Justin, congratulations on the win – what pleased you the most about tonight?
The win probably! I think the margin at the end of the day probably flattered us a little bit and we clearly weren’t at our best. There were different circumstances for this game and obviously there were a lot of distractions coming into it, so getting the win is the best part of it. I feel really bad for people at the footy club to be honest, they have put a lot of work into this, and it is such a big day. It was meant to be the 25th Len Hall Game where we get to commemorate the Anzacs, and it was disappointing that there were no crowds here. My heart goes out to the Anzacs who were coming along tonight and everyone at the club who put so much time and effort into putting on such a great show. It was a bit of an eerie feeling to be honest, coming here today and throughout the game. I’m just glad we got the win, that is all we can take out of it.
Under those circumstances you needed the leaders to stand up, David Mundy shone out above everyone, what do you make of his year?
I thought that him and Nathan Fyfe were our standout players throughout the whole game. Fyfe’s consistency across the four quarters probably got us over the line in the end and I thought they were really stood out with their clean hands. It was actually quite slippery out there, the dew set in and I thought those two in particular were able to be really clean around the ball. Both of them had 30 possessions and four shots on goal, obviously Dave finished his a lot better than that but I couldn’t speak highly enough of both of their games. They were outstanding and led the way, but I think our midfield group in totality was really strong, especially in that first half.
It is one goal and 12 behinds for Fyfe this year, what do you put that down to and how do you go about trying to fix that?
There is no other fix apart from just to keep practising. I think he has improved his kicking over the last few years, especially his field kicking where he rarely misses a target. I’ve got no doubt that if he keeps putting himself in dangerous positions and creating shots on goal that they will start going through. There is probably a couple today that he could’ve taken an extra step or an extra five metres on the run and he probably rushed some of them a bit more than he had to. I don’t really want to read too much into his goal kicking because I don’t want to take any gloss of the rest of his game. His work around the contest and work around stoppages helped us win the game tonight so I don’t want to take any gloss of his performance by talking about his goal kicking too much.
At training is he nailing them? Is it just a confidence thing that when he starts kicking them in games that it will flow from there?
I am confident of that, he is probably rushing the snaps and the on the run ones a bit where he can probably settle, take a bit more time and get closer. I’ve got no issues with his appetite to get better, he probably has more set shots on goal than anyone in our side so I am confident they will start going through the big sticks.
How are you feeling about the momentum in the group?
I feel like we are building, we haven’t played the perfect game by any stretch and we have got a lot of things we need to work on. The whole season has thrown different challenges at us and I thought tonight was a real challenge for the mental side of our game. North were able to defend us really well at times and deny us some ball movement which provided another challenge for us. They tried to deny us of the ball by taking a lot of uncontested marks which we didn’t handle as well as we could’ve. We take each game on its own merit and the thing that pleases me the most is that every time the players come to the club they are looking to get better and improve on our footy. We have got a tougher run coming up, we have got to improve on what we dished up tonight, but I am really confident the players have the appetite to do that.
The balance in the midfield group with the young and the old, are you quite content with that balance?
Absolutely, we obviously lost Adam Cerra out of the midfield but Caleb was able to play more game time and Andy spent a lot of time through there. Both of those guys had an impact on the game as well. A lot has been made of Dave and Fyfey but I think it has been a really even spread though there. Sean Darcy’s work in the ruck, especially over the last three weeks, has been really strong and he is really complementing our midfield group and giving them the first look. I feel like we are getting it done as a collective and not necessarily relying on individuals.
You were able to restrict them to six goals tonight, what was going right for you in the backline?
I think that was a by-product of a bit of inaccuracy by them as well. We kicked a lot of points, but they missed some goals that they should have kicked. I don’t think we defended that well, I was actually pretty disappointed with the way we defended as a team tonight which is not necessarily on the backs but on us as a group. I think it was a by-product of them being inaccurate rather than us being good defensively.
Have you got an update on Brennan Cox?
He’s rolled his ankle, it doesn’t look too serious at this stage but we will have to get it scanned and see how he pulls up.
Pending that everything pans out okay in the next couple of days, is this a handy stretch of three weeks at home without having to jump on a plane?
It is. It’s handy we get to stay off the plane and sleep in our own beds. The travel does take a toll so to spend a period of time at home is handy. We will see what the Covid-19 situation throws up over the next couple of days but it is a handy little stretch that we have got.
