News

From The Mercury
Reported by Brett Stubbs

THE Devils are looking to shore up their defence after conceding at least 30 scoring shots in their past two losing games.

Key defenders Tom Collier and Gregg Sharman have been brought back into the teams, just two of nine new names in the 27-man squad to play Frankston tomorrow night under lights at Aurora Stadium.

Other significant inclusions include former Collingwood player Luke Shackleton, Kangaroos-listed Ben Ross after recovering from a shoulder injury, and Sam Whish-Wilson, who has served his one-match suspension for breaking team rules.

But co-captain Brett Geappen and veteran defender Ben Careless both have to pass fitness tests at training tonight to take their place in the team.

Kingborough's Jason Howard is expected to miss just the one week with bruised ribs, inside midfielder Leigh Adams has been promoted to the Kangaroos AFL team from their rookie list and Brody Johnson and Darren Crawford have been dropped.

Despite the consecutive losses, highlighted by last quarter fade outs, Cresswell said his 11th-placed side was not far away.

"We played some really good attacking footy against North Ballarat, just gave away too many free kicks in front of goal and silly errors with the footy which cost us goals ultimately," Cresswell said.

"We went through them (on video) to show the players the goals we gave away we could have prevented. They were quite shocked at how many easy goals we gave them. We could have been four or five goals up but we gave up too many easy goals."

Stand-alone club Frankston (9th) does not have much AFL experience but does contain a potent forward line including 205cm veteran Daniel Clarke and small forward Justin Berry.