That is your biggest loss for Fremantle, what is running through your head?
We’re disappointed, obviously. Milestone games never get your across the line; they don’t guarantee results. But certainly for Matthew (Pavlich) and Lee (Spurr) we would have liked a better performance.
But we played a genuine premiership contender, albeit we would have liked to have played better. Again, centre back, the conditions, we struggled to get it out of our defence, which has been an issue all year. And it raised its ugly head again.
I thought we responded in the second quarter. I think we had 15 entries at one point and lot of repeats, which is good, but we struggled to score. We just spoke to the players as at times our predictability, under pressure, clearly isn’t there. The left hand is just not on the same page, which in round 18 or 19 or whatever it is, is disappointing. I thought our effort, we laid 90 tackles, how many of those were super effective, I don’t know. But it was an indicator – that there was 90 (tackles) with nine in the last quarter, so therefore, I thought their midfield, their big bodies, we were doing a lot of tackles and we wore down, we struggled to sort of stop them, clearly, so yes it was a disappointing performance.
 
How concerning is the midfield?
It was very concerning. All year, we had a patch when we turned around centre square bounces. But it was all areas, to be truthful. I thought we had 30 entries and I think we’d only had seven shots, we should have had 14 or 15 shots.
So, it just fuels your energy and your belief. And again, there were times when we could have gone it, we didn’t. We want to eradicate any confusion from the players, keep it simple for them and obviously we need to improve at that. We have some genuine concerns out of this. Pre-season can’t come quick enough at  the minute. So today certainly counts, we want people to grow. Obviously Langdon and those – and they had some young players playing as well, it’s around that midfield area and Langdon and Weller can get some good experience in there and Tucker, they get to feel what it’s like to play on an elite AFL midfield – clearly they are and we couldn’t go with them.
 
What do you get out of the next four weeks ahead of the pre-season?
 It counts. You're a little bit limited to what you can do during the week. There's still around the contest, one-on-one, just some of the fundamentals, keeping our feet, sticking the tackles, not fumbling. We've tried to be a more expansive team with the ball and we've run into adverse conditions a little bit, which is going to happen, against Collingwood and here today and we don't seem to adjust. But they're a coachable group so we need to work through that. We'd like to make some progress on it. At times we feel we have but then we've had some real horrible quarters and games. We need to strip back our football program and keep it as simple as we can. People under pressure need simplicity and we've got to try and keep them as buoyant as we can. There's a few teams in the league at the minute, and we're one of them, that are sort of struggling and are under some adversity. There's no silver bullet here we just need to work our way through.

Talking points from Sydney loss
 
From a coaching perspective how do you avoid it getting ugly over the next four?
I've never thought we're going to roll up and win. But I've always rolled up knowing we're going to be really competitive. Even today I thought we'd be a lot more competitive than that. I'm certainly working my way through that. We just appeal to personal pride and purpose. We'll have bits and pieces returning but it's not a quick fix. Aaron (Sandilands) should play next week. He should help us but it's a big ask. He hasn't played for 15 weeks. Ballantyne will probably come back but there's no quick fix here. People have got to stand up and take ownership and improve.
 
How do you feel personally about the loss?
I don’t feel great about it. Our fans and members, I'm really disappointed for them. We're paid to do a job and we haven't been able to get it done consistently this year. I think we've acknowledged we thought we had a campaign in us, a lot better than this, and form and significant injuries have impacted on that. But again we understand the short and the long-term where we're heading but we would like to be better than what we are. There's no sugar-coating this. We're not going to run away and hide. We need to front up and man up and say yep, clearly we need to improve. How am I handling it? I'm paid to lead, people can make their own judgements on that. Certainly I know what's required to be a really good AFL team and our coaching group does too and our leaders at the club do. So we've just got a mandate of hard work and pursue excellence and eventually the wheel turns. But where we're at at the minute, it's not a quick fix, we know that.  

How flattening is it that the guys weren’t able to lift for today’s milestone game?
It was clearly disappointing. As clichéd as ‘lift’ and ‘milestone game’ is, hard nose AFL people know those only take you so far. They had 90 tackles, it’s not like they didn’t have a dip. But our method, chemisty and connection was really poor. That comes back down to the coaches and the players. It's been relatively poor all year. We’ve had momenets but haven’t been able to make the progress we wanted to make. Emotion doesn’t get it done. I think it gets you for a little while. But it’s hard nosed preparation, consitency of preparation, mental preparation and teamsmanship.  Men win footy games, not abstract thoughts and emotions. Men win footy games and the team of men won the game today.  
 
Have you come to any conclusions with the ruck combinations?
Not particularly. Everyone continues to get an opportunity and we dissect from there. It’s a moving feast…or famine. Everyone gets an opportunity. I’ve been asked numerous times, whether it be an administrator, coach, or player, about their futures and that’s not fair to anybody. We are going to work through it and try and build a better football list, better coaching list and better administrative department. We need to get better in all areas. We’ll never individualise. We need the fullness of time to work through those decisions.
 
Michael Apeness kicked five goals for Peel yesterday. Is he a chance to come back into the team next week?
Yes certainly. There isn’t that many holding him out. He had a collarbone broken against Essendon. I am not sure how many he has missed. Its probably about six. I think I will be guided by our strength and condition team about his preparation for AFL football. But we are hopeful.

What did you think of Alex Silvagni’s performance on Lance Franklin?
He’s had some significant injuries. I thought he was fantastic with his effort. He’s desperate isn’t he? Strong tackling. We knew he would do that and that’s why we picked him for the role. On the back of that, he creates an opportunity doesn’t he, and that’s what it’s about. Someone’s just got to grab half opportunities and out of half opportunities you build careers. That’s what happens at this level.
 
Did you miss Connor Blakely around the stoppages today?
I wouldn’t have thought so.
 
Is Sam Collins a legitimate ruck option for you or was it more of a stop-gap?
Probably stop-gap.