AFL 2021: David Teague concedes Zac Williams must get fitter
Carlton has responded to scathing criticism of Zac Williams, conceding he must get fitter and might never be the midfielder the club hoped.
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Carlton coach David Teague concedes big-name AFL recruit Zac Williams needs to get fitter but also defended his big-money recruit after a week of heavy criticism about his poor workrate for the battling Blues.
Brisbane great Jonathan Brown took Williams to pieces on Fox Footy this week following his 11 possession-effort against his old side GWS and labelled him “one of the laziest footballers going around”.
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Williams joined the Blues as a free agent on a six-year deal worth around $900,000 a season after a failed stint in the midfield has been shifted to half-back, where he starred in his time at the Giants.
With pressure mounting on players, and the coach too with a review already started, Teague said there were mitigating circumstances for Williams, including an interrupted pre-season.
But Teague also said they would like to get from their recruit and acknowledged his midfield running was an issue.
“We took him out of the midfield for a little bit of the ability to run but also ... he was probably low on confidence and we put him back to a position where he’s played some really good football in the past (at half-back),” Teague said.
“It’s a tough game and it requires a lot of you and he’s had quite a few little niggles and an interrupted season.
“So we think that there‘s still a lot of upside there, we think he can get fitter and he’ll become a good player for this football club in the long term.”
Williams has “put his hand up”, according to Teague and acknowledged he needed to improve.
"Zac Williams should maybe watch a tape of Lachie Whitfield and his game on the weekend."
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Teague was adamant the 26-year-old, who has now played 126 AFL games, could still become a potent midfielder and meet Carlton’s expectations for him.
“We (recruited) him to be a midfielder and at the moment we‘re playing him at halfback because he’s been able to add more value to the team there,” he said.
“So we‘ll assess that going forward.
“Ideally he gets a really good pre-season and moves back into the midfield going forward but he may not, he may stay at half-back.”
With the walls closing in on Teague ahead of must-win clash against 14th placed Carlton who are staring at another fruitless campaign, the coach said he was still the man for the job.
“Do I feel I’m the guy to take the club forward? I do. I absolutely do,” he said.
“We’re not getting the results at the moment, I understand people talking about that.
“But as a collective as a club I think we‘ve got great people in good positions and we’ll come out of this. I have a lot of confidence in that.”
WHY BLUES LEGEND WOULDN’T BLAME STAR FOR LEAVING
Former Carlton coach Robert Walls says he would be “very nervous” if he was in David Teague’s shoes and he “could not blame” co-captain Patrick Cripps if he were to walk out on the club.
As Carlton continues a wide-ranging external review of the football department, Walls said he had expected a much better campaign from the club this year than what it has delivered.
Walls, who was brought back to Carlton as a mentor for former coach Brendon Bolton in 2019, said being a senior coach during a football department review was not a comfortable position to be in.
“I’d be very nervous,” Walls said when asked how he would feel if he were in Teague’s position.
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“Obviously they’re not happy, simple as that. It’s not a good thing if you’re the senior coach and they say they’re going to do a review from top to bottom. Obviously they think there are concerns and they’re not happy with the way the club’s going.
“When David Teague took over, I think we saw an immediate spark and there was some really good, fast play-on and bold football. Some good scores were being kicked. Unfortunately it’s fallen away.”
Teague took over from Bolton midway through the 2019 season and steered the side to six wins from their last 11 games that year.
However, since then Carlton has won just 11 of 30 matches and holds a 4-9 record this year.
“I thought they were a real chance to be in the eight, around six, seven or eight,” Walls said on 3AW radio.
“I thought if they won 12 or 13 games and had a winning season, that would give them a tick. I thought they were capable of that.”
Walls said high-priced recruits Mitch McGovern, Jack Martin, Zac Williams and Adam Saad had not delivered on expectations at Princes Park, which was a “real disappointment”.
Co-captain Patrick Cripps is still yet to officially sign a new contract despite expectations a deal would be agreed upon more than a month ago, with Walls questioning whether the star midfielder should stay.
“If you’re going to have one captain, it’s Cripps,” Walls said.
“It depends if he stays there and you can well mount an argument to say that if he wants to achieve the absolute best in football he’s better off to go to the West Coast Eagles. I don’t know whether that’s in his mind or not, but you could not blame him if he decided (to leave).”
Watch: Blues recruit exposed as great lashes laziness
Brisbane Lions great Jonathan Brown has lashed Carlton’s Zac Williams as “one of the laziest footballers going around” after the high-priced recruit was outworked by his former side Greater Western Sydney on the weekend.
Secured as a midfielder on a six-year deal reportedly worth up to $900,000 a year including incentives, Williams has primarily played across halfback in an up-and-down start to his first season at Princes Park.
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The 26-year-old recorded just 11 disposals and one tackle against the Giants on Saturday night.
However, most damning for Williams was the vision that emerged of his lack of defensive work rate.
“I tell you what, Zac Williams is one of the laziest footballers going around at the moment,” Brown said on Fox Footy’s On The Couch on Monday night.
“There’s about 100 pieces of vision left on the cutting room floor. We could have gone through it for the next half an hour and showed it and we could have really, really hurt his reputation.
“So I’m just verballing it for you. That bloke has come to the Carlton Football Club, paid that sort of money. He needs to turn up in better shape and get himself fit and turn up and put in a better effort, especially on defence.”
Williams has averaged 18.7 disposals this season but has laid a total of only two tackles from his past three games.
Overall, the Giants won the tackle count on Saturday night 79-41 despite also recording 39 more disposals for the match.
GWS was also allowed to take 138 marks – the most Carlton has conceded under coach David Teague – and the Blues’ pressure differential of -41 was the worst differential by a team since 2015.
Carlton now lost five of their past six matches and holds a 4-9 record for the season heading into a home clash against Adelaide at Marvel Stadium on Sunday.
Carlton announced an external review of its football department earlier this month to look into all aspects of the group including coaching, the club’s fitness program and recruiting.
Cripps defends Blues’ effort after breakdown
Frustrated Carlton co-captain Patrick Cripps can’t explain the Blues’ dismal tackle count on Saturday night but says a lack of effort is not the problem.
Cripps himself failed to record a clearance in the first two quarters, an alarming development given he averages more than seven per game across his career.
Greater Western Sydney also racked up 138 marks in the six-goal victory, the most Carlton has conceded since Round 9, 2019 against the same opposition.
“It’s a question I can’t really answer, to be honest. It’s something we’re going to address,” Cripps said of the tackling performance.
“One thing I will say about this group is we give effort every week.
“It’s disappointing that the tackle count was like that, but at the same time, we were winning the ground ball stat as well, so it wasn’t a lack of effort.
“We were still winning the ball, but pressure is definitely something we’ve got to keep addressing as a group.”
The Blues are set to embark on a wide-ranging football department review that spares no one as they try to figure out what’s gone wrong, after entering the season with finals expectations.
Carlton will miss finals for the eighth-straight year unless it can win at least eight and probably all of the nine remaining games.
Teague is technically in his second season in charge, but won the job after steering the Blues to a 6-5 record as caretaker coach in the second half of 2019.
He’s already feeling the heat for overseeing an underperforming team that’s suffered repeated midgame lapses where they’ve conceded gluts of goals, while the latest issue is constant defensive breakdowns.
“We’re definitely leaking too much as a side and we’ve openly said that, but we’re working hard to fix that – and it’s not just the back six, it’s a collective defence,” Cripps said.
“The best teams defend as a collective, so that’s something we’ll keep trying to finetune for the back nine games and I think we’ll see improvement in that area.”
Cripps said no one individual or area was to blame for the club’s predicament and he still had great faith in the group, including Teague and his coaching staff.
The 26-year-old restricted free agent, who guaranteed he would be at Ikon Park next season and beyond, also welcomed the review.
“I’ve never actually been involved in one of these processes and I’m not exactly sure what they are, in terms of the nuts and bolts of it,” he said.
“All I know is it’s going to be a thing (where) a lot of different areas will get feedback on how to grow, and I think high-performing clubs do that.
“We want to be a high-performing club and we feel like, although it’s hard at the moment, in the long run it’s going to be really beneficial for our group.”
Carey: Why Teague call must come after review
AFL legend Wayne Carey says Carlton cannot act on David Teague’s career until its review is complete as the club’s defensive frailties were again laid bare against GWS.
But Carey says the simple win-loss record at a Carlton side which declared its premiership ambitions in the pre-season means Teague’s job must be in doubt.
Carlton’s total defensive breakdown against GWS saw 12 players fail to lay a first-half tackle, with Teague admitting post-match the players were not executing defensive roles.
The defensive bungling included a lack of two-way run and a series of examples where players in dangerous spots were dragged out of leading lanes by opponents.
St Kilda champion Nick Riewoldt said there were players at Carlton who “don’t have a defensive mindset and don’t want to defend”.
Former coach Ross Lyon said the Blues looked so lacking in effort because too many players had no clarity about their defensive assignments.
The 4-9 Blues take on Adelaide next week and even their mathematical hopes of finals will be extinguished if they drop that contest.
Carey said the club’s decision to top up with established talent had set expectations that had clearly not been met.
“I picked them for the eight. I have been on the bandwagon with the talent they got into the club and they kept on topping up but the results haven’t come with topping up,” he told Triple M.
“Clearly they can’t make a decision before that review is complete.
“I would have said the same with Ross Lyon and with Damien Hardwick. I don’t like anyone losing their jobs. But is he in trouble?
“Wins and losses determine where you are as a coach so he’s definitely in trouble.”
Fox Footy commentator Riewoldt said the Blues were clearly working hard on defence but had players with no defensive intent.
“Clearly David Teague is prioritising the defensive part of the game because he speaks about it week after week. The disconnect happens with players,” Riewoldt said.
“There are clearly players at Carlton that don’t have a defensive mindset and don’t want to defend and then there are also players who don’t have the ability out on the ground to make the necessary decisions in real time, quickly, to take up space and defensive positions.
“For me it all comes back to the mindset. If you don’t want to defend, you don’t want to defend.’’
Lewis: Teague on borrowed time
A former Hawthorn star who Carlton approached about a potential board role has questioned whether David Teague is the right coach for the Blues.
Jordan Lewis revealed in May he knocked back Carlton’s interest, saying he would struggle to juggle that position with his Fox Footy commitments.
Lewis was critical of the Blues’ hunger in Saturday night’s six-goal defeat to the Giants in Sydney, which saw Teague’s men slump to a 4-9 record despite a belated second-half challenge.
In what was Carlton’s first match since announcing it would undertake a football department review, 13 players failed to lay a tackle to halftime.
Carlton footballers can almost certainly book September holidays early for an eighth-straight year, even with a friendly run home.
“I don’t think performances like that help your cause if you’re trying to maintain the head seat in the coaching position,” Lewis said on Fox Footy, including labelling the Blues’ first half as “really poor”.
“One of the hardest things to do, and one of the great strengths of really good coaches, is how they motivate their group.
“We can only look at the first half and see how the players came out and performed, and the way they attacked the contest. For me, they weren’t in a position where they were on edge.
“Is David Teague that person who can motivate this group when they’re down and out?”
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Originally published as AFL 2021: David Teague concedes Zac Williams must get fitter
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