Courtesy of Gold Coast Bulletin

TRUE BLUEY AFL with Guy McKenna

As a former AFL backman, it will probably not surprise you that I am big on the defensive side of the game.
You can blame my old coach Mick Malthouse for that.

At the Eagles, he was big on the old coaching philosophy that a good offence starts with a solid defence.

For us down back, the responsibility was always to shut down your opponent first.

But thankfully he allowed blokes like myself to be creative at the same time.

It is interesting how some teams go the other way and think it's all about getting the ball and attacking.

I have some statistics from when I played in the 1990s through to 2000.

They showed that the most attacking side made the grand final eight out of those 10 years, but then won it only 43 per cent of the time.

The most defensive side got in 47 per cent of the time but had an 80 per cent chance of winning the decider.

Out of the West Coast era, we played in 10 finals series and won two premierships. Our goal every week was to kick 13 goals and keep the other side to 12 goals.

I think it really is a fundamental of any code because if you defend well, it is going to open up your attack.

I look at those fundamentals and it serves me when dealing with my boys at the Gold Coast Football Club.

We want to take the game on and we think through our establishment rules we will be able to do that with an exciting group of young players.

We know we have a natural attacking flair but we must add a solid defensive component to that.

When you come under fire you have to stand and hold your ground and defend well.

We're certainly pushing the group hard this year because we have to.

We need to get them to play a man's brand of football because that's what they have to do next year.

Ken Hinkley has joined us as assistant coach from Geelong where he was immersed in their football style.

But we have to go beyond Geelong's style of football, which means we have to push and drive the group as hard as we can.

I'd like to think we will be eventually be able to attack like Geelong and defend like St Kilda.

The Saints do a great job of squeezing opposition clubs.

That was very evident last Friday night when they beat Geelong and kept them goalless in the second half.

They kicked only 10 goals for the night and a lot will say if Nick Riewoldt was there, they would have kicked a few more as well.

But the Saints' primary focus was to make sure they get those midfield turnovers and turn defensive opportunities into scoring opportunities.

It worked a treat and gives us at the GCFC something to work towards.