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Port Adelaide assistant coach Matthew Primus admits the Power will have to trade for a back-up ruckman at the end of the AFL season given the glaring inadequacy of their current group.
As the Power’s ageing tandem of Brendon Lade (33 years old) and Dean Brogan (30) saunter closer to retirement, the utter lack of worthy back-ups was again laid bare on the weekend when selectors declined to name any support for Lade after Brogan’s injury-enforced omission.
Not for the first time tall defender Toby Thurstans was pressed into service when Lade rested, leaving the likes of Jonathan Giles, Matthew Lobbe and Jarrad Redden languishing in the local leagues.
Giles, currently playing in the SANFL reserves behind Crows back-up Jon Griffin, has disappointed the Power coaching staff with his failure to develop in a timely manner – drafted in 2006, he is yet to debut.
“We realise there’s a bit of a gap between Brendon and Dean and our next group with Jon Giles and Matthew Lobbe and those guys who we’re bringing on,” Primus said on Monday.
“Especially Jon Giles we were hoping he’d come on a bit more than he has, but we’re going to be in the market to have a look at what’s around, what other clubs have and who’s not getting a go and at the end of the year we’ll decide what we’re going to do.
“We know Dean and Brendon are coming towards the end of their careers at some stage and we need to replace them.”
Primus said the impending entry of the Gold Coast would complicate matters in trade week but was frank about the Power’s need to shop around for a tall with established AFL credentials.
“Clubs are going to be in different situations with their lists with the Gold Coast coming in and that kind of stuff, so we’ll sit down and have a look at it then,” he said.
“Obviously we’re going to have to have a look at it in some regard, whether it’s a 200cm ruckman or a 196, 197cm running tall.”
Port’s hefty defeat at the hands of Adelaide maintained their longstanding form yo-yo, but with a challenging fixture against fellow midtable fighters Hawthorn this week there is no guarantee of a victory to follow the 70-point loss.
“Hawthorn have got a bit of their form back and we need to respond after another loss, which seems to be what we’re doing every second week,” Primus said.
“You can’t get there with that sort of form (win/loss/win/loss), if we do make the finals it means we’ve been able to rectify that problem over the next five weeks, and if we’re not good enough then we’re not good enough.”
Port shielded their players from the Monday media spotlight following the defeat – a recurring event this year – but Primus denied the club was being over-protective.
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