AFTER a fantastic finish to his 2010 season, performing strongly in many games and booting a big bag of goals at Etihad Stadium against North Melbourne, Jay Schulz was looking forward to his second season with the Power in 2011.
His preseason form was encouraging, and he started strongly against Collingwood back at Etihad in Round 1 - right up until the moment that his knee was twisted in a tackle, ruling him out for an extended period of time. Now, he doesn’t even think about the injury.
“The knee is really solid,” he confirmed, “and I hardly ever feel it any more. The scar tissue that was there has broken up and moved on, so it’s really good. Whether or not I strap it for the rest of the year remains to be seen - it depends on what the fitness staff think.
“The rest of my body has held up really well; a little tight here and there, which you can have when you’re coming back from injury, but I feel quite fit and it’s good to have four or five games now to get that match fitness back and it’s nice to be up and running and hopefully we’ll have a really good second half of the year.”
Whilst he missed a swathe of football himself, he thinks that the bye has come at the right time for his young teammates, with the Power the last side to have the week off.
“It’s come at a good time for the boys,” Schulz said whilst at the Power’s community camp in his home town of Kapunda.
“We’ve got a five week block and then another rest and it’s probably not a bad way to do it,” he believes.
“There’s a few sore bodies and blokes need a mental rest as well, so the boys are looking forward to it - we’ll have a solid week this week, have a few days off, and then try and have as normal a week as possible leading into the Perth game [against West Coast in Round 13].”
The first half of the year has been disappointing for players, coaches and fans, but Schulz is confident that the second half of the year will see marked improvement from the side.
“We’ll set some goals over the next block of five weeks,” he said, echoing the thoughts of Matthew Primus in the wake of the defeat at the hands of Carlton, “and we’ll work on several areas, which we’ll chat about with as the leadership group and with Matty.
“We’ll chat to the rest of the players as well and try and meet those goals and see where we’re standing and try and plan out short blocks so that we can try and meet goals - we know that if we’re meeting those goals then we’re a real good chance of winning games.”
