Are we witnessing the best season of AFL football in living memory? Another four games decided by less than ten points, the year’s first draw and a perhaps the ugliest on-field incident since Barry Hall’s Brent Staker strike headlined another crazy week of a crazy season.
On top of losing to Sydney in feeble fashion, Melbourne will remain in the news for the wrong reasons this week when Tom Bugg inevitably faces the AFL tribunal for clocking Callum Mills on Friday night. A suspension of six weeks isn’t out of the question and would not be excessive.
The Dogs’ premiership hangover lingers on, losing to West Coast in a tight encounter at Etihad Stadium. Luke Beveridge’s team is now a game and percentage out of the eight, with an away game against Adelaide to come this week.
Speaking of the Crows, they were given an almighty fright by the ever-competitive Blues at the MCG. Carlton hit the front midway through the final quarter but couldn’t finish the job, losing by 12 points.
At Metricon Stadium, Gold Coast celebrated Gary Ablett’s 300th game with a win over North Melbourne. The Roos continue to be competitive in their losses, but are now just a single game clear of bottom spot on the ladder.
Geelong and GWS fought out the first draw of the year at Spotless Stadium on Saturday night. Patrick Dangerfield surely added another three Brownlow Medal votes to his tally, clearly best on ground with 45 touches. With both sides missing key players, a rematch in September between these two leading premiership contenders is an exciting possibility.
Port Adelaide’s struggles against quality sides continued, losing to Richmond by 13 points. The Power have still not beaten a top-8 team in 2017 and can’t be considered a flag threat until they do so. Richmond, on the other hand, are into the top-4 – time to add some more carriages to the Tiger Train!
The evenness of this season was again demonstrated on Sunday with bottom-placed Brisbane beating Essendon at Etihad Stadium. The Bombers seemingly had the match under control, but let the inspired Lions kick six of the last seven goals to go down by eight points.
Hawthorn kept their slim finals hopes alive and probably ended Collingwood’s with a 24-point win at the MCG. The Pies now sit in the bottom four with only eight games to come. Nathan Buckley would be hoping for a few more wins before the end of the year to give himself any hope of continuing in the top job.
Finally, St Kilda edged out Fremantle by nine points in a tight contest at Subiaco. The Dockers battled on gallantly after losing Aaron Sandilands early in the game to a hamstring injury, but couldn’t quite ice the game after leading at every change. Michael Walters kicked six goals in one of the standout individual performances of the year to date.
