'Sniffed him out': Patrick Dangerfield in brutal moment with umpire

Geelong star Patrick Dangerfield found time to give a field umpire a piece of his mind during the Cats’ 59-point drubbing of St Kilda on Monday night.

The Cats sent the rest of the competition a message by thumping the upstart Saints 14.9 (93) to 4.10 (34), but Dangerfield had a message of his own for the umpire who interrupted his set shot goal from outside 50.

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Cleary sceptical of Dangerfield’s ability to launch a set shot from roughly 55 metres out, the Cats superstar was given the hurry up in the middle of his run-up, as the umpire called play on.

It didn’t matter too much, as Dangerfield roosted the ball to the goal line and the Cats successfully bundled St Kilda’s defence out of the way to land the former Brownlow medallist a cracking goal.

As he jogged back to the middle, Dangerfield could be seen exchanging words with the umpire who called play on, much to the amusement of commentators.

“Who is the umpire to say Patrick Dangerfield can’t kick the ball 55-58m?” Fox Footy’s Garry Lyon asked.

“I would hope he would run back and say, ‘Now don’t you make that same mistake again ump’”

“He won’t because he sniffed him out,” colleague Alastair Lynch said.

“Followed him back to the middle and just had a little word into his ear”.

Asked about the moment after the match, Dangerfield joked that he felt a bit hard done by after the umpire clearly didn’t believe he could go the distance.

“I said give me an extra five seconds next time. I’m only just 30,” he cracked.

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St Kilda entered on a four-game winning streak but were shunted back to the pack by the Cats, who were efficient early before kicking the last nine goals.

Tom Hawkins dominated all over the park and managed a season-best five goals to rise to equal first in the Coleman Medal race with Josh Kennedy (24 goals).

He found support in Gary Rohan (four goals) who managed three majors in the second quarter and Sam Menegola (two goals, 26 disposals) was prolific.

Coach Chris Scott said 32-year-old Hawkins' commitment to the craft had set him up to thrive in this peculiar season.

"Some conclusions can be drawn from it (this season's form), especially with such short breaks between games," he said.

"Over the years as he's developed some maturity, become a leader and learnt to prepare to play well into his 30s.

"To me he's in better shape than he was when I first started coaching, just on 10 years now."

St Kilda were on terms early, winning the contested possession battle 59-45 at half time and earning seven more forward 50s than the Cats and incredibly finishing with four more at full-time.

But Geelong had 23 scoring shots from their 40 entries and by three-quarter time had tipped the scales elsewhere in their favour.

With AAP