Friday night football
Firstly to North Melbourne, where the club most instrumental to the success of the very concept of Friday Night Football will this week rest so many of its regular players that the ones actually taking part will need to wear name tags and engage in trust exercises during the warm-ups in order to become better acquainted. This, says both the AFL Integrity Unit and anybody possessing basic levels of common sense, is all above board. Premiership glory beckons. A final in Melbourne is better than one in Adelaide where the Roos were walloped earlier in the year, so tonight’s fixture with Richmond is essentially devoid of benefit anyway. Why risk injury to any of the star Kangaroos who’ll be soundly beaten in week one of the finals?
Of more interest here are the counter arguments, especially that of Roos great Wayne Carey, who claims that the North Melbourne fill-ins could be used to “maim” Tigers players ahead of the finals. Sort of says more about the internal monologue of old Wayne than it does anything else, don’t you think? Best of all was North coach Brad Scott’s reminder to doubters that a number of his side’s inclusions had been “banging down the door in the VFL”, which certainly puts a new spin on Kayne Turner’s 9-possession, 1-goal effort for Werribee last week.
The biggest losers out of this are the Crows, now possessing only the remotest chance of playing a home final. The Tigers? They’ll probably just romp it in and continue deeper into September with the kind of momentum and genuine belief that their opposition tonight will lack.
Not much to Crow about
Speaking of Adelaide, their clash with Geelong now promises little other than a chance for players to keep their legs warm for another week. It’d be a little hard-hearted to criticise Adelaide after the year they’ve had, but all the frothing over the North Melbourne situation is a little rich from a team currently sitting in 7th place.
As it is they drag themselves off to Simmonds stadium to go through the motions against Geelong, antagonists primarily in their quest to lure Patrick Dangerfield back home in 2016. In a move that jas raised a few eyebrows this week, Adelaide decided to leave the star midfielder off the cover of their 2016 calendar, the biggest controversy in this realm since former Collingwood hard man Craig Kelly posed with nothing but a rubber duck covering his nether regions.
Of more immediate concern is that this game will represent the end of the road for Geelong favourites James Kelly and Matthew Stokes, while it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that champions Steve Johnson and Corey Enright will also play their last games in the famous hoops. It’d just look wrong if Johnson ended up in any other jumper, wouldn’t it?
The Doggies won’t be flirting with form
Pragamatic in their selection policy this week if not quite as noteworthy as others, the Bulldogs will rest the weary legs of veterans Bob Murphy, Matthew Boyd and Dale Morris for their clash against Brisbane with all three coincidentally succumbing to “general soreness” on the eve of the finals. Even without Murphy piloting their play across half back you’d think the Dogs have the firepower to account for the truly deplorable Lions, but it would be a win for football comedy if Brisbane somehow managed to scrape home, because doing so would entirely vindicate North Melbourne’s approach against the Tigers.
Neither flirting with form nor taking their opposition lightly, Luke Beveridge’s side knows that a win here sets up a home final at Ethihad Stadium, so the stakes are clear. Notwithstanding their heavy loss to West Coast a few weeks back, the closer you look at this Dogs side the more you convince yourself of the damage they might inflict in the coming fortnight. Even some lower profile Dogs – Mitch Honeychurch, Jarrad Grant, Jordan Roughead, Shane Biggs – have in recent times made valuable contributions to wins. If not the sky, their limit certainly seems higher than the Etihad Stadium roof.
Comedy Corner
The laughs keep rolling later on Saturday when Port Adelaide take on newly-minted minor Premiers Fremantle, whose list of omitted players is almost as long as that one of cricketers used by England in the 1989 Ashes. Of the 11 inclusions in Ross Lyon’s side, Zac Clarke, Hayden Crozier and Matt Taberner are the most likely to fight for a finals spot, but the real question here is whether Ken Hinkley’s side could conspire to disappoint their home fans one more time in 2015 with the odds stacked so heavily in their favour.
Carlton fans are probably making alternative plans at 4:40pm on Sunday, when their side faces Premiership aspirant Hawthorn at home just six weeks since the Hawks battered them by 138 points. What a way for John Barker to see out his time as caretaker coach. With only one change to their line-up, 4th-placed Sydney are at home to Gold Coast and actually need a win to hold firm in their ladder position. You find yourself doubting their credentials this season though, which is perhaps a slight on a side that is likely to finish 16-6.
The best and worst of the rest
Elsewhere in this lead balloon of a final round, West Coast stay home to face St Kilda and tinker a little with the line-up that they hope will go deep into September. The Saints, meanwhile, will not follow that clash with a traditional Mad Monday drinking session, with defender Sam Gilbert revealing that he and teammates will “just have a nice little sit-down lunch” among themselves. That’s quite a change-up from the dwarf-igniting fiascos of years gone by. Much has been made of St Kilda’s on-field progress this year but they’re starting to kick a few goals off it too.
The grimmest of all prospects this weekend is the Demons’ Sunday clash with GWS at Etihad, which a few Giants players might view as a paid job interview with other Melbourne clubs. If any game demanded a ‘free food’ or ‘10 cent beer night’ gimmick, it’s that one. Last but not least, Essendon and Collingwood face off in a fixture that’s long boasted ‘Blockbuster’ status but this time around carries all the gravitas of a trip to Bunnings Warehouse for some electrical tape. Perhaps it’d be more fun to pick two teams of 22 from members of the media who support either side and let them go toe to toe as the players point and laugh. Still, it’s not much of a full stop for the regular season.
