Chris Scott on… The Adelaide Match Up
If it were only those two (Taylor Walker & Darcy Fogarty), it would be a challenge, but it would be easier if they didn't also have Thilthorpe and Rankine and arguably their small forwards have been as big a threat as their marking targets this year, so combine that with Dawson and Laird going really well in the midfield, Keays has been an important player for them. Quite quickly they've become a really solid team. Their game style looks, complete is a strong word, but it's hard to spot holes in what they're doing. Their personnel is strong, and they've got some young talent.
Chris Scott on.. Oisin Mullin
Oisin has pulled up a little bit sore this morning so he's going to come out of our squad today, and we need to work through exactly what that means. Suffice to say, he will come out but it is worth talking about that he was in our squad for a reason and its reward for the progress he's making. He's getting a bit close, so it was never our intention for him to be our sub but he was close enough to be in the squad but it was just unfortunate that he had a bit of a tight hammy this morning, so we couldn't leave him in the squad.
Chris Scott on.. The Cats’ Longer-Term Injury List
The guys that haven't played for a while are still a way off, so Sam Menegola won't be until the second half of the season, Jack Henry is shaping up to be around the mid-season bye, and Cam Guthrie won't play again this week but hopefully he's a little bit ahead of those guys.
Rhys Stanley is more mid-season bye timeframe roughly, Tyson Stengle will be a bit closer, he's making good progress. As is often the case with players that have upper body injuries the benefit is that they can run really early and Tyson was running really quickly post-surgery, so he'll come to hand a lot quicker than the guys who have lower limb injuries.
Sam De Koning might be a little longer with that facial fracture but it’s a little uncertain in my mind, the medical staff are a little bit clearer than I am, but given he won't play this week or next week, it's out of my headspace right at the minute. And Gary Rohan has a very minor hamstring issue which he was able to play through last week which speaks to the severity or lack thereof but it's likely that we'll be more conservative than not, with him.
Chris Scott on… Patrick Dangerfield
I think he's a little reflective of us as a team; a little bit off early, had some work to do, applied ourselves to some areas that we thought we could improve and now we're starting to see some benefits. But generally, I don't spend any time unless I'm briefed on it worrying about what others might be saying, certainly not motivated by it.
Sometimes coaches can come across as being defensive of their players and I get why but I would hate us to ever sound like we're saying we're motivated because someone had a go at Patty and now he's showing them who's boss, I think he's a bit more sophisticated than that. But he's playing good footy, he's really important to us and I still think the best form of leadership is to play well yourself.
