Gold Coast Football Club v Sandringham Zebras
Saturday, 24 July 2010
2.00pm
Cooke Murphy Reserve
Ashton St, Labrador
GCFC’s new nickname, song and 2011 AFL home, away, and clash jumpers will be launched tonight at an invitation-only event at Southport Sharks.
In addition to carrying the excitement of tonight’s launch into the game, the players will also take plenty of confidence into this weeks game against Sandringham after their extraordinary come-from-behind win against Bendigo in Cairns last weekend. Down by 40 points at half-time and seemingly gone for all money, GCFC showed gut-busting determination to grab the unlikeliest of victories with a Zac Smith point after the siren.
This week the squad welcomes back Nathan Ablett, Daniel Harris, Jake Crawford, Piers Flanagan and Taylor Hine.
Although named in a back pocket, Karmichael Hunt is expected to rotate through the midfield for the first time in his young, busy career.
The full squad is:
B Karmichael HUNT Joel TIPPETT Taylor HINE
HB Rex LIDDY Jake CRAWFORD Piers FLANAGAN
C Marc LOCK (c) Maverick WELLER Sam ILES
HF Mathew FOWLER Charlie DIXON Luke RUSSELL
F Brandon MATERA Nathan ABLETT Alik MAGIN
R Zac SMITH Danny STANLEY Daniel HARRIS
Int: Tom NICHOLLS, David SWALLOW, Joey DAYE, Hayden JOLLY,
Todd GRAYSON, Jack STANLAKE
GCFC Senior Coach Guy McKenna believes the mental toughness shown by his side last weekend was the standout feature of a game of two distinct halves.
“We’ll take the win, definitely. But technically it wasn’t great,” McKenna said.
“That said, for the boys to grind that out against [Bendigo] with that kind of experience and those kind of bodies without older guys like Dan Harris or Michael Coad out there was really pleasing. It was really a message about belief for us. We are good enough if we want to be good enough.”
Although singling out Charlie Dixon, David Swallow and Maverick Weller for special mention, he said the team’s application as a whole should send a clear message to the kinds of players who will join the club at season end.
“The one thing I’ll say is that they’re going to want be go getters, they’re going to need a degree of courage, and they’re going to want to be committed and competitive because from what we saw out there after quarter time today, they’re going to have to fit into our culture.”
• Due credit to amazingly consistent GCFC ruckman Zac Smith – the VFL Record last week named him a mid-season contender for the VFL Team of the Year.
• Sandringham Zebras is aligned with AFL club St Kilda. Saints regulars Ben McEvoy, Rhys Stanley, Steven King, David Armitage and Nick Heyne are all chances of lining up on Saturday.
• Although bristling with seasoned talent, Sandringham has lost eight of its last nine games. The club sits in ninth place on the VFL ladder with five wins.
• Cooke Murphy Oval is AFLQ club Labrador Tigers’ home ground. The Tigers are travelling well this year and sit equal with Southport in first place on the AFLQ ladder.
