SHARING THE LOVE

Gold Coast coach confirms lending players to rival for practice

GOLD Coast coach Stuart Dew says his club loaning players to West Coast for a Saturday scratch match is just part of doing business in a bizarre COVID-19 world.

He confirmed yesterday Eagles and Suns fringe players contested a practice match before his team’s brilliant victory over 2018 premiers West Coast on Saturday night.

Suns players were rotated on to the West Coast side to ensure the teams had enough players for a legitimate threequarter contest.

“I touched base with Simmo (West Coast coach Adam Simpson) and he said they had roughly 13 and we had 19,” Dew explained

“We could have had 13 v 13 or make it 15 or 16 and make it a little bit more realistic.

“We spoke to our players and said, ‘Look, we are going to play three quarters so let’s do a bit of a roster system’, and we talked to the other coaches and West Coast about where their gaps were and we were able to fill them and importantly for our guys and even Simmo to play against another AFL team in this environment.

“For the players not playing AFL to get the competitive outlet was great even our boys playing for them.”

Dew said his team was all about writing new history for a franchise that has so far only endured failure.

Matt Rowell roared into short-priced favouritism for the Rising Star. The 18-yearold kicked his first two AFL goals, racked up 26 possessions, 14 of which were contested, and stood tall when challenged physically by Eagles stars such as Elliot Yeo and Luke Shuey.

It was a display that drew praise from Geelong captain Joel Selwood, who tweeted: “Going to enjoy watching Rowell for the next 15 years”.

“We’re not surprised,” Dew said of Rowell’s performance.

“I’ll get sick of saying it, but we love that we’ve got him.”

Such is Dew’s confidence in Rowell he was happy to use him as the replacement for suspended co-captain David Swallow at the opening bounce.

“It wasn’t a gesture to get him into the game, we thought he could influence from the start.”

Dew told Channel 9 muchhyped youngster Izak Rankine was still some weeks away from an AFL debut to protect his fragile body.