‘We want to be the best’: Giants stick strong despite 0-4 start

A tough draw has handed the Giants a difficult start to the season, but their coach is confident they’re moving in the right direction to be a competitive team.

Despite plenty of promise, the Giants are staring down an 0-5 start to the AFLW season. Picture: Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images

The Giants are confident that their exciting new game style will eventually bring results after an 0-4 start to the AFLW season.

Cam Bernasconi has attempted to implement an up-tempo strategy that focuses on moving the ball quickly, and at stages, there have been signs of progress.

However, a 77-point loss to Melbourne was followed up by a 69-point defeat to Adelaide in Canberra last weekend.

Bernasconi is resisting any reflex changes and wants to see his strategy through.

“We’ll stick strong to it,” he said. “I have full belief in this group that we’re going to turn it around.

“When we stick to our system, we go really well. When we go away from it, that’s when we leak goals … we just need to do it for four quarters.

“You look at Adelaide last year, we didn’t kick a goal and we lost by 96 points. But on the weekend, we kicked five goals up to the first half. So absolutely, you can see the development in the way we’re playing.

“But it’s the defensive part of our game now. If you’re going to play an attacking brand of footy, you need to value defence even more.”

Adelaide came away with a 69-point win last weekend after kicking nine unanswered goals in the second half. Picture: Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images

The Giants’ task has been made harder by a difficult draw. They’ve played three of last season’s top four in the opening month, and they take on premiership contenders North Melbourne this Sunday.

“The positive part of our draw is that we’re learning against the best consistently at the moment,” Bernasconi said.

“We’re learning about how our system stacks up. We want to be the best side. We don’t just want to climb up the ladder and scrape into finals, we want to get there and be there for a couple of years and win finals.

“We’re playing against sides who have been doing it for a number of years. We’re still new in our journey playing this way, so when fatigue sets in you can waver a little.”

Results are not far away according to Bernasconi. Picture: Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images

The Giants will have extra motivation for their clash with the Kangaroos with defender Katherine Smith celebrating her 50th AFLW match.

Across town, former Swans captain Brooke Lochland will also be bringing up her 50-game milestone.

They take on the Blues this Friday and coach Scott Gowans confirmed that despite the short turnaround, they’re up for the challenge.

“We didn’t get too many injuries out of the [West Coast] game, just bumps and bruises,” Gowans said.

“We trained once this week and did an extra recovery. It’s good not to have to push through a usual training week, just train once and play.”

Chloe Molloy trained strongly as she put aside any injury concerns, while Gowans did hint that Montana Ham could be given another week or two as she recovers from a foot issue.

One of the Swans’ most experienced players, Lochland brings up her 50th AFLW game this Friday. Picture: Phil Hillyard

Despite getting the win over the Eagles, transitioning into attack was a major area of concern for the Swans.

Lochland said that as a team they had isolated the problem and are looking forward to putting it on full display at Ikon Park.

“We’ve had sides that have flooded our forward line which makes it difficult at times,” Lochland said. “But we’ve been doing practice in training from mids to forwards.

“We’ve done a lot of work and hopefully you’ll see a bit of change this week and we’ll try and move the ball a bit to get different inside 50 entries.”

“There’s not too many harder tasks than Carlton at Ikon,” Gowans added. “It’s a bit of a fortress there, if you do happen to beat them there, in my experience it’s only just.”

Originally published as ‘We want to be the best’: Giants stick strong despite 0-4 start