With the finals series set in stone for 2013 the attention now turns to who will win the AFL Premiership.
18 teams have been narrowed down to eight, and by the end of this week only six will remain.
While the premiership will be won by the best team in the finals series – and on the big day – no one has mentioned some of the poor records or hoodoos some teams have in regards to opposition teams and venues.
To me, this will play a pivotal role in who wins the premiership as some sides will dread certain scenarios in the race to the grand final.
Take Hawthorn – the minor premiers – for instance.
Since they defeated Geelong in the 2008 grand final, they have lost every single match against the Cats since winning the Premiership.
With the streak at 11 matches, Hawthorn would want to avoid playing Geelong in the final series.
While it could give the team plenty of incentives to defeat the streak, it could also play on the team’s mind in an important match.
Geelong also has a losing streak of their own against Collingwood since the two met in the 2011 grand final.
In the three meetings between the two since 2011, Collingwood has won all of them including a six-point win earlier this year.
They’d fancy their chances against the Cats if they got an opportunity to play them.
To complete this triangle, Collingwood have a poor record against Hawthorn with the Magpies losing their last five matches against the Hawks.
In fact, since the preliminary final in 2011, Collingwood haven’t defeated the Hawks.
So to summarise, in this AFL game of rock, paper and scissors, Collingwood beats Geelong, Geelong beats Hawthorn and Hawthorn beat Collingwood.
Last year’s premier, the Sydney Swans, broke two hoodoos last season to win the Premiership.
The first was beating Collingwood in Sydney at ANZ Stadium and the second was winning at the MCG.
Against Collingwood at ANZ Stadium they are one from seven in matches against the Magpies.
While they may avoid Collingwood at the Olympic Stadium again, they will have to win at the MCG, which has become a problem for the Swans in previous years.
In their last 15 matches at the MCG, Sydney has one won four times which is hardly convincing at the ground.
Sydney will have to beat someone at the MCG this season, and like the grand final last year, they will have to break their poor record at the ground in order to win.
Another team who struggles at the MCG and Melbourne in general is Fremantle.
If you take Fremantle’s win against Geelong at the MCG last season away from the calculations, it doesn’t make for pretty reading.
Neither does their record against the other teams in the top four.
Fremantle hasn’t beaten Hawthorn away from home since 2001 with the Dockers not beating Sydney at the SCG since 2011 and are 4 from 16 in Sydney in their history.
Finally, the Dockers are 2 from 15 against Geelong in Victoria and haven’t beaten the Cats at Kardinia Park since 2005 which will be venue for this weekend’s qualifying final.
Fremantle also haven’t won a preliminary final in their history, which will need to be broken for them to stand a chance of winning the grand final.
They will have to break some records to win through to their first grand final.
As for the final three, Port Adelaide, Richmond and Carlton also have hoodoos to battle if they are to progress in the finals.
For starters, Richmond will play their first finals series in 12 years after last playing in the final in 2001.
While they have a good record against Carlton in the finals, the Blues have the wood over the Tigers in the last few matches.
In the last 11 matches, Carlton has won ten of them, with Richmond winning their only match at the start of the year.
They will have to break that trend again like they did earlier in the season in order to progress to the next round.
If they do that, they may play Sydney or Hawthorn.
While they have won their last two matches against the Hawks, the Tigers have a poor record in Sydney.
They haven’t defeated the Swans in Sydney since 2004 and have only won twice since the start of the millennium.
The Tigers face a tough task to progress to the preliminary final.
As for Carlton, they have never won a final away from Melbourne in their history.
If they were to defeat Richmond, and face Sydney in the semi-final, they would face the prospect of never winning a final in the state.
The same applies to Hawthorn if they were to face them in the semi-final.
Carlton has lost their last 10 matches to the Hawks and hasn’t defeated them since 2005.
The Blues haven’t also beaten the Hawks since 1987 in a final when they went on to win the grand final.
The Blues will have to break some major hoodoos if they are to even make the preliminary final.
It’s the same for Port Adelaide who faces an almost impossible task of making the preliminary final, let alone the grand final.
Port Adelaide hasn’t beaten Collingwood in Melbourne since 2007, and has not won a final in Melbourne since defeating the Kangaroos in 2005.
The Power has also failed to defeat the Magpies in their two finals meetings in their history.
If they manage to get past the Magpies, the Power faces two stern tests in either Fremantle or Geelong.
Against the Cats, they haven’t defeated them in Melbourne since 2007 and have only won twice in Victoria in their history against Geelong.
In regards to the Dockers, Port hasn’t beaten Fremantle since 2008 and struggled against them only two weeks ago in their Round 22 clash.
Fremantle are also unbeaten at home in finals since Essendon won their first ever finals clash at Subiaco in 2003.
So heading into the finals series, each team has a hoodoo or a poor record to shake if they are to be successful.
The great thing is one of these teams will have to break these shackles to win this year’s Premiership.
The team who can ultimately do that will win the grand final.
Let the games begin.
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