Essendon Fan
17 May 2003, 02:00
Essendon coach Kevin Sheedy admitted that he didn’t think his side could thrash Hawthorn by nearly nine goals, when most of his “All-Australian” spine was out injured.
The four-time premiership coach referred to the brilliant trio of skipper James Hird, full-forward Matthew Lloyd and full-back Dustin Fletcher as his All-Australians players who were sidelined.
But on top of that, the Bombers also had key players Adam Ramanauskas and Dean Rioli sidelined through injury.
“We had a decent goal-to-goal line out – it probably could be nearly All-Australian, so it was a real pleasing win from that point-of-view,” Sheedy said.
Sheedy was also delighted with the efforts of some of his younger players such as Ted Richards, Andrew Welsh, Joel Reynolds, Cory McGrath and Jason Winderlich, who all contributed in the win.
“It’s great to see these kids hanging around for a year or two get opportunities and take them,” Sheedy said.
“In general, that was a really good team effort. There wasn’t a superstar out there all night for us, but you’d have to say that in every department of the game, I felt we improved a hell-of-a-lot from the last two weeks.”
“We probably wouldn’t play as poorly as what we did against Richmond again – I’m quite sure about that.”
With the Bombers losing their previous two matches, the Dons avoided losing three in succession for the first time since 1998, but Sheedy was adamant that his side was not going to perform as poorly as last week against Richmond.
“We don’t want to play football like we played last week against Richmond – we are better than that,” Sheedy said.
“When we get our best team back, we’re actually going to start really looking at playing a few of these top sides up there.”
Sheedy said he was excited at the prospect of having the likes of Hird and Lloyd back up forward along with Scott Lucas and Damian Cupido, as he believed his attack could be as potent as any in the competition, while he believed his best 22 could challenge the best.
“We’ve got to keep working at changing the side where we find the right mix that will challenge the sides that have been, last year, in the top four,” Sheedy said.
“We’re just toying around and making sure that we’ve got as good a year as we can, to get that ball to our forwards, because we know too well that the forward line we can have at the club.”
“We haven’t had that for quite some time – in particular last year.” (afl web)
We'll be firing back soon!!!
GO DONS!
The four-time premiership coach referred to the brilliant trio of skipper James Hird, full-forward Matthew Lloyd and full-back Dustin Fletcher as his All-Australians players who were sidelined.
But on top of that, the Bombers also had key players Adam Ramanauskas and Dean Rioli sidelined through injury.
“We had a decent goal-to-goal line out – it probably could be nearly All-Australian, so it was a real pleasing win from that point-of-view,” Sheedy said.
Sheedy was also delighted with the efforts of some of his younger players such as Ted Richards, Andrew Welsh, Joel Reynolds, Cory McGrath and Jason Winderlich, who all contributed in the win.
“It’s great to see these kids hanging around for a year or two get opportunities and take them,” Sheedy said.
“In general, that was a really good team effort. There wasn’t a superstar out there all night for us, but you’d have to say that in every department of the game, I felt we improved a hell-of-a-lot from the last two weeks.”
“We probably wouldn’t play as poorly as what we did against Richmond again – I’m quite sure about that.”
With the Bombers losing their previous two matches, the Dons avoided losing three in succession for the first time since 1998, but Sheedy was adamant that his side was not going to perform as poorly as last week against Richmond.
“We don’t want to play football like we played last week against Richmond – we are better than that,” Sheedy said.
“When we get our best team back, we’re actually going to start really looking at playing a few of these top sides up there.”
Sheedy said he was excited at the prospect of having the likes of Hird and Lloyd back up forward along with Scott Lucas and Damian Cupido, as he believed his attack could be as potent as any in the competition, while he believed his best 22 could challenge the best.
“We’ve got to keep working at changing the side where we find the right mix that will challenge the sides that have been, last year, in the top four,” Sheedy said.
“We’re just toying around and making sure that we’ve got as good a year as we can, to get that ball to our forwards, because we know too well that the forward line we can have at the club.”
“We haven’t had that for quite some time – in particular last year.” (afl web)
We'll be firing back soon!!!
GO DONS!