By JOHN VAN KLAVEREN
IT WILL be on for young and old when Geelong meets Sydney in a Thursday night game but the long and short of it could decide the outcome.
Sydney’s talls have become a focus as they finally strung a few games together, with Geelong’s defensive stocks taking a hit in the head as Tom Lonergan battles to get back from concussion.
Geelong will try to ensure the midfield is the main battleground rather than the Swans forward line.
With the Cats wearing a uniquely designed jumper for the indigenous round, coach Chris Scott backed his senior players to take the lead again.
“Our senior players in particular love playing against the best, they have a good record against the best, they love the big stage against the best opposition,” Scott said.
And two of the shining lights from last week’s victory over North Melbourne will get the chance to sparkle through the midfield again.
Jimmy Bartel and James Kelly demonstrated again why they are part of the leading senior core in the competition by driving Geelong back to its contested basics.
With the flair of Steve Johnson back fit and refreshed after his week’s holiday, the midfield battle will be on for young and old.
One of the young, George Horlin-Smith, certainly believed the midfield contests will be crucial.
“Tight contest, getting the ball going your way early is really important. We need to make sure that we are clean and hard around the contest,” he said.
One of the older, Mathew Stokes, believed the Cats at or near their best will be able to match Sydney.
“They’ve hit some good form the last couple of weeks and we played probably pretty patchy over the last month, so it’s a really good test for us to see exactly where we’re at. We have the utmost respect for Sydney and what they’ve been able to achieve.
“It’s going to be a tough game but we feel that if we can play somewhere near our best we can be pretty competitive.
“It’s all about improving. I think we took a couple of steps backwards a few weeks ago.
“We spoke about that as a team and we improved on Friday night but we can still get a lot better.”
