Senior Coach Chris Fagan is urging both the ALP and LNP to announce their support of The Reserve before the weekend’s Queensland State Election.
Fagan spoke to ABC Brisbane Breakfast’s Craig Zonca in the studio this morning about the Lions' hopes for a new training and administration facility by 2020.
Currently this pre-season the Lions will train at five different venues and some days will travel to three alone in a day.
“Most of the other AFL clubs get to train on their own training ground on a regular basis and if they go somewhere else it’s because they choose to. We don’t really have a choice,” Fagan said.
“We’re at Yeronga at the moment, courtesy of AFL Queensland. We go to Coorparoo after Christmas. We don’t get on the Gabba until the start of the season.
“Our poor old property manager, he’s just packing his van and driving all around the countryside.
“It does make it challenging.”
Fagan is optimistic that both the ALP and LNP will back The Reserve’s funding before Saturday.
“There’s been no public announcement of their support which is something we would very much look forward to,” Fagan said.
“That $15 million we would need to get the project up off the ground would be invaluable to us. Not just for the men’s team, but the women’s team as well.
“The sooner they can get a place they can call home and a stadium in Brisbane you can play AFL football at, which doesn’t rely on the availability of the Gabba, would be sensational to us.”
The full squad trained for the first time at Yeronga this morning, with new recruits Luke Hodge and Charlie Cameron in the mix.
“We approach this pre-season with a lot of confidence,” Fagan said.
“We’ve got a young group who need to build their confidence and belief so we’ll keep working on that. We’ve got a game plan that we think can deliver success. We showed great signs of being able to implement that last year. But there’s a long way to go particularly in terms of team defence and contested ball.”
It’s a big week for the Brisbane Lions. On Friday night they will reveal their No. 1
“We’ve got a number of players we're still debating on. It’s a nice problem to have,” Fagan said.
“The two players that we’re thinking of are two very different players. It’s not as if they’re alike. We just have to decide who we really want to go for.”
