LIONS coach Leigh Matthews says he’s on the hunt for crumbing forwards to bolster his side’s attack after their 16-point loss to West Coast at Subiaco Oval.
Matthews was left lamenting a slow start by the Lions which saw them trailing the Eagles by 37 points in the first quarter before storming home to almost pinch the match.
West Coast dominated the clearances in the first quarter and had superior firepower up front through small forwards David Wirrpanda and Beau Waters who kicked two goals each.
Jonathan Brown played a lone hand early on for the Lions, kicking all four of Brisbane’s first half goals, finishing with six for the game.
Daniel Bradshaw, returning after missing all of the 2007 season through injury, helped drive the Lions’ second-half revival with three third quarter goals.
Despite Brown and Bradshaw combining for nine goals, Matthews said the Lions' forward line lacked potency at ground level.
“We were a bit too dependent on our marking forwards, we’re just not getting enough ground level ball in our forward 50.
“Brown’s kicked six and one of them was a snap but most of them were from marks and Bradshaw the same. We just need to get more guys who can actually sniff out a chance or two and finish when it’s their turn at ground level.”
Matthews paid credit to his team for bouncing back after a sluggish start.
“The game is played for 120 minutes,” Matthews said. “We had our good minutes and they had their good minutes but they had a bit more of them, that’s all.”
“I guess we worked hard to get back in the lead after having the bad first quarter but they were just a bit strong in the end.
“I didn’t think we made major adjustments (at quarter time), I think we just started to play a bit better and we started to win the ball. We were certainly getting really badly beaten in the clearances and the stoppages - we got badly beaten there over the whole night – but we did better than we did early.”
The Lions hit the front for the first time late in the third quarter and Matthews said he felt they had the Eagles' measure.
“At that stage we did, yeah, we were in the ascendancy at that point. They put Wirrpanda back in defence and that gave them the extra guy back there, that may have been significant,” Matthews said.
Matthews said the club had already turned its attention to the shortened preparation for next Friday’s clash against Collingwood at the Gabba.
“It’s a challenge but if you do everything right then we’ll come up OK in six days time,” Matthews said.
“But you won’t be able to be sloppy in your preparation protocols and your rehydration and you wouldn’t even think about looking at a bit of alcohol for instance.
“Certainly each player has to make sure he has a deluxe recovery and if that’s done we’ll come up fine on Friday night.”
Brown received attention from the trainers just on half time after appearing to jar his leg when landing in a marking contest, but Matthews said he knew nothing of an injury to his key forward.
Jed Adcock, who sat out the latter stages of the match on the bench after receiving a knock in the first term, looks to have some extra time in the physio room ahead of him however.
"He got a knock on the leg, he’s very sore so I’m not exactly sure what it is but it’s not a joint, it’s a knock on his leg," Matthews said.
