PORT ADELAIDE senior assistant coach Michael Voss has nominated Zak Butters, Sam Mayes and Kane Farrell as potential replacements for the injured Xavier Duursma for Saturday’s game against West Coast.
Voss also revealed the non-selected players would get a chance to team up with Fremantle’s non-selected players for a trial game against Gold Coast.
Duursma injured his hamstring in the win over the Dockers last Sunday and is expected to sit out the next three to four weeks.
Voss suggested there were plenty of options to take his place.
“It would be almost like for like – you don’t have to take too many guesses,” he said at a press conference on Thursday.
“We’ve been fortunate to have a few people to be able to roll through that wing position.
“Really the decision is does one of our forwards take one of those positions – Zak Butters has played a fair bit out there over the last few weeks, and then Kane Farrell has played there, Sam Mayes.
“There’s a few guys there to consider but we’ll get that finalised today.”
Mayes performed strongly in a recent trial game against Adelaide while Farrell is more known as a forward but has spent time up the ground over pre-season to push his claims for selection.
And Voss said the 21-year-old has shown significant improvement in his game.
“Faz has really developed his game. We know what he’s brought to the game is just his superior finish. There’s not too many better with the ball in his hands but what he’s added to his game is his ground level work and his work rate is really coming to the level,” Voss explained.
“We’re in a fortunate position. We always said this was going to take a squad to be able to get the job done over the course of the season and we’ve got the faith that these guys have got enough work under their belt to be able to make a difference.”
Voss said six non-selected players were likely to feature in a trial game this weekend, and despite having to team up with Fremantle players, they were eager to get another match under their belt.
“As AFL players they just want to play AFL footy, whether that’s playing on the weekend with us or being able to play with the Magpies,” Voss said.
“One of those has been taken away from us right now but we’re training them as hard as we possibly can.
“We’ll get a few little scratch (matches) in to help them out but we are really confident that they’re physically ready to go and certainly have the game understanding to be able to come in and get the job done.
“There’s one thing that you’ve got the guys out there playing, but there’s another bunch of players that want to prove themselves and are ready to go and get seen so they’ll be able to earn their spot or even replace someone.
“We all need a little bit of pressure on us. We’ve got a group that’s playing pretty good footy so it’s nice to have a settled squad that’s going pretty well as well.”
West Coast are coming off consecutive losses to Gold Coast and Brisbane and will be chasing their first win since entering the Queensland hub.
There have been claims the Eagles haven’t acclimatised to the dewy conditions at night but Voss isn’t buying into that.
“They’ve had a few things they’d want to get right,” he said.
“I saw enough last week against Brisbane to suggest they’re still quite a formidable team and we know the challenges we’ve got.
“They’ve got more than one or two real threats in that side and that’s across every line - you don’t become a premiership team without having that in the team at your disposal.
“They’ve got a few threats that if they get their game going or if we’re not mindful of, they’ll take off and then they’ll get the game on their terms and we’re in for a really tough day.”
Port Adelaide goes into the game unbeaten in 2020 and top of the table and Voss said the side was confident its game plan would stack up against anyone.
“What we’ve been really strong on this year is we execute our style, we stay with that, we challenge a team for 100 minutes of a game playing our way,” he said.
“And if we do that for long enough, then we feel we can beat any side.”
