Gunnedah FC coach Andy Cygan has bemoaned the attitude of some of his players following Saturday's losses to South Lightning.
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First and reserve grade both went down in their Tamworth District Football clashes in Gunnedah with reserve grade beaten 4-1 and first grade 2-1 after playing most of the second half a player down.
While disappointed with the results, the main source of Cygan's disappointment was that only 11 of out of 34 players turned up to training on Tuesday night.
"That's not the standard we set," he said, adding that they have a rule that people let let them know if they are not coming. But that didn't happen.
"We just hope that attitudes change sooner rather than later otherwise it will be a long year," he said.
"If people don't train you can't work on things, that's the problem."
There was some confusion as to whether the game was going to be played with Souths, citing a lack of players, trying to cancel the games on Friday morning.
The league initially approved it, Cygan said, but after FC complained the games went ahead.
"We moaned about this and it came back to backfire on us," Cygan said.
"I think too many of us thought Souths were going to come undermanned and short of decent players."
"That wasn't the case. They were strong and deserved their wins."
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Despite the three-goal margin he said reserve grade was a fairly close game.
"We had enough chances in the first half to be winning," he said.
Instead it was 1-all at the break, a couple of sloppy goals in the second half sealing their fate.
"The problem reserves have at the moment is too many players," Cygan said.
It means they are swapping players every 10 minutes to give everyone a run, and aren't able to really settle into a rhythm.
First grade were missing a large chunk of their defence, and didn't really create many chances.
The only real positive was that they hung on for 40 minutes with only 10 men after Duncan Thomson was sent-off after picking up two yellow cards within the first five minutes of the second half.
Cygan said it seemed to fire the team up.
He did pay credit to the Souths keeper, who he said was outstanding in both games.
"We'd heard he was good the week before," he said.
"He probably stopped four or five in second grade."
He said Michael Cooke was "as solid as ever" playing out of position in the defence. Captain Matt Williams also had a strong game.
To Cygan's recollection it is the first time first grade has lost at home in four years, but he did point out that last season they lost their second game of the season and went on to be unbeaten through to the grand final.
They now have a two week break with their next clash against Kootingal Kougars in Tamworth on May 4.