Tweet
ADAM Cooney is scheduled to play 80 per cent game time for the Western Bulldogs in their NAB Cup clash with Geelong at Simonds Stadium on Saturday as the Dogs steadily increase the star's workload in the lead up to the premiership season.
The 2008 Brownlow medallist's knee problems are well-documented and he has been carefully managed this pre-season.
After spending most of the pre-season in rehab, Cooney's pattern has been to play one weekend and rest the next.
The 26-year-old played half of an intra-club practice match before sitting out the NAB Cup opener, then played 59 per cent of the game against Carlton before being rested again last Sunday when the Dogs took on North Melbourne at North Ballarat.
The Bulldogs insist they are simply managing Cooney's workload in preparation for their season opener against West Coast at Etihad Stadium in a fortnight.
"We've upped his training each two-week block," Bulldogs assistant coach Steven King said.
"We were never going to risk him up at North Ballarat on a harder ground. We thought we'd just wait and keep him on AFL grounds and respect his body and respect the position he's in.
"[We'll] give him a full hit-out this week and he's got another week to get over it.
"We'd like to see Adam play at least 80 per cent of the game and hopefully pull up well."
King, the Bulldogs ruck and midfield coach, agreed that promising rookie-listed ruckman Tom Campbell was desperately unlucky to miss selection in the "full dress rehearsal" against the Cats after the 20-year-old kicked 3.3 and took several contested marks up forward against the Kangaroos.
"It's a good headache to have for us as a match committee," King said.
"Tommy got his opportunity last week and delivered. He's been really exciting for us as a group.
"Tommy's still knows he's still got a bit of work to do … He's come a long way over the three or four months over pre-season but he'll get another opportunity down the track for sure."
King said the Dogs were still working out who would partner Minson in the ruck.
"I'm pretty excited about the four young ruckmen we've got here," he said.
"I heard [Sydney Swans coach] John Longmire say the other day that different ruck combinations might work for different weeks.
"All four ruckmen will get a chance during the year … As Tommy showed on the weekend, there's going to be plenty of pressure on all four of them to perform each week, which is a really healthy thing to have.
"We'll try to develop all our ruckmen - we want them all to be able to play key forward …
"If they can do that and [with] the continual improvement you know they'll have as they mature and get older, it's going to give us [selectors] a few headaches, but a really good one to have."
King was also pleased with the increasing depth of the club's midfield.
"We don’t look at personnel and names, we look at the system," he said. "I think that showed last week [in] winning the contested ball by about 30 with a young midfield.
"We were really, really pleased with the young mids like [Mitch] Wallis and [Tom] Liberatore and [Luke] Dahlhaus and [Clay] Smith in there last week …
"Obviously having experience like [Matthew] Boyd and [Daniel] Cross coming back into the team is really healthy as well, but we certainly don’t want to rely on them."
LINK
Comment