In this week's Game Plan, Swans defensive coach, John Blakey, talks about the come-from-behind win over Hawthorn in Launceston last Sunday and the team's approach ahead of Saturday night's match against Adelaide.
We enjoyed a great win last weekend against the Hawks, but there were plenty of areas to review from a defensive perspective.
We were obviously concerned with our defence in the first half, particularly with Hawthorn’s Jarryd Roughead kicking five goals. In response, we had to change our structures a little to make sure he couldn’t continue on the same way in second half. Ted Richards was doing a good job on Lance Franklin, so it was important to increase the pressure on their forward entries.
That was the big difference in the second half - our mids started getting their hands on it through the midfield which took a bit of heat off our defence.
Another player who player a really important role was Rhyce Shaw. Rhyce took on Cyril Rioli, and managed to keep him quiet. To have Buddy and Cyril only kick one goal between them is something you wouldn’t expect to be able to do against such great players, so both Ted and Rhyce did a terrific job.
Ted has started this year in terrific form. He’s been around for a while and is probably in career-best form at the moment, and it’s just really good to have him and Heath Grundy down back as our two key defender and two steadying influences for us.
Young Alex Johnson has also been able to hold down his position in defence this season. Alex is only in his second year, but he’s been able to play most of the games last year and hasn’t missed game this year. He’s the third tall down back, and he’s been doing his role each week.
The other good thing about Alex is that he can play on the smalls because he’s very quick. Obviously opposition throw around their forward structures quite regularly trying to get the best match, but with Alex down there we’re happy with him being on a tall or a small, which is really handy for us.
We also welcomed back reliable defender Nick Smith in last weekend’s game after a virus sidelined him for two weeks.
Nick played a terrific second half and looked like he hadn’t missed a beat. He’s one of our mainstays in our defence and it was terrific to get him back. He’s in our leadership group and he really gives good direction to the others out there. We expected him to come back and do well and he certainly did that so we’re hoping he can be injury free for the rest of the year.
Looking ahead to Saturday night’s match, face another challenge against an in-form side. Obviously Kurt Tippett and Taylor Walker are their big forwards, and are playing some really good footy at the moment.
In many ways, Adelaide are not dissimilar to Hawthorn, with a very strong midfield and quality key forwards.
We must maintain our pressure standards. We are in the top few sides in the competition when it comes to tackling, but we will need to be at our best against an Adelaide side that has lost only one game for the year.
