Ross judging by the loudness of the boys in the rooms it sounds like it’s a win that means a lot to the club and the players?
Well it’s important, we’ll go into the break and get a good spell from here. We have planned a function together tonight that we did at last year’s bye post-Carlton. They’re a grand final team, MCG, so to come here where you need to play, it’s a big stage and pretty isolated, it was a really strong performance. It was a hard-fought victory, we never gave up, really proud of the group’s effort.
They kicked a few goals either side of the 3QT break, did you have any concerns that they were going to overrun you?
All the numbers were telling us, the ground ball, entries, it was 34 entries to 18 after half time so the second quarter they dominated us, the first quarter we thought we could’ve been a bit further in front. We just stuffed up some simple opportunities, we felt they were taking theirs. I thought there was a couple of goals we just over played some things. It was pretty clear, I thought we were in good shape, we restructured our midfield a little bit and we started winning the ball, driving it in, getting it back off them at centre half forward and putting them under enormous pressure which we did in the last quarter as well. They just counter punched, there was a couple of sloppy high tackles, but if you want to talk about the contest and the flow of the play and entries, we should’ve been in front.
What does it say about the character of the group?
We haven’t given up all year, every game we’ve been in we’ve gone to the end. So we know we can go to the end, we’re really confident. We won’t always get the outcome which we didn’t at the Gold Coast, but we went until the last kick, Adelaide, West Coast, and we feel the frustrations being a couple of games that got away from us that we felt we should’ve been able to get. The Essendon game was a big learning curve on our ball movement, I thought we implemented again today even though we overplayed a couple. So if we can improve our efficiency, which we improve week on week, I think there’s still some opportunity to put more scoreboard pressure on off the opportunities we’re creating.
Would you want the ball in anyone else’s hands than Michael Walters?
Mundy’s pretty handy, I’ll take Mundy or Walters. It’s the mental toughness, everyone talks about the physical side of the game but the mental side to go back and kick a winning goal, it doesn’t matter what distance or what angle, he’s mentally tough. But you are your habits and Sonny is an incredible trainer, his habits of his kicking skills and he’s focused on it. So, he gets reward for effort and we get rewarded as well which is fantastic.
Do you see this as your best win of the year?
No, you bank the four points, everyone goes up and down it’s a really even competition, but certainly to come here, they had some handy ins (De Goey, Varcoe, Moore), I thought Jesse Hogan was pivotal today in providing a contest as he was last week, but I thought we delivered it a little bit better. Cox and Hogan will only get better together, I thought Brayshaw’s 50/50 ball, he’s got a really sore neck, that was as big a contest as there was for the day so, he’s a second year player who has played 27 games, he sets a pretty high standard for our club and we’ll continue to build around our young guys and our senior guys will lead them. We’re onto the break, get together tonight, mentally freshen up, physically freshen up a little bit but still do the work and we’ll start preparing for Port Adelaide almost immediately. There’s not much time to smell the roses, as I said we’ll enjoy the night together and stick to the process, it’s been standing us in good stead, Port Adelaide’s a big challenge and we’ll prepare for them really solidly.
How is Alex Pearce?
He’s on crutches, he has an ankle injury and can put weight on it. We’ll scan it and assess, it’s disappointing but, we’ve got Griffin Logue, he may come up. Stephen Hill should be available after the bye, Sean Darcy (as well as) Griffin Logue’s playing so we feel like we’ve still got a bit to build.
Michael Walters’ goal in the third term that appeared to be touched by Chris Mayne, there’s a bit made of the score review, did you see that incident and what did you make of it?
The space I sit in, you get the rub of the green, you don’t get the rub of the green. I haven’t reviewed it. When I was a kid my Dad said the umpires call is final. I think that’s in the vault, it’s never going to be changed.
