Lions winger Jaspa Fletcher is adamant Brisbane will not be “surprised” by the GWS Giants for a second time this season in Saturday’s Gabba showdown.
Both teams are in top form going into the competition: the Lions are aiming for their tenth win in a row, the Giants are aiming for their sixth win in a row.
For the Lions, it is a turnaround that had practically already begun after they were crushed by the Giants by 54 points in Canberra on April 25.
Since then, Brisbane has lost only one of 13 games and is still storming into the championship ranks.
“Yeah, it’s never great to lose, but to get beaten like that… we were pretty slow that night,” Fletcher said Friday.
“It’s not great, but for us it’s probably the turning point of our season. We had a pretty tough review after that and got back into the swing of things after that, so we’re looking forward to (Saturday).”
Fletcher said defence was key for Brisbane to get revenge on a Giants side that could hurt their opponents in a heartbeat.
“They move the ball pretty well and are pretty fast too, so they can surprise you,” he said.
“They’ve done it to a lot of teams this year. They did it to us early in the season. So once they get the ball moving, they’re pretty hard to stop. So for us, it’s all about our defense.”
Fletcher, 20, admitted his form has had its ups and downs this season but he has started to regain his confidence.
“I’m going to start attacking the game more,” he said.
“‘Fages’ (Brisbane coach Chris Fagan) has placed a lot of emphasis this year on taking advantage of the moments and not worrying too much about the result.
“Obviously things weren’t going so well for us at the beginning, so we’re trying to get back to the mantra of playing every moment and every quarter and not worrying about the result.”
Fletcher supported the decision to give striker Eric Hipwood a second week off to recover from groin pain.
“He’s been closely involved with the physios over the last few weeks and the way his body feels, it’s probably the right decision to give him a little more rest and see if we can get him fit again for the end of the season,” he said of Hipwood.
The Lions have made one change to the 23-man squad that thrashed St Kilda 85 points last Sunday: defender Darragh Joyce returns from a broken jaw to replace Bruce Reville, who is suffering from a “stress reaction” in his fibula.
