As it happened: Dominant Dees tame Tigers; Freo dismiss North; Lions rise above Blues; Cats annihilate Eagles; Suns smash Swans

Q: Who comes into contention to replace them?
A: There will be a number of players because of the availability of our list at the moment. Some players will put up their hands. Once again, I saw some of the VFL today. VFL were a little bit disappointing today. We will have a look at the tape and we will give some boys opportunities. I have been in this situation before and we have found some players. So that’s the one positive. It is always a growth mindset for us and someone is getting an opportunity to play a couple of games. We just hope they will put their hand up and make us better.

Q: Is Prestia a chance?
A: No, he had calf tightness last week as well. So just as we thought we were getting him back - how far that puts him back we are not too sure, but once again, he won’t play next week.

Q: How did you assess Melbourne?
A: I thought they were good. I thought we were OK. We had a lot of inside 50 entries where we should have scored, we just didn’t. I thought they were clean. They looked like they were playing with the dry ball, and I thought we looked like wet, slippery conditions. A lot was to do with their pressure but some of it was perceived pressure. We just didn’t handle the conditions well. We had ample opportunity to kick a winning score, we just didn’t. That was the disappointing thing for us.
Gave away undisciplined free kicks, four goals from free kicks. It frustrates me and frustrates us as a team so we are just going to have to get that part of the game.

Q: 3-3 with key players out there, what is the alarm situation?
A: It is tough. Like, we would love to be going better, there is no doubt about it. We would love to win more games but we can only deal with the facts at hand. We are three and three, we played some tough competition, we have got some injuries but we are going to move forward. You can sit there and look back and dwell or you can look at the future and see what it has got to offer. We are very much a forward-thinking football club. We have got to player better than we did tonight.

Q: I know you are always evolving. You have always had great success with your style. Do you need to shift it at all?
A: That is probably up for you guys to say. We did have ample opportunity to kick a winning score. We kicked 6.13. We had ample shots. We had four goals on the goal line. It is disappointing for us. Melbourne had five as well. I think the scoreboard, whilst it looked a little bit out of control, I thought our system held us in good stead. I just thought their big game players played better. Petracca, Salem was very stiff not to win the medal. I thought he was outstanding. Lever good again. There are things that come into play we would have liked to have done. If you are playing straight line versus Melbourne you are in trouble. We played too straight tonight. We probably played to if the conditions were wet but it wasn’t overly wet.

Q: Tonight it seemed like a hot contest. How do you look at that? Is it just a pressure gauge overall or do you look at different areas?
A: There is different areas. Like, pre-clearance is the one where sides mostly are high but it is post-clearance what is the pressure is. I’m not sure what Melbourne’s was tonight. We value post-clearance pressure. Some sides value pre-clearance a little more but the open field stuff is where you sort of earn your quid. So I’m not too sure - the numbers were both over two tonight so it was a high-pressured game. I’m not sure what the pre- and post- is at the moment.

Q: Looking across the ground, not a lot of weaknesses there at the moment. Forward and back line functioning beautifully. We know what you can do in the midfield. You must be happy with all lines.
A: Guys doing well. (Sam) Weideman and (Ben) Brown are good. There are talls coming for my spots. I have to make sure I keep going well. The rain and the way Luke Jackson and Tom McDonald are playing will keep Sam Weideman out. Harrison Petty is another one straight out of the team. I presume it will be a similar case of our mids playing well.

Q: How good is Jackson’s athleticism? How is it for you going out of the ruck knowing he’s there?
A: I have complete trust in him to play both spots as a tall forward and as a ruck. Luke is doing great
things. He is only young, has played 15 games. He has the best records for 15 games. He will literally do anything you tell him to do. If I tell him to win a ruck contest, he will win a ruck contest 15 games in, you feel as though when he steps in he is completely capable of doing everything you need.

Q: You have done it on your own for so long. That must give you great confidence.
A: It has given me a chance to learn my forward craft. I have always been a ruck who found it quite easy to run backwards and some running patterns going backwards. But the running patterns forward I have tried to work on. This time I have been able to do that with McDonald and others going to the ruck. I’m learning from Weideman. We have talls out there which is fun. We are going at each other at training non-stop.

Q: What about Christian Petracca and his game. Every time you watch him and he is getting better and better and his self-belief going through the roof as well.
A: He was good. His ability through stoppage is super. His maturity, he has grown up, has been able to be an honest midfielder. He works both ways and he has become an eliter, which is what I am proud of.