Power coach Mark Williams subscribed to the theory that the team was ‘soft’, but not in the way that many commentators or football followers may suggest. Williams said his team needed to work its way through where it’s at right now and the leaders and senior players needed to show the young group the way. Here’s what he said in his post-game media conference.

A month ago we were top of the ladder. The last four weeks has been unacceptable for us. Obviously we’ve played some teams that are really in-form, but the result today was a bit of a disaster for us. People have been talking about us being soft and I think we were. There’s no doubt about the fact that Carlton were a lot harder than us, they wanted the ball more. It took us a fair time to get into the game. Obviously we’ve had more shots on goal, that’s becoming a recurring theme and it doesn’t hold too much water for me.

We’ll have to work hard on the training track. That’s the only thing you can do. You can’t just bring other players in, the ones that come in have to be in good form, otherwise it doesn’t make any sense. We will look to see the performances of those in the SANFL. We want to get a result next week against Essendon.

It was good for us to see Westhoff and Gray do some good things for us, which is exciting for the club moving forward. We had too many passengers, too many players that didn’t pull their weight, and that’s not good enough.

You talk about scoring shots, do you think that was really the difference?

Teams don’t kick 20 goals 5 and I think at one stage that’s what Carlton were. I think we also had about three or four occasions where we went inside-50 with really not much except our decision to kick the goal, and we were trying to pass it. Our decision making was poor. I think when we actually turned over the ball, we didn’t get anything out of it, we just turned it over again. When we caused turnovers we didn’t get much result from it. They certainly made the most of their possessions. Goalkicking would have brought us closer. I think they also kicked goals late in the quarters – that’s a concentration thing as well that you have to be determined to play the whole quarter out. Add those things together and we’re certainly not satisfied.

Are some of your players living on old reputations?

You can always throw those things up. They built reputations on years of consistent footy and right at the moment that’s not there.

What do you do with your captain?

He works as hard as anyone. He’s had no pre-season, which is always a difficult thing for anyone to try and come back from injury. You see Nathan Buckley trying to come back and you see him doing nothing, as far as presenting on the field. Nathan Brown is the same. Everyone cuts them some slack because they’re actually injured, but Tredders is actually up and trying to do the best for the side and that’s what he’s all about. We’re working closely with him. I thought he was actually on a few times tonight and we didn’t kick him the ball, which wasn’t the smartest thing

He moved into the backline at about the 8 minute mark of the first quarter, I think Carlton had kicked a couple of goals. Was that your move or was that his?

A little bit of a leadership thing. We’ve done it in the past. They kicked two or three goals in a row, just trying to hold it up a little bit, get a little bit of breathing space and get hold of the ball, but unfortunately the ball went around him and we really didn’t get anything out of it.

What’s changed the most in the last month?

We spent some time talking about exactly that. It has to be attitude. It can’t be anything else. We’ve had some players who’ve been out of the side, Motlop, and Wilson and Brogan, apart from this week. So if you add it altogether that’s been significant. But if you’re looking for that one thing, you’d have to say attitude.

Is this the greatest challenge for you as a coach to get them up?

We’ve had greatest challenges before and there’ll be greatest challenges in the future. That’s part of the coaching role, something I look forward to doing. At the start of the year we were coming off 12th last year. We’re right smack of a lot of teams right now that are vying for the bottom positions in the eight. We’re probably back to square one having climbed a fairly significant hill at the start of the year, we’ve certainly slid down the other side at the moment.

Your movement forward seems to be so easily broken up and you’re not getting that quick movement that you were. Is that you or what the opposition are now doing to you?

It’s a little bit of both. All teams play a little bit differently. But you can also look at consistent tall marking forwards. If you saw last night’s game (Essendon v West Coast), it was Essendon’s marking forwards that got them out of jail. That was it. They didn’t kick them from nice angles, they kicked them from 55-plus. I’m thinking Lloyd and Lucas and even Laycock had about two kicks and kicked two goals.

They might argue it’s their style, the way they brought the ball in?

We had enough shots on goals. I’m saying they (Essendon) had the ball in their hands from 55 metres out and kicked the goal. That’s what you need to do, you need to get the opportunity to mark the ball inside-50, that’s your first priority, and then obviously finish off the work afterwards. If you’re actually getting the marks inside-50 you’re saying something’s working, so we’re not throwing it all out. We’ll take something out of even the last half. I think if you look at inside-50 and shots on goals, I think they kicked 9 goals straight.

Mark, when people are saying the team’s soft from out side the club that’s one thing, but when you’re saying it internally, what sort of a reaction are you hoping for?

You’ll have to wait and see I suppose. Soft. What is soft really? If it means you’re second to the ball, if it means the ball gets pulled out of your hands, if it means you’re supposed to catch it and you don’t, if it means you’re supposed to tackle, those sorts of things add up. Other observers they’re talking about just jumping out of the way all of the time, well that doesn’t happen very often, so let’s be serious and let’s understand exactly what I’m talking about. Softness can also mean softness in mind and not taking the opportunities when you get the chance. That’s all we can do is set up opportunities but you’ve got to nail them.

Carlton are a good team for a bottom four side, aren’t they?

They’ve been ok. They were in the game against Adelaide and they’ve been going ok. I think Dennis has done a terrific job. He’s got his team working ok.

Where to?

We’re still understanding that we’re trying to develop our side and we’re still trying to learn the game and make good decisions at the right time. Obviously we look forward to our senior players and leaders directing that and leading us out of this place that we’re at the moment.

What’s your aim, where are you hoping to finish from here?

We’re about getting a win. It’s amazing what can happen when you do. This is not something I’m throwing out now, when we were 6 (wins) and 1 (loss) and on top of the ladder I know I said that any team can beat any team in the AFL. I still stand by that.

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