First questions was about finals Cotch answered will be nice and that's pretty much it. Didn't take the bait Gerard asked him.
Line of questions was he's played in 30 wins from 88 games had he lost the faith. He said no as he felt that the plans Dimma had in place after the Wallet era meant the club needed to go backwards before they went forwards and it would be a matter of time before the club would reap the rewards.
Cotch alluded to 12 list changes in the first year that Dimma was in charge.
Furthermore he felt that at the end of 2008 after winning 8 from 11 in the second half he felt that they could take the next step.
However it was hard in 2009 with two coaching changes but he felt that once Dimma had set his plans he had belief in it but the difficulty was implementing it as in the first few years because of such large list turnover alot of new players introduced have needed time to learn the gameplan. Cotch mentioned that there were three hour training sessions where the defensive press was taught whether the whole press or a part press which was very demanding which as mentioned because of list turnover was hard to implement due to the changing nature of the list in the first few years.
On the couch showed a graphic of how far the club has gone since Cotch first game where they had the team from his first game in Round 8 2008 and of the 25 players listed only 10 remain including McGuane and Moore who have not played at all this season.
Cotch mentioned he needed to get a bigger tank as he felt that taggers have the biggest tanks and to have an impact and make a bigger impact and run to the right spots he needed to get more fitness into him especially since his first two pre seasons were interrupted. OTC were alluding to Clint Jones was going to line up on him on Friday but Cotch also mentioned that our midfield depth also meant that opposition clubs would have dilemmas over who they would tag and who they wouldn't.
Furthermore our savvy over the last few years in bringing players from other clubs and our research being spot on and these players making an impact in big Maric Houli Grigg and although a mature recruit in Stevie Morris. Club has identified holes in the list and has recruited appropriately.
Also Maric presence how it has lifted us into the upper echelon of contested sides and has made us one of the best in terms of contested and uncontested possessions and Maric hit out and hit outs to advantage being 6th best and 8th best respectively compared to us being 14th -16th last year.
Maric being touted as virtually the recruit of the year so far. Mike was barely impressed when he learnt that we were after him but his tune has changed and commented how he has been a huge reason why our mids have been so good this year.
Spoke how alot of young kids come into the game now and it takes them 3 years to adjust to the pace of the game from junior footy.
Cotch was also very level headed saying that we had a big job not only in the midfield but our backline against Kosi and Riewoldt but also our forwards against their backline.
Roosy was also mentioning that if we lost on Friday he felt we couldn't make the finals which would be a shame as we are playing better than a side with a 4-5 record suggests although Mike mentioned that regardless of what happens we have played all the hard teams so far and that our run home possibly meant otherwise.
Also Tuck was like a new recruit with contested footy becoming big again and Cotch mentioned how he has always wanted to learn new things and develop a defensive side into his game which was evident on Saturday where he had 10 tackles. Although Mike did say that he was gone a few times but has stuck at it.
There's alot of love for us right now and universally alot have jumped on the bandwagon not only and Mike was saying how big we were in the 70's and early 80's and that we are just so much more distinct as a big club when compared to the filth scums and bums.
Also mentioned need to keep level heads and beat St Kilda and follow up on a so called breakthrough win on Saturday by beating a side that we have not beaten since 2003. Although it was mentioned that St Kilda are in great form also and that our game was worthy of Friday night status and that the footy world was waiting excitingly for us and we're hoping for a great result.
With that they thanked Cotch and wished him the best of luck.
Cotch was very humble and answered the questions the way he needed to without embellishing the answers or wanting to say too much.
Can't think of much more it's Monday night and I'm tired.
Hope this helps.
