Patchy Newcastle Eagles struggling for consistency
Nov 30 2010 by Mark Douglas, The Journal
FAB Flournoy admits it feels as if his up-and-down Newcastle Eagles are still in the starting blocks – some three months after they began their BBL title defence.
The Eagles have a two-week breather after enduring another inconsistent spell that saw them knocked out of the BBL Cup by rampant Mersey Tigers before squeezing past struggling Worthing Thunder with an underwhelming display on Friday.
The club believed they had turned a corner of sorts by beating the Tigers at Sport Central before having the stuffing knocked out of them by Drew Sullivan and company at the Echo Arena.
That is the sort of inconsistency that has dogged them all season and Flournoy admits there is real frustration inside the Eagles camp at the way the campaign has gone so far.
“It just feels as if we haven’t got out of the starting blocks yet,” he said.
“That is the feeling I get from the guys and from the supporters too. Normally at this time of year we’re going through some sort of identity crisis which ends with us going through our best spell of the season but this year we’re just trying to get our full squad together and on the court.
“This year began badly with Trey (Moore) not being available and that really meant we were chasing our tails. I’ve been missing for a couple of weeks at the start of the season and now been out for nearly a month – it just disrupts things and you can see that in our results and in our performances too.
“At the moment it is showing that other teams have been together for longer than us. They’re managing to integrate new players into their rosters and that means they’re improving every week. With us, it’s just about getting the players that we want out on the court at the start of games.”
It is true that the Eagles have been hampered by a long injury list – a succession of knocks and niggles following the late arrival of American Moore in the summer.
As well as Flournoy’s injury, Darius Defoe and Joe Chapman have missed weeks – while Aaron Nielsen has had an ankle injury. It has been unhelpful to say the least.
“This team was put together to be bigger than the sum of its parts,” Flournoy explains.
“The idea was that everyone was recruited because they had a specific set of skills that was unique to them.
“That means that really we struggle when we lose any one player because there is no-one who is capable of coming in and directly replacing them.
“Unfortunately we’ve not really had the chance to test out how good the team really is because it’s been very rare that we’ve had all of our players together and on the court this season.
“It’s disappointing but I hope that will change when we come back after this break.”
Meanwhile, Flournoy reckons his return from a knee ligament problem is imminent. The talismanic player-coach is now in advanced rehab.
“I’m not there yet but I’m close,” he said.
“The strain was a medial collateral ligament problem and it ruled me out for a lot longer than I thought I was going to be out for.
“But I’m starting to get out on the basketball court again, starting to move and working through the pain. I’m very close to playing again now.”
