Geelong coach Chris Scott is adamant the AFL ladder-leaders won’t be a spent force in September despite their recent form concerns.
Saturday’s 34-point loss to Fremantle continued a lacklustre run of form stretching back to the Cats’ mid-season bye.
Geelong have lost four of their past seven matches and are no guarantee to finish in to the top two despite still holding top spot on percentage.
And their style of play, labelled “boring” by their own skipper Joel Selwood, has become a concern, with opposition teams capitalising on their stagnant ball use.
The Cats host North Melbourne on Saturday night then face Brisbane away and finally Carlton at home, with Scott confident his players can find another gear.
“(It’s) a little bit of a hole, there’s no doubt about that,” Scott told Fox Footy’s AFL360.
“We’d like to be playing better, I’m not trying to sugar-coat that part of it, but we’d prefer to be playing our best footy a little bit later on.
“We’re really confident that we’re working on some things that we’ll see come through in the next couple of weeks, and we’ll be playing good footy when it really counts.”
Club great Jimmy Bartel joined the chorus of commentators questioning the Cats’ slow ball movement after they mustered only 43 inside-50s against the Dockers.
Scott noted that opposition teams were forcing the issue with the way they set up behind the play after getting on top in the midfield.
“I think we’ve played into some teams’ hands to an extent,” he said.
“Probably the Hawthorn game a few weeks ago, the way they defend is really successful against teams that do go slow and they can pin you in the back half a little bit. And we gave them every opportunity to do that.
“But it’s much more multi-faceted than if we play a little bit faster, we’ll be fine.”
Forward Gary Rohan injured his knee against the Dockers and is in doubt to play any of the Cats’ remaining home-and-away games.
“We’ll be careful with him because he’s been important to us, he’s one of the individuals that’s helped change the way we play,” Scott said.
“We’re optimistic it may only be the two (weeks) but if it’s three, he’ll come back and he’ll play a role for us, I’ve got no doubt.”
