Just a week after registering their first ever victory at Metricon Stadium, the Gold Coast SUNS with a mounting injury toll that currently has 18 on the sidelines travel back to Melbourne to face Premiership heavy weight Hawthorn.
With that in mind, Coach Guy McKenna was asked if the Gold Coasters would have their mind 100% on the task at hand come Sunday and if there was a danger a depleted side may have mentally clocked off.
“I wouldn’t have thought so, we’ve been down on the MCG, we get an opportunity to play a finals side, we understand what’s ahead of us, but I think during our first two years in the competition we have faced some enormous challenges and this is just one of them.”
McKenna sees the match as a great test for his young side and is eager to see who is prepared to step up, adding that if the SUNS were able to match the Hawks intensity with and without the ball, he gives them every chance of walking from the MCG with what would be the upset victory of the 2012 AFL season.
I’m not a gambler by trade so I don’t often look at odds as I said I look at the odds as the ball bounce and see who is going to fly in after that contested footy and the odds are stacked in your favour in the history of the AFL, if you can win the contested ball count, disposal efficiency and the tackle count, they are three things I will be looking at, I wont be looking at odds that’s for sure.
“We cant look three weeks ahead, it’s about what we have to do to Hawthorn which was different to what we had to do against GWS and it will be different than what we have to do against Carlton and then the following week against Adelaide, it’s just about bringing that consistency and effort and the longer you can do that, the more chance you have of winning a game of footy.”
While the SUNS have delayed a number of routine surgical procedures as they battle to field the strongest team possible during the final rounds of the competition, the Coach is also mindful of the increased responsibility and pressure to perform being placed on Captain Gary Ablett.
“We have to be mindful of his workload which has been massive over two years not just this season of course and give him opportunities to play more forward for us and sit on the pine (Bench) I think his game time when he first started last year was up around 94,95 percent and it’s probably on an average up to 92 percent but on the weekend he got it down to around 90 and also spent a good portion of that forward so this year we are mindful of that because we want to keep him as sharp and as vibrant as possible.”
One thing the Coach wouldn’t be drawn into though was his thoughts where he thought Adelaide’s Kurt Tippett may end up at seasons end and indeed if the Gold Coast were pursuing a power forward.
We talk about any other player in the AFL right now and we get ourselves into a very dangerous situation as I have said we will sit down with Scott and go through our list and talk about our needs and talk about the players we are potentially going to target.
Click here for Hawthorn v Gold Coast SUNS ticketing information
Do you think the Gold Coast SUNS should target a power forward during the trade period? Let us know your thoughts below.
