PORT ADELAIDE senior assistant coach Michael Voss says his side’s ability to overcome a host of challenges – including an early flight and some serious third-quarter pressure from Greater Western Sydney – has shown its maturity and fostered belief in the group.
The Power had a rude early morning wake-up to catch a flight on game day for the first time and get to the Gold Coast for the 1:05pm (AEST) first bounce.
It was a low scoring arm wrestle for much of the contest and when the Giants pushed hard in the third term, it looked like Port might be overrun.
In the end, a goal after the third quarter siren and four of the next five goals saw Port get over the top, and Voss labelled it a big win.
“The day itself was challenging enough, when you factor in the travel schedule, the quality of the opposition, the moment we had to overcome, it was right up there as a big win for us and a sign of maturity,” he said during a press conference on Monday.
“We’ve been in games in the past where it’s been asked of us whether we can go to another level and we were able to in that game against a quality opposition.
“We identified the moment and got the job done so it’s a really big tick and we’ve been really pleased with the way that we’ve been able to accept the challenges that have been put in front of us.
“We understand it’s a changing landscape but we’ve been able to take each challenge as it comes and we’re getting some really handy results so we should be getting some real confidence and probably more importantly some real belief.”
Voss highlighted key moments, including a game-breaking 60 metre goal by young Kane Farrell that said a lot about how far the side had come.
“There’s a lot of things we are really proud of the guys about over the course of the last few weeks but when we were challenged there were some important contests that were won and there were some big moments that were converted,” Voss said.
“We’ve been in those situations before and we haven’t converted those opportunities so we are all looking for those little moments of growth in us to show that we’re maturing as a group and that really builds the belief and we certainly have that belief amongst each other.”
Farrell only came into the side with an injury to wingman Xavier Duursma three weeks ago.
But with Duursma set to push for selection this week after overcoming his hamstring complaint, Voss said Farrell had given the coaches plenty to think about.
“The development of Farrell on the weekend I thought was a real positive,” he explained.
“He’s had three games in a row and hasn’t had too many opportunities to be able to do that, so to get some games under his belt was a big win for us, plus he handled the moment really well.
“We’ve obviously got Karl (Amon) and Fazz and Duurs on the wings so it’s a nice problem to have to say well how do we get them all in the team?”
Port won’t name its squad for Sunday’s game against Carlton until Thursday night.
Voss confirmed there would be at least one change, with the hamstring injury to Cam Sutcliffe, but he said it was hoped the injury was at the lower end of seriousness.
“(Cam) came in and was able to play a nice role for us,” Voss said.
“He was really frustrated he came in and wasn’t able to see the game out but it gives us great confidence that if he’s asked upon again, which we expect he would be, that he’d come in and get a job done.”
