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In this week’s Expert Tips column, I predicted Round 11 would be the weekend of upsets.
I didn’t have the guts to follow through – story of my tipping year – but with six underdogs getting up to win, including four of five on Saturday, it’s apparently the most shocking round we’ve seen since the competition expanded to 18 teams 11 years ago.
It’s an exciting time to love our beautiful game, despite all the reason it drives us nuts – unless you barrack for North Melbourne or West Coast at the moment, you can head along to a game reasonably confident your team can get the job done – and if Carlton fans disagree about this, I’ll point out that you were embarrassed enough by their performance on Friday night to provide another sweet, sweet weekend of talkback radio gold.
There’s debate over diving, some resurgent teams proving us all wrong, and some more utterly outrageous goals – plus a few things that really should be stamped out of the game.
Ready to unpack the weekend that was? I sure am.
Sometime during every year, there’s a round of upsets that leads to widespread calls about this being the most even season in decades.
The difference between those and what unfolded in Round 11 is just how predictable all those upsets were.
Sydney beating Carlton? The Swans at home always put on a good show, and the Blues’ ball movement problems are well established by now.
Fremantle knocking over Melbourne? Well, the Dockers did it last year, and with the Demons in a lull and minus Clayton Oliver, one of the flag favourites was ripe for the picking for an in-form team.
Even GWS taking down Geelong was always a chance – the Cats’ midfield has been smashed to smithereens in recent weeks, and was again on Saturday at the Cattery; add to that a bit of Toby Greene magic, and the boilover was secured.
Ditto Gold Coast taking down the Western Bulldogs; the Suns’ contested-ball strength matched up superbly well on the Dogs’ engine room, and with Matt Rowell playing a career game (more on him later) and five goals from Jack Lukosius to tear apart the Dogs’ still vulnerable defence, Stuart Dew’s men kept their season alive.
The point is this: the lines between the ‘tiers’ in the AFL have never been more blurred. A top-flight flag contender in Brisbane can be toppled by Adelaide, a side still fighting for their spot in the eight. A cellar dweller like Hawthorn can storm the house of St Kilda, who headed in with a 7-3 record and fifth on the ladder, if they come prepared for a fight.
West Coast and North Melbourne are the only easybeats; Collingwood are probably the only team any of those mid-range sides would head into a match thinking they were no chance, with the greatest of respect to Port Adelaide. From second to 16th, the gap is as small as it has ever been; from fourth to 14th, it’s even smaller.
I’m only prepared at this point to lock three sides in for September: the Magpies, Power and Lions. I’m also only prepared to rule out the Hawks, Kangaroos, Eagles and Richmond. Given we’re almost halfway through the year, it’s genuinely astonishing how many teams are still more than half a chance at September action.
We’re in for an incredible run home once again. And good news, Carlton fans – despite everything, you’re still well and truly in this hunt!
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Jacob Koschitzke of the Hawks celebrates a goal. (Photo by Darrian Traynor/Getty Images)
Let’s get this out of the way first – yes, diving, flopping, staging or whatever you want to call it is a problem for the game.
I’m stopping short of calling it a ‘blight’ on the game because honestly, I think that’s overkill. Yes, there were a number of ugly looks on the weekend – and one from Cody Weightman that, coming in the dying minutes of a close game, was always going to be particularly enraging – but it’s far less endemic than some would have you think.
I could honestly point to three from across the weekend – Weightman’s, Jeremy Cameron throwing his head back in a tackle to win a high contact free, and Max King dropping like a sack of potatoes to earn a 50m penalty.
(As an aside, I’d really like to see the Cameron incident get as much criticism as Weightman has for his – and while I’m at it, some of the vitriol directed his way is straight yuck.)
While rarely enforced, the AFL does have the power to hand down fines for staging – given public mood, I expect Weightman – but the benefits still far outweigh the drawbacks. Weightman’s goal brought the Dogs to within a point against Gold Coast; he’d pay $1000 for that every day of the week.
There are basically three options if the AFL are serious about stamping this out: the most widely suggested is to award free kicks against for players caught diving.
I’m against this for a couple of reasons. One is that this proposal gives umpires yet another job to do, and judging from the reaction to one particular umpire in the Bulldogs-Suns game, they’re having a hard enough time enforcing the rules as they are now. If you think it’s bad when a player gets a free against your team for flopping, imagine the vitriol when a player from your team is wrongly pinged because the umpire thinks he flopped.
Ask most supporters and they’ll tell you they want to see umpires have less involvement in the game; this just seems to be the opposite of that.
The next solution is to just not pay frees to players with a reputation for doing it, which I also dislike. Not only does it basically give some players carte blanche to still do as they please – I can’t ever remember seeing Cameron throw his head back before, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a bad look to do it – but it leads to problems we’re already seeing.
I remember this time 12 months ago this line of thinking was very popular, and I didn’t disagree with it at the time – but then when we saw it in practice, with Jack Ginnivan being denied clear high tackle free kicks almost every week on reputation alone, the reaction was even angrier than it had previously been.
Which brings me to the last solution, and in my book, the only solution. Want to stamp flopping out of the game, AFL? Then put it in Michael Christian’s list of Match Review Officer guidelines. Every player gets one warning, and then if they do it again, it’s a straight one-week suspension.
It’s assessed in the cold light of day – so no extra pressure on umpires in the heat of the moment having to make a judgement call. It’s a universal rule – no special treatment for some. And you’d better believe it’s going to change players’ thinking.
The only question to ask is: does the punishment fit the crime? Do we really think diving is such an egregious offence, such a blight on the game, that we’d be comfortable seeing players rubbed out for it?
I’d argue no. You might very reasonably argue yes. So let’s just leave it there.
Cody Weightman of the Bulldogs celebrates a goal. (Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)
Such was the volume of upsets on Saturday that Fremantle’s stirring win over Melbourne probably hasn’t been given the credit it’s due.
But make no mistake – the Dockers are back. Sitting ninth courtesy of Adelaide’s Sunday win over Brisbane, with four wins on the trot and each more impressive than the last, it’s back to 2022 levels for Freo.
What’s been most commendable has been how the Dockers have changed their style to spark their surge. They’re handballing far more, particularly through congestion, and less reliant on a mark-kick game from half-back. Clayton Oliver or no, beating the Dees for clearances despite losing Sean Darcy to injury after a quarter and a half is a serious effort.
The forwards are reaping the rewards for a dominant midfield, with Andrew Brayshaw back to his brilliant best, Jaeger O’Meara looking more in sync with his new teammates by the week and Caleb Serong an All-Australian frontrunner. Josh Treacy, though quiet on Saturday, is a perfect foil for the hugely exciting Jye Amiss, who is relishing having an extra key forward to share the goalkicking burden. His three goals on the weekend, showing both strong hands overhead and nerveless set-shot kicking as well as elite work below his knees, will surely bring with them a Rising Star nomination.
Earlier this year, and even at times last year, the Dees’ score of 72 would have been a winning score against them. That it isn’t is a testament to Justin Longmuir’s willingness and ability to adapt on the fly, and the team’s willingness to buy into such a significant change midway through a season.
Five weeks ago, I wrote that Fremantle needed to find Plan B. They’ve found it.
There’s no other way to describe it – what Dayne Zorko did to Luke Pedlar in Brisbane’s clash with Adelaide was as dirty as it gets.
It was unnecessary, it was potentially very dangerous – you don’t go messing about with eyes – and coming straight after he’d given away a free for high contact, there’s even a motive that paints him in a very bad light.
Zorko has become renowned for this sort of stuff – he of course made headlines last year for personal sledges of Harrison Petty, while he also has a sizeable career rap sheet.
But forget all that – this current incident was the dirtiest act of 2023. And given I’ve been up in arms already this year over gut-punches, off-the-ball hits and cheap shots, it’s only right to point out this blows all those out of the water.
If we’re lucky, he might get a week or two for misconduct – though I remember Toby Greene only getting a reprimand for a very similar incident in the 2019 elimination final, then a week later getting a week for doing it again. That’s probably as much as we can hope a suspension should be.
Honestly, though, it should be more than that. Three-weeks-plus more. It might have been innocuous, and Pedlar showed no ill effects; but this is exactly the sort of thing that should be stamped out of the game by any means necessary.
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About four weeks ago, I found myself seriously thinking, for really the first time, that Noah Anderson might go on to have a better career than Matt Rowell.
Consider my lesson learned, Matt. The 2019 number one draft pick’s 50th game was also his best, taking on a red-hot Western Bulldogs midfield and beating them hands down.
Rowell had 16 clearances in a scrappy, congested affair in Darwin, with his cleanliness making a mockery of the greasy conditions. 23 of his possessions were contested, and just for good measure, he bagged a crucial last-quarter goal as well.
The symbolic moment came with the match up for grabs in the dying minutes, fending off none other than Marcus Bontempelli with a delightful don’t argue to set up the game-winning Suns goal.
To think there were people who, as recently as a month or two ago, were concerned by Rowell’s lack of weapons. He’s a contested beast with explosive speed, he tackles as hard as anyone in the competition, his kicking is perfectly fine, his decision-making usually spot on, and with two goals in three weeks, he’s starting to hit the scoreboard too. He’s got weapons to spare, it turns out.
Rowell and Anderson – who, by the way, was also very, very good against the Dogs – are the most talented midfield duo the Suns have ever had, unless you count prime Gary Ablett as two players. With a bevy of emerging stars around him, from Charlie Ballard in defence to Jack Lukosius up forward and especially Bailey Humphrey on the ball as well, there is a bright future there for the Suns, whether Dew – who deserves all the credit for putting together this young and hungry list while still being raided year on year by rival clubs – is there to see them get there or not.
The Suns have been here before: in 2014, their first and only serious tilt at a finals berth, they had Ablett along with young guns Jaeger O’Meara and Dion Prestia as their on-ball brigade. That’s some serious talent.
Ablett, though, would succumb to injuries, while O’Meara and Prestia were both out the door within three years. The Suns will be back to square one if, in a year or two, Rowell and Anderson opt to follow their example. By any means necessary – and yes, I’m directing this at the AFL too – the Suns have to hold that pair close and never let go.
I resisted talking about Luke Jackson earlier, because I thought it was worth putting him on his own point: he could hardly have picked a better time to play one of the best three games of his career.
Stepping up to shoulder the ruck burden after Sean Darcy’s injury, Jackson might have been flogged in the hitouts by Brodie Grundy and Max Gawn, but comfortably outstripped either for influence around the ground. A ruckman in the Tim English mould, he had 19 disposals and bagged a goal, all while showcasing exceptional follow-up work at ground level with eight clearances and six tackles.
Naturally, his game has led to suggestions that Freo might be better off instilling him as the permanent number one ruck, and offloading Darcy elsewhere for a top pick. Here’s why that’s exceptionally dumb.
For starters, Jackson is in his fourth season, and is far from the finished product as a ruckman or footballer. He is raw, he is still comparatively slight, and effectively the Dockers had to rove to Melbourne taps at the MCG on Saturday. Darcy is, and probably always will be, far better suited to being Freo’s number one man, and given the strength of their list in the now, it would be foolish to throw away an integral part of their make-up for a top draft pick who will likely only enter his prime as their window of opportunity shuts in a few years’ time.
For another, Jackson has shown repeatedly in recent weeks that he doesn’t need the main ruck role to be super effective. With three goals against Sydney and two against Hawthorn, he is making great strides as a mobile key forward option with stints in the ruck.
A lump of a lad with great skills and incredible athleticism, there’s no area of the ground where Jackson couldn’t have an impact, and indeed pencilling him in as the number one ruck for a decade might limit the sort of player he can be.
We’ve never seen a six foot seven on-baller brushing off tackles and kicking goals from outside 50, one who’s far too big to be tagged and can make a mismatch of any rival in the competition. Give it three years, and Jackson could very much be that.
Even this year, with the top four race still very much open, the Darcy-Jackson combination is proving integral to Freo’s surge. Why change what’s working pretty well already, especially when the future is limitless?
Random thoughts
– Steele Sidebottom getting the first injury of his life 10 minutes into his 300th game is why we can’t have nice things.
– Worth making this point for umpiring conspiracy theorists: the Dogs got an absolute charmed run on Saturday night, but in the first 10 rounds ranked 14th for frees for and had conceded as many as the Suns.
– Is Josh Rachele single? Because if he is he’s going to absolute Modra Adelaide in a few years’ time.
– I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a footballer look as utterly cooked as Andrew Gaff does right now.
– This is the most extraordinary 50m penalty I’ve ever seen in my life.
– Port Adelaide would genuinely be 6-5 right now if it wasn’t for Jason Horne-Francis’ final quarters. The best final-term player in the game.
– Is the ‘if Toby Greene played for a Victorian club he’d be a superstar’ chat real? I’m pretty sure every single thing I’ve seen written or said about him this year has been that he’s ridiculously good.
– This is great.
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