Freo confident of toppling Saints - Sports News - Fanatics - the world's biggest events

Freo confident of toppling Saints

By Justin Chadwick 12/06/2010 09:59:40 AM Comments (0)

Fremantle coach Mark Harvey is confident his young charges will continue their stunning start to the AFL season by toppling top-four rivals St Kilda at Subiaco Oval on Sunday.

The Dockers fell to the Saints by 15 points at Etihad Stadium in round four but Harvey said the belief gained from that match would prove invaluable in the return bout.

"They beat us earlier this year so on our turf we'd like to think we can reverse that," Harvey said.

"We got close (in round four). We just fell away in the last quarter.

"With St Kilda you'd like to be putting the scoreboard pressure on early to see if you can break down anything they want to do.

"We'd be backing in that we are going to take them on a little bit.

"They've beaten us the last five times so it's something we need to change the trend of."

With Fremantle and St Kilda both boasting 8-3 records, the winner of this match will take a giant stride towards locking up a top-four spot.

"There's a lot of things at stake for clubs leading into the break and we know how important it is.," Harvey said.

"We are going to try to capitalise on what we've done.

"We haven't been beaten by too much even when we have been beaten this year so that's the confidence that we've got so far out of the season."

Harvey said Stephen Milne, who will line up for game 200, had become the Saints' most dangerous forward in the absence of Nick Riewoldt.

Milne booted five goals against the Dockers in the round four meeting and Harvey said it was crucial to ensure the goalsneak's supply was limited.

"If you can disturb the quality of supply, that's the No.1 priority, then how you defend him is the next," Harvey said.

"They're going to him a lot more because Riewoldt's not in the side, so we've taken note of that."

Fremantle will be without forward Chris Mayne (ankle) and Matt de Boer (soreness), while Steven Dodd was dropped after a horror showing against Adelaide last week.

Midfielder Byron Schammer and ruckman Zac Clarke were included for their first games of the season, while defender Alex Silvagni returns after overcoming injury.

St Kilda go in unchanged from the team that defeated Richmond last week.

While Milne is St Kilda's prized weapon, the Dockers also have an ace up their sleeve in the form of Hayden Ballantyne.

Ballantyne was electric when thrown into the midfield late in last week's loss to Adelaide and Harvey said the 22-year-old may be given more of a run on the ball against the Saints.

"He actually got three centre square clearances when he went in there, so it was good," Harvey said.

"You want your players to take risks and to take the game on."

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