Cats look to taggers for Eagles

Hamish Heard
A bouyant Geelong will go into Sunday’s homeground clash against reigning AFL premier West Coast brimming with confidence after last weekend’s 157point thrashing of Richmond.
The Cats will hope to avenge last year’s devastating round10 loss to the Eagles in which Geelong conceded a 54point lead in the third quarter to lose in front of a home crowd.
Coach Mark Thompson said his side was looking forward to testing itself against the ladder leader.
“It’s great that we’re playing a side that everyone respects and that the players totally respect,” Thompson said.
He revealed the Cats would use a tagging strategy to tame champion Eagles Chris Judd and Daniel Kerr.
“Maybe it’s up to a couple of guys to go through them and share the time on them as a pair because they’re such great players,” Thompson said.
“Daniel Kerr played such an awesome game this time last year and almost won it for them off his own leg.”
But the Cats will have to shut down the star duo without the assistance of arguably the team’s best player, Paul Chapman, who has been ruled out of contention with a hamstring injury.
“(Chapman) is one of our best players and he’s been playing some very good footy on the ball, so we’re going to miss him,” Thompson said.
Round six signalled a remarkable turnaround for the Cats after bookies named Thompson shortpriced favourite to be the next coach sacked following a humiliating defeat at the paws of the Kangaroos the week earlier.
The 35goal haul against Richmond featured 15 Cats puting the ball between the big sticks at least once and nine multiple goal kickers.
Geelong demonstrated its depth with excellent performances from Gary and Nathan Ablett, Joel Corey, Andrew Mackie, Cameron Ling, Jimmy Bartel, Cameron Mooney, Matthew Scarlett, Darren Milburn and Chapman.