We firstly can't afford to have anymore of those one costly 'dead' quarter per game or even "10 minute patches" as Dimma calls them where we go totally to sleep, our intensity drops off and the opposition slam on a bag of goals in a short period.
To beat Carlton we'll need our lesser likes to step up so all is not left to Cotch, Lids and Jack to try and get us across the line. Round 1 this year, despite being outclassed for periods of the game, we were able to stay with Carlton to midway through the last quarter before we ran out of legs with too much left to too few and we got blown away in the final 10 minutes of the match. That's why we'll need a few of our 3-4 year youngsters to have breakout seasons along with our experienced types not falling away so we can spread the workload across our whole 22. In the past Carlton's second tier group have been far superior to ours. While our attention is on their A-graders Judd, Murphy and co., guys like Scotland, Simpson, Robinson & Carrazzo have hurt us big time through the middle of the ground while Waite always has his one-to-two good games per game against us
. Even a giant spud like Hampson got under our guard and kicked 3 goals
.
The second meeting later on the year was a terrible game and so we can't judge anything from that. Both sides had a number of their better players out and second-rate spuds in
and so both did their best to lose the game and we ended up being just a fraction better at it
.
At this stage Carlton will go into the round 1 game as favourites. The only way we'll get respect and prove everyone else wrong is to win.
