It wasn’t meant to end like this for the Richmond Football Club.
The Tigers entered the finals as the form team of the second half of the regular season, on the back of nine straight victories following a poor first half which returned a record of just three wins against 10 losses.
Their finals hopes appeared dashed. But suddenly, the team came from nowhere to surge into the eight to secure a place in the finals.
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That meant they would travel to the Adelaide Oval, where they had beaten the Crows in Round 21, to take on Port Adelaide in a sudden-death elimination final on Sunday.
But all the hard work they had put into the second half of the season fell apart in a brutal first quarter as the Power kicked the first seven goals to all but bring the Tigers’ resurgence to a shuddering halt.
The same could be said last year when they capitulated in the second half to lose to Carlton.
Tigers captain Trent Cotchin will be left to regret kicking into the breeze in the first quarter after winning the coin toss. His decision would not only backfire, but also be criticised by retired Brisbane Lions forward Jonathan Brown.
“Captaincy 101. You should always kick with the wind when you win the toss,” Brown tweeted.
Whether that fateful decision led to the Tigers eventually losing by 57 points is debatable, but in the end it was a shattering end to what had been a fairytale run.
While the Tigers ponder the September that could have been, the Power live to fight another day and will travel to Perth for a third time this season to face Fremantle on Saturday night. The Dockers must now take the hard road if they are to return to the grand final this year after their 24-point loss to the Sydney Swans at ANZ Stadium sent their season into sudden death mode.
To say the least, however, Ross Lyon’s men were far from disgraced, kicking the first goal of the game and only trailing by five points at half-time. Only a final quarter exhibition from Lance Franklin really sunk the Dockers in the end.
The Swans’ victory, as well as that of the Hawks’, who defeated Geelong by 36 points to kick off the finals series, means both teams will get to rest and watch as their preliminary final opponents are known.
The Swans will face the winner of this Friday night’s battle of the twin brothers when Chris Scott’s Cats face Brad Scott’s Kangaroos, who came from 33 points down in the third quarter to end Essendon’s season, and possibly the coaching career of Mark Thompson, with a 12-point victory.
The Roos had appeared dead for all money when they failed to kick a goal in the second quarter, but an impressive second half saw them run on top of the Bombers to score their first finals victory since 2007.
Meanwhile, the Hawks, who broke free in the second half to defeat the Cats for the second time in three weeks, will await the winner of the match between Fremantle and Port Adelaide in the other preliminary final. All will be on the line when this clash takes place on Saturday night.
If recent finals history is anything to go by, then it will be the Swans and Hawks who meet in the grand final in just under three weeks’ time.
In the last seven years, the teams that won their qualifying finals have gone on to reach the decider. The last time that any team had to reach the grand final the hard way was the West Coast Eagles in 2006, who lost a qualifying final to the Swans by a point before getting them back by the same margin in the decider.
And so, four matches down, and five to go. We are now in sudden-death mode. Can the Cats and Dockers bounce back from their qualifying final losses this weekend? Or will their seasons end at the hands of the underdog?
Fabes
Guest
He gives as good as he gets. He'll be fine.
Aransan
Guest
There are too many people who rejoice in someone else's sorrow. How about writing something constructive.
Ash of Geelong
Guest
We also learnt (But Knew) that Gene is a front running down hill skier who loves to give it out but has gone AWOL.
Aransan
Guest
Teams had to look elsewhere with the compromised draft and some gems have turned up. Let us hope that players are looked at more after their draft year, not everyone matures at the same rate and that is particularly so with bigger players. Congratulations on North's win, I think they will make it to the preliminary final.
Dalgety Carrington
Roar Guru
I think you're reading things there Rick. dms is not saying Freo can't lose at all, but just doubting Port could get through three top 4 teams to win it.
Fabes
Guest
Thanks Aransan :) I didn't realise that. Being a Hawks man I never watched the 2012 Grandfinal again and probably never will. Cheers for stats mate.
Aransan
Guest
Equal second most disposals for Hawthorn, top goal kicker of the two sides with 3 goals 4 behinds. Perhaps a bad day only by his standards. Goodes was inspirational on one leg with a vital goal, his knee injury would have kept nearly all other players off the field and must have been very painful.
Fabes
Guest
Buddy 2012 Grandfinal. Pretty bad day I reckon.
Brian
Guest
I would say its worse then that because in reality many nuetrals with MCC are more likely to attend the Final. The nuetrals in the MCC were probably 10k higher then H&A meaning 15,000 supporters of the clubs who stayed away basically due to ticket pricing.
Pope Paul VII
Guest
It's curious. Maybe he was a bit skinny. Or smiles too much so no one takes him seriously. I'm a fan of the older player, even slightly older like Mr Brown. The expectations of the draft can damage young blokes. Incidently North also have Jade Tippett who looks promising if he can avoid being injured. Really enjoyed Pyke's effort. He's tireless, gutsy and smart. Another Sydney player grossly under rated. Anyway good on Brownie. Hope he has a long and happy career.
AR
Guest
Rd 5 - Geel v Haw - 80,222 (Easter Monday) Rd 22 - Haw v Geel - 72,212 (4:40 Sat arvo) QF - Haw v Geel - 74,753 (Fri night) Rd 5 - Syd v Freo - 25,376 (SCG 4:40 Sat arvo) QF - Syd v Freo - 35,998 (ANZ 2:45 Sat arvo) 75k and 36k are very poor results for these games.
Michael huston
Guest
Yeah I see what you mean. Port are definitely good enough to be in the top four and could have easily replaced Geelong or Freo, which makes this week a lot more interesting because suddenly the gap between the top four and the remaining other teams is smaller. Quality wise I have Sydney and Hawthorn as above the rest, then Freo, Geelong and Port all even, and then North.
The Oven
Guest
Yep I see where you are coming from. I guess my view on Port isn't based solely on the tigers game. I do agree with you though that people tend to flip to a new team of the year on weekly basis and Port is flavour of the moment (well... at least for the next five days). They did stretch us at home at the SCG earlier in the year though. And they're playing similarly to that now. All I was trying to hint at was that even though the semi-finals normally have a great build up only to have the bottom two of the top four normally get back through to the preliminary finals, this year might be one of those 'once every decade' moments where someone goes out in straight sets from the top 4. I think both the kangas and cats and port and freo games will be very competitive and I'm hoping that they aren't blow outs.
Franko
Guest
The AFL takes the $$$ for finals games, clubs get it for H&A.
Jason Cave
Guest
Would it be fair to say Richmond skipper Trent Cotchin did a 'Ricky Ponting' at the coin toss? If you may recall, in the second Ashes Test in 2005, Glenn McGrath had a training mishap just half an hour before the game. The pitch was ideal for batting, and with McGrath's 11th hour exit due to injury, would've been an ideal moment to win the toss and bat first. Ponting won the toss, sent England into bat....and Australia never recovered, losing their first Ashes series since 1986-87.
Winston
Guest
Interesting one. Let's do a maths example. Say a H&A game is on average $25 a ticket and they sell 80000, that's $2m. Say a finals game is on average $100 a ticket and they sell 70000, that's $7m. Clearly the finals game would still have made loads more money than the H&A game. So why does it matter?
Winston
Guest
I would have thought so too. As bad as he might have been, surely he had to have been better than people like Mike Pyke, Majak Daw, or 75% of other big men at the START of their careers. I would even say he looks better than Jonathan Patton before his knee. Does anyone know if he grew taller since the first time he was passed over? That could explain it. Anyway, even I'm getting excited watching him and I'm not a North supporter.
Michael huston
Guest
I agree with you, but why should a victory over Richmond suddenly throw them back into contention? And they've been exposed a few times this year. They're only flashy and brilliant if you let them be, and teams like Sydney and Hawthorn would not let them do that, and they'd then collapse.
Brian
Guest
I learnt the AFL charges too much for Finals matches. The Hawthorn v Geelong crowd was less then what were attending home and away fixtures between the clubs a few years ago.
Pope Paul VII
Guest
What I learnt was it's possible to accidentially get lucky. Ben Brown was pick 47 in Nov 2013 at a positively ancient 21 years old, having been overlooked three times. Pretty hard to overlook 200cm you would think. Apparently beaming Ben studies philosophy, so maybe that helped him hang in. Anyway North appear to have got themselves a bargain.