Kane Cornes has all but written Geelong out of the premiership race following the Cats’ latest loss, a shock seven-point defeat to Fremantle.
In what has emerged as a common theme for Chris Scott’s men, again Geelong was belted in the midfield as the reigning premiers fell out of the top eight.
The Cats have four top eight sides to play in their remaining four games and are currently out of the finals by two points.
But Port Adelaide great Cornes believes the issues in the club’s play will prove too great to overcome later in the year.
“They’ve teased us through parts of the year and you get sucked in, you think they’re back,” he told SEN Breakfast.
“But they’re not back, unfortunately.
“There’s a host of issues, it starts in the midfield where they just get beaten up week after week.
“They’re too thin too there, there isn’t enough A-Grade talent through the midfield and that was exposed again by a good midfield side, led by Luke Jackson. Caleb Serong did what he’s done all year and Geelong, there was no response.
“In the last five or six weeks they’ve only beaten North, Essendon and the draw against Sydney was really poor as well.”
In further issues, Mark Blicavs and Tom Hawkins also suffered hamstring injuries on Saturday afternoon.
Combined with a minor drop-off from last year’s premiership-winning standards, Cornes suggested that’s all it takes to rule the Cats out of back-to-back flags.
“They’ve been famous for not training a whole lot and having a very relaxed atmosphere and that is good when you’re winning but I wonder when you get to be an older group and you need that conditioning… has that relaxed atmosphere come back to hurt them?” he added.
“Are they complacent? Are they comfortable on what they did last year? Some of their efforts were so poor… you just haven’t seen it.
“They’re not the hungry group they were last year and the season is essentially done this year.”
Geelong has games remaining against Port Adelaide, Collingwood, St Kilda and the Western Bulldogs, likely needing three wins just to play finals.