Collingwood coach Craig McRae has reflected on his side’s stirring King’s Birthday win over Melbourne, as well as touched on a defender’s “unfortunate” off-field situation. The Magpies led at every change in their 38-point win on Monday afternoon, despite absorbing early attacking pressure from the Demons. The win lifts ‘Fly’s Pies inside the top eight, having claimed their sixth win of the season from 12 games.
After its first loss since Round 2 last Friday against the Bulldogs, Collingwood returned to winning ways in a scrappy but convincing triumph at the MCG. McRae began his post-match press conference by praising his assistant coaches — in particular Hayden Skipworth, who has served at Olympic Park as a line coach since 2020. “I’m really proud of the coaches — and I said that to the players — they put (the plan) in front of the group early in the week (detailing) what we need to do, and we had a 10-day break, which is huge at this time of year.
“Our coaches set this game up really, really well. “Most of the things that we planned for we got from the opposition, around clearances and other parts of the game that we knew we had to be on for. “In particular, Hayden Skipworth.
He’s incredible for our young players. We’ve got a young midfield (going) against some really hardened players — I know Petracca out hurts a lot for them — but (Max) Gawn, (Clayton) Oliver and (Jack) Viney. “Exceptional midfield players, and we beat them in that .