Cats fit and fired up
Players hailed for hard work away from training track
GEELONG will enter the next phase of its preseason campaign with one of its healthiest lists in recent memory.
The bulk of what would be close to Geelong’s best 22 returned from the Christmas break fit and in superb shape yesterday, with key defender Lachie Henderson the only notable absentee due to injury.
Assistant coach Nigel Lappin sung the praises of the playing group for their work rate in their holidays, saying it was a promising sign that so many had turned up to day one of the new year ready to tackle the challenges of an intense period of training.
“A lot of the players have done a fair bit over the break and had organised a few sessions where they got together, the guys that were around Geelong, so they’ve handled the footy a fair bit,” Lappin said.
“We give them a couple of weeks and wanted to give them a slightly longer break this year, and when you treat them like athletes they behave like adults, so they’ve put the work in and come back in really good condition.
“We’re ready to build into February and March where it will be quite a solid block for us when we get ourselves game ready.
“But the important thing for us is that the last couple of preseasons we haven’t had large numbers on the track, and this year one of the focuses for us is, while we want to make sure that we’re working hard enough and improving, we want to make sure we get some continuity into players that need it.
“We feel like we’ll get a lot more benefit from that if we have all of the guys training together.”
Henderson is expected to be back in full training by February as he continues to recover from the minor knee surgery he underwent in December.
Lappin said the swingman had endured a frustrating summer but was doing all the right things to make sure he was right to go by Round 1.
“He is going OK. He’s had a couple of minor hiccups which he is getting on top of and with a little bit of luck we’ll see Hendo out there in the back end of February,” he said.
“It hasn’t been an ideal preparation for him but the one thing we know about Hendo is he is extremely professional and we’ll back our medical staff to make sure they get him right, and he will be doing everything he can to get right.”