St Kilda v Geelong Cats

What a game to kick off part 2 of Round 13, with last year’s Grand Finalists Geelong and St Kilda to face off for the first time since that game where the Cats prevailed.

St Kilda this week have had some off field distractions with question marks being raised yet again, over the handling of allegations made against Stephen Milne and Leigh Montagna.

Can the Saints and Stephen Milne focus on the field, after a week of off-field dramas?

Whether or not this affects the games of these two important players for the Saints, only time will tell.

Going into this week’s game against the Cats, the Saints will be full of confidence after last week’s away victory over Fremantle by 18 points and winning their last 4 games certainly helps too.

Brendan Godard has been in fine form for St Kilda and ran riot last round with 33 disposals and 10 marks against the Dockers and will have to do much of the same against league leaders Geelong.

Without Nick Riewoldt for the Saints up forward, it really is a weak spot in an other wise complete gameplan from coach Lyon.

Stephen Milne needs to step up for the big games and with a poor return last match needs to be more accurate in front of the big sticks.

Geelong at the moment look unstoppable with a 7 game winning streak and a 71 point hiding of Essendon in round 12.

The Cats dominate the AFL stat sheet and have been able to score goals at will with many any their team contributing.

Paul Chapman is ruled out with injury and will be missed in attack, but Travis Varcoe and James Podsiadly have really stepped it up this season with their dynamic forward play when the usual suspects of Stevie J and Cam Mooney have been quiet.

There doesn’t seem to be any stopping the Geelong team this season and they play like a team that knows each other’s games so well.

The Saints only hope of winning is if they play a bogged down, close encounter but I expect the Cats to blaze away.

Geelong by 21 points

Sydney Swans v Collingwood

The Swans had a comfortable win against Port Adelaide last round by 38 points to cement their place in the top 8, and face a challenge this round of taking on a disappointed Collingwood who could only manage a draw versus Melbourne.

Rhyce Shaw and Daniel Bradshaw have been added to the team and add some much needed experience for the Swans.

Sydney really need Bradshaw to be fit and fire up forward if they are to mount a challenge against the Magpies who rebound really well out of defense.

Collingwood in the end were lucky to scrape away with a draw against the Demons on the Queens Birthday game.

Twenty two behinds is just not good enough as a lot of their forwards went missing in action, which seems to be a disturbing pattern down at Magpie-land.

Josh Fraser, Paul Medhurst, Nick Maxwell (calf injury) are out of the squad to take on the Swans which seems like a lot of experience going missing, but there is a lot of competiton for spots and in come Ben Johnson, Alan Didak, Luke Ball, Tyson ‘Moneybags’ Goldsack and Chris Dawes.

Not bad replacements and it just shows the depth Collingwood have at the moment, compared to Sydney with even Paul Roos admitting they are far from full strength.

With the match at ANZ Stadium even though it is a Swans’ home game, Collingwood bet Sydney here in their last encounter and should do much the same in this encounter.

Collingwood by 18 points

Adelaide v Melbourne

Adelaide were dominated last round by Hawthorn going down by 47 points but at least in recent weeks they haven’t been complete battering rams of the competition.

Good signs for future seasons were the efforts of the Crows younger brigade led by Kurt Tippett 4 goals, Patrick Dangerfield 2, Taylor Walker 2 , but defensively the Crows play like a leaky bucket.

If there is any positive for Adelaide in this round’s clash it might be the fact that their only wins this year have been in front of a home crowd.

Melbourne have only one more win than the Crows but competitively look a lot more healthier and definitely could of, would of, should of won a few more of their closer matches.

Brent Moloney and Mark Jamar have been excellent players for the Demons this year and have definitely contributed to the fact that the Dees are a lot more competitive this year.

Melbourne have won their last two encounters against Adelaide but both games have been at the MCG.

Whether or not their young team can win in South Australia remains to be seen, but if there was ever a time it would be this match.

Melbourne by 12 points

Your Round 13 Tips & Observations

So what are your tips & observations for round 13 of the 2010 AFL season? Do you agree with Johnnytruent?

If yes or no please post your tips and observations about the round in the comments section.

We will keep a running tally of the tips throughout the year, so make sure you get your tips in on time & you never know there could be a prize for the winner.

If you have not added your tips yet that is ok, please feel free to add them and what your ongoing tally is.

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