Essendon assistant coach, Ashley Prescott, says the huge win against Carlton was a result of a team effort and playing the best four quarters of football.
Speaking on Weekend Rewind, Prescott praised the standout individual performances of Brent Prismall - who stepped up in the midfield after the loss of Jobe Watson - and Andrew Welsh who shut superstar Chris Judd out of the game.
“Prismall was brought to the club to add a little bit of what Jobe has in the midfield, he showed in this game that he is a hard, strong inside player, that he will always have a go at the ball and is good with his hands,” Prescott said.
“It’s phenomenal to think it was only his third game back from injury, so that was a fantastic effort from him.
“Andrew Welsh was another stand out performance, it was also only his second game back and to play on Judd and to limit his influence in the game and get 30 possessions himself was tremendous.
“Full credit to Andrew, the way he has gone about his rehabilitation has been so professional, it is just great to see him rewarded on the field.”
Prescott said the rivalry against Carlton was as fierce as ever and rated the victory as one of the best this season.
“It certainly was a good win, to beat Carlton on such a big stage and by 69 points in the end was a fantastic result. The percentage boost will be handy also later in the year too,” he said.
“We don’t really focus on the build up of games; we focused on what we could control- preparing really well on the training track and doing our homework on the opposition and it payed off for us.
“We sensed that Carlton was a little bit caught up in the fact that Essendon have had the wood on them in the past and think that potentially they might have been a bit nervous going into the game.”
Prescott admits his side will be looking to ‘play down’ the hype surrounding this Friday night's blockbuster game against Collingwood, which is expected to attract around 85,000 fans at the MCG.
“I think after such a huge win all the boys are pumped up, we all just move on from the win and focus on the next task ahead of us,” he said.
“It is all about Collingwood now and making sure we recover well and get our players up and going again. I think the fact that it is a big game on a Friday night is fantastic.”
