Geelong had a clear directive when it faced Collingwood on Friday night at the MCG and that was to maintain control of the ball.
Taking a leaf out of Essendon's book (and ironically Chris Scott's twin brother, Brad), the Cats went out with a plan to utilise the uncontested marking game style to their advantage, preventing the Pies from adding chaos to the contest.
Scott's men racked up 145 marks (139 uncontested) to 75, refusing to give Craig McRae's men a sniff.
However, on multiple occasions, the umpires were caught between two minds during Geelong's particular tactic, as the whistleblowers were quick to call play-on on a close call, something that's been brewing over the last few weeks.
"It was clear, wasn't it? Right from the start. It was like, 'oh, that's the way they're picking that one up'," Scott said of the 15m ruling post-game.
"It's a really, really difficult one to adjudicate because, in the moment, you've got to work out whether the ball's gone 15 metres; you only get a split second to work out whether you're going to blow the whistle or not.
"And then you've got to work out 'Am I watching the ball carrier to see whether he's played on? Or am I watching the guy on the mark to see whether he's abusing the stand rule?'
"When the opposition last week marked the ball a lot and it was clear that we were going to try and mark the ball a lot, it's annoying.
"I'm actually just going to say what I think about this stuff ... don't take it as criticism necessarily. It's just like, we shouldn't cover our eyes and say, 'oh no, it didn't happen'. It did. You saw it, I saw it ... it's a hard game to umpire, we've all got to get used to it. If you expect perfection from them, you will just end up frustrated.
"I don't want to sound like I'm critical of (umpires), I'm actually trying to defend them."
Scott believes that if there was a shift in interpretation, the clubs were not alerted, given how red-hot the umpires have been on it.
Nevertheless, the Cats recorded a must-win victory which shoots them up to third position on the ladder.
Despite eight games remaining in Round 18, Geelong will only drop as low as fifth and sets up a mouth-watering clash with the Western Bulldogs next week at GMHBA Stadium.
