Geelong produced an improved performance in their 29-point loss to Collingwood on Saturday.

Here are some of the key take outs from the Round 2 defeat.

Dream Debut

Olivia Barber could not have asked for a better start to her AFLW debut with a goal inside the opening minute of the game with her very first kick.

Fellow debutant Stephanie Williams deserves a mention for helping set up her teammate with a brilliant smother which resulted in a Barber backheel in the goal square.

“How good is that for Liv. Playing AFLW for 32 seconds and you’ve kicked a goal,” AFLW coach Paul Hood said post-game.

“It’s fantastic for her and she is a pretty passionate young player and that was a pretty exciting way to start the game and hopefully she excites her teammates for many years to come.”

Strong Start

After failing register a goal until the final quarter in Round 1, the Cats couldn’t have gotten off to a better start against Collingwood.

Geelong doubled their opponent for inside 50’s in the opening term, with Maddie Boyd joining Barber on the scoresheet.

“The strong start was great, and we were really pleased at quarter time.

“We got ourselves into the game and into a really good position so that was a real positive for the day.”

The strong start was offset by a couple of brain fades, with Geelong giving away two 50 metre penalties that resulted in Collingwood goals and brought them into the contest when the Cats were on top.

“To let the opposition into the game with things that you can control, and we need to be better in that area as we grow and develop our team.

“We need to stop doing things that enables the opposition to get easy goals because we are working really hard for ours at the moment.”

Competitive Cats

Geelong’s tackling pressure in the first half drew praise from Hood post-game.

“I thought we did a great job with that; we maybe ran out of steam a little bit near the end of the game but our tackling pressure in that first half was outstanding.”

Julia Crockett-Grills led the charge for the Cats in this area with a game-high six tackles.

Hood was also pleased with Geelong’s improvement in the middle.

“We just about levelled up on clearances and hitouts as well, so it was a big step forward from the previous game.”

Young Core on the improve

Geelong may have started the season with an 0-2 record, but a pleasing aspect has been the development of their young core of players and the experience they are getting playing week-to-week.

On the weekend eight of Geelong’s 21 players that took the field are yet to have celebrated their 21st birthday. Another two, Amy McDonald and Georgie Rankin are yet to reach 10 games.

McDonald and the likes and reigning best and fairest winner Olivia Purcell, Becky Webster and Sophie van de Heuvel are now out-and-out key players of Geelong’s line-up and will continue to improve with the more games they get to play alongside one another.