Here's Looking At You, Kid

So, we all know how to bust a zone.

(If you don't, consider this)

An entirely different problem is working out where to put people of lesser experience when running your zone offence. This is a scenario I'd imagine quite a few teams have to deal with in the uni season (and to a lesser extent the mixed season) of Australian ultimate, as there are always new recruits who have to learn as they go, a fair amount of experienced-but-not-superstar players, and generally not that many World-class athletes who can demolish one all by themselves for the entirety of the tournament.

So:

What seems to be the temptation in the teams I've played with is to stick the inexperienced players as wing/deeps or popping, and have the experienced players as handlers. Consequently, a lot of teams of this skill mixture generally have an okay time dumping and swinging, but their middle of the field really fails to engage and so they have a harder time scoring. Here are some alternative mix-ups to this formula, assuming a mix of 3 experienced players to 4 not so experienced, and a zone defence that is not overly impenetrable.

The Risky
Have three inexperienced players handle, two experienced players popping, and the remaining one good one not so good players act as wing/deeps. If necessary, have one of the experienced poppers receive the pull and pass it to the handlers.

The Pro's:

• The inexperienced folk get more disc time than they normally would, increasing their confidence and handling ability.
• Once the disc gets to the experienced poppers, they will have the confidence to give-go or look for decent upfield options. Most inexperienced poppers, once they get the disc, just give it straight back. Basically, once it gets to the middle, expect the zone to be broken permanently.

The Con's:

• It's not called 'The Risky' for nothing: three inexperienced handlers could spell death if they are caught in, say a sideline trap.
• Much more pressure on the experienced folk (poppers) to bail out in situations like a high stall count or aforementioned trap.

The Talk Show
Place one inexperienced player as the axis handler, with the other two handlers being experienced/inexperienced respectively. Poppers and wing/deeps are made up of one good and one not-so-good player each. The idea generally is that, just as a good zone defence revolves around a lot of on-field communication, so does this zone offence! The experienced handler is there to guide the other handlers, and the popper/wing-deep pairs have one experienced player each in their to guide the other one.

The Pro's:

• The inexperienced players are getting lots of advice as events occur, as opposed to after the point or on the sideline where recalling the situation may be difficult.
• Equal spread of experience all the way down the field, to ensure continuation and flow.

The Con's:

• Relies heavily on calm, measured and timely communication to newbies, which can be quite difficult in the heat of the moment. (Think 'Turn to face your dump, Sarah.', not 'SARAH DUMP DUMP DUMP!')
• Once again, new folks handling presents a little bit of a liability. Make sure the experienced handler is prepared to work to give the inexperienced handlers safe, easy options to reset the count.
  

Sydney League - A Mixed Bag?

Pun in the title courtesy of Owen "Dad" Shepherd.

In Sydney, the largest Ultimate league is the Northern Suburbs League, with four divisions of roughly ten teams each. It is mixed, as are most leagues in Sydney.

The Dingoes aren't playing League this season because they have a crazy amount of other trainings to do. Thunder and Terra are discouraged from playing 'social league' and it doesn't count as a run as far as our training requirements go.

I often wonder why attempts at opens and womens leagues haven't really taken off. NUFL aside, afdastalking tells me that apart from the Brisbane Women's League and the proposed Premier League in WA, there aren't any Opens/Women's leagues this year, and the Brisbane league only had 20 players, about as much as were playing the pick up in Geelong (I will post about why Geelong excites me later on).

Now, I can understand why a mixed league is so popular during the mixed/uni season, where tournament formats are mixed - the Mundi's have a sort of rep team in division one this season, which makes sense in this, a worlds year - but it seems odd to me that there aren't even any efforts to have an open or women's league operating during Nationals season.

I was trying to think of reasons why this is so: is it just a case of (understandable) administrative fatigue? I remember some folk trying to run a women's league last year sometime (I registered as a beginner as a joke) in Sydney but it didn't take off, due to, I think, lack of players. So I can see why the powers that be would be hesitant to try again. That isn't the only sort of fatigue at play here - teams like Fakulti are training 2-3 times a week during the season, so perhaps asking folk to shell out another weeknight away from HSC/uni work/actual work/relationships with people is a bit much.

Or maybe there are larger forces at work here. Australian ultimate may still be experiencing 'growing pains' at a Worlds level, but when it comes to the schism between Mixed and Open/Womens ultimate... er, there is none? Roughly half the players at Mixed Nats last year were Nationals players, and with the exception of JD I can't think of a single person who prefers to play mixed, and even then I may have just made that up. Why is this relevant to Sydney league?

To use a scientific term, aussie ultimate is too squished. Trying to fit a proper opens season (complete with league) as well as a mixed season for the same group of players in one year is too much. There is not enough time, there are not enough people, and those people don't have enough money to make it work. What we have at the moment is viable - regionals, the odd Share the Love/April Fools tourney that are mostly neglected, followed by mass convergence at Nationals - and will probably be our best option until either people start getting paid to disc, or the numbers reach breaking point.

T.

Damn lost again...

North Shore League Division 2. Friskee always come last or second last. We usually try to console our selves thinking "its ok, we'll win spirit"

This season we didnt spirit again.

01) Control Freaks 105/13 = 8.077
02) Cousin Sven 104/13 = 8.000
03) RuBi 100/13 = 7.692
04) Friskee 100/13 = 7.692 *

The star means we had a forfeit which means we got 0 for a game because we didn't turn up.

Damnit!

It was that good.

We are no longer negative points on our div 2 table.

Friskee managed to pull a draw against the Mac Uni team.

Friskee came together as a team and we played putting all the weeks training into play.
We busted a zone for the first time, the handlers handled, the poppers popped the wing deeps flew.

It was magic.

Piers, Timill and Jimmy wanted Aussie Thunder to be the best pommy d in juniors world.
Tonight we practiced it, and it was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

The team did however sustain a few injuries.
Alex Peters while in the wall jumping up for a bid, landed and twisted her ankle very badly.
Ange later at Div 1 got decked (not sure of the complete details)
Loren and Sali are broken.

I played a lot more popping and wing deep, as well as playing more in the wall.
I'm glad my fitness can take it now, have a lot more to go.

My knee is slightly something wrong with it right now.