Crocker says the Friday night game will be particularly difficult following a tough road trip to Brisbane and after Carlton suffered a heavy defeat at the hands of Collingwood.
“I’ve already mentioned to the players that recovery is going to be really important,” Crocker said.
“It’s Friday night football so our guys should look forward to that once we get over the disappointment of tonight.”
Crocker says the players would not have been distracted leading into the Gabba clash, knowing they had just six days rest before a Friday night TV game.
“It wouldn’t have been in their minds at all,” Crocker said.
“We knew that we had a task right in front of our noses coming up here. I thought the build up was good and strong and unfortunately we couldn’t execute.”
The Kangaroos dominated on the stats sheet, winning the disposals (423 to 373) marks (121 to 118) and centre clearances (19 to 11).
Crocker says the stats are misleading as many of the touches were inefficient.
“All our indicators would suggest that we should have been right in the game a hell of a lot more than a 40-point loss,” Crocker said.
“I think a lot of those possessions didn’t take us in the direction we wanted to.
“We fell in the trap of over-possessing the footy just for the sake of it and didn’t play the brand of football that we know will take this club forward.”
Crocker paid tribute to Jonathan Brown’s eight-goal haul and to the silver service he received from the likes of Justin Sherman, Simon Black and Luke Power.
“They’re (the Lions) well structured, their setups around the stoppages were very good and allowed them to take the ball from stoppages cleanly and quickly into their forward line.”
But Crocker believes it was the Lions ability to get back in numbers which was the main difference between the two sides.
The prime example was key forward David Hale who was swamped by the likes of Daniel Merrett and Joel Patfull, registering just two disposals, one mark and a kick out of bounds for the game.
“David really battled with the extra numbers that Brisbane were getting back in support but in saying that David by his own admission would come away and say that was a poor game from him,” Crocker said.
Crocker described the loss to the Lions not as a step back, but as a valuable learning curve against a side which created pressure across the ground, particularly down back.
