really needed it with Lobb, O'Donnell, Khamis, Freijah, Jaques and Budarick managing 24 between them.
After the breakneck speed of the 1st 4 games, last night's boundary-fest was not the greatest watch. Both teams defend with the ball via low-risk ball options with a whopping 239 total marks between both teams - 223 uncontested!
The Pies have a system that allows for creativity via the Diacos Brothers and De Goey but when the Saints needed some flair in the last quarter, they couldn't make the shift but that's a staple of Ross Lyon-coached teams.
Today we look at:
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