Friday night finals football
After 23 regular-season rounds that have increasingly felt like that awkward stage of a wedding reception when you’re trapped too far from the hors d’oeuvres, the finals buffet has finally been unveiled and what a glorious sight it is. Tonight we kick things off with West Coast and Hawthorn, a contest that will play a major role in how things shake out over the next fortnight. If the Eagles win at home they’ll take a week off and play there again during preliminary final round. If the Hawks get up, they’ll skip through to an MCG preliminary and avoid any further interstate travel.
This might well prove the match of greatest intensity, physicality and scoring density in week one of the finals and the Eagles enter it with genuine belief that they could win their first qualifier since the glory days of 2006. Hawks skipper Luke Hodge returns after an eventful fortnight on the sidelines, livewire Isaac Smith will be given every chance to play and their side enters the game close to full strength, but West Coast can’t say the same with industrious midfielder Chris Masten missing, Will Schofield only just hobbling back from a 3-week hamstring injury and his fellow key defender Jeremy McGovern still to hit his straps. That’ll be music to the ears of Jarryd Roughead, Jack Gunston and Luke Breust.
We’re left with many tantalizing questions. Can Hawthorn curb explosive ruckman Nic Naitanui’s influence? Could Josh Kennedy tear a big final apart the way he has some regular season games when he’s faced with a Frawley-Lake tag team? Will the Hawks become entangled in the Weagles Web or be overrun late? Or will Alastair Clarkson’s men show that finals experience is what really counts? Those and more will be answered tonight and with no disrespect to Fremantle’s efficiency, the victor here might move into outright Premiership favouritism.
Bonus: this game will be coming to you via the Guardian goal-by-goal live blog.
The Dockers couldn’t possibly lose at home to Sydney, could they?
Fremantle sit in a strange position right now; minor premiers with a deep and undoubtedly respected squad but not, you feel, possessing a great deal of fear factor. In all likelihood, they’ll use both their home ground advantage and a depleted opposition to their favour to book themselves a preliminary final berth, but their fate from there is harder to pinpoint.
The Swans are without Lance Franklin, whose withdrawal under trying personal circumstances perhaps could have been dealt with in a slightly more sensitive fashion around some quarters this week, as well as co-captain Kieren Jack, midfield ace Luke Parker and ever-reliable Nick Smith. Those are impossible scratchings to cover and make this a mighty task.
Adding to the intrigue has been the absence of Freo’s premier midfielder Nat Fyfe since Round 21 with inflammation of the fibula. Fremantle coach Ross Lyon claimed this week that Fyfe was “feeling a million bucks”, which if our knowledge of AFL contracts serves us correctly could probably be interpreted literally. Other question marks are the fitness or not of key defender Luke McPharlin, the sudden love for ruckman Zac Clarke after he’d been banished from the side for most of the year (will a fit Jon Griffin push him out of the side in the weeks ahead?), and the haunting spectre of Ryan Crowley, who is eligible for a return from his doping ban during Preliminary final weekend. This one will be a grind, but no less gripping than the stakes deserve.
The Bulldogs really need to win their home final
Saturday night’s MCG final between the Western Bulldogs and Adelaide puts the hosts in a unique position, being the designated home side at a venue where they’ve played a grand total of six games in the past four seasons. Remember last week, when Adelaide was actually upset about surrendering home ground advantage? Simpler times. Anyway, the Dogs still enter this one as favourites and a deservedly popular side among neutrals for their Cinderella streak this season; all defence-splitting runners and heart-racing action.
The sad irony, of course, is that the man missing from this match – Adelaide’s late coach Phil Walsh – would have been as happy as anyone that such attractive and joyful football was propelling a side to success. Now Adelaide’s players face another significant hurdle, if not the same emotional burdens they’ve handled so admirably this year. Accordingly it’s impossible to be cynical about this one in any way; the Crows boast the most explosive and eye-catching midfielder in the competition and a multitude of potent forward options, while the Dogs have winners all over the ground and play with heart.
Team line-ups are of interest here. The Dogs will miss the blistering run of Jason Johannisen and Jordan Roughead is injured too but veterans Bob Murphy, Dale Morris and Matthew Boyd all return and provide the ballast that has complimented youthful exuberance so well all year. Roughead’s absence means a rare senior outing for big Will Minson, and what a time to come in. Adelaide’s Brodie Smith has been under an injury cloud all week but made the squad, while David Mackay and old-fashioned goer Kyle Cheney return.
Which of Richmond or North Melbourne will be its truest self?
More to the point, would it necessarily be a good thing if either of Richmond or North Melbourne is its truest self? Sorry to both sets of fans for noting this but Sunday’s game leaves us with a greater scope for unintentional comedy than any other this weekend. Against 2013 finals ring-ins Carlton, the Tigers suffered a full-fledged brain fade in front of 95,000 people. Last year Port Adelaide all but wiped the floor with them in a single, dispiriting quarter. But North Melbourne? If North Melbourne was a schoolchild, let’s be honest, its parents might put other kids’ artworks on the fridge.
Richmond is the better side here. They’ve played gorgeous, barnstorming football at important times all season. They won 15 games, only one fewer than bona fide flag contenders Hawthorn and West Coast. They’ve got dashing midfielders, hulking forwards, impenetrable key defenders and a few wily veterans too. The MCG is their home patch. Their supporters will be going hoarse cheering them on. But they’ve also got their doubts. They’re a doubtful people, Richmond fans. They need to be. Maybe Ivan Maric’s old-school physicality won’t be a match for Todd Goldstein’s ground coverage and sumptuous tap work. Maybe Shaun Higgins will have a day out and snag five cheeky goals. Perhaps Drew Petrie and Jarrad Waite will tear the game open. Maybe Terry Wallace’s face will be accidentally flashed on the big screen right as the national anthem is sung.
You’d hope not. Richmond is precisely the kind of giant-killing side the latter stages of a decent finals series needs.
The best and worst of the rest
One unfortunate by-product of all this “finals” business everyone’s faffing on about is that it distracts from the real reason fans are getting excited in September: ludicrous trade rumours. For fans of clubs whose players are already sitting in pubs dressed as Nintendo characters or setting waiting staff on fire, herein lies hope for seasons ahead. And questions, so many questions.
Maybe Harley Bennell is a problem child, but wouldn’t it be great if he was our problem child? If Travis Cloke is the answer, what exactly is the question? Are Rhys Palmer and Sam Fisher really still players you “lock in” to two-year deals or were they each carrying round one of those four-in-one pens in case a contract happened to be flashed in their vicinity? Why do Collingwood now get all the best young midfielders who want to come home? Can Lachie Henderson’s mother do some freelance work, perhaps handling my next request for a pay raise?
Then there’s the crazy world of free agency compensation, where poor old Matthew Kreuzer – eternally crocked and yet somehow still smiling – could be worth an early first round pick. If so, what does that make Matthew Leuenberger worth? Two top five picks, a framed lithograph of Richard Lounder and a $50 voucher to Michele’s Patisserie at the very least, you’d assume. May all our clubs make like bandits or failing that, at least pinch a Brisbane player or two.
