Gold Coast Suns free flowing football here to stay for 2020 AFL season
Gold Coast powerbrokers have promised the efficient ball movement on display across the board by Suns during the pre-season will become a staple of their game on the back of improved skills.
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GOLD Coast powerbrokers have promised the efficient ball movement on display across the board by Suns during the pre-season will become a staple of their game on the back of improved skills.
The Suns expanded game style was on full display in the Marsh Community Series where they beat Geelong and Adelaide.
Defence will remain a fundamental part to the way the Suns play this year but Gold Coast football manager Jon Haines said efficiency with ball in hand should trouble teams more in 2020.
“There has been a heavy education focus over the course of the pre-season,” Haines said.
“We have brought another 13 players in over this year’s off-season and last year it was 16.
“There has been an enormous amount of change in the playing group over the last two draft and trade periods.
“Largely, our focus is on continuing to educate the playing group on how we want to play and embedding that into our game.
“We know in a theoretical sense last year was year one, this year is year two with the new group.
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“How we defend will be fundamental to the way we want to play but we have been looking at how we can progress our ball movement over the summer.
“Generally, we have seen an improvement in the skill level of the group. That allows you to move the ball a bit more effectively.
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“That is a credit to the players’ diligence and focus as a coaching group on developing individual skills.”
Haines said it had paved the way for more competition for spots as the football department begins to work out who will feature in its Round 1 side on March 21.
“There is some really strong competition for spots across most areas of the ground,” Haines said. “If we sat down and picked the team for Round 1 today we would have some really detailed and heavy debate on a range of different roles, which is a really positive position to be in.”
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