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Three a-grade league players won’t be available for round one with minor injuries, they will be ok for round two. We played a heap of colt’s players in the three games and blokes like Carpenter / Bewick / Wooden & Swadling to just mention a few. Most of the seniors played two games, there were seven out in today’s game against EF. The game against EP was a bloody good hit out, EP had a number of seniors out, so did WP but overall, it was a typical scratch match. The game against the eagles was just a training run from both sides. Today’s game against EF showed how undersized we are, the bloody mosquito fleet. EF played in front all day, they were harder, faster, tougher and played the long game and when the ball came to the ground, they had crumbers everywhere. Patterson played his guts out but EF sharked his knockouts and they won the ball. Tyler was held, Nelson played his usual gutsy game and Meadows tried hard with his long kicking. We rely on Nelson / Black / Keitel / Meadows all the time, I hope the four new blokes that have come to the club and with the blokes coming up from the colts can gel into a winning combination. Keep well all.

Thanks for the summary Winger and I think you’ve hit the nail on the head with what could be our Achilles heel- if we get injuries our depth is not huge even though our colts and youngsters have talent.They simply will take time to develop.Interesting comment about being too small.Was that just the selections for the day or a problem overall? I think we have some height in Paterson,Sprigg,Keitel,Mallard.McKenzie and a few others but whether they all play in the same side (unlikely) we have to wait and see.Good to see Paterson get a good mention- have always had time for him and hope he has a breakout season.Should be an interesting season and hopefully a step in the right direction.

EF will finish top 3, make no mistake about that. I think I have to revisit where I think we will finish, although it was only scratch match, we were completely out played, felt like a 15 goal loss. McKenzie will need time to adjust or I am hoping he does, he hasn't shown many glimpses of being anything near league standard, hope I am wrong. Steele played his heart out again. Sprigg needs to be our #1 ruckman and Patterson CHF with the occasional chop out. Young Carpenter is a reincarnated Nick Rodda, he needs to stay in the side, even went forward on one occasion and kicked a goal. Steele needs to play in the middle, our midfield were brushed aside, unless we have a good run on the injury front we are going to struggle to break even. Cant believe we have 5 or 6 players on the injured list and we haven't even started the regular season, disappointing if that many are missing R1. Players yet to play any preseason games are-

Black
Moulton
S.Rotham
M.Peirce
C.Lynch
B.Thompson
B.Johnson