Speaking to the media at the Lexus Centre on Friday, ahead of his team’s round one clash with the Kangaroos, Malthouse made it quite clear what his side is capable of even without Alan Didak and Nathan Buckley, after being the highest-scoring club in the league in 2006.
“I think we’ve got the capability of kicking enough goals to win games of football. We might have to stitch up other areas, and that’s part of our game plan this year”, Malthouse declared.
“It doesn’t matter how you win it, it really doesn’t matter. If you win games by kicking eight, they kick seven, you’ve won the game. You kick 19, they kick 18, well you’ve still won the game.
“It was never a focus last year, believe it or not it was never a focus on being the number one scoring side in the competition. It fell that way because of certain areas we were quite strong in, but I thought last year we were also quite weak in certain areas, so again it (scoring heavily) is not becoming a focus for us.”
When asked if he’s wary of some of his young guns experiencing second-year blues, Malthouse conceded it is something many young players do struggle with, but the ability to play a variety of positions can help avoid it.
“I think Dale (Thomas) has (improvement) in front him, that he, Pendlebury and Iles, the boys we played last year in their first year, like any first year player, is going to get away with a bit of latitude.
“Second year, clubs don't necessarily work them out, but put a bit more pressure on them.
“I think the extra string to the bow is to have another position. Dale is quite capable of playing multiple roles in the side. Pendlebury is the same, and Iles is basically a back pocket player at this stage, but we hope to bring him up to the front half or certainly in the middle.
“So these players are going to be confronted with that, I don’t think there would be any second-year player that hasn’t been confronted with the reality that football in the first year is a little bit of a honeymoon, and the reality sort of checks in pretty quickly. Dale’s no exception, he knows that.”
Malthouse also paid tribute to Shane O’Bree, who is notching his 150th game for Collingwood this Saturday, and described the role to be played by recruit Paul Medhurst, who will appear in his 100th game of league football in his first game for the club since crossing from Fremantle.
“It’s a fantastic effort by Shane, a Beaufort boy coming down from Brisbane, found it pretty hard up there and he’s come down here and done really well for us.
“Paul will find it tough at times, trying to adjust to our game style, particularly playing next to Josh (Fraser), Anthony (Rocca), Travis (Cloke) and so forth, and Leon Davis, so there’s that component.
“You’ve got to adjust, he’ll have to get used to the ball coming in differently. It won’t be Hasleby, Bell or Cook kicking it to him, it will be O’Bree, Burns, Pendlebury, Nicholls and so forth.
“He is going to be an important player for us, there’s no question about that.”
Malthouse also said that the club’s first selection in the 2006 AFL Draft, Ben Reid, will probably make his league debut as a key forward in the first half of the season given his outstanding improvement in recent weeks, while exciting indigenous player Brad Dick would’ve made his debut in round one had it not been for a recent bout of tonsillitis, and Nathan Brown was only kept out by experienced key-position defenders James Clement and Simon Prestigiacomo.
