How to stop Jai Newcombe will be the number one question on the minds of all Geelong staff and fans before their Preliminary Final against Hawthorn on Friday night.
Newcombe - coming off his fourth straight number one player-ranked performance - has been in scintillating form, such that we have never seen in finals football before.
No player in the history of player ratings has ranked best afield in four straight finals, and his average of 21.2 ranking points in finals is the best of the past 10 seasons.
It is undisputed that the Cats must put their attention into stopping Newcombe.
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Fortunately for the Cats, tagging has been one of their biggest strengths this season.
In recent weeks, Geelong has deployed Osian Mullin into the tagging role with great success.
In the Cats’ qualifying final win over the Lions, Mullin held All-Australian Hugh McCluggage to just 14 disposals - his lowest disposal count in a game since round one, 2023.
Since his shift to a tagging role, Mullin has quelled the impact of superstar midfielders such as Nick Daicos, Ed Richards, Errol Gulden, and Zak Butters.
Despite those names being some of the best in the game, these midfielders are all of the same kind: the lighter-framed midfielders.
Mullin has yet to be tried on the bigger-bodied midfielders, and not many midfielders play bigger than Newcombe.
What Newcombe lacks in height, he more than makes up for with his brute strength in the contest - which has set him apart from the rest of the competition in finals football.
But Geelong has another Irish asset up their sleeve: proven tagger Mark O’Connor.
O’Connor’s track record tagging bigger-bodied midfielders is as good as any in the competition.
In Round 13, O’Connor held AFLCA award winner Noah Anderson to his lowest disposal tally of the season with 19 touches, while the Irishman found 21 disposals of his own.
In Round 23, Isaac Heeney attended 67% of Sydney’s centre bounces but was held to only 15 touches by O’Connor, whilst Heeney provided little to no impact on the game.
Geelong’s ability to deploy two different types of taggers on any given night sets them apart from the competition.
If O’Connor can get the job done on Newcombe—something that no one has ever done in finals— it will go a long way in deciding the result, and the Cats will be hard to beat.