When people say a home-and-away match is finals-like, they’re usually referring, at least in part, to its quality.
That was far from the case on Saturday night at the MCG – for three quarters, Geelong and Melbourne slugged it out in greasy conditions that they made look far worse than they were, committing a range of errors both in disposal and decision-making that manifested in a run of 14 straight behinds in the second quarter and hardly improved.
It’s actually not worth talking much about those first three quarters, ugly as they were, so distinct were they from the best the Demons and Cats have produced thus far this season.
But the last quarter was something special – and THIS was properly finals-like, in atmosphere, in desperation, and even in quality, with both sides going hammer and tong at one another until one moment of magic from Bayley Fritsch finally swung it permanently Melbourne’s way.
Bayley Fritsch celebrates a goal. (Photo by Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images)
Forget the fact the Cats had some cattle missing, and forget that Jeremy Cameron might have never played a worse game in his life and is unlikely to play a worse one anytime soon. This was a statement win for Melbourne, a triumph every inch worthy of its status as a table-topper.
it began, as it so often does for the Dees, in defence. Individually, Jake Lever and Steven May may have had better games, but it’s hard to remember them ever producing so well as a collective than on Saturday night.
May’s status as the game’s best key defender has been up in the air in recent seasons, but this was a potent reminder of what he offers both as a stopper and then as an offensive threat. Not only was Tom Hawkins comprehensively blanketed to continue his ugly run of form, but May essentially paid him no mind on everything but the fastest of Cats’ plays; trusting himself to read the ball in the air better than Hawkins, he marked at will all night, spoiled when he couldn’t, and sagged off to set the Dees up going the other way again and again with a game-high nine rebound 50s.
Ditto Lever, almost as proficient aerially as May and even more significant at ground level, with his pressure helping significantly in keeping the Cats’ dangerous small forwards in check. Occupied with Ollie Henry for most of the night, he had a game-high four one-on-one contests in defensive 50, and didn’t lose a single one.
Remarkably, he’d rack up 24 disposals for the night, with May accumulating 25: the fourth- and third-most respectively on the field.
The ability to use the ball well separates this pair, by and large from other key defenders in the competition, and has allowed the Dees to successfully cover for the loss of Christian Salem and Trent Rivers’ move further up the ground.
But it wasn’t just the big two coming up trumps: Tom McDonald was first sent into defence earlier in the season as a necessity, but he has taken to the task like the backman he was before a mid-career shift into the forward line.
His closing speed on Cameron was a key reason why the Cats star had a supremely dirty night at the office: deceptively quick, the leading patterns that made him an effective if inconsistent forward for a number of years proved handy in knowing just where Cameron would go and when. Most significantly, his blanket job enabled Lever and May to take on less responsibility, especially with Hawkins looking a shadow of the player he was even last year.
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The scrappy conditions suited Clayton Oliver perfectly; for large parts the cleanest pair of hands on the ground, the Dees star has been waiting for a slow, tough game like this to show that while he still might not be covering the ground as well as at his best, his work in tight is almost unmatched.
With a game-high 17 contested possessions and three centre clearances, Oliver was the most impactful midfielder on the ground, simultaneously allowing Christian Petracca to spend more time forward of centre while ensuring Jack Viney didn’t have to go it alone in the tough stakes. Most notably, his seven marks showcased improvement in his run and spread from contests that hasn’t been there for much of the season, as good a sign as any for Simon Goodwin that his premier on-baller is slowly but surely getting back to peak form.
The second half belonged to Max Gawn, who faced stiff competition from Rhys Stanley and Mark Blicavs and a plan to body him at every opportunity. The captain’s first half might have been his least impactful of the season, but with hands like vices on down-the-line kicks following the main break, and a monster goal to start the last quarter, too, he once again proved that few if any rucks in the game are capable of going with him for a full match.
While a far cry from his four-goal haul against Richmond, Daniel Turner had a sizeable impact on this contest too: the makeshift forward stuck doggedly to Tom Stewart all evening, consistently spoiling his intercept marks and giving the star Cat enough to worry about that he was some way off his best.
Just two intercept marks was a huge win for the Dees, and it required Zach Guthrie to play out of his skin for the Cats to have any semblance of rebounding power against a Melbourne forward line determined to lock it in, laying a whopping 13 tackles inside 50 to just two.
It would also be imprudent not to mention the youngster, Caleb Windsor, who is fast proving himself as a man for big moments: just as his superb last-quarter goal helped sink Port Adelaide a month ago, so too did a nerveless set shot at a crucial stage stop the Cats’ momentum in its tracks.
But the most compelling thing about Melbourne’s performance was how well they nailed every single big moment in the last quarter. That’s a trait that has deserted them in the last two finals series, where defensive lapses, poor set-shot kicking and being overrun in midfield have contributed to four straight losses, three of them from positions of strength and one of them a major butcher job against Collingwood in last year’s qualifying final.
It’s an immeasurable help when your players are kicking accurately for goal, and while Gawn’s long bomb and Fritsch’s pearler from the boundary line were the standouts, Pickett’s silky snap from a textbook rove to regain the lead in the last quarter, as well as set shots from Fritsch and Windsor that, while simple, were far from gimmes, are all the sort of opportunities the Dees have squandered in the last two years.
The match’s flashpoint epitomised all that the Dees have not been at big moments in big games: when Guthrie marked ahead of Fritsch at half-back for the Cats with a little over three minutes left, danger signs hovered ominously in the air.
But unlike against Carlton in last year’s semi final, this time Melbourne closed off the corridor: when Jack Henry, having received from Guthrie, looked to spot up Stewart inboard, Harrison Petty, wonderful all night, was alert to it.
Busting a gut to affect a spoil, Petty knocks the ball to Petracca, a star of the game who has often bitten off too much in a situation like this. Against Brisbane a few weeks ago, he famously tried to kick a goal from 70 metres out and kicked it straight to Harris Andrews; this time, he lowers his eyes and tries to hit up Fritsch in the pocket.
The ball, fortuitously, tightropes the line but stays in, and Fritsch, unlike his opponent Henry, doesn’t decelerate thinking it’s dead. He gathers with a precious metre of space on the closing Cat, gives himself a second to balance, and goes for the all or nothing dribble kick.
So much of what went wrong for the Dees in the last two finals series can be put down to the luck of the draw – misfortunes at key moments, handy breaks for their opponents – as much as to their own failings; here, the worm turns for them. Because Fritsch’s kick, on a slippery night, where at times both teams could barely hit the side of a barn door, doesn’t wobble across the face, or trickle over for a behind.
It rolls straight through the middle.
A minute later, and with the Cats officially in the last-chance saloon, Henry again has the ball at half-back. Once again, the corridor is closed off, and this time, he doesn’t risk it: he goes long, and down the line.
Who’s under it to take the game-sealing mark? Big Max, of course.
And to cap it off, he shaves precious seconds off the clock with a risky, but perfectly executed, short chip to Petracca, who has dashed forward into the space showing great presence of mind. It’s the sort of smart, alert play that Collingwood have made a habit of of late.
Who knows what the future has in store for Melbourne in 2024, but a wounded giant is a giant nonetheless.
The Demons have had a rough run on the big stage in the last few seasons, which will make Saturday night’s triumph all the sweeter: and maybe, just maybe, they now know how the curse that has overcome them in finals can be undone.
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