The work of Brandon Zerk-Thatcher, a vital component of Port Adelaide’s defensive defense, has been praised by Tyson Goldsack.
Assistant coach Tyson Goldsack of PORT ADELAIDE says he’s been a touch taken aback by how effectively backman Brandon Zerk-Thatcher has fit into the team’s defense following the backman’s impressive performance in Saturday night’s victory over Fremantle.
After 51 games with Essendon, Zerk-Thatcher was sold to Port Adelaide in an attempt to return to his home state of South Australia.
This season, the 25-year-old has been given some major assignments, including as stopping Richmond’s Tom Lynch in Round 2 at the MCG.
With another trip to Melbourne this week to take on Collingwood, Goldsack has demonstrated how much his teammates now trust Zerk-Thatcher.
During a Monday press conference, Goldsack also talked about the likelihood that Travis Boak would be able to rejoin the team and why the Power is excited about the challenge of taking on the defending premiers at the ‘G.
Tyson Goldsack on the initial review of the performance against Fremantle:
“There was a lot to like, but there’s areas where we probably fell down, you know, strengths of ours would be our midfield players and the way they can win the ball and explode out and the credit has to go to Fremantle on the way that they were around the ball. Their contested numbers were huge, their stoppage numbers were huge, but then we managed to find a way to stay in the game and then come over the top.
“A pretty strong message coming through to the players from us is that we did find a way and we did it in a way that wasn’t chaotic. In the last seven minutes it was still in our structure, you know, we still fought our battles well, we still turned up with the contest and we started getting the ball moving. There were a couple of big plays by Charlie (Dixon) and then Jason Horne-Francis the next one, so that was important.”
Tyson Goldsack on Jason Horne-Francis’ composure to kick the winning goal under immense pressure:
“To take the moment for what it was and take his time and have the composure to want to take seconds off the clock… to be in that state of mind at that time again was huge for him. He did everything right. He looked very calm at the time though inside he said he wasn’t, but from our point of view, he stood up in the moment, he wanted that moment, so he put himself in the goal square and put himself in the position to take the mark first and compete for that and then finish his work. It was huge.”
Tyson Goldsack on Brandon Zerk-Thatcher’s start to his time at Port Adelaide:
“He’s been huge. And it’s those moments, the one-on-one moments, where, if you lose that contest, then they’re out, and they’re getting that territory game that we know we like to take away from teams. But he’s been a beacon for us down back and others can play off him knowing that he’s just going to get his job done when he’s in that contest. He’s surprised me a little bit but he’s getting some pretty good assistance around him as well. The way we structure up behind the ball with the flexibility to have different guys do different roles, I think helps that out.”
Tyson Goldsack on what he has made of Collingwood’s start to the season and whether Willem Drew will lock down on the impressive Nick Daicos:
“They are quality side. They had some big games early, you know, so it’s not as if they have played teams that aren’t going to be there at the end of the season, they’ve played some kind of highly ranked teams and didn’t get over the top of them. But now they seem to be coming into form and playing, not exactly the same way they did last year, so there’s going to be a different team from what we were up against last year. We’ll go through them in detail, we’ll start that today a little bit of opposition analysis and then move on through the week.
“Drewy has been known to be given a role. He spent some time with (Hayden) Young on the weekend because he was getting away from us a little bit, so if there’s a job that needs to be done, Drewy is probably the one that we’ll turn to to do it. But like I said, we haven’t really gone into that much depth on Collingwood yet. We’ll do that over the next two days.”
Tyson Goldsack on whether taking on Collingwood at the MCG is a game the side looks forward to:
“Yeah, it is – for two reasons. We want to play well on the ‘G – we had Richmond earlier in the year and we dealt with them pretty well on the bigger oval compared to Adelaide (Oval), so just kind of getting used to those surroundings over there because that’s where you need to play good footy. We know that come finals time Collingwood are going to be there abouts again. It’s funny how the calendars work where we’ve played Essendon who are really offensive then we’ve gone Fremantle (who are) quite defensive and then Collingwood who can attack at a quick rate – so we’re getting these challenges week to week and Collingwood away is about as big as it gets.”
Tyson Goldsack on losing Miles Bergman from the backline to allow him to play on the wing:
“If he’s taking marks before it gets to our backline, I’m very happy. I’m just as happy. But he had a great game. He’s been doing a mountain of work but you don’t often get to see, especially if you’re watching on broadcast. His work off the ball to support the backs is huge. So he’s getting a little bit of reward now for all the hard work he’s doing.”
Tyson Goldsack on Travis Boak’s prospects of returning after a week off with a sore back:
“From what I’ve seen so far, I think it’s too early in the week to make a call one way or the other, but I think he’s recovering well, and we’ll wait to see – we’ve got our main session on Wednesday – so we’ll see how he trains there and he’ll either put his hand up to play or he won’t be right and we’ll make our team selection from there.”
