Geelong should take heart from great record against top sides

IT’S a record Chris Scott should hang in the Geelong rooms on a banner.

The Cats coach has spent the past month defending a run that has seen them drop four of their past seven games.

But crunch the numbers about the record of current top-eight sides against each other and Geelong comes out squeaky clean.

The Cats have played seven games against teams currently in the eight and won six of them, with a four-point loss to Greater Western Sydney at GMHBA Stadium the only black mark.

Not only have they won, they have a 35-point winning margin in those contests, including several crushing wins.

Granted, they faced Collingwood, GWS and West Coast early and got Richmond when its injuries had it at rock bottom.

But if the Cats are in need of affirmation about whether their best is good enough, it is right there in front of them.

In Round 1 it was Collingwood by seven points, with the Pies coming off a grand final.

They have knocked over Adelaide twice — by 27 and 24 points home and away.

And their win over West Coast by 58 points in Round 6 came after pundits had predicted they might start the year at 0-6 instead.

For all of Richmond’s predictions of grandeur in September, they have beaten just three of seven top-eight sides, losing to Adelaide, GWS, Collingwood (plus a win over the Pies) and Geelong.

West Coast is on the march, having won 11 of the past 13 games, and all eight of its MCG and Marvel Stadium contests in the past two years. And the Eagles record against top-eight sides stacks up, having dropped only three of seven games and one of them by a single point.

Their Round 1 loss to Brisbane at the Gabba (44 points) is long enough ago to be irrelevant, with the Geelong loss in Round 6 and the one-pointer against the Pies their only other blemishes.

GWS (four of nine against top-eight sides), Port Adelaide (four of 11) and Essendon (three of eight) all have concerns against the best.

For his part, Scott believes the Cats can peak at the right time after a disastrous finals record since 2011 that has seen them win just three wins from their past 12 finals.

“We’re really confident that we’re working on some things that we’ll see come through in the next couple of weeks,” he said.