Sixers fittest/strongest lineup in a few games in a almost must win game if they are serious about making something out of this season.

Hopefully a good crowd returns after last weeks good game/atmosphere but unfortunately a loss, there was a lot of talk of it being a good game though.

Game time!

Howdy DJ

fingers crossed for a good result

SIXERS STARTING LINE UP

5 BRETT Maher
9 WILL Farley
3 ADRIAN Majstrovich
44 NICK Horvath
11 DAVID Cooper

crocs line up

21 JOHN Rillie
32 JELANI Garnder
20 BRAD Newey
33 LARRY Abney
9 ANDREW Rice

TIMEOUT-CROCS

SIXERS 13

CROCS 6

7-0 run for SIXERS!!!

Maestro 3 pts, 3 rbs, 1ast

Horvath 6 pts

Sixers 18
Crocs 18 (Umm 10?)

Horvath 8

Maher 5 assists

Heya Statman, you'd be looking forward to Sunday night no doubt :)

Nice start by the Sixers up 10 18-8 6mins left in 1st qtr.

123abc welcome, who else we got out there, billo?

Hi!

Sixers 30

Crocs 18

Farley 9

HE DID A SOLO ALLEY-OOP DUNK!!!!

30-18

Farley some sort of self Alley-Oop?! got the commentators excited, seems to be the play of the moment since Tuckers off the backboard self pass last season, DT and Dmac on occasions have tried out the self Alley, and now Farley, it's a good show but technically a travel (And called in the NBA!).

Copeland throws something up and Farley tips it in. Got the crowd pumping and makes a nice little buffer.

qtr time sixers 33 crocs 22

Farley and Copeland went nuts!

And so did the crowd!

ritz, now the numbers are coming in.

Good first quarter,. hopefully we can keep it going
36ers 10 assists
Crocs 5 assists

Does Farley's self alley oop count as an assist ;-)

Maher 5 assists in the first quarter in 9mins and 45 seconds! wow.

Horvath 3 fouls in the first quarter is that a worry, puts some pressure on Wheels and Cooper now, Abney is a tough matchup!

hill in trouble injured wrist

Hey DJ, I'll also be checking in from time to time.

Abney being booed- did usportsmanlike on Hill.

Sixers up by 17

And Abney is getting a serve from the crowd, good to see they are in voice, hopefully it keeps going all game ala Heal ;-)

Yogee, at the game I pressume, working the stats or just surfing the net?

Unfortunately no unsportsmanlike, just a holding foul.

PS The reason the Crocs are loosing, according to NBL live scoreboard only 4 players on court haha.

Hill has a broken arm. In hospital.

Brad Hill, broken arm, in a holding foul WTF?! Thats harsh.

Poor bugger.

56-43 Sixers up,

Rillie has 13 and is hurting us. Newley has 12.

Maher 10pts, 4 rbs, 7 assists

9-0 run for Crocs.

Crocs won the quater when Sixers were winning the quarter by 11!

20 point turnaround.

Not a good finish to the quarter and hopefully not a sign of things to come. Horvath with 4 fouls, probably will sit out most of the 3rd. Ive got money on him scoring 25+, looks like thats outta the equation. Looks like everyones playing ok just a lapse at the end of the half there.

4 fouls nothing to worry about YET. get him back out there in the 3rd, dont let it play on his mind, if/when he gets his 5th (hopefully late in the 3rd at the earliest) than sit him and bring him in early in the 4th. I'm always somewhat dumbfounded that players will sit for soo long on 5 fouls.

Hey all,

Just joined the game, looks like Willie's good form is still keeping on. Nice.

.........and im back after some very tasty chinese ;)

whats the go with Hill? did he get mugged by Abney and broke his arm....now thats a hard foul!!

Yes DJ Sunday should be great - Sturty and I have gone for the Holywood courtside seats....so look out Mick Hill Il be gunning for you!

I agree with the sitting on 5 fouls...youve got 6 so may as well use em up rather than sit on the bench most of the last 1/4

well they sit on 5 fouls incase they are needed down the stretch. Horvath is most definately a player you want to have on the court in a close game. Use him if they have to but otherwise let the others do the job.

I'd rather use him now and maybe even get more time out of him and build the buffer early?

Than 'save' him for a close down the stretch.

Evening all just popped in, whats the deal with Hill? Read 'broken arm', is that for real?

Quick look on live shows us up by one and my boy Horvath with 4, good to see Wheels back, 5 and 5 cant hurt.

Has Sutts seen the court or does he get pushed down to the end of the bench with Maher back? Kid deserves to run it for a few minutes a game i reckon.

At home DJ - dont tend to get to 6ers games anymore unless I'm working them, I've moved and it's a bit of travel involved now.

agreed Dr B that that is a good theory - I hate it when a player sits on 5 fouls till say 3 mins to go then comes on and finishes the game still with 6 fouls - may as well get em in a bit earlier IMO

6 more rebounds and Mahersy has a triple double. Go you good thing.

whops - that should have said finished with 5 fouls

now he has 5. No use now.

Horvath should have came off when he got 4 fouls. I wish Smyth wouldn't leave them out on court when they're in foul trouble...

Im trying my best not to be worried about Horvath's foul count but . . . Oh well watch out Crocs here comes Dodman. Im sorry guys I dont really mean that. Newls is having a nice game, bastard:) You reckon we could set up a trade, Ng for Brad?

Greetings DJ and co, this daylight savings switch has screwed me up, it's a 2 hour turnaround up here so I always forget to tune in till half time!! Looks like this could be a tight one, RIllie's obviously making up for his 0 from 7 for zero points in his last game against us.

6 more rebounds and Mahersy has a triple double. Go you good thing.

agreed dr b its a tough call - but are we best to sit him till 2 mins to go in the game and possibly watch the crocs get a lead while he is off? or bring him back at the start of the 4th and play for as long as he can?

Sixers were once up by 21 now down by 1

I am bloody sick of teams scoring on the buzzer evedry quarter against the Sixers...

14-0 run for crocs

Get Sutton back on the court

Good call Andrew.

gone wireless now so will just be following the action. thought we only got out by 17? damn horvath cmon boys!

Enter the Horvath. No fouls for the big fella and this one's in the bag. We have learned to use him down the stretch now haven't we? Oh crap we're still coached by Phil, this is gonna be tight.

A DOULE TECH FROM HORVATH

REJECTED FROM THE COURT AND THE GAME. IN THE CHANGE ROOMS.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

5 minutes to go and hes out. My theory looks pretty stupid now doesnt it!

Horvath fouled out!

Rillie in line for a triple double, needs 1 rebound and 2 assists in 5 minutes.

i didnt say it was stupid - was just offering my thoughts!

if its adouble technical then he would have been off anyway wouldnt he no matter what his foul count was

6 freethrows, and side ball after the two techs from Horvath. Copeland pushing foul.

Sixers DEAD....

DAMN IT!

36ers were up by 21...

damn techs could cost ashot at the game

TP, ONLY 6 boards for Maher to get his triple double? Come on, that's just a silly thing to say....

hmmm time to start praying......

no more praying left...

lol - and i just got hosed in my poker tourny - crap night all round!

Sixers are screwed this season.

4 wins, 8 losses, Hill injured, Brisbane on sunday.......

How the hell can the Sixers get out of this?

V Bullets L
V Breakers W
V Taipans L
V Crocs W
V Kings L
V Razors W
V Slingers W
V Hawks W
V Dragons W
V Wildcats L

Currently:

12 4 8

Possible:

22 10 12

That is an improvement if we can do that. Still a finals possibility.

The 6ers are terrible. smyth is a fool. recycling rejects like wheeler, cooper, farley, copeland are not the way to go. the 6ers should have went down the rebuilding with youth route. newely would have spearheaded the younger 6ers. not to mention ingles....

Settle down people.. did any of you actually go to the game??

I just got back from it - and although im not usually a ref basher - the tech on horvath was crazy. Especially considering Abney just got called for a normal foul in breaking Hills arm earlier. It would have been a 3 game suspension for a flagrant foul in the NBA.

Horvath just throws the ball down after he scored, in frustration. He didnt get a delay of game warning. He got a tech straight up. Total bullshit.

I have no idea where the 6 foul shots came from as i was only aware of 2 techs.

This loss had NOTHING to do with lack of desire. Crocs got back into it with some freaky shooting that no one would have been able to stop - and blew the lead out on the back of some gift foul shots.

Im not convinced with Newley at all. Hes athletic and obviously has talent. But im not sure i would want him on my team. He's erratic, and seems to disrupt the offensive flow. Not to mention he struts around like an arrogant prick.

Just got home from the game. I'm pretty sure the Sixers (Horvath especially) were pretty emotional following the Hill/Abney "incident". I've never seen Horvath like that before - he's usually a pretty cool customer, but he just lost it for no apparent reason in the 4th.

Honestly, Abney goes straight to #1 on my list of most pathetic human beings in the league. So he just hammered a kid from behind and snapped his arm in half (it was sickening - Hill's wrist was flopping all over the place so I guess he must have broken both bones) - and then he's gloating at the end, big smiles, high fives all round. Honestly, by the end I didn't care who won or lost. It was just a pathetic show of pride and self-gratification from a jerk who had a lot of fun, possibly at the expense of a young player's career.

In closing, Abney sucks.

(Yes, I am angry.)

simply the answer is sack smyth,

no im not being sarcastic, ive just at my wits end trying to defend or agree with him, decision making skills of a goldfish

f*ck him off

Im pretty sure there is no such thing as a flagrant in the NBL - but surely that deserved more than a standard foul!? I could tell it did damage from the moment he made contact, and i was on the other side of the court.

I dont blame this loss on Smyth at all. It was neck and neck until they got given a string of foul shots. I actually think the sixers would have finished them off if Horvath was still in. I dont know what everyones getting so worked up about. THey played most of the game with energy, enthusiasm and passion which was SORELY lacking in the first 5 or 6 games of the season. Tonight was a treat compared to the sydney, wollongong or bullets game.

If anything, in the past ive been very harsh on them. But I just dont think this game warrants it. No team in the league is going to stop a comeback if Rillie is hitting shots like that..

two very critical times in the game IMO:-

1) breaking of Hill's arm when he was going up for a dunk to extend the lead, kind of took it out of the crowd and players to see such a nasty injury, and from then the Crocs got it together and upped the ante defensively, holding, hacking etc and getting away with most of it.

2) Horvath's Ts - was mad as heck for getting hacked in the face on his power move to the bucket and no call and hit the ball away in anger. Probably was the right call for the T, then got another one for abuse. Not sure why there were 6 foul shots - one for a disqualifying foul? but I thought he was disqualified for the two Ts?? From there, it stiled our comeback and the crocs held though, we couldn't buy a basket and there was no heart left in the players.

** What happened to Farley?? He was firing up like he has been over the last 5+ games, and then her went back to his old self = MIA!!!

The final score wasnt indicative of the game. It was anyones game with 5 mins left

It should have been a delay of game warning. As far as I could see, he didnt say anything to the ref - just hit the ball away.

why wait so long and waste SOooooooooooooooooooooooo much of the lead before a Timeout,

and yes horvath had a brain explosion

It shouldnt have been allowed to get back to anyones game. We were up by almost 20 a one point. To then go down by almost 20 is disgraceful!

That was pathetic. The worst part about it was I could see it coming in the second quarter.

Smyth's performance was a disgrace. The Abney foul on Hill should have been much more than it was called as, and I don't blame Horvath for blowing up as he did, as he was fucked by the officiating crew all night. But all that aside, we lost because Townsville controlled the tempo of the game better. Adelaide looked excellent in the first 18 minutes, Townsville weathered this and then dominated the last 30 minutes.

Copeland did not play at all well tonight. He has been great the last 4-5 games, but tonight he was really ordinary, and there was NO excuse for him playing the minutes (32) that he did.

Maher started well and distributed the ball really well all game, but his inability to hit a shot in the second half cost us badly.

Farley was white hot, and everything should have been running through him in the second half. It didn't, and we couldn't score.

Townsville had Robertson (or Gardiner) in the game with Rillie and Newley for most of the second half. Adelaide should have countered with Maher, Farley, and Sutton, but instead Copeland and everyone's favourite Mark Nash were in full time occupancy.

At a 36ers game you can just about always see a fan wearing almost any player's jersey: plenty of Mahers, lots of Farleys, I even saw a Williams tonight. The last fan that turned up to a 36ers game wearing a number 7 jersey had "Bradtke" written across the back of it.

Cooper tried hard, and Wheeler gave a bit of a punch in the first half. Smyth's bringing Horvath back in the second when he already had 3 fouls was lunacy. All he managed to do was pick up a fourth, which gave the Crocs an edge thereafter.

Great game by Rillie, and from Abney too considering everyone in the stadium wanted to kill him for what he did to Brad Hill.

Phil Smyth, what is your excuse this time? You had 6 days between games. You had your full compliment of players available. We beat this team by 27 three weeks ago. At some point you need to stand up and take some responsibility for the team's performance (or lack thereof). Congratulations on the new record for most home losses in a season!

At last there is someone who is calling for Smyth's head! Good on you Thomo!
I was at the game and I have never seen such amazing decisions by a coach. For a start, Horvath should never have been left out there in the first q after 2 fouls, but he was left there and committed a third. Then when we were about 20 points up in the second q, he sends him back on, there was no need to do that, another foul!
Then it was obvious to blind Freddy that Copeland was not hot at all tonight, in fact ice cold, so why on earth was he left out there for so long!
The last time we played Townsville, Smyht made his only good move for the season and that was to bring Sutton on, who played some great stuff, including being able to guard Newley. So tonight, hardly plays, but when he did come on, we were at least able to get into offence quickly.
And of course my favorite player, Mark Nash. Now I am not going to blame Nash, he can't help it if his coach keeps him out there, but goodness me, you have got to be joking. The guy is absolutely no threat whatsoever, and don't give me crap about him being a good defensive player - tell me who he was guarding so well tonight?! When we really needed to score in that 3rd q, Smyth has Nash out there!
Many of us have had enough of Smyth, surely there must be some way of removing him, before the crowds disappear completely, What we saw there tonight was one of the worst performances from a sixers side ever. The fans deserve far more than that.

FIBA Rules 36.1.4:

To judge whether a foul is unsportsmanlike, the officials should apply the following principles:

* If a player is making no effort to play the ball and contact occurs, it is an unsportsmanlike foul.

* If a player, in an effort to play the ball, causes excessive contact (hard foul), then the contact whall be judged to be unsportsmanlike.

* If a player commits a foul whilst making a legitimate effort to play the ball (normal play), it is not an unsportsmanlike foul.

By reading that definition, Larry Abney's foul could be only be declared as unsportsmanlike. The referees got it wrong.

The Horvath Incident was this
Tech for the ball slap - 6th Foul
Tech abuse, he is no longer a player = bench Tech
Disqualifying Foul for kicking the bench.

Now I am just calling it how it was called (or appeared to be called.

My question, how can a player on 6 fouls and already out of the game be given a disqualifying foul - I don't know and we will have to wait for a person with more foul knowledge to tell us - but I dont think it can happen. Therefore it probably should have just been another bench tech, I personally think Andrew was just flustered and didnt know what to call.

Personally I think refs lost control early and never regained it. I did notice the head of refereeing was there and it would definetely have been interesting to be in the refs rooms after the game.

Let's get one thing straight though - the refs did not lose this game for us! Smyth seems to spend most of his time theses days back chatting the refs - I thought that whilst they were not good, they did a better job than Smyth!

I always pick up when Smyth does a shit coaching job, or when Sixers dont play with any heart, and the little things that point to the Sixers stinking it up generally - and i get stuck into them. For some reason, I just didnt feel that negative about this game. By the sounds of everyone elses rants - maybe I was just off in la la land the whole game? I enjoyed 95% of the game more than i have most home games this season..

hmm.. maybe it was the latin dancers?

You are getting accustomed to losing Kwest, and yes you were off in la la land!

Heck no, the refs didnt lose us the game. There was a number of factors.
1. Horvath - having a brain fade
2. Other 4 player on the court, not trying to calm Horvath down
3. Smyth - not calling a time out after the Hill incident and then after the Horvath Incident to calm everything down and refocus the team.
4. The other players for not hitting shots when it counted.

It is pretty obvious, it took us 6 weeks to gel as a team, but the team we are now seeing on the court is different - maybe it will take us another 6 weeks to gel.

Gee I hope not!!!

First 22 mins of the game we did look very good though.. I dont think I imagined that?! Defensively and offensively.

Kwest what game where you watching?? How does a team go from being up by 20 to losing by 20 constitute a good game by your opinion?? or how about 63 points to 93 in the final 3 quarters??? Once again that equals a good game with "energy, enthusiasm and passion"?

Please, besides the first quarter that was terrible to watch. Our defense is absolutely shit house! Nash is a joke out there! I was happy for him to get 10-15 minutes a game but now that is way too much, he doesn't even look at the basket. Also the only thing he has going for him was apparently his defense but last week he got cained by Powell (especially that last quarter) and this week gets cained by rillie! Is it just me or do the sixers go down hill every time he is on the court? We put him on the last 3-4 minutes and he just screws everything up. He is a massive liability out there! Adding to that Copeland is terrible on defense also. Yet we put Nash and Copeland on Rillie for lots of the game. Yes great Coaching!

That brings me to my next point. Once again Smyth has to be accountable for this embarrassing loss. I don't blame the refs at all for this. Yes, they were bad but they weren't the ones that made the sixers complacent after quarter time or made them play with no help defense.

Townsville will battle it out to make the last few spots in the 8 if at all, so to lose like that shows we are currently a dismal basketball club. If we play like that against Brisbane the game won't finish with us losing by ONLY 20. At least we MIGHT actually beat bottom of the ladder West Sydney next week.

I said 95% of the game. eg up until the last 5 mins when they pulled away. I always knew the Crocs were coming back. So it didnt surprise me or horrify me when they did. Maybe that IS getting used to mediocrity?

King James, I have praised you before and do so again. When is someone in charge going to recognise that Nash is USELESS!!!!!!

He should be a 10-12 min role player off the bench. I dont think hes useless in that role.

Im glad Mastro is starting now at least.

How many referee arms were going to fracture had the towel hit him? No matter which way you look at the situation, I cannot get over the fact that Abney got away with so much and yet Horvath was victimised by the refs. Who would have reacted any differently in Horvath's situation? You can only stretch the elastic so far before it breaks.

open a phone book call ninnis offer him a job and assist in packing the bags for phil!

thats all you need to do mal

Does Smyth have a team capable of winning a champiionship?

The answer is NO. Why?

Because too many players are getting injured.

Can they turn it around?

Yes, Adelaide can do anything when they put there mind too it.

HOW can Adelaide turn it around?

Will telling them what is wrong and what they should do always going to help?

Adelaide can make the finals. If they make the finals then they can win the championship.

How will they win?

By confidence.

Confidence=skill improvement

Confidence=luck

Confidence=winning

Can a team with confidence beat a team full of talent?

YES!

WHERE can you find confidence?

Going back to the basics, change the starting lineup etc.

Yeah that is one way.

But WHAT is the biggest and best source of confidence?

The supporters!!!

How can the sixers tap into the confidence brought by the supporters?

By the supporters going to the match!

What if the supporters lack confidence in the team?

Then the Sixers can't tap into that confidence because it is too low.

So what do we do?

Have confidence in the Sixers, post messages to the players on this forum, keep positive, go to the match, aim to get 6,500 to each game. That would be enormous support, don't keep quite if the Sixers are down, urge them on. Create a buzz and a build up to each game, be excited, make the players get excited, excitement and confidence can change a team better than dissapointment and lack of confidence.

You all heard it!

Next home game, if the Sixers get 6,500 and the crowd shows there support and be loud then the Sixers will win.

What are you waiting for? Invite mates to come to the game with you. The supporters are a franchise player in its self. We carry the team. Can any team beat 2 Brett Mahers? No possible way!

Thanks 123abc. My faith is restored.
There are smart people on this forum!