Senior coach Luke Beveridge addressed media at Mission Whitten Oval on Thursday morning.
Here are the key talking points from his press conference.
On the challenges of playing at Norwood Oval:
“You have to be careful you don’t overplay how narrow the ground is. It’s similar to Geelong, as far as how narrow.
“Obviously with the width of the ground, there’s not as much space to use it and defend it. Defence should theoretically be a little bit easier, but when you play against the Lions who are quite adventurous their transition and how they use the footy, you really need to be on your toes to defend any grass.
“We’ll look forward to it. We’ll have a good session today and focus on the things we need to do well.”
On the Fremantle loss:
“It’s not really any easier to cop. There were some inconsistencies in other areas, other than those 10 minutes (before half-time) as well.
“As I said on the day, how easily they scored especially in that first quarter...we dominated territory and many of the aspects of the game, but for them to score 4.2 I think it was from minimal entries was really disappointing.
“To start the game with some stealth but allow them easy scores was frustrating. That was the main emotion post-game, and it was sort of prevalent throughout the game.
“We’re not coming away thinking ‘oh it was just those 10 minutes’. Even in our other three games, we feel like there’s quite a bit we need to do better for more minutes.
On focusing too much on Sam Darcy:
“I did reference that we were a bit Sam conscious.
“The times we did kick it to him, we didn’t kick it well to him. He wasn’t ready for it or we didn’t kick it to his advantage.
“There were other teammates open in different areas during those minutes as the game crept on and we just lacked a little bit of composure towards the end of the game.
“His presence in the game is starting to build. In totality, we’ve always been a team that relies on multiple goal kickers, and we can’t just rely on Sam to kick our winning score.
“He kicked most of our score last week and hopefully he gets a look at it again this week. But we need others to step up.”
On exposing Brisbane’s defence:
“Harris (Andrews) is a great interceptor. One of the best key defenders in the comp.
"Our preparation will be thinking one of two ways: he might go to Sam but, if he doesn’t, we’ve got to make sure that we don’t let him get in the way all the time.
“That’s what we’re talking about at the end of [the last] game. If we’re kicking it into spots, or we’re not kicking it well, he reads it pretty early, Harris.
“Hopefully the way we play and the way we use the footy and our decisions, discount him as a factor. That’s a huge challenge for any team.”
On Tom Liberatore:
“He’s come through fine.
“It’s a short break with two travels, so this morning’s session is not too long.
“Bit of a breather, some recovery, and getting our sleep and trying to come up fresh for another warmer one on Saturday.
“Tom will join in today. At the moment, he’s a definite starter.”
On Marcus Bontempelli:
“Yeah we’re hoping he’ll play next week.
“He’ll have a pretty decent session on Saturday with the boys who don’t come to Adelaide, and we’re hoping he’s able to play on Easter Sunday next week.”
