WITH five games left to go in the season, Jacob Weitering is hopeful of a final month which sees the Blues make a strong statement on the back of four-quarter football.
Here's what he had to say when speaking to SEN.
On the return from injury:
"It’s been a bit of a bumpy one for me, I think it’s certainly tough coming back after injury as most players would have experienced.
"It’s actually my first time that I think I’ve spent more than two weeks out of the game with an injury: early on in my career, I missed a couple of weeks with a shoulder and a couple of weeks in the VFL but it’s been positive for me to come back into a side that’s been performing quite well and consistently.
"We’re in a really nice position and to come back against West Coast and get the win there was super, but then obviously the result on the weekend wasn’t ideal.
"I’m still trying to get back to my absolute best and I’ve got some quite high standards of myself. I was a little bit disappointed with myself on the weekend, plus the team result as well: we’ll certainly try and bounce back this week."
On the biggest challenge in returning to the side:
"It’s just the continuity for me. I haven’t missed too much football and I guess the last game I played before injuring my shoulder was the Sydney game: that was probably my best game for the year.
"Then you go play Collingwood, we had Essendon, Richmond and I was pretty amped up to play at the ‘G those three weeks and get some wins, so to go down with a shoulder was really disappointing. At the same time, I had to remain as positive as I could be, rehab and lead the way for the group off the field.
"It’s probably that continuity piece for sure, and then just the physicality and trying to make up a little bit of ground when you’ve lost a little bit of fitness. When you have a reasonably major surgery and you come back in and you’re playing against your Josh Kennedys and Tom Hawkins, it’s probably not the most ideal situation. But at the same time, I was physically ready.
"I was confident in the shoulder, and to be honest, the shoulder has held up really well. It’s only going to get stronger and I’m only going to get more confident as the season progresses."
On managing the shoulder:
"It’s always at the back of your mind, no matter what you do.
"I haven’t strapped it. I remember strapping my shoulders early on in my career and it probably plays a bit of a mental game with you: for me, I just didn’t strap it in training – I was allowed to do so.
"The testing, the combat work, the tackling, the bumping, the driving through tackling – I play quite a physical position and I was up against a physical beast on the weekend. You have to be ready for those kinds of battles and the doctors and physios did everything they could to get me up as a fast as possible and they’ve done a great job."
On the nature of the Geelong clash:
"It’s certainly a lesson learnt. It gave us a really good understanding a mature, well-drilled, great culture... [the Cats have] been doing it for so many years, the way they’ve been playing.
"They brought some young guys into their system with Sam De Koning who performed really well, but at the core of it, they’ve got a great game plan and guys who just do things for longer.
"I guess for us, it was relatively disappointing. I think the numbers and few statistics were in our favour and it was a balanced game: we were within four points late in the second and they kicked a couple of cheap ones.
"It was definitely a lesson learnt, we took a fair bit out of it and it’s a good lesson to learn against Geelong at this time of year rather than in September."
On the team's reaction to the loss:
"I guess there was an element of frustration, it’s a combination of things: when you’ve got a young side, a new coach and a young system, it’s a young way of playing.
"We’ve had a fair bit of conversation amongst the leadership group and 'Vossy' and we’re really happy with the way we’re progressing. We understand we’re going to go through some growing pains and on the weekend, that was one of them.
"The maturity of Geelong, you can’t understate that. They defended incredibly well, they moved the ball with speed and we didn’t defend our defensive 50 well: I think they went in at 50 per cent scoring efficiency. There’s definitely a lot of areas we know we can fix up and hopefully implement those improvements on the weekend."
On the system standing up:
"With the way we’ve played this year and the games we’ve played in, we’ve got full confidence in our system and the way we play – as you should if you’re wanting to march towards the end of the year.
"Geelong was no different and they showed us how to play a mature style of football that gets things done over four quarters.
"There are some tests coming up. We’ll take it one week at a time, the next five games are incredibly important for everyone chasing the eight at the moment."
On the run home:
"It’s heading to the end of winter. Guys are getting injured, sick, more and more sore, guys are playing for contracts, guys that are trying to make it from the VFL to the AFL: there a lot of different factors that are now playing into the back end of the season and that’s not going to affect just us, that’s going to affect every team that’s trying to make a run.
"We’ve got to worry about ourselves and make sure that we have full confidence in our game plan, in the players that we’re putting on the park and trying to bank up some wins.
"I don’t think we've lost two or more games in a row this year, we’re in a really solid position and we’d like to solidify that in the coming weeks for sure."
