{"id":745640,"date":"2026-06-19T01:07:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T01:07:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/745640\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T01:07:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T01:07:11","slug":"kept-their-powder-dry-afl-greats-intriguing-geelong-finals-theory-after-thursday-night-freo-thriller","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/745640\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Kept their powder dry\u2019: AFL greats\u2019 intriguing Geelong finals theory after Thursday night Freo thriller"},"content":{"rendered":"

Is there a chance Geelong didn\u2019t show all its cards in Thursday night\u2019s nine-point loss to Fremantle?<\/a><\/p>\n

That\u2019s the belief of AFL greats Jason Dunstall and Leigh Montagna, who suspect the Cats kept some tactical weapons in reserve for a potential finals rematch with the ladder-leading Dockers.<\/p>\n

Watch every match of every round of the AFL Premiership Season LIVE and ad-break free during play on FOX FOOTY, available on Kayo Sports | New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Chris Scott\u2019s side were extremely valiant in the Round 15 defeat, and did so without star midfielder Bailey Smith who didn\u2019t make the trip across the country through illness. Five-time All-Australian Tom Stewart was also absent as he continues to recover in concussion protocols after a head knock a fortnight ago.<\/p>\n

Additionally, reigning Coleman Medallist Jeremy Cameron was quiet with just six disposals, two marks and two goals as he continues to battle both a hip complaint and forearm issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did speak to him post-game, and he didn\u2019t mention it. I think the bye will come at a good time for him in a general sense,\u201d Scott said of Cameron.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe feedback we\u2019ve got around him is that obviously he\u2019s had this sort of arm injury that, and we have a very conservative approach with these things. If that was really restricting him, or there was any potential for further damage, we wouldn\u2019t be playing him.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven Bailey\u2019s a good example of that, he was sick. Could we have pushed it right to the end? Maybe, but we\u2019re just not in the business of pushing guys to play; especially when it might kind of put them in a hole for a week or two afterwards.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dockers hold on to beat the Cats | 03:07<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if you look at tonight \u2014 and this is far from the reason that we didn\u2019t win the game \u2014 but when the margin\u2019s tight and you\u2019ve got closely matched opposition … you come away and think: \u2018We\u2019re not that far off them\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Caleb) Serong in was really good for them, he played well. And it\u2019s hard not to think that we would\u2019ve liked to have Bailey and Tom Stewart. But, from memory when we played them earlier in the year … there might\u2019ve been one or two others (injured for Freo).<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the secret is to take the game on its merits.\u201d<\/p>\n

Intriguingly, last year\u2019s grand finalists also opted not to tag any of Fremantle\u2019s midfielders, instead going head-to-head with all of Serong, Andrew Brayshaw, Hayden Young, Shai Bolton and second-year star Murphy Reid.<\/p>\n

Scott was instead glass-half-full on the result, while conceding there may have been opportunities to deploy a different matchup strategy.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not that good, that at this stage we\u2019d be holding back things because we \u2018know\u2019 we\u2019re going to get a chance against them,\u201d Scott said.<\/p>\n

Shai Bolton produces MOTY contender! | 00:30<\/p>\n

\u201cThe difference between being way out in front on top of the ladder, and being fourth, is not that great. The advantage you get is a home final, which doesn\u2019t necessarily get it done for you.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe if we get the chance to play them again, I doubt that we would be looking at Round 1 \u2014 that would just be too far away. Again, things change so quickly.<\/p>\n

Dunstall and Montagna weren\u2019t entirely convinced the Cats had shown their full hand, however, given they remain the only side to have defeated Fremantle this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cUndermanned, they gave themselves a chance on the toughest road trip in the game against the best team,\u201d AFL Hall of Fame legend Dunstall said post-match on Fox Footy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI suspect, given what he mentioned about Oisin Mullin and a couple of other match-ups \u2014 visually it didn\u2019t look like there were genuine hard tags tonight, and I think they kept their powder dry in a couple of cases.\u201d<\/p>\n

287-game Saint Leigh Montagna added: \u201cI tend to agree, considering last week they played Gold Coast and almost had three tags going: (Matt) Rowell, Touk Miller and (Christian) Petracca.<\/p>\n

\u201cTonight, to not really have any strong tag … he was quietly confident, wasn\u2019t he? I think he sat back and goes: \u2018Okay, I\u2019ve had a good look at Fremantle … it doesn\u2019t matter if they finish 22-1. If we finish fourth, there\u2019s not much difference coming into a prelim (final).\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

After their Round 16 bye, Geelong host premiers Brisbane in a Thursday night Grand Final rematch at GMHBA Stadium.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Is there a chance Geelong didn\u2019t show all its cards in Thursday night\u2019s nine-point loss to Fremantle? That\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":745641,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-745640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=745640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745640\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/745641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=745640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=745640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=745640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}