A LESSON LEARNT

SUNS VOW TO RISE AGAIN:

IN the moments directly after Gold Coast’s 49-point QClash loss to Brisbane, Brayden Fiorini warned his fellow Suns leaders not to allow their AFL season to fall apart the way it did in 2018.

Gold Coast are 3-3 but after two horror losses, memories of last year’s promising start and the nightmare that followed have come flooding back.

The Suns boasted the same record last season before losing 11 straight. Fiorini is acutely aware if the team is to take steps forward this season, it has to arrest form slumps quicker.

“Last year we started really well and then fell off,” the midfielder said. “We have spoken about that. I brought it up (on Saturday) and said we can’t allow it to happen.

“We fell off badly (last year) so we can’t afford the two bad weeks to go into three, to go into four. We need to get back to training hard and getting it back on our terms.”

Gold Coast face an almighty task to turn things around, with a trip across the country to take on premiers West Coast this Saturday.

West Coast have lost to Brisbane away and Port Adelaide at home already this season and Fiorini believed the Suns could take them.

“They are a really good side

but still getting into the swing of things,” Fiorini said. “We saw Port beat them over there (in WA). We are 100 per cent confident if we play our brand of footy and start at the contest we will be in the game.”

Fiorini agreed with coach Stuart Dew in saying the team’s mental preparation for the QClash had to be called into question.

“We just went away from what we were doing in the first few weeks, which was our tackle pressure, our contest,” Fiorini said.

“It’s not a crisis, there are still a lot of games left but we have had two bad games in a row now so it wasn’t a fluke.

“We do need to question our own preparation and focus on that throughout the week, train really hard and get back to having an edge at training and focus on the contest.”