If Carlton gets the ball in Adam Saad’s hands more, they will score more – says David King.
An All-Australian in 2022, Saad has had a few down weeks, but is still averaging nearly identical stats to last season.
However, the Blues have repeatedly missed opportunities to give him handball receives through the middle, with King saying it has cost the club “walk-in goals”.
King revealed he is the number one rated kick in the competition and believes simply need to get the ball in his hands more, citing Nick Daicos at Collingwood and Nick Blakey at Sydney as examples.
“He is the best kick in the game. For players who have had 10 kicks on average or more across the season, he is ranked the number one field kick in the game,” the North Melbourne great said.
“Good business is to give the best ball user in the game the football as often as you can.
“When he runs past a Mitch McGovern or a Jacob Weitering, he’s number one in the game, give him the footy and let him use his speed and his evasion.
“The gap between what the Swans did with Nick Blakey and Carlton did with Saad was the game.
“They gave the ball to Blakey – sometimes in awful spots and then had to find his way out of trouble and use his foot skills, which he did.
“They’ve got to give Saad those same opportunities. They set fire to two walk-in goals by not giving him handballs in the middle of the ground.
“You do so much to find two goals in a game of footy. You can change your whole method on game day to find two goals. You give those two handballs to Adam Saad and there’s two goals.
“You’ve got to find a way to get him from 11-12 kicks a game, to 16 kicks a game. If you can do that, I’ll guarantee there’s two more goals. And not kicking out from full back. I’m talking about the ones on the fly.
“Let him run, let him charge, let him be your Nick Daicos.”
Carlton takes on Melbourne on Friday night, with Nic Newman, Ollie Hollands, Adam Cerra and George Hewett set to be unavailable.