Orvis injury adds to Coutas’ pain in 47-point belting
QUEENSCLIFF star Nik Orvis looks set to spend time on the sidelines with a knee injury as the Coutas count the cost of Saturday’s 47-point loss to Drysdale.
In a horror result, Orvis was among a host of injuries to hit Queenscliff as it was belted on its home turf.
“Everything went wrong,” first-year coach Steve Clark lamented.
“We just didn’t use the ball well at all. Our skill level was well down on what it had been (in the pre-season). But Drysdale’s pressure was really good around the contest, they tackled well, but even when we were out 20m on our own we just gave the ball back to them.
“We’d have someone 20m in the clear, yet we’d kick it straight back to them and they would counter-attack. When you’ve got your own running patterns right and you give up an easy turnover, you’re often caught out of position and that’s what happened to us quite a bit.
“Losing Nik Orvis before quarter time and then (Michael) Randone hurt. We’d lost both ruckmen and that didn’t help.”
Randone suffered a corked shin and hurt his ankle, while Orvis injured his knee.
“Nik will have scans on that,” Clark said.
“He’s had knee problems in the past and he just needs to get looked after, but what happened on Saturday was a different incident and his knee has swollen up and they (medical staff) are not really sure what’s wrong.
“I don’t think it’s an ACL, he certainly doesn’t think it is, but there was quite a bit of swelling and he couldn’t come back on the ground.”
Jake Hedley was also injured before half-time, but with a lack of rotations, he pushed through the pain in short bursts to assist Clark.
“He showed plenty of courage and had a five-minute cameo appearances to give someone a rest, but in the end we were out on our feet,” Clark said.
“We had a lot of blokes who just didn’t win their position and the skill level was uncharacteristically down.”
But Clark refused to blame injury or unavailability for his side’s performance.
“The squad we had was more than capable,” he said.
“There were seven new blokes in the side, and they’re playing a different game style, but we just made too many mistakes.
“We’d been sharp with our skills leading up, but (on Saturday) you had to see it to believe it. And that’s not taking anything away from Drysdale, they were just too good.”