Five talking points from GWS Giants vs West Coast Eagles first semi-final

The GWS Giants are through to a preliminary final after a comfortable win over West Coast on Saturday night. Here’s my five talking points from the match.

No more finals blowouts, please
Last week’s Port Adelaide vs West Coast game was a thriller, but it’s fair to say that all the finals we’ve seen in the time since have been a bit uncompetitive.

Geelong vs Richmond was a gripping contest if not particularly thrilling, and Geelong vs Sydney, while a textbook blowout, was at least a notable upset.

The other three matches so far have been uninspiring big-margin victories to the favoured side. Not a one has come within six goals.

This hardly seems like a fitting finals series for what was dubbed the most even season of all time.

Personally, I hope we’re just building up some good excitement-karma for an epic grand final.

Deledio vs Richmond
Who would have thought when Brett Deledio was traded from Richmond to the Giants at the end of last year that it would be the Tigers, not Deledio, who first scored a finals win?

Who would have thought that the respective finals wins of both teams would lead to them being pitted against each other in a preliminary final?

And who would have thought that Deledio would battle with injury during the season just long enough for that preliminary final to be his 250th career game?

Footy really can be kind to us fans sometimes.

(Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Media/Getty Images)

Stevie J show hits peak form
It felt more like the thing you’ll see in an EJ Whitten Legends game than a genuine AFL-level performance.

A week after being dropped from the side, Steve Johnson came back in and booted six goals, four of them in the third quarter, to more than confirm his spot in the side for next week’s preliminary final.

Like the Giants’ performance in general, it’d be getting a bit overly excited to say that this was indicative of that much of an improvement since last week.

The opposition was of a vastly different calibre and all things considered Johnson would have been lucky to hit the board if he played at Adelaide Oval.

It’s telling that his goals came in the second half, when the game was already dead.

Can he have that kind of impact against Richmond next week? You never write off a champion, but if the Tigers bring the suffocating pressure they did against Geelong, it seems very unlikely.

(Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)

New Eagle era on the way
We saw three remarkable players of the modern era walk off the field for the last time on Saturday night in Sam Mitchell, Matt Priddis and Drew Petrie.

All of them have contributed something special to the game over the past decade or so, and all will be respected – perhaps more by their original clubs than West Coast in the case of Mitchell and Petrie – for a long time to come.

While players who’ve been there only one year can hardly be considered the fabric of the club, it’s no doubt that the times they are a changing at West Coast, and I’d be surprised if these are the only three to have played their last AFL game on Saturday.

Mark LeCras and Sharrod Wellingham are both out of contract from last night’s side and you’d have the question the wisdom of re-signing them for 2018 and beyond at this point.

Of course, we’ll take more about all that tomorrow when I review West Coast’s list – for now, a hand to three heroes.

(Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Media/Getty Images)

Small Giants better than tall?
You’d be reading far too much into limited results to say that having a smaller side on the park last night was the difference between devastating loss last week and comfortable victory this time around.

However, there has generally been a concern throughout the year that the Giants were running a bit too tall, particularly in the forward line, and having one less there this week did seem to help.

With Shane Mumford out Rory Lobb went into the ruck and acquitted himself well there. He looks like the longterm successor to Mumford in that role.

Ideally you would still have Jeremy Cameron available and playing in the side, and in that case Harrison Himmelberg would probably miss out.

The Giants will be forced by necessity to play a small side again next week, which is the logical way to play against a team like Richmond anyway.

It’ll be interesting to see if it leads to a genuine change of philosophy in 2018.