Hawthorn rising star Josh Weddle says Carlton’s fourth-quarter workrate is poor.
The Hawks usurped the Blues into eighth spot on the AFL ladder with a statement 74-point victory at the MCG on Sunday.
It completed a brilliant rise from 17th into finals contention after a 0-5 start to the season.
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Back then, Hawthorn looked set to be duking it out for the wooden spoon with West Coast, North Melbourne and Richmond, while Carlton was sitting pretty entrenched in the top four.
But the two clubs’ fortunes have been reversed as the Hawks steamrolled passed the faltering Blues on Sunday.
The in-form team of the competition kicked 13 goals to Carlton’s two after quarter-time, including four to one in the last quarter — an area of the Blues’ game that Hawthorn clearly targeted.
That much is clear after Weddle’s post-match interview with Triple M.
“We knew that their workrate’s not the strongest in the fourth quarter, so we were like, we may as well start it from the start, get them tired early,” he said. “And then when we heard that they were getting numbers down, we were like let’s just keep going and really tire them out.”
The Blues are licking their wounds from an injury crisis after having four go down in Sunday’s bloodbath.
Two-time reigning Coleman medallist Charlie Curnow injured his ankle early in the second half and didn’t return, while Jack Martin, Jordan Boyd and Lachie Fogarty all went down in the first quarter.
Martin was subbed out at the quarter-time with a hamstring problem, Fogarty didn’t come back on after his collarbone injury, and Boyd tried to play on through an adductor problem and a corked quad but struggled.
Making matters worse, Adam Saad finished the game on the bench after tweaking his hamstring.
And if all of that wasn’t bad enough, Harry McKay was sent for scans on a suspected quad injury on Monday morning.
McKay appeared to suffer the setback in the final four minutes.
Saad and Martin are expected to miss this week’s must-win clash with West Coast, while Boyd and Lachie Fogarty will be assessed.
McKay pulled up short while taking a mark on the wing in the dying minutes but was forced to stay on the field with the Blues already reduced to no rotations.
McKay was one of six Blues forced to play every minute of the second half.
The Blues are already without Tom De Koning (foot/lung), Adam Cerra (hamstring), Orazio Fantasia (calf) and Matt Cottrell (shoulder) from their first-choice side.
They could be forced to turn to untried key forward Harry Lemmey to cover the load in attack against the Eagles, while swingman Lewis Young was held out of the VFL as a carryover emergency.
– With Mitch Cleary