By JOHN VAN KLAVEREN
GEELONG could easily have been in Carlton’s position and fighting for its first win, Cats coach Chris Scott has conceded.
“We’re not sticking our head in the sand,” he said at a press conference this week.
“We’re aware that (slow starts) cost us at times last year and could have very easily cost us again this year.
“We’re as good a chance to 0-2 as we are to be 2-0, so we’re aware of it.”
But Scott was adamant the coaching staff knew what to do to “fix it”.
“I don’t think there are huge fundamental flaws in what we are trying to implement.
“There are some intangibles we need to be across but we’re going to focus more on the tangible things, the difference between when we fought our way back into the game as opposed to when it got away from us early on.
“We don’t talk about those things publicly but we’re really confident we’ll be able to fix those for this week.”
Scott said Geelong’s overall game plan would be tweaked for the match against Carlton at Etihad Stadium on Saturday night.
“If we go in with similar plans to the way we’re going to start the game this week we’d expect the change to be that we implement them better,” he said.
“There are a number of plans we can implement, slight adjustments on the overall game plan, but which one we choose is not going to be as big a factor as the way we implement it.
“We’ve been through and we’ll continue to go through some specific parts of the game when we’ve played poorly and we expect to improve every single week we play and I’m confident that’ll happen this week.
“It’s a combination of a lot of things but whichever way we collectively decide to play we’ve got to make sure that we do that well.”
Scott said he was excited forward Daniel Menzel would return in the VFL game against Sandringham at Simonds Stadium on Sunday.
Menzel will be joined by Josh Hunt, recovering from glandular fever, and Cameron Guthrie, who has overcome a calf injury.
Scott said Menzel would spend “a few weeks” in the VFL, initially playing limited game time.
“It’s just about getting out and playing some footy again. We’ll tick off the performance markers as the weeks go by but we’re still confident he’ll play pretty well,” Scott said.
“He’s been through a hell of a lot. It’s testament to work he’s done that everyone is so excited about what he can bring to our team when he does eventually force his way back into the AFL system.
“It’s easy to forget in the finals in 2011 he kicked six or seven goals in five quarters of footy against two of the best teams in the competition.”
Scott said expert medical opinion believed Menzel could return to his former playing level.
