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Blues relish tight AFL turnaround: Teague

3 minute read

Carlton will face St Kilda on Thursday night after the AFL's fixture reshuffle and coach David Teague says the Blues are excited for the tight turnaround.

DAVID TEAGUE the assistant coach of the Crows talks to his players during the AFL match between the Essendon Bombers and the Adelaide Crows at Etihad Stadium in Melbourne, Australia.
DAVID TEAGUE the assistant coach of the Crows talks to his players during the AFL match between the Essendon Bombers and the Adelaide Crows at Etihad Stadium in Melbourne, Australia. Picture: Quinn Rooney/Getty Images

Carlton coach David Teague says the in-form Blues have been buoyed, not thrown, by having their AFL clash with St Kilda brought forward by two days.

The Blues were originally meant to face the Saints at the MCG on Saturday but had their game moved to Thursday night at Marvel Stadium.

"It's shortened the week, which we're pretty excited about. We're looking forward to it," Teague told reporters on Tuesday.

"We actually planned over the isolation period for games five days apart; we thought that might have been one of the situations so we actually trained a little bit around that.

"The last couple of weeks, our Thursday session, we've actually had to pull back because the boys' intensity has been a bit higher than we thought.

"So we think we'll be ready to go."

The short turnaround hasn't adversely affected player availability with the Blues set to enjoy a selection headache after two wins on the bounce.

Harry McKay (soreness) and Zac Fisher (ankle) return to the selection fold though Jack Silvagni will miss out after suffering a bruised lung and fractured rib against Essendon on Saturday night.

Teague said it was important for the Blues to match it with the hard-running Saints, who are coming off an impressive win over Richmond.

"We need our pressure up; the Saints do move the ball well," Teague said.

"You've go to win the contest, I think that's important in most games and particularly for us.

"So if we can win our fair share of the ball, we'd like to move the ball quick too if we can.

"We'll focus on what we can control and if they're winning it, we need to make sure our pressure and our outlets are strong and if we're winning it we want to test them out the other way."

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