After a loss, and with a few of the Carlton forwards kicking goals, we were looking for a really solid effort from our whole defensive group against the Bulldogs in Canberra last week. I think we achieved that and I thought most of our players won their position and beat their man.

Ted Richards has been particularly consistent this year and it is great to have him available this week after being cleared by the tribunal. He has become a really important player in our defence. He can play on the really tall players and even the resting ruckman, but is also good enough to play on those in between forwards who are quick. I think he’s done a really good job, especially without Lewis Roberts-Thomson all year.  Ted and Heath have done the job on the opposition talls, which is a good effort because they don’t get much of a rest off the ground.

Alex Johnson was another player who really impressed us against the Bulldogs. He has been great since making his debut over in Perth where he had a bit of a nervous start, as you do in your first game. Even when the game was up for grabs in the last quarter there, he had some really good one-on-one efforts. He can play big minutes and is very quick and competitive. Going through his tape the other day, he had numerous spoils in one-on-one situations which are really important to the team.

This week we take on my former Club, Port Adelaide. Football has changed a lot since I was running around for Port, so I certainly don’t take too much of an advantage into this Saturday night’s match, other than a good understanding of a few of the players that are still there.

If you look at last week’s game when Hawthorn probably didn’t start as well as they would have liked, Port really jumped them and the Hawks found themselves behind for the first three quarters. They definitely showed that night that they have some quality players and they also beat the Crows a few weeks ago in a big game over in Adelaide. They’ve still got a fair bit of experience mixed in among some good young kids, and we know that if we take them easily, they will knock us over.

Looking at last week’s game I thought Port were really good inside in their midfield against Hawthorn who have a strong mids group. They’ve got a lot of marking power up forward too, so we really need to put a lot of pressure on that ball that is coming in because they’ve got talls who can clunk a mark, along with players like Brett Ebert and Robbie Gray - who for smaller guys, have great hands, along with really good goal sense.

When he is on song, Daniel Motlop is one of the game’s most dangerous small forwards. After an uncharacteristic night against Carlton a few weeks back, Nick Smith really bounced back last week against the Bulldogs. He is one player we could possibly look to play on Daniel, depending on where he plays. Nick has shown that he can play one-on-one out of the goal square, or higher up on the half back flank. We’ll need to have a few options, as Port do shuffle their forwards around a bit.  One of the strengths this year of our back six has been their ability to change match ups within the game, without the message even having to be sent out, so I’m looking forward to them taking care of that again.

Lewis Roberts-Thomson has played a few strong weeks in the Reserves and will make his return to senior footy on Saturday night after missing our last 15 matches.  Guys like Teddy and Heath in defence are what we can call ‘tall-smalls’ who aren’t that tall, but capable of playing on bigger forwards. LRT is someone who is a genuine match up for a stand-out tall forward, and having his experience back out on the SCG will be really valuable.

First and foremost as a defence, we will continue to work on beating our direct opponent. We don’t want to be giving sides a lot of space or easy ball and we want to make it as hard as possible for opposition forwards. If our back six can all tick that off, we effectively beat the forward unit.

We don’t like losing games on our home ground and after two losses at the SCG to start the season, I’m confident our defence, and the rest of our group, are ready for a big performance this week against Port.