David Mundy has “full confidence” that Fremantle will play finals footy this year.
The Dockers made great progress in their first season under Justin Longmuir in 2020, winning seven of 17 matches which was a better result than many expected.
With the new season fast approaching, midfielder Mundy says there is one point of difference that will see today’s Dockers take another step forward in 2021.
He cites the desire of the club’s younger brigade as one of the key components for potential success.
“I think the big difference with the group we have at the moment to a lot of other groups I’ve had in my time at Fremantle is a real strong individual desire to improve,” he said on Sportsday WA.
“All of the guys we’ve drafted over the last three or four years are of really high character, high football ability and are really self-driven to improve.
“No one has gone away after last season and thought, ‘Oh, how great was that. We improved last year, it will just happen again’.
“It’s a pre-season cliche and I hate saying it, but everyone has come back in really great nick and are really enthused to come back to the group and improve together.
“I have full confidence that no stone will be left unturned from a club perspective, but all the way down to an individual perspective, in a bid to take us back up the ladder and playing finals.”
Many pundits have indicated that there should be cause for concern with Fremantle, who despite being strong defensively, lacked scoring power in that they averaged a tick over 50 points per game last year.
Mundy pointed out how Longmuir and his coaches are attempting to fix the disconnect between the midfield and forward line.
“We’re working really hard on our midfield connection. How we deliver the ball inside forward 50 to our forwards,” he added.
“Matt Taberner and Rory Lobb in particular showed that they have an incredible ability to take contested marks. That’s great but we’d love to get them some really easy ones on the lead where they can go back and convert for us.
“It’s something that we’re working on really hard. We certainly understand that it’s an area of improvement for us and we’re putting in the time there.
“Hopefully with that time comes an improvement that we’re looking for.”
As Mundy enters his 18th season, he still expects to spend most of his time in the midfield even with a group of quality youngsters including Andrew Brayshaw, Adam Cerra and Caleb Serong snapping at his heels.
But he feels with decreased interchange rotations from 90 to 75, we may see a new normal in 2021.
“At the moment I’m training full-time with the mids and doing my midfield minutes there,” he said further.
“I’m really trying to continue to improve, get myself up to scratch and hopefully along the way pass on some knowledge to the younger guys.
“I think what we are going to see moving forward, especially with reduced rotations across the AFL, is that multi-positional players will become the new norm.
“I expect, if I manage to sneak into the Freo best 22, to play midfield minutes but it would be very naive thinking that it will be only midfield minutes.
“Whether that’s a bit of time up forward or out on a wing or at half-back, we’re not too sure yet. We’ll play that as it comes about.
“I certainly think most players in the AFL will be looking at being multi-positional players.”
The Dockers