Footy Fix: How the Lions dismantled sluggish Pies... and proved this is the best chance they'll ever get for a flag

If Brisbane can’t win the premiership in 2023, they never will.

Courtesy of a 24-point triumph over a battered Collingwood on Friday night, the Lions now have the inside running on a crucial edge in the most even of competitions: do as they should and beat St Kilda next week, and they won’t need to leave the Gabba until grand final day.

But home ground advantage isn’t the only reason this season is the Lions’ best chance at the flag that has eluded them in the first four years of their premiership window; the one team above them on the ladder is limping into September with a string of hobbled stars and cracks in their once-irresistible game plan beginning to emerge. Below them, the gap between the five legitimate top teams and the rest has grown stark in the past month, to the point where it’s hard to give anyone south of Carlton any chance at all.

Just like on Friday at Marvel Stadium, when the Lions got the chance to shore up that home qualifying final against a Magpies team minus Nick Daicos, Darcy Moore and Jordan De Goey and looking every inch a team without three of its top five and who they’d beaten in their previous five clashes regardless, the fickle finger of fate couldn’t be pointing any harder at Chris Fagan’s team. Especially given the Lions, aside from their wake-up call in the QClash, are the only top-four team that you could confidently say are peaking at the right time.

Moore’s absence in particular means you can only read so much into events at Docklands, and take the Lions’ supreme efficiency at ground level inside 50 and superb ball movement with a grain of salt. Time and time again, balls the Pies rely on Moore to defuse either with an intercept mark or a strong spoil were neutralised, and with nine goals from snaps and a 19-14 advantage in inside 50 ground-ball gets, the likes of Charlie Cameron, Zac Bailey and Cam Rayner were constant threats.

The first goal of the game is the perfect example: Neale’s high ball inside 50 is one Moore swallows nine times out of ten at his best, having red the drop zone better than his key forward opponent. On this occasion, though, it’s not Moore but rather Nathan Murphy and Isaac Quaynor who fly for the ball one on one with Charlie Cameron and Eric Hipwood, resulting in the ball sneaking out the back for Callum Ah Chee to run onto.

You’ll also notice Josh Daicos not defending Ah Chee with the vigour required, perhaps because he’s been conditioned to expect Moore to mark, and to then need to set off for the back pocket for the outlet, cross-goal kick.

The Lions also need to be given credit for their strengths in attack both curbing the Magpies’ own best traits and ruthlessly exposing their weaknesses: it’s not a coincidence that they have now won six games in a row against the Pies, three of them in the last 18 months, and remain the only team Craig McRae is yet to beat.

When Moore was quietened against the Western Bulldogs a month and a half ago, Quaynor stepped up to become interceptor-in-chief, taking a swathe of telling marks and stymying the Dogs time and again.

But against the Lions, he was required to effectively sacrifice his game and attempt to stand Charlie Cameron, and his limitations became clear. Cameron is quicker than about 95 per cent of the opponents he faces, and with a great footy brain to boot: a moment in the third quarter where he pelted towards goal with Quaynor hot on his heels, only to turn at the perfect time as the kick came inside 50 to leave the Magpie totally out of position, was so perfectly executed that he could afford to slip on the turn and still have more than enough time to take the mark.

Cameron kicked six goals when the Lions bested the Pies earlier in the year, but this four-goal haul was better by far: where the majority of that first bag was achieved out the back, which I wrote at the time would have seen him slated for cheating if they’d lost, this was a classic small forward’s game by the best one of those we’ve seen since peak Eddie Betts.

Equally influential was Eric Hipwood, who is simultaneously the most frustrating and the most dangerous member of the Lions’ attack. Given he’s essentially been best 22 since he debuted seven and a half years ago, it’s easy to forget that he’s still 25, and by key forward standards should only now be entering his peak.

Three more goals, including a clutch pair in the third quarter to stave of the Pies’ charge, give him a career-best 39 for the season; with a decent run in September, he could give 50 a fair shake. With seven marks on Friday night as well, his presentation was superb all evening, and whether it was Nathan Murphy before his injury or an outsized John Noble, no Pie could go with him on the lead.

Hipwood and Cameron’s speed inside 50 makes it desirable for the rest of the group to push up the ground and given them ample space to lead into, which likewise suits Joe Daniher perfectly; his transition into almost a classic centre-half forward role warrants All-Australian selection this year, and whether it was with strong hands overhead or marking outside 50 and wheeling onto his trusty left, he was too quick, too strong and too good for Billy Frampton. Moore would have almost certainly been his opponent had he been fit.

The Pies’ two highest conceded scores this season have been off the Lions’ boot; considering they’re the third-meanest defence this season and have spent much of the year in top spot, that speaks volume’s of Brisbane’s attacking power. Part of the reason they match up so well on the Magpies is their array of attacking options, which forces the Pies, subconsciously or otherwise, to be more concerned with stopping those stars than setting up the structure in defence that holds lesser teams in their thrall.

Case in point: late in the piece, when Cam Rayner marked just inside 50, the Pies immediately looked to block up Cameron and Hipwood’s space, who sat deep in attack near the goalsquare. The issue was, it left a huge amount of open space between 40 and 50 metres out, which Keidean Coleman moseyed into from half-back and kicked the goal anyway.

We haven’t seen many lapses like that from the Pies this season – not least because their desire to turn defence into attack makes that exact space vital to have representation in and allow them to get a handball chain going from defensive 50 rather than just hacking and hoping.

In midfield, it has been fascinating to see how the Pies have changed their structure in the past fortnight with the younger Daicos on the sidelines. Most notable of all, though, is the damage his absence has done to their on-ball leg speed: it was striking on Friday night just how slow the Pies were.

For all the criticism directed his way by David King in recent weeks, the Pies don’t get close without Scott Pendlebury at Marvel Stadium: sure-footed as ever on the outside, he wound back the clock with a vintage display in close, winning a game-high 12 clearances and weaving through traffic like prime 2011 Pendles. Sure enough, the Pies kicking 11 goals from stoppages, with Pendlebury mustering 10 score involvements, was their avenue back into the match, especially when they banged on four goals in quick time in the third term to storm to within a kick.

The problem, though, is in who was alongside Pendlebury on the ball. With no De Goey or Daicos, McRae briefly used Jack Crisp and Josh Daicos at centre bounces, but for the most part it was Taylor Adams and Tom Mitchell as the on-ball group.

Mitchell is the prime example of what went wrong, and why the Lions were so damaging on the turnover. In close, his hands are still fine, but over the past month as the Magpies have begun to flag his limitations as a footballer have been regularly exposed by teams with the leg speed to give the ladder-leaders a taste of their own medicine on attack.

It seemed like Mitchell’s primary role was to make Lachie Neale accountable at stoppages, given how often he lined up next to him; if that was the plan, it failed utterly. The best man afield and as dynamic as ever at the coalface, Neale was the driving force for the Lions all night out of the guts, with some of his clearances as clean and crisp as you will see.

As for that blind turn out of trouble and kick inside 50 in the third term… it’s about as close to midfielder porn as you will get.

The Lions love to push extra numbers up to stoppages, often one of Zac Bailey or Cam Rayner and this evening Deven Robertson: all are young, all have speed on their side, and together with Hugh McCluggage, they ran the Pies off their legs on transition.

McCluggage, from just 21 disposals, had eight score involvements and six inside 50s; Mitchell, as it happens, nearly matched him with six inside 50s and seven score involvements, but there was a clear distinction in both reputation and execution. You’d much rather be leading to McCluggage than Mitchell, and given the latter had just five kicks for the night to go with 26 handballs, a good chunk of those inside 50s came via forward handballs to teammates, often Patrick Lipinski, running on rather than anything more penetrating.

Watch this goal, here: it doesn’t end up mattering as Ah Chee kicks a superb major opposed to Oleg Markov, but from a stoppage on the wing Mitchell is a good 10-15 metres behind both Rayner and Bailey, who have burst forward at full tilt.

Bailey very nearly is the one to bounce on the spilled ball, but as his kick sail through, you’ll see he and three other Lions are still all goal side of their opponents – had Ah Chee centred inboard, he could have hit up any one of them for a set shot.

Mitchell’s lack of pace was an issue as Hawthorn’s young brigade left the Pies a smeary mess on the MCG a fortnight ago, and you can bet Connor Rozee and Zak Butters and Christian Petracca are relishing the chance to have a crack at doing what the Lions did in a qualifying final where Daicos at least is unlikely to be there.

The set-up was good enough for a Geelong midfield that couldn’t cope with the Magpies’ ferocious pressure, and which was able to get the ball to the outside enough for Josh Daicos to be the match-winning force. That wasn’t evident on Friday night, nor against Carlton or Hawthorn; and so, despite a whopping 23-6 tackle advantage in a ferocious third term, the Lions were still able to move the ball dangerously enough to bang on six goals.

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The issue for the Lions, though, is this: for 13 minutes in the third quarter, a weakened Magpies army was still able to make them look distinctly ordinary, especially in defending centre bounces.

Their defence loves nothing more than high, hopeful balls for Harris Andrews to intercept, then proceeding to get the footy in the hands of Coleman or Conor McKenna to start the transition from defence to attack. 39 per cent of their rebound 50s ended in an inside 50 on Friday night, well above the AFL average, and for the past six weeks they’ve been the best at the league in achieving this.

But one on one, they’re still putting plenty of faith in the likes of Ryan Lester, an admirable journeyman who shaded Jeremy Howe all evening but looked vulnerable one-out from Pendlebury’s repeat centre clearances. Jack Payne had an awful night that he will surely rebound from, but whoever was manning Jamie Elliott, be it Darcy Wilmot or Coleman or McKenna or even Brandon Starcevich, struggled to contain him without numbers flooding back to support.

Charlie Cameron. (Photo by Daniel Pockett/Getty Images)

Even if the Lions do hang onto second spot, you couldn’t possibly foreordain a grand final berth. For five years, they’ve been nigh on unbeatable at the Gabba… except in finals, where they’ve lost four times, including twice in 2019 when they finished… yep, second.

There’s no reason the Power or the Demons – or fine, why not, let’s give the Blues the credit of saying they’re a chance to sneak into fourth too – can’t expose those weaknesses in a cutthroat final, be it qualifying or preliminary, at the Gabbatoir.

But for all that, it seems unlikely the Pies can do likewise. The Lions have a way of punishing their weaknesses and limiting their strengths, especially behind the ball: it has now told on them twice this season.

Collingwood still have a monty on the minor premiership, and with it, all the advantages the Lions have for a home finals run with the extra edge of having the grand final, should they make it, on their own turf.

But while Moore should be back, De Goey will, and Daicos might, the ladder-leaders are wobbling. They have a bogey side now, and in three weeks’ time, they’ll be facing another top-four opponent that has just been given a blueprint on how to take them down.