- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
The Fremantle Dockers and Brisbane Lions are both coming off of what most would consider their best wins of the season. Join The Roar for live scores and coverage from 1:10pm (AEST).
Coming in to the business end of the season, this contest between a top four contender and a bottom four candidate looms as surprisingly intriguing.
Matthew Pavlich donned his ‘Super Pav’ cape and with his army of warriors clad in purple took down the then top of the ladder Hawks last round.
Fremantle booted seven goals to three in the second half to record a 19-point win – perhaps the most pleasing thing about the performance was an increase in their attacking prowess and a return to the manic pressure that enthralled many in big games last year.
Michael Walters made a much welcomed return to the line-up and had a strong performance in his first match back since Round 3.
The downers of the evening for the purple haze were an incident that led to Nathan Fyfe’s suspension and a broken thumb to Michael Barlow that will see him sidelined for the final two games of the home and away season.
For Brisbane, many wouldn’t have considered them much of a chance against Buckley’s Collingwood side but the withdrawal of Jamie Elliot and Scott Pendlebury before the game seemed to provide them with renewed vigour.
Much was made about the spate of injuries the ‘Pies suffered during the game, but Pearce Hanley was correct in saying that Brisbane had Collingwood’s measure even before the likes of champion Dayne Beams and vital key post players Ben Reid and Travis Cloke went down.
The Lions had some exhilarating run going for much of the night as they carved the ‘Pies up and broke lines left and right.
For a side that has been one of the poorest attacking teams in the competition this season, scoring over 120 points with 11 individual goal kickers was a fantastic result.
Second gamer Jonathan Freeman booted 4 goals and the often maligned Daniel Merrett finally stood up in as a key forward in 2014, booting 3 and providing a presence.
Will the loss of two star players for Fremantle be enough to spark Brisbane again this week?
As much as we fans love the underdog, logic says no chance. Brisbane’s inexperience has led to massive swings of inconsistency all season and the Fremantle people fear seems to be well and truly back in town.
Brisbane go into this game with seven players under the 25 game mark compared to Fremantle’s two. At the other end of the scale Fremantle have 13 players with over 100 games experience compared to Brisbane’s six.
Even when Fremantle weren’t flying earlier in the year they absolutely annihilated Brisbane in all facets of the game. Make no mistake – the 100+ point beltings Brisbane have copped were bad, but in the Fremantle game they might as well have been an Auskick side.
They recorded the lowest amount of inside 50s since stats have been recorded with a paltry 17 for the whole match. Fremantle went into their attacking zone 72 times in comparison.
Brisbane’s final score of 22 was their worst against the Dockers by a fair distance and the losing margin of 83 was also the biggest hiding they’ve copped from Fremantle.
Fremantle will want to back up their fantastic performance last week by putting Brisbane to the sword. Lions fans should be very happy with a competitive effort and acceptable margin.
The hopes for Brisbane are twofold – Fremantle relax their pressure against a weaker opponent and allow them to use their dash and overlap run and the outs of two of Fremantle’s best players will let the likes of Tom Rockliff and Pearce Hanley to get the upper hand in the midfield.
Playing at the GABBA rather than over in the West will help as well.
For Fremantle, the return of Hayden Ballantyne will bolster their forward stocks and his combination with Walters may wreak havoc on a tall Lions backline. They will be looking to run the well oiled machine efficiently and continue on their march to September.
You never say never and Brisbane are at surprisingly reasonable odds at the bookies, but it’s extremely hard to see the Lions coming out of this with anything other than an honourable loss.
Fremantle by 42.
Who’s in your ultimate team? Pick the best team and compete with other fans for daily prizes on Draftstars. For the best odds on the game try out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Think. Is this a bet you really want to place? Set a deposit limit.