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‘The next moment is the most important’ for dominant Fremantle Dockers
🇦🇺 Australia /Economy & Trade

‘The next moment is the most important’ for dominant Fremantle Dockers

From ABC Australia · () English

Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

News Named sources Ongoing story
  • Fremantle won 19 of 23 home-and-away games to claim the AFL minor premiership, putting it three wins from its first premiership.
  • Coach Justin Longmuir said players should focus on winning each moment, beginning with Thursday’s qualifying final against Hawthorn at Perth Stadium.
  • Fremantle expects several players to return but will miss defender Brennan Cox, while Hawthorn is close to full strength.

Fremantle has produced the best home-and-away season in club history, but coach Justin Longmuir is refusing to let the prospect of a first AFL premiership pull his players beyond Thursday night.

The Dockers won 19 of 23 games and secured the minor premiership, earning a home qualifying final against Hawthorn at Perth Stadium. Three wins would take Fremantle to the club’s first premiership, a prospect that has excited supporters after only one previous grand-final appearance since the club entered the AFL in 1995.

The way to win premierships is to win games of footy, and you win games of footy by winning more moments than the opposition.

— Justin LongmuirThe Fremantle coach explained why his team must focus on each stage of the qualifying final.

Longmuir said every player understood what was at stake, but the team needed to turn that pressure into concentration rather than distraction. “The way to win premierships is to win games of footy, and you win games of footy by winning more moments than the opposition,” he said. “We’ve just got to make sure that we give our best to each moment, and the next moment is the most important one.”

We’ve just got to make sure that we give our best to each moment, and the next moment is the most important one.

— Justin LongmuirLongmuir urged players to stay focused on the immediate task rather than the premiership.

The coach also wants a faster start than the team produced in its previous meeting with Hawthorn. Fremantle relied on a late home-crowd rally, known as “Wharfie Time”, to recover and win that game, but Longmuir said supporters could not carry the team unless it played well from the outset.

Defender Brennan Cox will miss the match through injury. Murphy Reid, Jye Amiss, Heath Chapman and retiring player Sam Switkowski are expected to return, while Hawthorn has almost its full squad available.

They’re not going to get us over the line if we’re not playing good footy, so we’ve got to give them something to cheer for, and it needs to be from the start.

— Justin LongmuirHe said Fremantle could not rely solely on its home crowd against Hawthorn.
About this summary

Originally published by ABC Australia in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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