Q. You have made it clear that you are not happy with the discipline the team has been showing over the past couple of weeks.....
A. Two of them went to the tribunal last night, so we weren't happy about that. Barnard has been outed for a week and I would rather have him playing in the firsts. He is fit and fresh so he has penalised our team. That is something that the coaches here at the club and the players have to rectify because we don't like losing players in situations like that. Clearly it was a frustrated attempt to hit a player and he got a week. I think he was smart and pleaded guilty and got his due penalty.
Q. Does the fact that so many players are unavailable through injury and suspension going to save Mark Mercuri?
A. Not necessarily. If we feel Mark isn't playing good enough he will be dropped. It might shake the whole club up.
Q. How is Adam Ramanauskas?
A. We will find out later today. The decision is right to go and get it operated on straight away. His health is more important than the Essendon Football Club, the team and the coach and his worry about winning this week. The issue is his health is very, very important to us.
Q. You have had some good tussles with the Western Bulldogs over the years....
A. They live on the other side of the Maribyrnong river and are neighbours and neighbours always fight! I think in general the Western Bulldogs and we appreciate both living in the north west passage of Melbourne. We probably believe that territory is an issue. Ever since I have been following footy the Western Bulldogs are a pretty dour side and even if you beat them they stretch you everytime. With their running game the way it is at the moment they move the ball well and they run through the lines and it is a skillful side to combat against. On the field there is not much difference between the two teams and we have had some really good encounters over the past two years.
Q. How do you gauge your form at the moment? Up until three quarter time against Carlton you had played three good quarters?
A. I think at three quarter time it was one point the difference and then we kicked two goals and six behinds in the last quarter. If we had kicked five goals and two behinds we would have won the game. In the end I thought we lost the game ourselves. Very rarely do you see Matthew Lloyd miss from 15m out. But that is something we have to cope with, move on and focus on this game against the Western Bulldogs.
