On facing the Suns:
“You sort of normalise that every week – you don’t go over the top talking up the opposition, but you’re always going down that track of anticipating that they’ll play their best game.
“Regardless of whatever negative publicity they’ve had, they’ve been on this journey trying to win every week like us. We know how determined they’ll be to change the storyline.
“Our angles and how we prepare as a group – every week is critical. To stay up every week is important.
“We had a really disappointing experience against the Swans a couple of weeks ago, and now to go up to the Gold Coast to play them on their home deck at People First Stadium, our coaches’ sponsor so we feel like we’re at home, it’s a huge challenge.”
On the season so far:
“We’ve had great evidence of even contributions in winning games, but we are on this pilgrimage of trying to play the phases – every one of them – better than what we have been.
“We still feel like as deep as we are into the season, there’s a lot of growth left in us.
“The emotion and the possibilities as a team, and as the season unfolds and how we’re perceived within our own club is absolutely critical.
“We know we are not a team that anyone’s thinking is that formidable at the moment, and that’s what we want to become. I think there’s a fair bit attached to that as far as the emotions go.”
On how the team is perceived:
“I think it’s just reality. We are sort of mid-table, but I think the great thing is that most of our players have played AFL footy this year – the Luke Kennedy and the Lachie Jaques of the world.
“Obviously Michael Sellwood is having a steady year in his first senior year, so it’s really encouraging seeing how the boys are going and all the boys I just mentioned, plus their counterparts, that there’s a lot left in them.
“The reality is that we’re mid-table and we’re not going to claim to be anything we don’t feel like we are, because as I said there is a great spirit among them but we’re not knocking down the different phases in the way we’d like to at the moment.
“I think there's some really encouraging signs defensively and through some of our stoppage components, but definitely the one that's really missing at the moment is probably the offence and our scope to score.”
On Aaron Naughton’s impact:
“Aaron has been steady – the games that he hasn’t necessarily kicked a lot of goals.
“He’s been influential in score assists and score involvements, and his power and his courage – the knock-off effect of that for the team is quite extreme.
“We always go in every week, with a design on trying to have at least about a dozen goalkickers and not to rely on Aaron, but it’s always nice to see him bob up with five like he did last week.
“Spreading the load in that front end is going to be important. Getting goals from our midfield brigade is critical, so we’ll set the game up and do our best on that front to endeavour to spread the scoring load.”
On losing Bailey Dale to injury:
“You can’t replace him – he's such a playmaker.
“We haven’t been a great rebounding side – we're one of the best kicking sides – but when it comes to the turnover game and how you transition off turnover, we haven’t been one of the better teams.
“When it’s in Bailey’s hands, you feel a bit more confident.
“We’ll have to make sure that we strike a good blend in our back end, so we can actually use a footy out of there.”
On Joel Freijah:
“He’s likely to come out. A bit like Westy the other week, he just needs a bit of a circuit breaker.
“It’s been challenging for him, so he’s named in the squad at the moment but I’m happy to say that he’s likely to be an emergency this week.
“We saw how he can really influence outcomes last year – his Sydney game was probably the high watermark of his performances.
“Week-to-week we’ve been hoping for his best and he’s playing through that midfield area inside, bit of wing and a little bit forward.
“We’ll give him a spell from AFL duties and the pressures of that level this week. He’ll play on Sunday in the lead-up game for Footscray.”
