Josh Caddy fills Joel Selwood's breach to get Cats home

GEELONG 3.4  4.8  8.10  10.12 (72)
WESTERN BULLDOGS 2.2  3.4  6.10  9.10 (64)
Goals: Geelong: S Motlop 3 T Hawkins 3 C Gregson J Caddy J Walker M Duncan. Western Bulldogs: T Dickson 3 M Wallis 2 J Grant J Redpath J Stringer L Dahlhaus
BEST: Geelong: Caddy, Duncan, Motlop, Kelly, Lonergan, Blicavs, Taylor. Western Bulldogs: Dahlhaus, Wallis, Macrae, Dickson, Johannisen, Picken.
Umpires: Chris Donlon, Ben Ryan, Ray Chamberlain.
Official Crowd: 25,041 at Simonds Stadium.

Josh Caddy reckons he doesn't pay much heed to media musings, but one thread hadn't escaped him when it came to Geelong's midfield muddles of 2015. "Who else is there apart from Joel?"

A contest Caddy readily admitted wasn't pretty ("probably a shocking game to watch" was his sober assessment) delivered a vital win over the Western Bulldogs, and in the eyes of the beaten coach, an answer to please the Cats.

Western Bulldogs captain Robert Murphy assesses his options. Photo: Getty Images

"Josh Caddy played like Joel Selwood," Luke Beveridge observed after Caddy turned in a 37-possession game that topped his previous high by nine. He marked himself hard for turning the ball over amid the manic pressure, but 23 hard-won touches was a mark to do his absent captain proud.

He'd spoken with Mark Blicavs and Cam Guthrie during the week about the need to step up - "no point worrying about not having him, it was just time to get the job done". Against a young on-ball group hard beyond their years in which Luke Dahlhaus and Mitch Wallis were standouts, Caddy was ably assisted by Mitch Duncan's super-smooth return from 10 weeks on the sidelines.

The Cats had lost three of four games at Simonds Stadium this season, so began under the cloud of uncommon fragility at their previously rock-solid home. The Dogs kept them on their toes until the very end, but a game that will do nothing to silence calls for radical overhaul in search of more aesthetically appealing footy always seemed in Geelong's keeping.

Four goals to three at half-time was a dreary scoreline, and where beauty was sought there were only quirks. In the Bulldogs' seven-man forward line the most striking match-up was Jake Stringer on Jake Kolodjashnij, a two Jakes pairing to please Jack Nicholson but raise eyebrows at the junior in an experienced Cats defence getting the job on the Bulldogs' most dangerous forward.

Other than a barnstorming Stringer goal in a tit-for-tat last term, the Cats second-gamer held his own.

At the other end, the Bulldogs half-backline springboard struggled to impose itself early as James Kelly, the first of several Cats to play "spare" on a wing, made hay while Steve Johnson demanded attention and Geelong's trio of tall forwards, led by Tom Hawkins, all threatened in the air.

Mostly Johnson was like the contest itself - threatening to catch fire, yet unable to rise above the strictures of a game trapped in leg irons. He had three behinds to half-time, and a calamitous no-score from the top of the goalsquare when he was the only person in the stadium who didn't see Stewart Crameri's smother coming.

Caddy's first touch landed in his lap as he came through the interchange gates and by quarter-time he'd had 13, nine of them hard-won. "I thought to myself, 'Maybe things are gunna go my way a little bit today'," he said, admitting he had a sense as the afternoon wore on that he was getting more ball than ever before.

Chris Scott wondered if, with no Selwood, Caddy takes more responsibility to win the balls that come into his vicinity. But the coach saw more in his game, too. "I think he got after the ball and was really strong in the contest."

The third quarter loomed as the game-breaker, as the Dogs went forward 19 times (after just 21 first-half inside 50s), yet went backwards on the scoreboard by two points. Geelong's eight entries reaped four goals, two of them to Hawkins.

Tory Dickson kicked three of the Bulldogs' nine, but key to Geelong's arm's-length win was that in a five-man forward set-up they found enough medium-sized threats to prevail. Steven Motlop matched Dickson's goal tally in the second half, and his long-range snap in the last was pinpointed by Caddy as the counterpoint to the dull-footy drone.

"I know the public want to see the free-flowing, special sort of stuff (but) I think we still saw glimpses of that too," Caddy said of a dour affair that was to his liking. "And I think if it becomes too common you lose a little bit of that excitement - when Motlop kicked that goal, if that happens every five minutes, it's not that exciting anymore is it?"

As for the way football looks in 2015, on this day at least, Caddy had no issue whatsoever. "I don't think there's a problem with the game at all. I love the way it is."

VOTES: 

8 - J.Caddy (Geel)

8 - L.Dahlhaus (WB)

7 - M.Duncan (Geel)

7 - M.Wallis (WB)

7 - S.Motlop (Geel)