The SUNS trained at Metricon Stadium this morning before flying out to Townsville this afternoon for a three-day community camp ahead of their Round 2 NAB Cup match against North Melbourne this Saturday.
Lovell told reporters at Metricon Stadium that the coaches were beginning to see positive signs from their game-style, and believed the NAB Cup tournament would provide the team the every opportunity to build on the plan ahead of the 2013 AFL Season.
“We’re constantly building and tweaking our game plan to evolve to a point where we can stand up and hard final’s footy, and I think we saw from the game against Hawthorn (last Saturday) that our ability to implement that game plan is certainly getter better,” said Lovell.
“There’s no doubt that we’re starting to build a strong culture at the Club.”
With the AFL set to trial a total 80-cap rotation for all Rounds 2 & 3, with limit of 20 interchanges per quarter, Lovell conceded that the SUNS would have to take a conservative approach with travelling squad as extreme humidity and high temperatures look certain to be an influential factor in the Northern Queensland pre-season exhibition.
“Certainly with 80-cap rotations you have to be mindful of making sure you pick a team that is capable of playing big minutes... and also making sure you don’t over-expose players who might be coming back from long-term injuries who haven’t completed a high percentage of the pre-season camp,” Lovell said.
Despite goal sneak Brandon Matera and exciting midfielder Dion Prestia eager to return from injury, it’s likely one of the two promising youngsters will be spend another week watching on from the sidelines as the Club takes a more cautious approach with it’s emerging stars.
“(As of yet) we’re not to sure if we’ll play them both or just one yet... We do need to get game time and minutes into them (Matera and Prestia) but with a cap on rotations we don’t want to put them in risk of injury.”
“We’ll probably wait and see how they pull up after this morning’s training session, but I’d think it’s unlikely we’ll play both of them.”
All tickets to the SUNS NAB Cup match in Townsville against North Melbourne this Saturday at Tony Ireland Stadium are available online via ticketmaster.com.au, by calling Ticketmaster on 1300 136 122 or by visiting any Ticketmaster outlet.
