The team played some terrific footy after half-time on Sunday. It must have been a pretty enjoyable second half?
Paul Hudson: Yeah, we had our best quarter of the year by far, kicking 9.3 in that third quarter. That easily our best offensive quarter for the year. We’ve just been struggling to get out of the blocks a bit, so we’ve got to address that. We’ve only won three first quarters for the year, so that’s one of those things where we’ve just got to make sure that we’re ready to go. This week we’ll aim to do that.
What happened in that third quarter? Was there anything that triggered it?
I think it was probably a combination of things. There’s no doubt we started to do better at the stoppages and we were far more effective in our ball use. We got it in quickly and put tremendous pressure on them with numbers at the ball basically, out front and square work with guys like [Brad] Dick and [Tarkyn] Lockyer and these guys was terrific. But it does help when you get those clearances forward of the ball.
I’m sure the coaches are all concentrating intently the whole time but when things are going so well, can you ever sit back and enjoy it at all?
Not really. You want to keep the momentum going and there’s always something going on within the coaches’ box; you’re looking at trying to keep that momentum. You hit a 15-minute purple patch like that and you probably let the players on the field go for an extra three or four minutes but you’ve still got to be conscious of your rotations, and not have guys getting cooked as a result. So we’ve got to stay on top of those things.
In the middle, Dane Swan had a reasonable game with 48 touches.
You could hear through the glass, I think the crowd was actually cheering – I don’t know if something came up on the scoreboard or what – but I couldn’t work out what the cheer was for. It would have been nice to see him get 50 [possessions] … to accumulate that amount of footy he’s obviously had a fair game.
You mentioned Brad Dick. Mick Malthouse said earlier this year that he was one guy the club had missed last year, and the other night Pies fans might have seen why.
He was tremendous for us. He obviously kicked three goals and generated a few others. I hadn’t had a lot to do with Dicky before this year obviously, but he certainly adds some speed to the forward line, his defensive pressure’s good, he can kick both sides of his body, his positioning is really good and he is good on a lead as well. So with all those attributes he can be pretty potent around the goals.
As the forward line coach it would have been nice to have Alan Didak and Dale Thomas back in. How’d you see their first-up performances?
Coming back in you are going to be a little bit rusty and both of them were at times. Dids kicked three and you couldn’t really ask any more. To kick three goals as a half forward then you’ve definitely done your job and a bit more, but there was a couple of times when they fumbled … but they’ll both definitely be better for the run.
There seems to be more light at the end of the injury tunnel, too, with more forwards set to come back. It might be tough to squeeze them all back in.
Yeah but injuries create opportunities and it’s been good to get Steele Sidebottom through the forward line and [Dayne] Beams and [Sharrod] Wellingham and all these other guys to see how they go as half forwards. Leigh Brown really stood up last week and played what I think was one of his best games in a long, long time at any club. So now we’ve just got to be really conscious of the balance that we’ve got in the forward line. That’s where it’s going to be interesting. Obviously we’ve got Clokey and Medders in the mix this week. But this is the predicament you want to be in as a football club.
The views in this story are those of the author and not necessarily those of the club.
