With fighting win

Kelly up for the battle

IT speaks to the maturity of Tim Kelly that he wanted to be in the moment, not once, but twice, in Geelong’s 12-point win over Sydney.

The mature-age recruit will be talked about for his brilliant running snap that gave Geelong a matchwinning lead in the 23rd minute of last night’s match. But his running goal in the first term was equally as important.

The Cats had dominated large parts of the first quarter, but it was Sydney that had kicked the game’s first two goals. Enter Kelly, who took responsibility, ran to 50m and kicked truly to settle Cats’ nerves. In either situation a first-year player would most likely look to pass it off to a more senior teammate for fear of missing.

Not Kelly. The Cats have themselves a gem and it’s little wonder both West Australian clubs are circling with intent as they look to lure him home.

Kelly finished the night with 21 touches and two goals, drawing praise from star Mitch Duncan and coach Chris Scott.

“I think TK (Kelly), the way he kicked that goal at the end really shows he wants to be in the big moments and that’s what we are trying to train,” Duncan said.

“He is a really confident player and so he should be because he has got it all there to put on display. We love players that step up in those moments and he is just one of those.”

Duncan admits there were some hairy moments during last night’s win, but was relieved the Cats managed to pick up a crucial four points on the road.

“You probably look more (at the ladder) as a senior player, there’s no doubt about that,” he said.

“You can’t really focus on that now. It’s a week-to-week process for us.

“We can’t afford to look too far in the future. We have a young group and we have got to keep them on the job weekto-week.

“We came up here with a job to do and we got it done which is great. I thought our young kids really stood out. They were clean around the footy.

“We put them (Sydney) under pressure, we managed to lock the ball in our forward 50 for long periods of time but just didn’t capitalise on the scoreboard.”