North Melbourne rest three players from VFL as it prepares to play Hawthorn with five players under injury clouds
NORTH Melbourne rested three players from the VFL on Sunday to ensure it will have fit replacements if needed for Friday night’s litmus test against Hawthorn.
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NORTH Melbourne rested three players from the VFL on Sunday to ensure it will have fit replacements if needed for Friday night’s litmus test against Hawthorn.
The Kangaroos will count the cost from Saturday night’s wounding loss to Geelong on Monday and did not want to risk Farren Ray, Trent Dumont or Corey Wagner in Werribee’s loss to Richmond.
The Roos suffered five injuries but could still escape with all passed fit to face the Hawks.
Captain Andrew Swallow (concussion) appears in the most doubt, followed by Nick Dal Santo (adductor).
Ben Cunnington battled on after copping a nasty corkie while goalsneak Robbie Nahas suffered a compound fracture to his little finger, but will play if he does not require surgery.
Shaun Atley hurt his ankle in the final quarter while ruckman Todd Goldstein also appears to be playing sore.
Defender Robbie Tarrant on Sunday said Dal Santo should be fine after playing out the match as the Roos enter a season-defining block of games.
Brad Scott’s men have dropped two of their past three games and now face the Hawks (Etihad Stadium) and Adelaide (Adelaide Oval) off consecutive six-day breaks.
After the bye the Roos travel to face West Coast and then encounter another nightmare month leading into September.
But vice-captain Jack Ziebell said on Sunday the Kangas had already proved their football stood the test of big games and legend Wayne Carey said if they could not beat fellow finalists mid-season they would fall short in the finals.
Hawthorn defender Ben Stratton told the Herald Sun North’s triple-pronged attack of Ben Brown, Jarrad Waite and Drew Petrie loomed as a danger.
Stratton usually takes Brown while Waite’s form has dropped with the former Blue failing to kick a goal for three weeks.
Stratton dismissed talk the revitalised Hawks were not a serious threat to claim their fourth consecutive premiership.
“If you’d said at the start of the year we’d be 9-3 going into this stage of the year we’d take it,” Stratton said.
“We don’t really listen too much to the outside influence. It’s a big game (against North) and we got a taste of Etihad (against Essendon). We don’t play there that much.
“This will really test us and see how far we’ve come. If we play one or two good quarters we’ll come up short, so playing four quarters is going to be very important.
“They’re probably still hunting us, I think they’ve only dropped (two) games and some of their midfield is elite at the moment.”
David King said Hawks kid Kade Stewart reminded him of St Kilda champion Lenny Hayes while youngster Daniel Howe was won comparisons to Geelong’s Andrew Mackie.
The Hawks beat up on the Kangaroos last year in a spiteful contest which saw Jordan Lewis and Luke Hodge suspended.
Originally published as North Melbourne rest three players from VFL as it prepares to play Hawthorn with five players under injury clouds
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