John Longmire fronts the media and chats on all the hot topics, including an injury update on Josh Kennedy, the return of James Rowbottom, form, facing Richmond this Friday night and the improvement in Logan McDonald.
See the key quotes from John Longmire below.
On Josh Kennedy injury & MRO:
No we won’t be challenging it. Josh (Kennedy) has a hamstring injury which is an 8-10 week injury. It’s significant amount of time out for Josh so we won’t be challenging it.
Unfortunately he’s got a bit of tendon damage, it doesn’t warrant an operation but it’s serious enough for him to be out for a significant period of time. He’s going to concentrate on rehab and getting himself right, which he needs to do, and then look towards the back end of the year. In the meantime, he’s going to help us out in the coaching and leadership space which is great. Josh is a fantastic asset around the footy club. He’s determined to get his rehab right and see whatever the back end of the season can bring him.
He’s disappointed, he loves footy and he enjoyed playing in front of a big crowd last Friday night and was enjoying the possibility of that happening this week too. That’s what he loves doing, but he’s also very pragmatic. He’s had a wonderful run as far as injuries go, I think the longest he’s had on the sidelines up until this point was a six-week knee injury a couple of years ago, up until then it was really only one or two weeks here or there. He's had a fortunate run and Josh being the type of person he is tends to focus on that, he has a glass half full approach. This is a bad injury at a bad time for him, but there’s never really a good time. What I do know is Josh will commit himself to the rehab and get himself as good as he can.
He’s looking forward to applying himself to his rehab. Whatever Josh does in life he does it really well and I’m sure he’ll do his rehab program really well and get himself in the best possible condition and do whatever he can that’s in his control to get back and play.
On Rowbottom returning from one week suspension:
Rowy (Rowbottom) will come back in this week, he’s been an important player for us so he’ll come straight back in.
On losing 3 of the last 4 matches:
Even over the last month we’re equal fifth for quarters won, but we’ve given parts of the game up to the opposition that’s proved costly for us. On the weekend it was clearly our second quarter that was really costly. To have nine goals kicked against us in one quarter, we didn’t wrestle the momentum back quickly enough. We won the other three quarters and in the last half in particular we were well on top in inside 50’s but we couldn’t convert it. It's been the story of our year, we’ve been able to win parts of the game, and I think we’re equal third for the year as far as quarters won but we’ve let the opposition in at certain parts and we need to get on top of that.
On Richmond’s form:
Over the last month they’ve only lost two quarters of footy I think, they’ve been really consistent. They’re playing a confident brand of footy, it’s a very familiar style of footy they play, they’re hard at it and play a real surge brand of ball. They’ve got Riewoldt in really good form up front, and a really sound defensive system. They’re one of the form teams, if not the form team of the competition in the last four weeks.
On Logan McDonald’s improvement:
We understand it takes young key position players a bit of time to come through and develop, grow into their body first and foremost, and then develop the confidence to launch for your marks and take those marks. He’s been almost there the last couple of weeks, but just hasn’t quite finished off his marking. On Friday night we saw his impact and his ability to be able to take those contested marks and have 6 shots at goal and be a real threat in our front half. That’s a big thrill for him to play a big game in front of a massive crowd and come through and play his best game for us. His progression won’t always be like that, he’ll keep learning every week, but I thought he played a really solid game that can hopefully show some real potential for what he can deliver in the future for us.
