Amazing coincidences in football

[emuboy]

Eh?

Si, Que, What?

 

[PAFC66]

Each time Brisbane won a flag as a merged Fitzroy/Brisbane entity, an Ashcroft has played in the Grand Final

Gee that gave me goosebumps

 

[Borussia Teeth]

Si, Que, What?

You’re taking the piss out of ShitVic… carry on

 

[TheRealComptroller]

Only two teams under the current finals system [last 25 seasons] have won a premiership from outside the top four- Bulldogs 2016 and Lions today. It's quite the coincidence that Josh Dunkley played in both!

Fun fact - fourth has never won the flag in the current system. It’s actually the top three that a QF flag team always comes from.

Also Dunkley as a player being passed over as a father-son selection by the Swans to then go and beat them twice in GFs is kind of freaky.

Another thing - in the last two Swan GFs they have lost to a team containing a player who has won a GF against them previously at a different club eight years earlier -

Isaac Smith 2014 and 2022 (also played in a GF loss against the Swans in 2012).

Josh Dunkley 2016 and 2024.

This is a very rare occurrence. The only other example I know of is Doug Wade who won two flags Vs HFC; as a Cat in 1963 and as a Kangaroo in 1975. He’s also amazingly lost GFs to Richmond with both of his teams in 1967 and 1974.

 

[Morbidly_Obese]

Fun fact - fourth has never won the flag in the current system. It’s actually the top three that a QF flag team always comes from.

Also Dunkley as a player being passed over as a father-son selection by the Swans to then go and beat them twice in GFs is kind of freaky.

Another thing - in the last two Swan GFs they have lost to a team containing a player who has won a GF against them previously at a different club eight years earlier -

Isaac Smith 2014 and 2022 (also played in a GF loss against the Swans in 2012).

Josh Dunkley 2016 and 2024.

This is a very rare occurrence. The only other example I know of is Doug Wade who won two flags Vs HFC; as a Cat in 1963 and as a Kangaroo in 1975. He’s also amazingly lost GFs to Richmond with both of his teams in 1967 and 1974.

In another universe, dunkley was drafted by the swans, tagged neale out of existence and annihilated us today.

 

[emuboy]

Fun fact - fourth has never won the flag in the current system. It’s actually the top three that a QF flag team always comes from.

Also Dunkley as a player being passed over as a father-son selection by the Swans to then go and beat them twice in GFs is kind of freaky.

Another thing - in the last two Swan GFs they have lost to a team containing a player who has won a GF against them previously at a different club eight years earlier -

Isaac Smith 2014 and 2022 (also played in a GF loss against the Swans in 2012).

Josh Dunkley 2016 and 2024.

This is a very rare occurrence. The only other example I know of is Doug Wade who won two flags Vs HFC; as a Cat in 1963 and as a Kangaroo in 1975. He’s also amazingly lost GFs to Richmond with both of his teams in 1967 and 1974.

Gerard Neesham, the inaugural coach of the Fremantle Dockers and himself a Sydney Swans player for one season in 1992 had an astonishing WAFL Grand Final record as follows:

• Playing for Swan Districts, Neesham would play in Grand Final victories over Claremont in 1983 and his former team East Fremantle in 1984 but would play in a losing Grand Final against South Fremantle in 1980.
• Playing for East Fremantle, Neesham would play in a winning GF team over Subiaco in 1985, but a loss by the Sharks to Subiaco in 1986. He also played in East Fremantle's losing side to Perth in 1977, the Demons most recent premiership to date.
• Playing for Claremont as captain-coach in 1987, 1988 and 1989, Neesham's Tigers would defeat Subiaco in 1987, lose to the Lions in 1988 (the fourth year in a row Neesham had met the Lions on GF Day), then thrash South Fremantle in 1989.
• As non-playing coach of Claremont in the 1990s, Neesham's Tigers would lose to Swan Districts in 1990, defeat Subiaco in an absolute rout in 1991 and a similar demolition of West Perth in 1993.

So as player and coach, Neesham would win flags four times with Claremont but would win against them the only time he played against them in a GF in 1983. He would win three times over Subiaco once with East Fremantle and twice with Claremont and lose to them twice once with East Fremantle and the other time with Claremont. Neesham's experience with Swans saw wins with them over his other teams Claremont and East Fremantle in 1983 and 1984, but a loss to them with Claremont in 1990. His two GF encounters with South Fremantle saw Swan Districts thrashed by the Bulldogs in 1980, but a similar trouncing by Claremont over South Fremantle in 1989. Neesham was never able to best Perth in a Grand Final with the Demons trouncing the Sharks in 1977 but was never defeated by West Perth in a GF, the Tigers easily winning the 1993 premiership decider over the Falcons. The only WAFL team that Neesham had no Grand Final encounters with either as a player or a coach is the East Perth Royals.

 

[peetoo]

Each time Brisbane won a flag as a merged Fitzroy/Brisbane entity, an Ashcroft has played in the Grand Final

How many premiership sides since 2000 have not had an Ashcroft or a Rioli?

 

[BigVic]

How many premiership sides since 2000 have not had an Ashcroft or a Rioli?

5 premiers this century without an Ashcroft or Rioli in it

 

[peetoo]

5 premiers this century without an Ashcroft or Rioli in it

I think we just won the thread

 

[sherb]

Half-time yesterday, Lions 73 points, Swans 4 goals.

I was hoping for a coincidence to happen, but alas it didn't.......

 

[BigVic]

The Stuart Dew

Stuart Dew

Age

45

Ht

183cm

Wt

99kg

Pos.

M/F

Career

Season

Last 5

D

13.1

3star

K

9.1

4star

HB

4.0

3star

M

2.9

3star

T

1.7

4star

No current season stats available

D

12.2

3star

K

9.0

4star

HB

3.2

3star

M

2.8

3star

T

1.8

4star

GF Olympic leap year stat continues

2000 - Central District (Premiers)
2004 - Port Adelaide (Premiers)
2008 - Hawthorn (Premiers)
2012 - Sydney (Premiers)
2016 - Sydney (Runners-up)
2020 - Gold Coast (14th)
2024 - Brisbane (Premiers)

2020 was an outlier with Dew having a 5-1 record with Olympic Leap Year premierships

 

[emuboy]

Red and White teams seem to do badly in Grand Finals. The Sydney Swans yesterday lost their fourth Grand Final post 2012, three of these by big margins, with this adding to a generally poor GF by the Sydney Swans prior to this with the Swans in their South Melbourne days losing many more grand finals than they won.

In lower grades South Melbourne/Sydney never won a reserves grade premiership, and just once in the Under 19s, way back in 1956. The NEAFL came and went pretty fast but in its 9 years from 2011-2019 the Sydney Swans were runners up five times without winning a grand final once.

WAFL team South Fremantle have a very poor Grand Final record after the 1950s, with some premiership droughts, heavy grand final losses and upset losses in other GF's that the Bulldogs should in theory have won comfortably. SANFL team the North Adelaide Roosters have a number of terrible Grand Final performances to their name, and even when North won their two few and far between premierships in 1991 and 2018 both grand finals were mired in controversy.

VFL team the Northern Bullants (previously Preston) also has an unflattering Grand Final record and hasn't won the premiership for 40 years, while Geelong West in their VFA tenure lost more Grand Finals than they won.

NRL team the St George Dragons certainly had no problems winning premierships in a golden era from the mid-50s to mid-60s, but struggled to do so before that and afterwards, save for two quick premierships in 1977 and 1979. However this short burst of success would lead the Dragons into a 30 year premiership drought with a number of Grand Final losses both for St George on its own and when it entered into a joint venture with the Illawarra Steelers (which never won a senior GF) from 1999. The Dragons finally broke the hoodoo against the Roosters in the 2010 GF, but since then the Dragons have mostly struggled, and never really challenged for another GF position in 14 seasons since then.

 

[terrybull]

2017 Brisbane wooden spooners, Richmond Premiers.

2024 Richmond wooden spooners, Brisbane Premiers.

 

[emuboy]

2017 Brisbane wooden spooners, Richmond Premiers.

2024 Richmond wooden spooners, Brisbane Premiers.

Add to this 1980 - Richmond Tigers premiers, Fitzroy Lions wooden spoon. And in all three seasons - 1980, 2017 and 2024 - the Geelong Cats were beaten preliminary finalists. Another feline coincidence was in 2020, which saw Richmond beat Geelong in the Grand Final, with Brisbane a beaten preliminary finalist. And going back to 1944 when Fitzroy defeated Richmond in the Grand Final, their feline cousins Geelong collected the wooden spoon.

 

[emuboy]

I also posted this on the weird scores thread - in Round 13 (which seems apt) in 1976 and 1977 Melbourne and the Bulldogs took turns at doubling each other's scores on each other's home ground.

Round 13 in 1976 saw Melbourne trounce Footscray 14.20-104 to 7.10-52 at the Western Oval. A year later the Bulldogs took their revenge on the Demons, Footscray giving Melbourne a 15.12-102 to 7.9-51 thrashing at the MCG.

The 1977 score is a coincidence in itself - it is the exact same score by which the Bulldogs beat Melbourne in the 1954 Grand Final. And it gets even stranger when considering that Melbourne thrashed reigning premiers Carlton 15.12-102 to 7.9-51 in 1948 - which turned out to be a Demons premiership year.

The only other time that a score of 15.12-102 to 7.9-51 has come up was hardly memorable or significant - it was by St Kilda over Hawthorn in 1929 - but what is quite strange that the only four times there has been a 102-51 game for a 51-point margin, it has always been 15.12-102 to 7.9-51. There have never been any different scoring combinations for the same aggregate, like 16.6 to 8.3, 14.18 to 7.9, or 13.24 to 6.15.