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“Tag him”: McRae’s message to Saints about Nick Daicos
SEN • June 21st, 2025 11:05 am
Collingwood coach Craig McRae hopes St Kilda tag Nick Daicos on Saturday night at Marvel Stadium.
Daicos has copped a tag in eight of his 13 games this season, and while he’s still averaging 29.1 disposals a game, he was held to just 19 disposals and a goal in his last outing against Melbourne and tagger Ed Langdon on King’s Birthday.
While St Kilda tagger Marcus Windhager kept Bulldogs superstar Marcus Bontempelli to 14 touches in Round 14, McRae isn’t too concerned if he goes to Daicos this weekend, particularly as the attention didn’t help the Saints on the scoreboard.
"Windhager tagged Bontempelli, and they lose by 72 points, so what value do you put on that?" McRae said.
"So, we win a game, a really hard-fought game, and I’m repeating myself, but I thought Melbourne were brilliant… but watching the game back, we had so many things that we can improve on.
"Nick in itself is a challenge every week, because you want Nick to be as best as he possibly can be, and then the opposition wants him to be the opposite of that.
"So, we've got to get the balance right, you know, do what's required to win the game, and then obviously Nick's a big part of that, but it's pleasing to think that we're winning games and Nick's not having an influence, that says a lot about our system.
“But I'm constantly looking at how we can support Nick."
After his quiet King’s Birthday performance, Langdon’s ‘hard tag’ against Daicos was put into the spotlight as he gave away five free kicks and was often holding the midfielder before the stoppage even began.
McRae himself even admitted he was caught off guard by Langdon’s tactics.
"Watching it back, it caught me off-guard a bit how much he was getting tackled off the ball early, but I think he got some reasonable free kicks in the end, to balance that out," McRae said.
"We want our best players to be the best players, but again, if you tag someone, that comes at a cost to you.
"So, we hope they tag him this week, which I'm sure they will, but you've got to find a way of getting the best of both worlds.
“You know again, they tag Bontempelli, and they lose by 70 points. Is it winning? What do you value?
“We’ll work through our version of it.”
In the wake of the Daicos v Langdon battle, McRae himself hasn’t brought up how the young Magpie is being umpired, although that didn’t stop assistant coach Matthew Boyd from voicing his concerns to some officials at training.
“I didn’t (bring it up), but the umpires were here today, and I know Matty Boyd did (laughs),” McRae said.
“He just asked the question, but it’s all in the rules isn’t it, there’s holding off the ball and holding with the ball.
“Hopefully he gets a couple of those (frees) this week.”
Saturday’s clash between the Magpies and Saints at Marvel Stadium is set for 7:30 pm (AEST).
