CARLTON coach Brett Ratten has been a keen observer of the Sydney Swans' winless fortnight and believes he has seen a few things that could help his side overcome the Swans at Telstra Dome on Sunday.
"The last two weeks we’ve got maybe a blueprint of how to do it with Hawthorn beating the Swans and Collingwood as well, so we’ve sort of seeing firsthand what you can do against them," Ratten said from Princes Park on Wednesday.
"[But] they’re a very good team and very hard at it, so we’ll have to be on our game around the stoppages. They have more stoppages than any other team in the competition per week so that will be the challenge.
"What you really admire about them is that regardless of who’s playing in their team, they just keep coming and fighting and grinding and scrapping. They’re one of these teams that never say die and they find a way."
The task is an imposing one given Carlton has not beaten the Swans since round eight of 2000 at Princes Park with 10 losses mounting since then.
"It hasn’t been great so that’s a challenge for us as a group," Ratten said of his side’s lop-sided recent record.
"We couldn’t break last week’s [bad] record [against St Kilda] which is a little bit disappointing, but we need to get the Swans down here and get that winning feeling again."
Ratten maintained his side was in a better position to topple the Swans than it had been for some time with the emphasis on player education starting to bear fruit.
"I think we’re understanding ourselves a lot better than we have previously in how we need to play and why we got beaten against St Kilda and things like that," he said.
"I think we’re understanding ourselves in a broader sense; we’ve had more education on ourselves and on the opposition, so our understanding of the game has improved enormously I think."
The Blues’ cause will be helped by the return of speedy utility Andrew Walker, who Ratten confirmed will play his first game of the season after fully recovering from pre-season shoulder surgery.
"He, with Juddy (Chris Judd), is probably close to the fittest player at the club, so it will be great to get him back in the team as well and will really add to us from a running point of view."
