GREATEST Finals Moment + Pies SHOCK The AFL | Zero Access Footy 29

This episode sees us take a look at the BEST week 1 of finals we've seen in a while, react to David Swallow's historic moment, revisit our disastrous pre-season ladder predictions, Behm takes us through the shocking Crows v Pies tribunal fallout, we predict week 2 of the finals (double straight sets?!?) and Macca's Man of the Week is BACK!

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
G'day everybody and welcome backto 0 Access Footy episode #29
Today we are once again joined with Ben Gaddy, otherwise known
as the Premiership Quarter and we are ready to look at all
things AFL finals. We have officially gone through
our first week of the finals andplenty of things to look at,

(00:21):
including some pretty decent predictions from your end.
Not too bad and your yours dude Yours is better.
Look at us been all nice to eachother wants to start off that's
a really really nice and positive way to get caught with
podcast. I have a good feeling today we
have ourselves. I already know that's going to
come back to bite me but week 1 results we have ourselves to

(00:43):
start off what probably we were both will we split on this one?
I can't remember. We were certain, but.
This was a game that you couldn't see it going both ways
a lot. I think a lot more people had it
Crows because of the Pies play as of leading into the finals,
But the Pies ended up taking it in a really, really solid
performance by 24 points at Adelaide Oval and have secured

(01:04):
themselves a home preliminary final as well.
So well done to them. But story for that game, for the
most part seemed to just be the fact that Collingwood's
experience and finals play really shun over the top of this
Adelaide side that looked that'syou've got some finals
experience within that side, butthey haven't been there since

(01:25):
2017. So they're still working things
out. You would have liked them to
handle it a little better considering how well they had
played against top end teams forthe most part of the year.
But Collingwood just took took over them, just took over them
from pretty much go to woe. Much better than you could.
You could tell that, as you mentioned, that finals
experience was a huge thing. I also think the coaching wise,

(01:45):
tactically, you could say the finals experience with the
Collingwood box compared to the Crows box where Adelaide didn't
try anything new. It was very much we're going to
continue to play how we play rather than trying something
different to either stop Collingwood or get ourselves
better, whether that's ball movement, whether that's
defensively or stoppage wise, whatever you choose it.

(02:07):
It was pretty clear that I thought Collingwood with a with
a stronger team throw out and that reflected on the scoreboard
pretty much the entire way through.
Something that I was really impressed with is given their
last game against Adelaide, the 71 inside 50s and they had like
no genuine impact inside the forward 50.
I noticed that instead of going to one on one, like
structurally, especially inside 50, they were kicking to two on

(02:29):
twos and it forced the Adelaide defence to work together, which
is something they don't want to do.
They want to be one on one because Kane and Morel, like
we've talked about many times how good they've been this year,
they weren't able to do that. And Collingwood, when they're
not winning one on one, they canat least get it to ground IN2V
twos and Mason Cox was a big part of that.
Yeah, I can't believe how Mason Cox continues to just play a
massive part in every single finals campaign.

(02:52):
He's been really. He's had a good track record
hitting the scoreboard. I don't think he did in this
game in particular and had some really like early on, I think he
give gave away A50 metre to Riley Philthorpe in the rock.
It was just a very silly thing to do.
But I mean other than that little blemish, it was the only
real blemish on a night of positive positivity all around
for calling when it's like this is what we kind of were hoping

(03:13):
for and have pretty much cemented back their first spot
position that they've been in for the entire season.
They had to do it the hard way basically.
But they now have a home prelim final.
Ridiculous. That's insane to see how it's
all turned around once again. Just shows the pedigree of this
side. But this seems to be something
that maybe we have to look out for next week.

(03:35):
Is the finals pressure going to hit and strike twice?
Because I play another side who've played more finals than
them in Hawthorne, who we'll discuss very, very soon.
But yeah, credit to to Collingwood.
I think one of the players to me, Darcy Moore was one that
really, really stood out, was ontrack to break innocent mark
records and just in general, innocent marks all over the
place. And it does surprise me that

(03:56):
Adelaide never switched around what they were doing.
It was literally just keep putting it long hope that their
big forwards would make enough pressure to at least bring it to
ground. But the intercept Mark Talley
says otherwise. So 100% Darcy Moore on text.
I think it was was the big matchup that really, really cemented
Collingwood's defence that night.
So just yeah, it seemed to be that was the main story for the

(04:18):
for the game. But yeah, crows go down by 24.
It's a calling. When we move on to the next
qualifying final, we have the Cats beating the Lions by 38.
Unfortunately, between these twosides, if the Cats win, it's
always a big win. And if the Lions win, it's a
close one. It's you.
You don't get a close and exciting match up each and every

(04:40):
time. And there's plenty of stories to
go through with this qualifying final.
But the Cats showing their class, I thought they'd maybe be
a bit rusty against the really, really top side.
I mean, they find wise the Geelong system that the whole
team from top to bottom. And I've analysed Chris Scott a
little bit over the last week ortwo as to how he goes about

(05:02):
footy and how he coaches his team and he almost always stays
directly on this. This is the time that matters
the most for him. And it's finals time because he
knows with the way that his teamis structured, with the way that
his team plays on its regular day, that this is their goal,
that this is their bare minimum,I'm sorry.
And their goal is a grand final.It's another Chris Scott master

(05:23):
class. It is like you look at what he
did on the on the game on Fridaynight, like they had to drop
race Stanley and they resort to to blitz and SDK and the rocket
and basically split timing it and and they obviously it's
getting Darcy forward. So you know.
It's not like it's the biggest like difficulty in the in the
rock, but it's not like they didn't do what they were

(05:44):
supposed to do. Correct.
And it just helped them midfield, like on paper lines
midfield is much deeper. That's deeper, like probably
higher in talent as well. As they racked up stats for
sure. And that that pressure that they
had, like we talked about that Collingwood and and Adelaide
game with pressure of finals experience.

(06:04):
This was pressure in terms of just unrelentlessness and not
allowing any time and space for Brisbane without like the Rand,
most random goal you'll ever seewhere it was taking risk at
every single stage for Brisbane.Geelong, we're on top 100% of
the game aside from 5 minutes inthe last quarter when the game
was already done and Brisbane got it back to 25 points in the

(06:26):
end. Geelong, I hate it because
they're successful for every year that I've been up, been
alive basically, and it's not fun.
As North Melbourne and St. Kilda fans, we have never had a
success and they have only had success.
Well, hold on. Never had success.
We've got 4 premiership calves. Have we won a flag since either

(06:47):
of us have been alive? I was born the year after we won
a flag. Yeah, exactly.
So I'm very close. Were you born in 1963?
I didn't think so. Wrong year, mate.
Or 1967? Wrong year again.
What is it? 60s, isn't it?
Yeah. Yeah.
What year? 66.
Oh wow, get it through your head.
Doesn't matter. Long time ago.
The point still stands. It's been a while.

(07:09):
Shut up. Don't care either way.
Cats really, really big win. Impressive win.
It's just quintessential Chris Scott, but we'll move over now
to the next matchup. No, we won't.
The camera right now, we've got to talk about this.
Yeah, we've got. No, that's fair.
We will talk about the camera ina dive because this one was.
I mean, it comes back to your bold prediction, doesn't it?
It does. It does.

(07:31):
You want to give a little explanation as to what it was
for the people who didn't watch last week?
Might have to give a little. We went through last week. 3
bold predictions. One of mine was an umpire
decision will get slandered in the media and that it has the
potential to be game changing. Well, it didn't change the game,
if we're being honest. But at half time you very well

(07:51):
thought it could have. Yeah, that is.
True, it cut the lead from 25 to30 points to either two or three
goals, and I mean it just very much wasn't there.
Like this probably happens 1000 times at the stoppage alone, let
alone 150 metres from the goal. It's just because he hits the
floor. It's it's literally because he.
Flops. Yeah, like, so if if there's any

(08:12):
time to to find someone for flopping, it's probably right
now. Yeah.
The AFL came out and basically said yeah, first one not there,
second one was there, which I mean it was very much was yeah
and there's no argument in that one, but I thought it was very
funny and the crowd were booing him when it's not really his
fault, it's the umpires fault. Yeah, same time it's.
Understood. But at the same time he's trying

(08:33):
to milk it. He's trying to play within the
rules but bend it to his advantage.
At least the fans won't get suedby the umpires for doing
something wrong like the AFL media.
Yeah, I guess so. Technically that's a very
interesting little thing to throw in there.
Just a quick dig. Is that a dig at the AFL media?
The umpire? Probably a bit of both.
Bit of both you reckon? I mean considering the I think

(08:57):
it was Kane, Corns and David. Kane Corns, Luke Hodge and Daisy
Thomas. That's it.
It was those three who were at the eye of the umpires because
they basically said they said something along the lines of
they shouldn't be umpires anymore.
They I don't remember exactly what they said, but they said it
because the AFL released wrong information that's and didn't
check all their sources. Yeah, funny times.

(09:19):
Guess what happens when the AFL has zero access?
That is a crazy, crazy bringing to try and squeak in the 0
Access name in there. That's good.
We're going to move on though. Giants defeated by the Hawks at
Ng Stadium by 19 and the margin should have been bigger.

(09:40):
The Giants their usual way of clinging back into it at the
last minute seems like. I'd say it's more the Dogs
actually, who do stuff like that, but Giants have been doing
that a fair bit occasionally this year where they have
stretches of really, really impressive play.
But the whole story of the game tells you they weren't in it, it

(10:00):
wasn't going to happen. And this is a really impressive
win from the Hawthorne Hawks, headed by Sam Mitchell, who
looks to have a lot of differenttricks up his sleeve.
Well, there was a lot of talk about Mitchell Lewis being
dropped at the start of the gameand that's one of the things
Mitchell obviously went with to bring back Weddell and he played
a bit around the ground late. He got moved forward when they

(10:21):
needed to get back into it afterthe Giants kicked like 6
straight goals or whatever it was.
And it ended up working because I won.
But I don't know what would havehappened any differently because
you could tell that it just worked.
But like at the same time, the Giants dominated the ball.
They dominated the inside 50s and they looked not necessarily

(10:43):
more dangerous, but they looked on top even though the.
Scoreboard didn't reflect that. The problem is the Giants ball,
the ball efficiency from everything I've heard, because I
didn't get to watch too much of the game, the ball efficiency
from the midfielders wasn't fantastic.
So Finn Callahan racked up some good numbers.
Lucky Whitfield in the back line.
Obviously he's one of their mainball users off that half back to
try and get the ball moving up their side of the field and

(11:04):
that's the sooner he goes. It kind of likes to go through
him. But yeah, Finn Callahan, I don't
know how lucky Ash went. Do you know how he did?
Had a lot of bouncers but I don't know what his ball use was
like because it didn't look great to me.
Yeah, but Tom Green was another one that someone had mentioned.
There was a few little incidentswhere he could have kicked to
the advantage of a player but instead kicked wide out of space
when they really could have useda bit more accuracy heading

(11:28):
inside forward 50 to, you know, take advantage of the fact that
they're trying to push the transition.
And to me, that sort of relies abit on the coach because when
you look at the insurance from the weekend, obviously Josh
Kelly was the sub and when he came on, he was really good.
That Stringer came back in, who's a forward.
Hogan came back in who's a forward and Cornelio came in
who's a midfielder who bit iffy on the weekend, but.

(11:51):
No Jack Buckley, which was No Buckley was.
Coming in, no, he he's had a badcar for a while.
But to me, that Ford connection sounds like an issue with
bringing back players a, when they're not necessarily fully
fit, and B, where you just disrupt the chemistry, chemistry
that you had coming into it. Like Max Grushowski was the one
who got dropped for Hogan. He'd been pretty good last few
weeks and the team had started to learn his leading styles and

(12:14):
it's different to Hogan. And so to me, a lot of this I
think falls back on Adam Kingsley to the point where
nothing changed. Obviously they had to bring in
Kelly because Darcy Jones toys ACL, which is very unfortunate.
That's awful. But like, aside from that
change, there was nothing else that Adam Kingsley that at least
I saw where he was willing to change or even did change that

(12:36):
ended up fixing their forward ball movement.
And I think that's a huge criticism of him and his
coaching style because it's verymuch, I've got one of the most
talented teams in the league, it's going to get me to a spot,
What am I going to do now to help them improve?
And I haven't seen it yet. We've seen past finals failures
where against the run of play, nothing quite goes for them.

(12:58):
And we saw that last year with the 2 finals, so this year as
well where they were down by 35 points or whatever it was, got a
lucky come back and then didn't even challenge the the Hawks in
the last. And I just think that that's a
huge blight on his career so faras a coach.
Yeah, Kingsley, we love him. I I at least personally, I
really like the way he he got. Guns.
That's all I'll say, yeah. You like the way he looks, do

(13:20):
you? Yeah, fair enough.
But at the same time, he has been really, really solid when
it comes to the way that his team functions and how
aggressive their play style is. So when it works, it works
really well. But it's just been so topsy
turvy. And that's why the Giants are
out of the Finals. Just a quick thing, I thought
the Hawks midfield really stood up in the season where the back
end. Giant Nukem was fantastic.

(13:41):
Human whopal I thought the Hawksmidfield was their biggest
weakness was their biggest strength on the weekend.
Well, yeah, sorry, not going to.Newcomb has had moments this
year. He's had up and downs, but
finals, he keeps going up. Yeah, he's going.
Up in his three finals, he's been the highest rated player
according to Champion Dud in every single one.
Yeah, shout out to Newcomb. And then finally, Oh my God, the

(14:04):
group chat was, oh, I say the group chat was you 2 talk and I
was, no, I was working at the time of this happening, but Oh
my God, on a game. You pumped me up before I got to
pump you up on this one, man. Well, calm down.
You mentioned my you. Mentioned my Bob.
You mentioned my Bob prediction.What was your ball prediction?
My ball. Prediction that was was one of
the games this week was going togo into extra time and.

(14:27):
You didn't just say one of you said this one in particular.
Yeah, true, I did, didn't I? Forgot I mentioned that little.
Extra. Part yeah, I'm pretty good at.
This time. And you had the Suns winning an
extra time. Yeah, Suns won.
Well, it didn't. It wasn't an extra time, but I'm
I'm so much happier it happened the way it did and the way I
predicted because like, it's fairy tale stuff, man.

(14:48):
That is so like, they could makea document if Gold Coast going
to be a dynasty, they could makea massive point of this game in
particular. This is a bookmark moment in AFL
history. It's so, so good that it
happened the way it did too, away from home.
God, if it if it was a goal, it would have been even more fairy

(15:08):
tale. I'm glad he got the reactions
out as if he'd kicked the goal because those are going to look
great on documentary style footage.
I'm just keen to say when this is talked about more in the
future. But to think that David Swallow,
the last remaining member of theinaugural Gold Coast side, has
stuck it out for 15 years and got rewarded with the biggest
moment in Sun's Sun's history, that is a ridiculously exciting

(15:34):
fantastic. It's just what the game and what
Gold Coast needs. I'm not even talking Gold Coast,
I'm talking Gold Coast sport. Gold Coast is notoriously awful
when it comes to all sporting clubs and that is what the Suns
have been boiled into for a longtime.
Yep, hopefully starting now, it's no longer the case.
They were so glad to get finals.They haven't just done that.
They've won a final and they're up against the Brisbane Lions,

(15:57):
the first ever Q clash final. Can you believe we've got AQ
clash final before we've got a Western Derby final?
Yeah, that's that's crazy. That is really been in the
league. Almost triple double the lengths
for Fremantle, but ridiculous. Yeah.
But at the same time, just there's so many people around
there like Mac Andrew, how he continues to pop up in these big

(16:19):
moments, kicking a goal to tie the game.
And honestly, if the Sons had played a proper 80 minutes or
120 minutes if you count the extras of full football, this
wouldn't have been a close game.They had.
They were playing at a pace and they were playing at a point
that they could have kept the lead so far out that Fremantle

(16:39):
didn't come back. But credit to Fremantle and
they've kind of been like that all year since they're poor
star. They've been fighting back ever
since. And I think one it gives, give
credit to Fremantle for salvaging a season that we
thought was going to be done at some point during it, during the
year. But if you're a Fremantle fan,
an insider within Fremantle, you're probably disappointed

(16:59):
with how the season's gone. And it just feels strange.
I'm always a little worried whentalking about calling a
finalists season a failure. But from all people I've seen,
from more people sorry that I'veseen, it's either one or other
in terms of which side of the camp you're on, you're either
this is a disappointment. They should have beaten this

(17:20):
Gold Coast side playing at home,The talent was clearly there,
they had what it takes. They needed to show signs both
for the coach and for the club and going out like this is going
to hurt. But on the other hand, it's like
they could have very easily not made it.
They could have not made it and they're also it's another
building step. Technically, if things go well
next year, this is just another step.

(17:41):
It's another season of experience within a group that
can work together a bit more. But the thought is it's not
going to be the same team next year, is it?
With the biggest notable one being whether Sean Darcy comes
back or not. Yeah, there's going to be a lot
of questions about this. And for the most part, their
list is pretty much set. Like you look at their back

(18:01):
line, it's it's Pierce, Cox, Ryan, Chapman, Clark and and
Warner and Banfield's. They've got a bit of depth in.
There, yeah, there's really goodtalent.
Then you've got Draper as well, who's another key position
defender coming through their midfield.
We know how stacked it is, theirforward line, the four tools.
It works and they've got a good small fall in line as well and

(18:21):
they they brought in Bolton. Thing is, what more can you
expect at the moment? They've got the team.
And so when you're not winning afinal in a, in a season where
you won 15 games, 16 games, won 16 games, yeah.
And they didn't win a final against a team that have never
played a final before. They maybe 4 plays in total that
had played a final and one of them was Ben Long.

(18:45):
Shout out Ben Long, so Gold Coast legend.
Saints legend. Saints legend do.
We'll never forget him knocking out Jackman.
Actually, no, he didn't knock out Jack McRae, but he got
suspended for it in the 202075 elimination final.
We would have won the fight, andI'm joking.
Calm down Saints man, calm. Down issue is with Fremantle, it
was the game style they wanted because what they've been doing

(19:07):
in the back half of the year when they have been successful
is having a flash in the pan moment where they just have a
really good stretch and able to beat teams.
We've seen it in fourth quarterswhere they just get on top, that
St Gilda game, that Collingwood game where they just come back
really, really well. But then when the game's not on
their terms, they can't score. And that's been a huge criticism
of Justin Long Muir and they defend well enough to keep them

(19:30):
in the in the games. But then they're midfield, which
has been highly talented and obviously there's no head and
young for a lot of the season. It just hasn't performed when
needed to. They can get shut down pretty
easily too. You think it's the wrong tags?
Yeah, yeah. Like Sarong's tags, Bolton has
been very hot, hot and hot and cold this year, relying on
Murphy Reed to be game breaker. Like there's they're all young

(19:50):
players and so there's a lot of potential, but I personally
don't say it under the long Muirand I think he's holding them
back to a cent. I think had they've unleashed
the shackles. And easily would have beaten for
Gold Coast, with no doubt in my mind about that at all.
I see, I see what you're saying 100%.
I think next year is going to bea really, really big year for
this team. I think top 4 needs to be a

(20:11):
lock. Yep, it has to be a lock next
year if it's Justin wants to keep his job.
If they drop out of the 8 he's done next year.
I really think so. But top 4, which is also very
possible, and hopefully he's taken this year and the year
before and how many years he's been coaching as learning
experiences. Dockers will be able to make it,
they'll be able to get further. So call this a down year, call

(20:32):
this an unfortunate event, but I'm going to call it a bit of a
celebration really. I'm just really happy that the
Suns took this over. I'm really, really happy that
they've managed to break a few things since they've needed it.
They've really needed it. But we're going to now have a
look at some of the predictions that we've kind of mentioned
throughout all of this and Oh myGod.

(20:59):
I love our little little references.
I'm not on Akinator bro. I love the little references
that we have here. It's good, isn't it?
What is this? What is this?
So a few of our bold predictionslast week.
Let me quickly bring a few of them up.
Sports. Comments.
Reference. Sports comments reference.

(21:19):
Oh, my goodness. But one of my bold takes the
that you had brought up before, it was one game in the first
week of finals. Go on extra time.
I did mention on top of that that it was going to be that
Gold Coast free game. It damn near nearly happened.
Yeah, I can't believe that. I can't believe that nearly
worked. Pat yourself on the back for
that. One, yeah, I'll get myself a
little bit. The one that I mentioned was the
umpire decision. Technically, yes.

(21:41):
I can't wait for it to happen again this week.
Yes, would be actually ridiculous.
Yeah, I know. I also had whoever loses between
Collingwood and Adelaide will goout in straight sets, so
Hawthorne of Adelaide. Honestly, I think that's a
that's a pretty decent chance ofAdelaide losing it.
And guess what? My other bold prediction
Adelaide garden straight sets. So that's looking pretty good as
well. I also had the final one, which

(22:03):
I mean, if for those who don't know, I had written down Gold
Coast will lose by 60 plus not realising that I'd also
mentioned at the first game thatthe the Gold Coast free again
we're going extra time. So I had to change it up a bit
on the fly. What was my other one?
It was banking would kick 6. Right, something like that.
Yeah, that was way off. They're ball predictions for a
reason. They're they're, they're ball.

(22:24):
Predictions exactly. My final one was we see 0
comebacks the entire final series.
It damn nearly happened. But you know what?
Didn't have it in the first game, Didn't have it in the
second game. Almost have it in 3rd game.
Damn, you almost have it in the fourth game.
But guess what? It's still fire.
Yeah, I could. I could go 3 for three.
You did go 3 for Oh yeah, but the Adelaide one, yeah, that one

(22:46):
needs to be I. Could go 3 for three you.
Could we'll have to wait and seewith that.
A lot is lying on that Adelaide all form one that's going to be
really good at Friday. Friday night again, Adelaide
Oval game, mate, that's going tobe.
So there's two pretty, pretty solid games.
Nothing in Victoria, but two pretty solid games.
But now we are going to Macca's Man of the week.

(23:07):
Yippee. I'm really excited to go through
this one because I mean just lots of positive stories.
And honestly, the donkeys aren'tdonkeys in the sense of like bad
stuff. It's more the sense of funny, if
that makes sense. OK, so one vote in Maccas man of
the week, third place goes to Darcy Moore.

(23:28):
I think his play in the back line and how he's obviously the
captain of the side and structures, how that back line
plays out, they were fantastic. He he excelled on a team level,
on an individual level and for me at least, it was a big upset
that one. I know some people pick
Collingwood because of their because of their finals
experience, but I genuinely thought Adelaide's forward line

(23:48):
would be able to crunch them. They got barely anything, Barely
anything. So much so that even when they
did get something I'd like couldn't find a way to to finish
it off. So I think what they were, Luke
Peddler was one that stood out alittle bit, had three goals.
Yeah. So like, he did well, but it's
not like you're planning your game around Luke Peddler.
He just took, he just took the most of his opportunities.

(24:11):
No one else really could, no oneelse.
Tex had a few occasions where hedid, but there were very few and
far between. It was much more calling we get
on top of them. And I gave a lot of that credit
to ask him more. Two votes goes to Giant Newcomb.
A lot of praise to Giant Newcombthroughout the AFL world.
And I wanted to give my credit to him because there weren't too
many individual statistics standout on almost all of the winning

(24:34):
teams this week. But whole thought had a few that
I want to give a quick mention to in the sense of Connor
McDonald, Jack and Evan Danny had the exact same start line.
But when you have two players who are kicking three goals and
getting 17 possessions, when they're both doing that and
they're not your main inside 50 targets, you can't ask for more.
No, you really can't ask. That's six goals from 2 blokes,

(24:55):
so you're not even hitting up all that often inside 50.
They're creating it for themselves and helping out their
opponents. Sorry, not their opponents,
their team mates. They wouldn't help their
opponents, but a lot of their work really, really paid off and
made it so much easier for all those involved.
Jack Johnson kicked himself a cheeky 32, so their forward line
was just all over the place, butlead by John Newcombe and his
number one man on the ground. Impact.

(25:18):
Three votes for me had to be forthe Storyteller, David Swallow.
No way I could give it to anyoneelse.
In my mind. It just had to be sure.
Not from statistical reasons, but my God, this is a legacy
vote. There's a three votes in a
legacy form. David Swallow, you are a legend.
I'm so glad it is paid off as well as it has for him.

(25:39):
And the way I talk about it makes it seem as if there's not
more to go. There's very much a chance
there's more to go. Gold Coast would fighting for
top four. If we're being completely
honest. They would disappointingly in
7th. If we're being completely
honest. A top 4 is should not be
considered out of the question. I'd even say they should be top
four. They should make it to a prelim.

(26:01):
I don't think that is guaranteedby any means.
No, it's no one's counting them out against against the reigning
premiers. So no, that's really, really
exciting for Gold Coast fans. We're just going to have to wait
and see who brings it in that one.
But those are the Mackers man ofthe week.
Now let's get the donkey of the week graphic up.
I've got two different players and I mentioned them very

(26:21):
briefly. One of them is Cam Rainer.
I'm sure I can give it to the umpires as well.
And again, it's more because, like, I can't believe in a
finals game, you're, you're testing the umps that hard.
But it paid off for you. So maybe I'm the donkey for
thinking that you're the donkey.But.
You just are the donkey. You just, you just look a bit
soft, don't you? And you still came away with the
loss. So I don't know.

(26:42):
I expect a lot more from a man that strong to go to ground that
easy. It's a bit strange, but yeah.
OK. I'm sorry mate.
There's one second was Riley still for one particular play.
Wide open, wide open goal. I think he was trying to do the
team thing. But in a final when you're your
main forward and you've got no one between you and the goal,

(27:04):
please kick the goal. It just reminds me of the it's
like the anti Jason Dunstall rant when I think it was Jack
Redden in the Miracle and grass game from like 50 metres out,
dribble, try to dribble, kick a goal and he goes absolutely
ballistic. I just imagine Jason doing the
same reaction to Riley Field forgiving a hand pass from 15

(27:29):
metres out directly in front with no one in the way.
So look, they're more funny. They're both on losing ends so
they're probably going to think about it a lot in term.
Or maybe not Rainer as much because he actually got a goal
from it. But Philthorpe for certain is
one that I'd imagine is going toruin his performance.
And thankfully for both these sides, they get a second chance.
So a bit more of a lot harder. Don't give the weight this week.

(27:52):
Like it? I like it, yeah.
Good. I'm glad you should.
But now we're going to have a look at something that I forgot
to mention last week and forgot to bring up in the discussion
for this for last week's episodewas we started off, I think it
was episode one or two. Both.
We did it. Oh, that's right.
We split it. I remember now we created a

(28:15):
preseason ladder or end of season ladder as to where we
thought every team would finish off by the end of the season.
And there's some spot ONS in there, but there's also some
very funny ones, very, very funny ones.
So I kind of don't want to go first.
I don't want to go first to thisone because it's a little

(28:36):
embarrassing, some of these ones.
Oh, man, Do you want to go 1 by 1?
We'll start with 18 and then go for one.
All right? We both I think had the same 18.
Richmond. Richmond and that's why I always
give credit to how Richmond haveplayed this year.
We expected potentially zero wins from this time that it was
not them. Obviously the real 18th side

(28:59):
this year was West Coast. Just an absolutely horrific year
on all fronts for West Coast. So Richmond being 18 on both of
our ends, understandable at the time but they literally backed
that up in week one. They literally said no we are
not going to finish last in weekone.
In 17th I had Melbourne OK not as bad of a year but definitely

(29:25):
no the word I use or the phrase I use was boom or bust.
A massive bust of a year, Just not. 17th place at at times I
played 17th place football, theydid, but I remember the the 1/4
that will forever live on in memory.
You're going to, you're going tolike it does create great
moments, doesn't it? He won a car out of that game.

(29:47):
You actually won a car. I think it was 40 classified of
someone for the people at 40 classified.
They're like the Lexus of Blackburn.
Yes, Yeah, yeah, yeah. They gave him a car for that
game, so more rewarding in in individual ways, I think, than
in 10 ways. But it's still very rewarding.
The fact that he resigned from that one.

(30:08):
How did we get sidetracked with St.
Kilda? I don't know.
May 17th I had West Coast. Yeah, and that's more close
enough. That's fair enough.
I think I was just very big at the time on Melbourne having a
shocker year and while they did.Was not that extent.
Not that extent. And even then, they still lost
their coach. Could you imagine if I finished
17th? That's in the second earlier in

(30:28):
the season. If they if they finished 17th,
we it'll be like Petrarca gone. There wouldn't be questions
about it. It'll be they're gone.
They're rebuilding. Yeah, I.
Think it wouldn't want to stay 16?
Big things changed for May 16th was West Coast.
That was obviously a bad one because I expected them to do a
lot better than one win and one surprise win.

(30:51):
They couldn't even beat a bottomfader, they had to.
Wait, we were a bottom fader? No, you guys ended up pushing
for final or not. Sorry, not pushing for finals.
That's a big, that's a big wrongcall.
But you guys were pushing up theladder, is what I'm saying.
Eventually we got there, but. That's not what you wanted to
do, No. You would have much rather been
in the top a bottom four spot. 100% and.
Funny enough I had you in the bottom 4 as well.

(31:12):
I got well, I had Essendon at 16.
And honestly, they could have. It is very close.
Yeah, they could have been. 16thin a, in a different world if
they, they debuted 17 people instead of 15.
But yeah, for me, Essendon is very much oh God, I I definitely
have had a lot more of an idea that they are having a really

(31:33):
poor injury lock season. But even that hasn't stopped the
questions of people of players leaving and and all of that type
of added talk on top with the idea.
Zach Merritt again in the news, considered to be not available
per SE, but disgruntled, right? He's clearly having a very rough
run at Essendon but. Jordan Ridley, another one.

(31:55):
Jordan Ridley, that as well. Just so many players.
No one wants to talk about Essendon, mate, No one was.
I love to talk bad about Essendon, I'll be honest.
OK, well, should we continue to do it?
Well, I've got St. Kilda at 15.
Do you want me to talk bad aboutSaint Kilda?
Might as well. But yeah, my last bottom 4th
spot was Saint Kilda and they'regoing to be the most talked

(32:19):
about what, what? Where do they finish?
Actually, they finished 12th. They're going to be the most
talked about 12th place finish ever.
I think so. We already are the most talked
about 12th place finish of all time.
Yeah, absolutely. There's no way you're not with
the Nas staff with his ascensionthis year, with the fact that
you guys have already locked yourself into so many like.

(32:40):
Four players. It's crazy.
I don't even know if it's, it could be a culture thing now.
It could just be the personality.
Just go to the person have money.
You literally have not won. Shut up.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Shut.
Up, Shut up, Shut up. You have no culture.
You have no culture. Money.
That's all we need, God. So you've got now Sylvani.

(33:01):
Yeah, TDK, TDK. Brian.
Ryan. Ali Yep, we've said we're going
to get Flanders. Re sign that and there's a good
chance dude, you're going to. It looks like you're about to
clean sweat and I'm pretty confident Wilkie is not going to
leave. Well, I don't need to ask you,
but I'm talking about myself because I don't have St.
Kilda bias. OK.

(33:22):
Yeah, it's looking to. If they finish, they should be
finals next year. 100%. Should be.
I reckon they'll have a bit of struggles here and there trying
to fit everyone in and work out like where everyone's going to
play the best and how to work how to play with each other.
But. The talent I've got now means.
The talent means you should be finals.
Yeah, 100 percent, 100% my 4. Did we go to 14?

(33:44):
What? Was your 15?
My 15 was Melbourne. Yeah, it was one off.
Yeah, we talked. About the same talk, yeah.
My 14 was North Melbourne, whichwas kind of close.
I'd be happy if they were 14. I really would be happy if they
were 14. Do you want to know who I had at
14? Think the worst possible time,

(34:05):
like to put at 14 Collingwood. I put Adelaide, Adelaide at 14.
I thought because remember last year they had a really poor
season, a really poor season last year.
And of course we're now talking about this like Riley
Stillthorpe really smashed out this season.
Josh Roll has gone to Australiansquad contention.
Like there's so many things thathave improved from last year,

(34:26):
but clearly I just didn't say it.
I put him at 14, which is hilarious in hindsight because
14 is such a smack in the face to these guys.
I had N over them, that's how crazy I was.
Jesus Christ. Yeah, that's really bad. 13.
What did you have? 13 I had the doggies.
And they didn't do as bad. I do remember you saying a lot

(34:46):
that they're about to drop off, that you were confident but like
their talent just proof shout out to Sam Darcy.
He's a big reason why. And it's just helped Norton grow
like he's helped. There's so many talented people
in this team, but their back line is obviously one of the
things that didn't improve, which is made it close to 13.
But I actually got the dog spot on the season.

(35:06):
I'll just give a little spoiler to that.
But 13 for me was Gold Coast. I'm on a stinker run at this
point. Real stinker run.
I just didn't trust them. And could you blame me?
No, not really. I couldn't trust them, I could
not trust them making the finalsand thankfully, thankfully.
I've won a final. Yeah, I said to.
I said at this point I'm like, Iwant to put them in finals.

(35:28):
I just want them to hurry up andget there and here we are.
They've won a final in the same episode that we're talking about
them winning the final in fantastic fashion.
I'm here in my words, about their 13th spot.
Who'd you have at 12? Jalong.
Yeah, you did have a hate burnerover these guys, didn't you?
You really did not like Jalong. No.
I just, yeah, for me, I couldn'tbelieve that because they just

(35:50):
always found a way. The structure was so good.
They added Bailey Smith, which is probably now that things
ended the of the season. Yeah, so questionable.
Why did you think? Why did you think they were
going to be that lie hate? Train and I also didn't trust
that they would have enough depth either in their K position
players. Turns out they didn't need to,

(36:12):
cause for the most part they stayed healthy and they had the
best injury list all year so. It does help when that happens,
especially with an older side. The fact that they didn't get
too many injuries is very, very good for them.
Or I wouldn't say an older side.They do have a lot of younger
players still experience. Yeah, I was going to say some of
their experienced players can beinjury prone and they most of
the time stayed out of it. So yeah, good on them. 12 for me

(36:33):
was Essendon and this was not thinking about all the injury
hell they were going to go through.
So 12 was pretty disrespectful. I think at the time it was more
than, it's more than fair now, but that is even 12 was speaking
too high of them, speaking way too high of them.
So, I mean, it's just if we're going to look at just this

(36:57):
season, it's purely injuries that have caused them to go this
low. I think that team on paper, if
everything worked out and they weren't injured to hell could
have made some noise and made made me my words.
But yeah, we don't need to go through them again.
We've we've already talked so much about their injury
problems. Who'd you have at 12?
We just mentioned 12. How was your talk, John?

(37:20):
Oh. I'm think we've gone.
I thought that was your 11. My bad.
Who's your 11? My 11 was GWS.
Oh yeah, very. Interesting, I had them falling
out and I might repeat it next year.
I mean, potentially they're so up and down that 11 doesn't even
seem that out of the question. But because of the gap between
10:00 and 9:00 this season, it'slike anyone in the finals that

(37:42):
you had from 10 to 18 is just a bad miss.
It's a really bad miss. So yeah, 11 JWS is not great
because they would have had to have a really bad year from what
it looks like, and they just didnot for me.
Carlton was my eleven. A spot on.
That's my first bang. Let's go.
That's my first correct, yes, myfirst correct answer my #10

(38:05):
however, was North Melbourne. This was me being very hopeful.
I mentioned at the time my hope,my my realistic was 14, but my
optimistic was 10. They didn't do either of that.
No, definitely not. And so Richmond now have picks
2:00 and 3:00 because of that. So North, yeah, 1610.
We've I've talked so much about North Melbourne on this podcast.

(38:27):
I don't want to go too far into depth, but yeah, 10 is just a
big overestimation. Overestimation.
Who did you have a 10? Freya, and they very well could
have finished their had they? If they didn't, if they didn't
come back so hard, yeah. And also one game could have
seen them in night spot. You're right.
So Oh my goodness, it's not the worst.

(38:47):
It's certainly not the worst. Yeah, it's not that far off if
it comes down to one game, but hey, that's footy #9 guess what?
My second spot on guest, I have the Doggies.
I said they are the definition of mid and well, I think mid is
not ninth this year. I think 9th upwards is actually
upper level. 10th was probably closest to mid, which I think

(39:10):
ended up being Sydney. Yeah, I mean he finished middle
of the table. Bill, be it having a great
season. 15 wins in not making finals is not what I expected
from picking the Dogs 9th. Who do you have at 9:00?
9 I had St. Kilda.
I finished 12th. That's.

(39:31):
Terribly optimistic. You had us 15th, I had us 9th.
Maybe. Was it out?
You got it right on. Yeah, we're both winners
basically. We were both spot on.
There is a one team that we forgot to mention in in this one
in the bottom, bottom 10. Sorry of all of this that I'm
about to mention. Port Adelaide.

(39:51):
I had him at 8th. Where'd you have Port Adelaide?
Actually, no, I'm not going to say it.
Yeah. Who'd you have at 8?
Who'd you have at 8:00? I had Carlton at 8:00 and they
finished. They pretty much proved 11.
They pretty much proved you wrong from round one.
Literally proved move on from round one.
Oh man. Carlton.

(40:12):
So 8th ended up being the Hawks.Yep, which is a very interesting
one. It's a very interesting little
result, especially based on whatwhere I put them.
I was very high on the Hawks this year, but yes.
I mean those top four locks. I did, and they very much could
have been, but they weren't. But they weren't Which.
Means they're not locked. 7 For you, who was #7 Adelaide, that

(40:38):
was a good, that was a good pick.
It's a lot 7. Higher than what a lot of people
would have said, but at the sametime it's lower than when
they're finished. Yeah.
No, 100%. You like you're in almost the
the the golden spot in terms of right you high on them when you
needed to be, but not so high onthem that it seemed outrageous.
Because if you had said Adelaidefirst at the preseason, I would

(41:01):
have been like, what the Hell's wrong with the top four?
Yeah, I would have been like, what the Hell's wrong with you a
bit. Not for me.
I actually predicted the slide for seven that I have at 7:00,
but not how far that slide. I had Sydney at 7:00, so after
minor premierships and a grand final appearance I had them
slipping to seven. Of course they slipped out of
finals entirely. 1 due to a new coach that was trying to work

(41:23):
out the system. 2 due to horrific injury health at the
start of the season. The reason that Sydney finished
10th rather than in the top eight.
I will 100% stay on this kind ofis that injuries and missing out
on those players and being so top heavy and reliant on them
ruin them. I think it ruined the way they
played this season. So I fully expect I I would put

(41:45):
Sydney in the top 8 again for next season.
Right now I think Sydney are going to make finals next year
but of course things just were not in their favour.
No, next we move to six. Who'd you have at six?
And Gold Coaster 6, it's a nice finished 7th.
It's a nice pick though. It's a very, very nice pick.
I'm surprised both of our picks were not too bad at all.

(42:07):
Was my was this pick spot on? Hold on.
It was your 6th. My 6th was GWS.
Nigel Davis finished fifth. Very.
Close. We were close on both sides of
it. That's insane.
Oh, man, we're very close on both sides.
But yeah, I mean, considering our 6/6 was pretty spot on, like

(42:28):
I'd like to think that the rest of them would be all right.
Yeah, and that. There's still a team that I
haven't heard yet. Oh, we've got #5 you have a 5
Hawthorne. That's good.
It's a good one. OK.
They played. If they, if they did hit five,
they would have played in the same final that they ended up
playing in in real life, except they were in the eighth

(42:50):
position. That's correct.
But for five I had Collingwood, so it ended up not being bad.
It looked like a bad hit. It looked like I'd
underestimated them during the season, but they cooled off and
hit 4. That's being one off there.
In the end, pretty good is not. Bad at all.
I'm very happy with that pick and how we hit the top four.
I can't believe there's a team. There's a couple of teams in

(43:13):
here that I haven't heard yet and and one starting with AP.
This really really. In in 3rd spot I had no no
please let me get away with. It oh it was your 4th pick put
out. Why are we so high in port?
I don't know. I just I didn't see them losing

(43:35):
many players and they also gained a couple like obviously
last Houston, but they gained back the cautious and I didn't
really see much else that meant they would go down.
Yeah, well, they had a horror injury like as well.
Shocking. In hindsight, they had Houston,
that one of their best players, they had him leave, and then
they had Lococius, one of the players they brought in injured

(43:57):
for most of the season. And then on top of that, they
had injuries sprinkle around Horne.
Francis barely played all that much.
Francis Rosie was injured. Butters has injuries, Todd
Marshall was injured the entire year.
Ollie Lord had injuries. Like I could go on and on.
They just got butchered with injuries.
Yeah, but 4-4 is such an upside.Such an upside considering they

(44:18):
lost one of their best players and put like they finished top
four last year as well. So I can see where you're coming
from but my God did it not go that way for me.
And four, I had Fremantle so nota terrible pick.
They could have been 4 if they had played their second half of
footy, all their footy, their their season, second half, in

(44:39):
their first half too if they hada full season.
I think 4 was definitely expected and they may do so next
year. For me, 3 was Hawthorne.
That was that top 4 lock situation that I had going on.
I think Hawthorne, they definitely the, The funny thing
is they could be a prelim finalsteam very, very soon.
It's just the fact I finished 8th that seems so crazy to me.

(45:02):
Like how how did you go from, inmy head being a top 4 lock to
8th? And I think it's just because
the race in the top 8 was so close, so, so close.
That top four could have been a possibility.
It just had to swing the other way for Hawks though.
You're #2. I had Collingwood at 2:00.

(45:23):
Which isn't bad. It's all right.
It's not bad at all I think, considering they were one.
Did I say? Did I say my 3?
You didn't say you're 3. My 3 was Brisbane.
Yeah, I definitely didn't hit Brisbane.
So yeah, Brisbane was spot on for you.
Well done. Which?
Makes up for my port arrow. Does it?
Almost. No it doesn't.
Yeah, well, we still haven't heard my 1 yet.

(45:45):
Yeah, I forgot about your one. All right?
Yeah. So 3 for me.
Hawthorne, 3 for you. Brisbane 2 for you.
Collingwood, as I mentioned. Yeah, as you mentioned and
again, not a bad one for me. I went spot on.
Again baby, I had a long Yeah, Iwent spot on.
I just, and I remember it specifically, I said these guys

(46:05):
always find a way, they always do.
You were like, you're not high on them.
I feel like they're going to drop off.
I just knew that Geelong will find some bullshit to get them
through. I just knew they would and here
they are. Yep #2 and then number one, I'm
going to go first to hold it offfor you.
I picked Brisbane. I thought Brisbane were going to

(46:26):
be minor premiers and not far 3rd.
I'm not mad at the number one pick, but who did you have at
#1? Sydney, sorry, what was your
overall ladder again? Look, I can see why, but it's
injuries. It was the fact that their play
was falling off a little bit during the end of the last

(46:47):
season 2 that stopped me from putting them that high up.
I just saw a fall off coming, but not as hard as it did.
And I mean, that's not good on you, does it?
I'd say the port picks worse than the Sydney pick. 100% top 4
port is much worse than Sydney 1.
OK. So what we want to do is we want
to go through every time and seethey're different and add those

(47:08):
points up and see where we've finished.
I can't do. That I've done, No, but I'm
working out yours to do it for you.
OK, I've done mine. So I got 66 points, which is
about average. It's all right, I don't have a
one spot. Did you have Essendon finishing
12th? I had Essendon finishing, they

(47:29):
were in. Where are they?
12th, yeah. Yeah.
OK. So that's three points.
That equals 12. You had West Coast finishing
16th. Yes, OK, they finished 18th, so
that's two points. You had Richmond finishing 18th.
That's one point. That is correct.
Yes, yeah, I like, I like this little mathematics.

(47:49):
OK, so you had Melbourne, Fini. OK, let me go.
You had Richmond, Melbourne, West Coast, St.
Kilda. Yes, Adelaide, Adelaide Gold.
Coast Gold. Coast, Essendon, Carlton,
Carlton, North Melbourne, Western Bulldogs, Port Adelaide,
Sydney JWS, Collingwood, Fremantle, Hawthorne, Geelong,

(48:16):
Brisbane. Yes, I had Richmond, West Coast,
Essendon, Melbourne, North Melbourne, Western Bulldogs,
Geelong, GWS, Fremantle, St. Kilda, Carlton, Adelaide, Gold
Coast, Hawthorne and my top 4 It's Port Adelaide, Brisbane,
Collingwood and Sydney. I love hearing that.

(48:37):
So let me count your points. 11 I think 16 with.
The way it sounds your bottom like 6 almost spot on, like the
bottom six are pretty good. They're like one or two spots
off each of them and as soon as you start going away from bottom
6 it starts getting worse and worse.
As soon as I heard Dogs 13 I'm like OK it's getting bad now.
So your total was 56 points. Which is pretty good.

(49:01):
And what was yours? Mine was 6666 so you had a much
more accurate gear than I did. Hey, what can I say?
I just know ball. I have good ball knowledge.
I know what I'm doing. I'm that's why I'm the host of.
Your balls on the man. I, I, I I stop it now just
quoting you stop it now just. Quoting.
I'm quoting you. You're a Nas ball handler.
What I'm doing you are a Nas ball handler.

(49:22):
All I'm doing. Is quoting you?
What do you mean? I'm quoting you.
Get to your tasks mate, I don't want to hear your quotes about
me anymore. OK.
Well, I do have a back to back segment here.
I do. I do know what the other segment
is, but what could it possibly be?
Bam. We'll start off when we say
date. There were multiple instances in

(49:44):
the Thursday night game between Collingwood and Adelaide.
Obviously we had the Jordan Goy hit on Joshua.
No suspension. Was a suspension?
Probably not, did look like he was going to smother however it
did slightly cop him high. To me this is careless, low
impact and high contact which does not result in a week.

(50:07):
Hence he was not suspended. I'm happy with that.
Josh Worrell on lucky shoots wasslightly more.
I think this could be upgraded to medium contact, however that
very barely meets the recommendation of a one week
suspension so I'm understandablewith him not getting that.

(50:27):
But Mark Kane literally elbowingsteel side bottom in the head,
the back of the head mind you, is most definitely worthy of a
suspension. And you know what he got for it?
Nothing. He got a $6000 fine.
I was. Going to say he didn't get.
Any week down from $10,000, it was his.
Guess, guess what offence it was?

(50:48):
Probably 6th, 6th offence. I didn't mean to get that spot
on, by the way. So yeah, elbow one someone one
time. Oh, it's fine.
We'll give you suspension. Yeah, almost.
Second time. OK, maybe.
Maybe don't do it again. We'll hit you with suspension.
Third time, mate, stop it. Suspension.
No, no. Oh, fine.
OK. Fourth time we told you stop it.

(51:11):
I'm going to get. Angry in a second fifth.
Time stop it. I don't like it. 6th time I'm
going to send you to the principal, Andrew Tiller says.
Hey mate, we're just going to give you a suspension, You're
fine. Never mind, it's a fucking fine.
How? How did you get away with doing
something 6 times? Bottom was so like ready for it

(51:32):
too. He was like, yeah, see, because
instant reaction from side bottom after he'd been hit was
was basically yeah, enjoy your time off mate.
I'm so confused as to how this wasn't given a suspension.
And Jordan Digoi's is one that Iimagine you're going to bring up
in a SEC. I just mentioned it like.
Oh, I thought you. I didn't think you had made an

(51:54):
actual mention. Sorry.
I'm sorry. All right.
But yeah, Jordan Digoi looks like he could.
What did he look like he would get anything for?
It no, he was clear. Yeah, OK, thank God, because if
that if Kane is going to get a fine for it, then let Digoi off
to I don't know, but. Complete bullshit.
There was nothing else really over the weekend except for
Rayna not getting fined for. Staging It didn't get fined.

(52:18):
Did not get fined. Oh.
My God. So we now know that diving
works. You can do it like Stephen May.
Except you can play final. Yeah, boy.
Anything else on Bimi's TT this way?
I don't think so. I think that's all.
Was it mainly Collingwood? Yeah, surprisingly.
Not dirty players. What do we say?

(52:40):
The hell come from going on allied?
Apparently you don't know so thefinals look now is shaping it is
looking a bit more full after one week of finals play.
We have two games that we're coming into this week that I
mean they're both pretty exciting because both could go
either way and we're going to start off firstly with Adelaide

(53:01):
versus Hawthorne. This one in particular I think
has the potential to really, really get close.
I think I know which way it's going to go.
Do you? But it's just again, the idea
that this has been the match up.I think it's probably the best
possible match up we could have got.
I think if it was a Collingwood versus Hawthorne it would have
been a blow out on. One end?

(53:21):
No, I think Collingwood Hawthorne would be a ripping
match. Up you reckon?
Yeah, yeah, fair enough I guess,but I think this is just as
good. I really do.
Adelaide versus Hawthorne, they've got so many match ups
all over the place like these. The team has an outrageous
midfield, but they've both got some really nice targets in the
forward line, have a decent backline on both ends.
Adelaide I'd say they're a bit more than decent, but you can

(53:43):
also make the argument for Hawthorne.
They're similar sides, it's justone has now home field advantage
but also have just proven themselves more with their first
place finish. It's just you think Hawthorne
with the likes of this will be areally nice coaching match up
too. Matthew Nicks is going to need
to learn a lot from last week, yeah. 100.

(54:04):
Percent. Sam Mitchell does play around
with a lot of things. I've given Matthew Nicks a lot
of credit this season for how hecoaches this time, but Sam
Mitchell has proven himself very, very well as a coach and
he's coming up against what could be his toughest challenge
yet, I think. Matthew Nicks.
Yeah, certainly one of them. This is going to be such a good
game. To be honest, I think this is
better than the other final. I want to talk about the K

(54:27):
position stocks because I think the midfield battle is very
interesting. We'll talk about it really
quickly, but make versus O'Brien2 contested Rockman, neither
midfield really has a distinct advantage over the other.
Although Newcomb was a very good, I don't think he
outperforms Dawson in any way and both they're both very one
paced without their two stars and day in Rankin.

(54:49):
So defensively for Hawthorne against Adelaide's offensive
team, matching up really well, Boras on Philthorpe, really good
match up there. Boras really likes to be
aggressive and I think Philthorpe potentially being in
the ruck gives Hawthorne that advantage personally.
So it gives Adelaide that advantage also at Adelaide home
ground, so that provides a bike slide advantage.

(55:11):
Then you've got potentially battle on Walker.
How many goals do you think Walker's kicking?
I hope 100 but he's been decent lockdown wise.
Be very careful with the way youtalk about Josh.
That is all Australian Josh Battle to you.
Not to me. So everyone else maybe, but

(55:32):
definitely not to me. And then you've got the two of
Sicily or Scrimshaw on Fogarty, and probably Pedlock is the
other two. I'd assume it's Scrimshaw and
Fogarty. And then they'd want Pedlock on
Sicily, at least that's what Matthew Nick should be doing
because you want to lock down the intercepting.
And then I think Hardwick comes in and plays on Rochelle,

(55:54):
assuming Rochelle is fully fit, which he should be.
And then without Rankin is not much else Adelaide Wise have
defensively. Then you look at holes on
forward line against Adelaide's backline, it's the smalls of
Hawthorn that really get them going and it's the tools of
Adelaide that really get them going.
Which is why I find this so interesting, because you're

(56:16):
going to have Marie on Troll, you're going to have probably
Kane on, let's say potentially Lewis because I think he comes
in for Dia because it didn't really work that well, I don't
think. And then you're going to have
Waru on Jack Gunson and it didn't work out very well for
them last time. And then you got the smalls.

(56:39):
I don't trust Adelaide Smalls and I really trust Hawthorne
smalls, so I think Hawthorne have that advantage right then
and there with a being pretty even elsewhere, except for the
fact that it's Adelaide's home game.
But because I have my ball prediction, yeah, Adelaide
losing a straight set, Hawthorneget it done like that in the

(57:02):
first quarter when they played them over there earlier this
year, they get it done by 22 points.
So revenge. Bit of revenge.
That was crazy. Shut up.
We got with this one man. I tend to agree with you on a
lot of those aspects. I think with the way that the

(57:23):
Crows back line was, I wouldn't say exposed, but it was like
overwhelmed with the amount of pressure that was coming in.
And it's not like Adelaide have a midfield that's so crazy.
Like they've got fantastic players, but it's not like it's
a fantastic enough midfield to stop it from getting there
enough or stop them from making the inside 50 attempts hard.

(57:45):
Like it's it's not going to makeit really difficult for
Hawthorne getting inside 50. And because they have so much
talent, you really think Hawthorne could run the score
up. But you think back to last time,
this was such a back and forth game last time between these two
sides. I think the Crows are going to
make it closer, but I'm going Hawks as well.
I'm going Hawks by 5. I think they have what it takes,

(58:07):
I really do. And that comes back into my bold
prediction as well. I said whoever loses out of
Collingwood, Adelaide will go onto losing straight sets.
So all that hard work from Adelaide and they're out in
straight sets. I think they've proven that
finals pressure can get to them.Hopefully last week we'll have
made it a bit more of a thing towork off of, but the Hawks

(58:29):
matchups, especially going inside that forward 50.
I was very sure that you were going for for Adelaide in this
one. No, I'm.
Very, very confident with Hawthorne in this one.
If you're going to give a bold prediction for this game, what
are you going with now? I'm putting you on the spot.
Ginevan 4, Ginevan kicks. I like it.

(58:52):
It's not going to be him or Watson who kicks a bag.
Yeah, OK, so I could do Guinea and Watson that kicks for.
How about that? I like it because Guinea
obviously had the stuff last year with Kenny Hinckley at the
Adelaide Oval. Now he just makes fun of Matthew
Nicks. Very well could.
Yeah, just let's go. We're flying to.

(59:12):
Just stop, Stop, Go to the next game you're going to, you're
going to embarrass yourself in front of.
Everyone, my bold prediction is Adelaide kick themselves out and
be really inaccurate. How inaccurate.
Like I'm talking eight goals, 20bad.
Like two goal, like two goals worth of points over.
Yeah, jeez. Really.
Bad. That's a very big goal.
Semi final #2 the very first Q clash, Q clash final.

(59:38):
How are we here? What timeline are we living in?
I don't understand it. I do not get it here.
This is one that I hope goes a certain way, and the great thing
is I think it could. This is the reigning premieres.
If we're talking about experience last week, this is
the reigning premieres against the team who just won their

(59:58):
first final. No lucky Neil, no Erica Put.
Come on, Brisbane. Brisbane will start playing
better. Yeah.
I think Hipwood isn't as big of a deal Lucky Neil will be.
We've seen them struggle withoutLucky Neil and the Sun's
midfield is pretty stacked. It's pretty good.

(01:00:20):
Last week was the week of the tour, Defenders.
When you speak of Darcy Moore, obviously Thomas Stewart was
great, Ryan Lester was the opposite of great.
And then you got Alex Pierce wasgreat in the last quarter, but
so was Sam Collins and Mac Andrew went forward obviously.
And then you had Tom Boras, who I thought was arguably one of
the best on in that Hawthorne Giants game.

(01:00:43):
This week, I think is the week of the Smalls.
So I like your pick and I think the Lions Smalls are able to get
this one done. Yeah, if you go in smalls, I
would say lions as well. I want to say Suns.
I want them to do just the the craziest thing.
I just want this season to be known as the year the Suns took

(01:01:03):
over the world. I really do.
I want that timeline. But I feel like they've used all
their fairy. They've used all their fairy
tale magic on last week. Yeah, yeah, they've got none
left. I.
Think unless David Swallow kicksa goal they're not going to be
able to get. That too weird.
I think look, the positive thingabout this is that they're in
Queensland, they're in their home state for a final at the
very least that's a positive. That's fantastic for them.

(01:01:26):
But yeah, I think this is going to be a lion's win and I'm
unfortunately going to stay by 40.
I don't mind it. I won't go that far.
I'll go about. I'm not 28, let's say, but I
really hope it's a good game because I don't want to say Gold
Coast. Few clashes have been
notoriously poor too. Let's hope that the finals can

(01:01:47):
buck that trend. Yeah, I'm hoping so at the very
least. But that is episode #29 of 0
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(01:02:07):
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