AFL round two as it happened: Saints clinch boilover win; does Danger have a case to answer for this?

A pointed Cats coach Chris Scott has delivered a mini-drive-by at football commentators after Geelong’s upset seven-point loss to St Kilda at Marvel Stadium.

Scott was adamant it was the Saints’ cleanliness with the ball, and not their pressure, that caught out Geelong across the first three quarters on Saturday night.

“Forget all the cliches that you hear from commentators that don’t know what they’re talking about around intensity,” Scott said in his post-match press conference.

“I just thought they [the Saints] were clean. I thought we couldn’t get the ball forward enough, but when we did, they were able to bounce it out really quickly, and it was obvious to everyone that they’re kicking skills at this venue are at a really high level.”

Scott said the Saints continually worked their way out of trouble to set up goals. St Kilda led by 27 points at quarter-time, 29 points at half-time and 27 points at the final break.

“I think everyone that actually spends some time on the game knows that virtually every team in the comp are going to have patches where they’re really hot, and it’s unfortunate for us that we just weren’t able to slow that down for long enough and early enough to get the game played a bit more our way,” he said.

When asked if there were any intensity issues in the first quarter, Scott returned to his earlier criticism.

“I mean, if you want to be one of those guys, I’d suggest you don’t,” he said.

“Maybe I’ll watch it and I’ll come back and say, ‘Possibly’. And you could sort of ask the question, ‘Well, was the intensity high later in the game when we were coming back?’ Possibly.

“But it’s rare you do this because you two tend to focus so much on yourself, but I just thought, it wasn’t Harlem Globetrotter stuff, but I just thought they were just so good early.”

Ex-Bulldog Jack Macrae credits St Kilda’s pressure for delivering him his first win in Saints colours.

Macrae, a 2016 premiership player who struggled to break into the Bulldogs’ team last year, had a game-high 35 disposals and 11 tackles. He was pivotal to St Kilda’s upset seven-point win over the Cats at Marvel Stadium.

He said St Kilda’s work rate and ability to outnumber the Cats at the contest in the opening five minutes set the scene for the game.

It came off the back of a disappointing opening round when they lowered their colours by 63 points to Adelaide.

“It was a clear review on what we didn’t deliver against Adelaide, which, as I touched on, was the outnumber game, work rate and our pressure rating,” Macrae said.

“I don’t know what it (the pressure rating) was tonight, but it would have easily been right up there, especially the first three quarters.

“So yeah, we really stripped it back and just focused on those things. And you could tell the boys went in with a real sharp focus.”

St Kilda led the possession count 389 to 322 and were clearly superior with their disposal efficiency – 73 per cent to Geelong’s 67.7 per cent – a figure largely down to their pressure.

They topped the uncontested possession count 245 to 174, setting up the game by moving the ball cleanly across the first three quarters.

St Kilda have survived a rampaging comeback from Geelong to cause a seven-point upset at Marvel Stadium.

The Saints led at one stage by 40 points and had to hold off a late surge from the Cats to win.

The Saints led by 27 points at quarter-time, 29 points at half-time and 27 points at three-quarter time. But the Cats outscored them four goals to one in the final term to almost pinch the win.

Jack Higgins led the scoring with four goals to help set up St Kilda across the first three quarters. Ex-Bulldog Jack Macrae was huge with 35 possessions – 17 kicks and 18 handballs.

St Kilda’s pressure was the difference. Their intensity caught out the slow-starting Cats and made them play catch-up all night. Key playmakers Patrick Dangerfield and Max Holmes were well held in the first half.

For Geelong, Shannon Neale, Tyson Stengle, Ted Clohesy and Oliver Dempsey all kicked two goals. But Jeremy Cameron spent a lot of the night up on the wing.

Of bigger concern for coach Chris Scott will be a knee injury to key defender Tom Stewart, who was subbed out of the game in the second term. He could be forced to miss several weeks with a suspected PCL injury.

New recruit Bailey Smith was a late withdrawal with a calf injury.

The Saints will be without Liam Stocker next week after he was subbed out of the game with concussion.

Final score: St Kilda 15.8 (98) lead Geelong 13.13 (91)

Geelong have had a goal overturned.

Brad Close claimed he had booted the ball off the ground for a major and the goal umpire agreed. But a review ruled it came off the St Kilda boot of Nasiah Wanganeen-Milera.

They trail by eight points with four minutes remaining.

The Saints have flooded back and look to be in survival mode.

Patrick Dangerfield marked strongly but his 40-metre shot at goal fell short. It’s unusual for the Cats skipper not to get the distance.

Then Jhye Clark missed a tough snap. This game really could go either way. Wow.

St Kilda 15.8 (98) lead Geelong 13.11 (89) with five minutes remaining

Oh dear. The Cats have kicked yet another – a Shannon Neale long bomb – and they are within just 11 points of the Saints. There’s less than two goals in this.

Geelong have kicked seven of the past nine goals and Neale has two for the night. That one came after a mark and a 55-metre drop punt.

Another goal to Oliver Dempsey. Now the St Kilda lead is shaky – they are ahead by just 17 points.

They have held a buffer of more than 20 points since quarter-time. We have 11 minutes left in this fascinating game.