The Geelong Cats will play the Melbourne Demons at a ground where neither team feels entirely comfortable, Etihad Stadium, in Round 3 of the 2017 AFL Season.
Both sides come into this match with undefeated records, but one will leave here having copped their first loss of the season.
Geelong took what looked like a very strong win over Fremantle on the road in Round 1, but the Dockers’ capitulation to Port Adelaide last weekend has made that one look a bit less shiny.
They were then pressed very hard by North Melbourne last week, a side they were expected to beat comfortably, and ultimately they were lucky to escape with a 1-point win.
Melbourne started their season in the best possible way, breaking long running losing streaks against St Kilda and at Etihad Stadium in Round 1 with a five-goal win.
However they then struggled to put away one of the competition’s stragglers in Carlton last week. They got the win, but they did not cover themselves in glory.
That makes this a hard match to predict – neither side played their best football last week and so it’s hard to tell if they will improve this week or not.
Complicating matters is the fact that Melbourne will miss two key players in Jordan Lewis and Jesse Hogan due to suspension.
That seems to have swung the odds in favour of the Cats, who are at $1.40 to win – however this match looks more even than that, and that may not be good enough value.
Of these two sides Melbourne are the one that has played the best footy this year, even if they didn’t show it last week, and $3 for them to win is good value but $3.50 to win by 1-39 points is a little better.