From the Coburg Moreland Leader...
Rookies put to test.
By Brad Bishop
The VFL club aligned with one of Paul Spargo's
former AFL teams gave Coburg's new coach a
tough initiation.
In a game to forget, Port Melbourne handed the
Tigers a thumping in their first practice match
of 2003. No official score was kept but the
domination was obvious.
The Borough made the most of the availability of
handfuls of the Kangaroos' AFL players, the side
with which they are aligned this year, to
comfortably defeat the Coburg outfit consisting
mainly of VFL rookies.
"We got beaten fairly easily but they had 14 AFL
listed players and we only had one Richmond guy,"
Spargo said.
"I tuink we had 12 guys that had their first taste
of VFL footy so you've got to put the result into
perspective."
Spargo said winners were hard to find for his team
but he expected to see much improvement before the
start of the season on April 5.
"It's only the first practice game and there's a
long year ahead of us so there's plenty of
improvement on that," he said.
With much the same list as the one that took the
Tigers to third place last year, Spargo said the
Tigers would be relying heavily on the development
of their youngsters to climb those extra two spots
in 2003.
"There are no real big-name recruits," he said.
"We're really just basing our season on hoping
that the younger guys that were blooded last
year can take the next step.
"We've kept the core group that we had last year
and getting those (young) guys to develop a bit
more from last year is the key.
"Guys like Eric Kuret, Brad Rayson, Andrew Maggiore
and Warren Carlyle. Those type of guys are the ones
we're looking at."
Spargo said the Tigers, who will retain the services
of Kristian De Pasquale, Garth Taylor and Simon Hart
despite that trio being left off Ricgmond's rookie
list, where keen to capitalise on last year's
hard work.
Rookies put to test.
By Brad Bishop
The VFL club aligned with one of Paul Spargo's
former AFL teams gave Coburg's new coach a
tough initiation.
In a game to forget, Port Melbourne handed the
Tigers a thumping in their first practice match
of 2003. No official score was kept but the
domination was obvious.
The Borough made the most of the availability of
handfuls of the Kangaroos' AFL players, the side
with which they are aligned this year, to
comfortably defeat the Coburg outfit consisting
mainly of VFL rookies.
"We got beaten fairly easily but they had 14 AFL
listed players and we only had one Richmond guy,"
Spargo said.
"I tuink we had 12 guys that had their first taste
of VFL footy so you've got to put the result into
perspective."
Spargo said winners were hard to find for his team
but he expected to see much improvement before the
start of the season on April 5.
"It's only the first practice game and there's a
long year ahead of us so there's plenty of
improvement on that," he said.
With much the same list as the one that took the
Tigers to third place last year, Spargo said the
Tigers would be relying heavily on the development
of their youngsters to climb those extra two spots
in 2003.
"There are no real big-name recruits," he said.
"We're really just basing our season on hoping
that the younger guys that were blooded last
year can take the next step.
"We've kept the core group that we had last year
and getting those (young) guys to develop a bit
more from last year is the key.
"Guys like Eric Kuret, Brad Rayson, Andrew Maggiore
and Warren Carlyle. Those type of guys are the ones
we're looking at."
Spargo said the Tigers, who will retain the services
of Kristian De Pasquale, Garth Taylor and Simon Hart
despite that trio being left off Ricgmond's rookie
list, where keen to capitalise on last year's
hard work.
