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The Hawks went top, the Crows went bust, the Blues went close, the Pies went back, the Cats went on, the Power went out. Four games to go, and ramifications all over the ladder keep playing out.
The real manic movement in the top four will run from next weekend to the close, with Fremantle, Geelong and Hawthorn all playing each other and fifth-placed Port lining up Sydney and Freo.
But even this week’s more predictable results have had their influence.
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Geelong had the hardest job of the top sides, coming away with a strong win against North Melbourne to stay level on points with standard-setters Sydney and Hawthorn. North have flummoxed other good sides this year, but the Cats held them comfortably all night. Which sound quite romantic, when you think about it.
North challenged regularly but the Cats finally put together a consistent match, with eight goals in each half making sure they weren’t headed. The only doubt was whether beating North makes you a rubbish team, given the Roos’ tendency to beat the best and lose to the rest.
Now facing two games in Melbourne and two interstate teams at Kardinia Park, as well as the chance to take points off two immediate rivals, the Cats have direct control of their fate. First they have to find a way past bogey side Fremantle in one of those classic eight-point games.
The Dockers got away with a win that nearly wasn’t against Carlton, when a loss would have dropped them two games off the pace in fourth place, while Hawthorn passed Sydney into top spot by virtue of a bigger percentage boost.
But all those teams should have won easily enough. The biggest winners of the round were Collingwood and Gold Coast, snapping runs of poor form to get back on the winners’ list and remain in finals contention.
Collingwood downed Port Adelaide in the game of the round, one of those manically energetic games of football ultimately decided by a few moments of fortune, a few of brilliance, and single-goal margin.
The Suns, meanwhile, had St Kilda at home in what was an easy game on paper, but given Gold Coast’s recent disintegration against low-ranked sides and St Kilda’s demolition of Fremantle, nothing was sure.
That all left Pies eighth place and Gold Coast ninth, joining the Kangaroos and Bombers to form a raft of teams on 40 points jostling for three finals spots. It’s all down to who drops points: Collingwood face a trip to West Coast and a game against Hawthorn, while the others have reasonably friendly fixtures, but Essendon versus Gold Coast in Round 22 may settle the issue.
Toward the non-September end of the draw, recent weeks have seen Richmond, West Coast and Brisbane stringing form together. The former two could feasibly finish with ten wins after forgettable seasons, which may inspire less happiness than lament over missed opportunities. The Lions now have six wins and a far less bleak outlook, and have skipped away from the bottom three after being the lowest side for much of the year.
As far as the round’s biggest losers, though, it was a depressing footballing day in South Australia’s capital. Adelaide’s miss against the Eagles dropped them from eighth to tenth, and now a game behind the top-eight traffic jam. From here they’d have to make it past two of those four teams, a tough ask even with a reasonable draw.
Port’s narrow loss was their fourth in five starts, only punctuated by a lucky three-point home win over competition struggler Melbourne. It has been a mighty fall after starting the season with 11 wins from 13, with only a couple of narrow losses to good teams.
Port remain safe in fifth, two games ahead of North, but and have Sydney and Freo in their last four games, and now drop a game below Freo outside the four. A decent win would have seen them claim fourth on percentage. It’s still possible in the next month, but a whole lot of mojo has to be found again, and soon.
North would rank theirs as a big loss as well – two games adrift of Port, and three from Fremantle, their hope of skating into the top four through a finish-line crash has now vanished.
The Roos’ general play was more than good enough to stay with the Cats on Saturday, but a lack of composure saw them offer unnecessary free kicks, 50-metre penalties, and terrible conversion. A halftime score of 3.10 is pretty appalling, and a final line of 10.19 isn’t much better, especially in a game with only four or five goals in it.
Boomer Harvey’s men will now have to set their sights on staying in sixth, but with a stack of other teams breathing down their neck, there’s not going to be a release in pressure.