The Benny

After a third term when we seized the initiative and Geelong seized up, I watched the last huddle of the season with rapt impatience. We could probably win this without Riewoldt or Lynch but it would sure help if they joined in. Nank got things off to a flyer with a splendid 55 metre pass down Lynch’s throat; but nothing came of it. Then there was this handpass.

Toby is such an unassuming gun footballer. Matt Zurbo used to coach him and wrote this fantastic piece in the Almanac earlier in Grand Final week, inspired by his outstanding prelim final performance against Port.

For one so young, Baker is a serious finals performer. He kicks a genius submarine pass to Riewoldt who’s in acres of space in forward 50, and via quick ungainly transfers it goes through Graham, George, and Lambert to Prestia running along the boundary, who goals from near the point post [Bruce credits it to Graham]. Really only the last pass was cultured and conventionally accurate. 52-44, we have six of the last seven goals.

Astbury is putting on a masterclass for any defenders with a daunting match-up. Hawkins looks like Micky Conlan would if he was scaled up to the height of John Ironmonger. But there’s something early-Richo-like about Hawkins’ lack of resilience in games. Miss a shot early and they are almost a liability. Now Astbury is rag-dolled out of the way but Hawkins drops the ball; and in there I am crediting Astbury with making it just hard enough for mentally-gone Hawkins to fail.

Geelong are not putting anything together. Their isolation from each other is Crows-at-the-2017-anthem-like. Making a very rare inside 50, Gryan Miers gallops forward, chased by Houli at calf-tearing pace, and kicks while too far out with no mates there to catch it, so Broad does.

Shai flashes into the game with a mark, play on, and astonishing stop-start mosquito run that gives him space to bomb it to Lynch in the square. Tom is on the board, 59-44 and the margin really feels like more.

Soon Cotch is lining up for another one after taking possession and going looking for Harry Taylor’s elbow with his head in classic Selwood fashion. 45m out on a steep angle we know he is no chance but the comms are quite excited that he might be getting us one goal away from being uncatchable. He misses.

Shorty is having a hell of a game. Everything he does has a lightness to it. He is probably the model rebounding halfback in the game now. Look at this kick, the physics of it is beautiful.

Dusty is front and centre all on his own and kicks his third after barely shrugging to dislodge O’Connor’s tackle, and its 66-44. He stretches his jumper in celebration. Hard to see where a Cats goal will come from. Hard to remember how they got to a grand final. This quarter the umps are giving them nothing; we are getting all the line ball calls and getting away with murder at times. Eg Nank takes the ball out of the ruck, gets caught: another ball up.

Now the Cats go forward and Menegola marks bravely running with the ball but unfortunately poleaxing Sam Simpson. He’s out cold and there’s a 7-minute delay, while TV replays the incident in stomach-churning detail.

The teams get into huddles, but the Cats break up quite quickly and seem to all be staring into their personal darknesses alone. Meanwhile the cameras catch the Tiges in 3s and 4s talking animatedly. That’s winning and losing I suppose. But there are nearly 8 minutes left on the clock and only 22 points in it.

After an eternity Sam Menegola kicks the goal professionally, and I was really happy for him that he did, in these circumstances.

As Simpson is placed on the cart the spidercam shows a few Tigers come over and wish him well.

Riewoldt kicks a point, then we have five minutes where we look wobbly. Not like we are going to lose, but not like a team that “can do no wrong”. We can do wrong.

Danger is trying to rally his side by staging, really flopping about looking for high contact. As noted above he is not the only player doing this.

Stewart has been Geelong’s best, and he is trying to rally his side by kicking very very long and accurately.

Baker has had a great game, now with amazing fingertip control he manages to slam ball on boot and hit Riewoldt lace out. Jack nails the shot from the boundary 48m out, and gets the crazy eyes in the celebration. 90 seconds to go.

Now Martin kicks his 4th. The hapless Rhys Stanley fumbles again and again while running out towards Danger in the pocket. He finally gets away something like a handpass to Danger, but it’s plucked right off his hands by the sharking Martin, also running towards the boundary.

He stops, shrugs off Dangerfield who is rotating around him like a naughty kid on a Hills Hoist; and just hooks it through for one of the all-time great poacher’s goals. 80-50.

There’s time for Riewoldt to clunk another one. His set shot is always missing as Brian intones “Riewoldt is on target…”. BT’s dedication to being clearly wrong has been a real 4-quarter effort.

By now Richmond staff are massing on the boundary. Unlike the sight of happy players, even very happy players, seeing happy coaches hugging and high-fiving is very rare. For Richmond people to have been able to enjoy that sight twice more after the delirious breakthrough of 2017, is really special.

Richmond 2.1(13) 3.2(20) 7.4(46) 12.9(81)
Geelong 2.2(14) 5.5(35) 6.8(42) 7.8.(50)

Epilogue

It’s taken me ages to write up this game, so first apologies for that. In 2017 I designed a bumper sticker as part of my celebrations of the win. In 2019 and 2020 I had to follow up with new ones, and both times it really got in the way of me celebrating the win; having this job to do with people waiting. Knowing that we are certainly still in the mix to win more premierships, I’m going to announce now that that’s the end of my premiership merch career. The 17, 19 and 20 items will stay on sale for anyone who wants one; but I think there are plenty of other people doing wonderful designs and I will leave it to them to cover our 2021 three-peat hat trick and our subsequent flags.

The Benny

5: Dustin Martin – Australian Rules’ greatest ever big game player. His first three goals were each desperately needed footholds as we clung onto the mountain; his fourth was just the perfect celebration of our total mastery of Geelong. Dusty has again taken out the Benny with 41 votes.
4: Jayden Short – had 25 touches including 18 exquisite kicks, made 7 inside 50s and laid 6 tackles.
3: Shane Edwards – 27 touches, covered every blade of grass, a quiet leader
2: Toby Nankervis – followed up last week with another complete ruck performance, 6 tackles.
1: Shai Bolton – just a highlight package isn’t he? Had some glorious moments, 7 tackles. And he is runner-up in the 2020 Benny.

Final standings
41: Martin
27: Bolton
24: Short
18: Grimes, Vlastuin, Graham
17: Balta
15: Cotchin
13: Lambert, Edwards
12: McIntosh
10: Riewoldt, Baker
9: McIntosh, Prestia
8: Houli
7: Pickett, Nankervis
6: Soldo, Lynch
5: Higgins, Eggmolesse-Smith, Chol
4: Caddy
2: Aarts
1: Castagna, Astbury

Maurice Rioli Grip of Death Trophy for Tackles
This year won by Jack Graham with 72
Pickett 69
Lambert 68
Rioli 57
Cotchin 51
Bolton 47

For a regular night game, half time is a bit of toast, maybe bring in a couple of logs for the fire, and possibly switch from beer to coffee. We did the kick-to-kick in the early evening pre-game, so instead we had the saveloys that we didn’t really want, because dinner was only an hour ago. The TV tells us that Danger’s gone to full forward and Dusty to half forward. We resume down 20-35, having been “flogged with a warm lettuce” in the 2nd quarter by a dominant but inaccurate Geelong.

The first minutes after the restart were all down our end. It was a perfect start, with the same move-it-on attitude we showed at the beginning of the game. Prestia just swinging a boot at a loose ball a couple of times, it came to O’Connor who is ragdolled in massive tackle from Pickett who can’t believe its play on. Sheds stood in a tackle and got it to Cotch who was 97% gone when he got a knuckle on it to Graham; Graham swept it out wide to Dusty and his first kick of the half was perfection. Jack had position, Henderson got over his shoulder and conceded a free that Jack iced with no fuss. 26-35.

Next Dusty placed another kick into 50 perfectly and this time Graham was caught high by Blicavs. His shot at goal is utter pants, but that’s 11 inside 50s in a row to the reigning premiers and hope is starting to put in an appearance. Immediately Kolodjashnij clearing out of defence kicks it straight to Lambert, who squares it to Jason “0.5” Castagna.

Even before his shot there was a real sense of Richmond now being in the driver’s seat of the ute and Geelong just running alongside in cheap thongs trying to get close enough to jump into the tray. Castagna’s kick is very strange and the three Geelong players on the line all fail to stop it. 32-35.

Miers gets on the end of a very sharp handball chain orchestrated by the man @AFLItalia (probably) calls Il Piccolo Maestro. He goals to recover a tiny bit of personal respect and stop the rampant Tiger roll. 32 – 41.

Geelong now slowed the game right down. After a few minutes of this Brian said “Geelong… taking a little bit of milk out of… the Tigers”. Halfway through he wanted to back out of it, but couldn’t work out how.

An insane series of events led to a Lambert goal. A beautiful Short kick was fumbled by Sheds as he was 15m out right in front. George chased the loose ball and was held without it, no free. Bews tried to “play out from the back” Manchester City-style and his short kick was thrillingly marked on the boundary by Shai Bolton who came from nowhere over Menegola. Shai bounced up and kicked dangerously to Lambert on a better angle, but it came off. After taking the slips catch, Kane converted nervelessly. 39-42

Tuohy kicking out of defence was pushed off-balance by Dusty, and the ball landed amongst Tigers. It came back via a long Short kick and Dusty beat Tuohy to the high loose ball, then just turned and paffed it through on the bounce off the outside of his right boot from 30 metres out. 2 goals to Dusty, Tigers in front in the 2020 Grand Final, and Dusty loves it. 45-42.

This was a great moment; a surgically precise intervention by Jack’s toes between Selwood’s hand and boot.

Lynch finally gets a clean touch – to be fair on watching the replay he has been using his body, scrabbling defensively, he’s been working hard. Guthrie took a screamer over Nank. Il Piccolo Maestro hits Hawkins with a great kick; but Hawkins rushes his shot and misses. Geelong are still trying to clamber onto the ute but they’ve just lost one thong. In one minute Pickett outplayed Danger, and Grimes outplayed Ablett, who by now was carrying on like the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

A Dusty Martin blast kick into acres of space bounced awkwardly and Blicavs approached it like a bomb disposal novice.

Together Blicavs and Henry cocked it up under pressure exerted by Rioli and Graham.

Geelong were playing scared. The ball came via Lambert to Sheds, who ran towards an open goal and kicked a point – unmarked Jack Riewoldt took it pretty well considering. 46-44.

The last action of the term saw Geelong streaming in numbers towards goal as last man Grimes made a crucial save.

SO crucial. A Geelong goal following Sheds’ miss could have flipped the momentum back the other way. As it was, we came to the huddle leading 46-44, having kicked four goals to one in the quarter, and with many familiar signs of the brittle Geelong we’ve come to know and love.

As the broadcast resumes, we are looking at the end Geelong was attacking in the previous quarter. “That’s the Geelong forward end… … … in fact the Richmond forward end”. Thanks BT. We’d seen Richmond running towards it so probably no need to say anything eh?

Dave Astbury flaps at the ball like an outwitted goalkeeper and Ablett gets away, only to be run down by Pickett. Marlion Pickett is in everything tonight.

Rohan stops Prestia and gets a HTB free. Dangerfield is isolated on Cotchin and as Rohan’s kick comes in Cotch gives away scragging free. Dangerfield kicks the goal. 13 – 20. Geelong pressure is up and we have not come out with a good plan B. Ablett gives Dangerfield the rare one-handed high five.

Next bounce Pickett nearly cleans up Graham then seconds later Simpson’s perfect kick for Hawkins is ruined (bravely) by Dalhaus. Duncan is really generating heaps for Geelong.  We’ve had some luck with the umpires eg Nank marks a touched ball right in front of Geelong’s goal and essentially rolls in a ball like a slater. 

Shane Edwards creates a scoring opportunity. His wide kick out of the backline sets up for Shai to beat Blicavs in a sprint, then it goes via Kam, then Prestia, Dusty (all under kilopascals of pressure), back to Edwards but his final kick is just too deep for Jack and Tom Lynch.

Astbury is getting clearly beaten while Grimes is just anonymous – he and Rohan are mostly cancelling each other out. Dangerfield has another shot (after a mark that was actually touched by Broad) but he hits it all wrong.

Stewart attacks a ball on the edge of Geelong’s 50 and kicks it high for Rohan. Grimes runs him under it. Pickett and Broad tidy up but Broad under pressure hooks the ball back into danger territory, where it falls in the lap of stationary Gryan Miers. Gryan Miers ignores traffic cop Gary Rohan, decides to play on and kicks a behind from 20 out on a 45° angle. He tucks his ridiculous dreads behind his ears.

We are under a lot of duress now but the Cats are failing to turn the screw when the opportunity is there. Fragile. Harry Taylor gets a push, adds some mayo to it and dives into the legs of Graham who knees him in the head for his trouble.  Tuohy kicks another point. After 8 minutes of complete domination their lead is only 9 points. Rioli is trying to get into the game with some 2nd-in tough-guy efforts. Dahlhaus sets up a high kick to the square to be punched through for another behind, 13-23. 

Pickett makes a great tackle on Bews but then plays on from the free and handpasses it straight back to him. He is a big part of keeping us in this game but his mistakes are always made on centre stage.

Balta in the back pocket kicks with his scything style straight to Selwood. He slows play down, but still picks out Miers who was unmarked for ages. Miers gets Menegola, who finally kicks them another major. 13-29. It’s technically their 4th in a row but they actually have zero momentum.

Great little pass from Ablett to Selwood who pumps it down to Hawkins. Tom kicks the goal and now there’s some momentum. 13-35. “They’re going to be hard to catch” says Bruce. I’m worrying not so much about the margin but now Hawkins is up, and we are very flat, making unforced errors and letting loose men drift away.  For the first time I can visualise us losing this.

We move it slowly after a series of bounces. A hope kick comes out of Geelong’s defence to Short, who bangs it back in and finds Shai. His set shot misses, he got too close to the mark. Balta marks the kickout, but his kick is too cute and gives Kam no chance.

Henry kicks OOF on the other side. Baker takes the kick and goes deep to the big pack. Lynch and Riewoldt have been absent from the screen all night. Now Lynch rises above the pack and smacks the sherrin into the arms of Dusty for his first touch of the term. He runs across the goalface while holding Kolodjashnij at bay and hooks the ball through the middle, giving us a lifeline for half time. 20-35.

With 55 secs left there’s another throw-in in our forward pocket. Blicavs collects the tap and is caught in a vice by a re-awakened Dusty, who flips it out of his hands. That’s probably not a free. Dusty lines up, gets some advice from Riewoldt which he ignores, and kicks the worst banana you’ll see. In lawn bowls you’d call it wrong  bias.

The siren goes as we are hunting hard another goal. Geelong’s brief spell of momentum is dead. A half of wonderful intense and skilful footy has set the stage for the main event – some rich kids with colourful hair playing derivative rock n roll. We mute the TV and go to work on the saveloys.

It’s a different game with different rules. After the first bounce the ball is hoofed off the ground, out of the air, it’s like the players are big birds with no hands. Cotch soccers it, Shai soccers it. Selwood picks it up with his human hands and kicks it OOF. Kamdyn gives it a huge whack along the ground and Sheds soccers it. As it goes out again Baker delivers a big bump to Dangerfield, and it’s dripping with contempt.

Another big defensive hoof off the ground by Balta. Shai is such a smart player. Look at how he uses his body and O’Connor’s momentum without pushing him. He just ushers him onto the ground, and although he goes to ground himself he is up literally in a blink.

At 3 mins in Vlastuin and Ablett are injured within seconds of each other. Vlossy and Dangerfield converge on a ball, Dangerfield gets there first and punches it away. He has time to bend his arm to meet Vlossy’s head with his forearm. My gut feeling at the time was that it was instinctual to protect himself. I don’t like Dangerfield and could easily convince myself it was deliberate but in Grand Finals, that matters little. Nick was out before he hit the turf and gone for the day.

Ablett hurts his dicky shoulder when tackled four seconds later by Cotchin. He went and had an injection and came back out, but it limited his output. He’s an old bloke who’s had surgery. That’s footy. We lost a key foundational player and they lost 30% of an old stager. So much has happened already and its still 0-0.

Dusty sweeps a big handpass backwards to Cotch among Cats, putting him under pressure but then helps tidy up. Short take a 2 bounce run. He and Baker are making lots of ground off half back. Nank is dominating.

We bomb it into 50, Henderson misses the ball with a fist and it would have been a stone cold goal to Sheds except he fumbled [inconceivable] then gets taken out below the knees by Stewart.

Shai’s hands are clean and his mind is clear. Look at this pick up. He has Dusty as an option but chooses George. Tuohy’s is an uphill battle.

Sam Menegola is the architect of Geelong’s first forward move after 10 minutes, leading to a Hawkins behind. Tiges still looking good. Graham is pinged for in the back on Danger, on 50. He kicks badly, its 0-2. Ablett appears on the boundary, crowd gets worked up.

Prestia nails the first goal. Menegola dumps it straight to Short, who sends it back into 50, Bolton is the tall timber who brings it to ground where Sheds actually controls with his calf then soccers it to Rioli, who hands to Graham, who hands to Dion, two white flags.  6–2.

30 seconds later Dusty gets it on centre wing, turns inside and squares it to the corridor to Baker. He dishes a little handpass to the galloping Kamdyn who runs inside to 48 and always kicks these. 12-2.

Dangerfield takes on Shai and Dion and loses it, Martin hooks it to the goal line. We are dominating with 6 mins to QT. Lost of good ‘fragile Geelong’ signs. Broad is heading off-field with trainers. “Broad – appears to be not making much sense” – says Brian Taylor. All over the nation and beyond people mutter to their televisions ha – you’d know all about that BT.

With two key backs missing some gaps are appearing. Parfitt and Guthrie in turn take easy marks in space, and Guthrie goals. 13-8. I rate Guthrie. Ablett is tackling gingerly. Parfitt has been off and come back with a strapped thumb – it’s broken we later learn. The ball passes Ablett and he gives it a little poke, not keen to take possession.

Duncan with the ball in the forward pocket tried to do the Mexican Hat Dance to lose Dusty but his great defensive pressure rendered the kick harmless. Then another Duncan kick is OOF. Duncan is very tonguey. Edwards lays on a perfect kick for Bolton to run onto but Stewart got a hand to it. He’s sweeping very well.

Intruders on the ground. After they’re secured a spare security man runs across the ground back to his station BT: “oh it’s ANOTHER one”. Disinformation flows from this man. Ablett was clearly feeling his shoulder while BT talked about a leg injury.

BT and Bruce did not notice this but it seems neither did most people: Houli backheel straight to Cotchin from Ablett’s soccer. So deft.

Later we learned Bachar tore a calf muscle in the early minutes. It’s likely that this move was a response to feeling restricted in his ability to change direction or bend down.

Cotch kicks straight to Stanley. Stanley to Menegola and he has a choice of two as Duncan and Bews have just wandered forward. Pickett and Broad at fault. 43 seconds left. Goal to Duncan with 8 sec left. Super slow-mo tongue action, no-one needs to see that. It’s 2.2.13–to 2.2.14 at quarter time. The Gabba fills with pop music and suddenly the footballers sprint is happening. Geelong wins it.

On Friday evening before the game I sent a text to Joe in Launceston, a lifelong Tiger.

At 7.22pm he called. He was not in Launceston. He was not near a TV. He was walking the Overland Track, and had just arrived at Narcissus Hut after a big day walking 28km, with a 20kg pack. He had one bar on his phone, battery nearly flat. I said I’d send him score updates.

Holy hell, what a game! The pressure was insane. It was raining, the ball was soap, and each player receiving it was just intent on moving it on asap. The ball was booted off the ground and out of midair countless times, but there were also incredible contortions to get the ball from hand to foot before the inevitable tackle.

The best thing I’ve read about the game (and probably the best short footy piece of the year) is this; Nankervis by Matt Zurbo. Go and read it, I’ll wait here.

Port were on top early but their entries inside 50 were terrible. They had a clear chance with Marshall galloping free and he kicked out on the full. I haven’t seen a lot of this kid but I marked him as a weak link. Grimes seemed to have his measure. Tiges didnt make a scoring chance until 8 mins in when Lambert stripped Mackenzie of the ball but he dribbled a point. There was no actual Port pressure on him at the time (from my vantage point on the couch 885 nautical miles away) but I know the air around him was just pinging with perceived pressure.

Grimes was copped high and with his free kick chose to slow things down, take a really good look and send a considered long ball to the top of the square. Jack brought it to ground, Dusty roved it at top speed and hooked it back on his right for the game’s first goal. Jack has started really well. Duursma is one of Port’s young stars and Jack ran through him in the centre. Soon after Jack was smacked across the chops by Jonas and put the resulting free kick through for a goal. We were using our chances better than Port.

Then Marshall set up a goal for Rozee. OK maybe I was wrong about him. Robbie Gray, one of the most balanced modern players you’ll see, gathered with one hand as he wheeled around with his back to goal, and with great vision hit up Duursma. The kid’s a very good player but his archer stuff is dumb. Sort of masturbatory. You can image he’d feel at home at Narcissus Hut.

He ran 50 metres to have a yap at Lynch afterwards. Port ahead 2.3.15 to 2.1.13 at quarter time. Best sight of the first quarter was Balta galloping out of the backline – he’s blanketed Dixon.

Rozee kicked a goal from the Eddie pocket. Burne Jones is on Martin and like most humans, has no hope. We are a goal down but I feel we are winning the 50/50s down low and we are dominant in the air. It’s going to turn. Nank kicks to Shai in space, but his set kick doesn’t make the distance. BT does his nana about Shai turning his back to goal, but I reckon he was looking for a runner to dish it off to.

Next minute Shai runs down Lycett for holding the ball and just picks it up and skips away from him.

Burne Jones tried some kind of body stuff on Martin and missed him entirely, leaving him in space to mark and goal. It’s 21-21 now and the score doesn’t move for a long, LONG time. I suddenly remembered I had to text Joe.

We are getting an OK run with the umpires – they are giving deliberate OOBs all over the place but its consistent. Pickett is working into the game after a dud first quarter. I feel like every Tiger has had vital moments.

Duursma dropped a chest mark. Rioli tries to just bowl the ball between his legs to escape a tackle. Balta gets away with a big shove on Dixon. Graham goes off sore. Powell-Pepper is trying to crash through packs and its not working.  A promising move forward goes to Prestia and he puts it OOF.

Half time score 3.3.21 apiece.

For the rest of the game I had Joe in the wilderness hanging on my texts. It really added something extra to a game that was already totally engrossing.

After a lovely clean move Bolton out it across the face for a behind. Lynch outmarked two to put us in front. Houli is in everything, a low-to-the-ground ball-promoting machine. I don’t know about stats but Nank is the dominant ruckman on the ground. He’s the greatest tackling ruckman the game has seen. He pings Gray. Baker has quelled Rozee.

Suddenly Lycett is galloping free. Motlop finds him and he goals from the set shot. Port are getting some rough decisions and the home crowd are baying for blood.

Joe is on the verandah now trying to get reception. It is -7°C.

I’m just going to tell the rest of the game in our texts. I am yet to rewatch the last quarter but this is how I saw it.

In these last minutes Nank took two crucial marks in defence. He ended up with ten tackles.

Port Adelaide 2.3(15) 3.3(21) 4.4(28) 6.4(40)
Richmond 2.1(13) 3.3(21) 4.6(30) 6.10(46)

The Benny

5: Nankervis – “Nothing flash, just effort down low. Pushing, shoving, tackling, clearing paths, getting it, giving small handballs. Work.” – Matt Zurbo
4: Martin was unstoppable. He is unstoppable.
3: Balta beat Dixon. Played on the edge but huge contribution.
2: Lynch worked so hard all night.
1: Lambert’s two quick goals finally put our slight edge up in black and white on the scoreboard.

Leaderboard
36: Martin
26: Bolton
20: Short
18: Grimes, Vlastuin, Graham
17: Balta
15: Cotchin
13: Lambert
12: McIntosh
10: Riewoldt, Baker, Edwards
9: McIntosh, Prestia
8: Houli
7: Pickett
6: Soldo, Lynch
5: Higgins, Eggmolesse-Smith, Chol, Nankervis
4: Caddy
2: Aarts
1: Castagna, Astbury

Maurice Rioli Grip of Death Trophy for Tackles
Graham 67
Lambert, Pickett 64
Rioli 53
Cotchin 51
Bolton 47

Confidence for this game was pretty solid. We were OK without being quite good enough against Brisbane. Tom Lynch was available after a spell to get his sore hamstring completely right. His absence contributed to last week’s loss, but would that call ultimately pay off? Dimma decided to put his faith in the “Nank & Friends” approach in the ruck, so Mabior Chol made way for Lynch. Unlucky Jake Aarts was dropped to bring back dual premiership defender Nathan Broad. The Saints had 3 forced changes, with Ryder injured, Carlisle on baby watch and Ben Long suspended.

Lynch was on the board immediately, after outmarking his shadow for the day Dougal Howard. A few minutes later Sheds crumbed a huge leap from Jack in the pack and dribbled one through from straight in front. Modern players practice this incessantly, that’s why they’re so good at it. Why do they not practice drop punts incessantly? Good question, Virginia.

Shane Savage, who played at Hawthorn in the 1970s, kicked an absolute monster from the NSW border to get the Saints away.

Shai Bolton replied with two goals in a minute that were audacious and ridiculous. He followed a sort of bumblebee path with Sinclair on his heels clutching the air. It ended with Shai running outside 50 then launching a kick over the crowded forward line. It bounced 15 out and rolled through.

From the bounce we pumped it long once more and Shai roved to Nank, ran juggling the ball into a pack of Saints, and without ever really controlling it, tapped it towards his swinging boot, to goal from 30 metres out.

Dan Butler has excelled at his new club this year and it was a spicy moment when he ran down Cotch in the centre for HTB. He then goaled on/after the siren to give St Kilda a smidgen of hope after a tough quarter. Richmond led 5.1.31 to 2.2.14.

The second was maybe more even but St Kilda were wasteful. Billings, Marsh and King blew gettable chances. Cotch ripped Zak Jones’ head clean off, in a classic example of his literally careless style in finals. Will kill for Richmond, this guy. They re-attached Jones head but he didn’t contribute a great deal thereafter. Again (if we win) the next few days will be full of speculation whether Trent will miss a final.

Sheds kicked a beauty over his shoulder before Clark answered from tight on the boundary. Dan and Lynch added goals so we went in at half time on a very accurate 9.1.55 to 3.6.24. In 2020 footy that’s close to a decisive lead.

The 3rd term however was all Saints. Cartoon-baddie Tom Lynch reappeared, sitting on a bemused Howard’s head then dropping a knee gently on his shoulder and giving away 50 metres – and bringing more tribunal speculation. Quite harmless but dumb and unnecessary.

For all their chances this quarter the Saints didn’t hurt us, through a combination of our pressure and plain bad luck. Our one goal for the term came after Sheds shot this pass to Prestia who goaled. Look at this wonderful player’s composure in the moment – about to be hit hard but his eyes are only on Dion.

A much better effort from the Saints that term, finishing off with a goal to Kent after a duff kick from Bachar and great twinkletoes from Dan Butler. But they’re still 23 points in arrears at the last break.

Well, now it’s interesting. Hunter Clark is quite a player, he sold a dummy to Bachar, ran on and set up a goal for Seb Ross. Margin 17 and momentum with the Saints. Somewhere in their mansions Eric Bana, Shane Warne and Lazar Vidovic are sitting bolt upright. Their boys have 17 scoring shots to 14 and maybe if they can just hit some targets they can do this.

But it just didn’t happen. Richmond are a hardened finals unit and there are children at kindergarten now who have never known them to lose from here. We ‘raised the fight’ and overwhelmed their moves forward with mad pressure.

Sheds spotted up George for our 11th goal, Dusty hoisted another, and we were home by 31 points.

We can say the gamble of resting Lynch has at least broke even. Nank was fantastic with help from Astbury and Balta. Faith in Dimma is strong.

RICHMOND   5.1       9.1       10.4     12.8 (80)
ST KILDA       2.2       3.6       5.11     6.13 (49)

The Benny

5: Edwards – sublime to watch
4: Bolton – his goals set us on the path to a prelim
3: Houli – 32 touches
2: Martin – Did Martin things
1: Lynch – Richmond aren’t themselves without him now
Honourable mention to Dan Butler who would have got votes if opposition players were eligible for the Benny.

Leaderboard
32: Martin
26: Bolton
20: Short
18: Grimes, Vlastuin, Graham
15: Cotchin
14: Balta
12: McIntosh, Lambert
10: Riewoldt, Baker, Edwards
9: McIntosh, Prestia
8: Houli
7: Pickett
6: Soldo
5: Higgins, Eggmolesse-Smith, Chol
4: Caddy, Lynch
2: Aarts
1: Castagna, Astbury

Maurice Rioli Grip of Death Trophy for Tackles
Graham 63
Pickett 61
Lambert 58
Cotchin, Rioli 47
Bolton 46

This match promised great things early, with goals aplenty and unbelievable pressure in the first quarter. We went in without Lynch as a precaution, and relied on Jack and Marbs up front. Prestia and Bolton were big ins, at the expense of unlucky Jack Ross and inconsistent Josh Caddy.

Things got started with a big Brisbane goal. McCluggage marked on 50, then Daniel Rich wandered over and said ‘give me the kick’ then stood there whistling. Tigers stood off while Buggerlugs thought about it for a few beats and finally handed it to Rich who thumped it through. James Brayshaw yelped “What a start that is for Richmond! Uh the Lions! And Rich!”

Shai fooled around so much he was caught by the very big Oscar McInerny, then made things worse by giving away 50, enabling the Big O to bring up a goal. Bakes kicked his first goal of the year on the run from 50, and the skipper followed up to keep us in touch at 19-19. Kam added another and we went in on top at 4.1.25 to 3.1.19

We traded goals after the restart, then we owned the ball for the next fifteen minutes. It was clear as day that the Lions couldn’t continue to hang on. We just kept pumping it in and Harris Andrews took relieving mark after relieving mark. Never in footy history has a team dominated fifteen minutes as we did and failed to score at all, as we did.

What happened next was goals to Rayner, Cameron, and Neale. Neale’s was a double 50 on the stroke of half time, where we cocked up a goal chance with one too many handballs, and suddenly found ourselves conceding one instead. In this quarter we shattered our mental grip on the Lions, played Cameron and Rayner into form. Like Cotchin, Neale doesn’t kick many, and the value for them is slightly more than six points like Cotch’s are for us. We were down 5.1.31 to 7.2.44 at the long break and it seemed like a welcome halt to the momentum.

It didn’t work. Four minutes into third term Cameron kicked his third, and the spell we (Grimes) have had over him was broken. Rioli kicked a wonderful snap in reply for us; he hasn’t had a great year but spring always sharpens him up. It was 52-38 and we were just staying in touch. It was a cracking game – as the scoring slowed after QT the pressure went to new levels throughout. Bailey got another for them. Young Keidean Coleman in his 5th game could have just about pushed it out of our reach but he was hauled down by Astbury with the timekeeper’s finger on the button for the 3QT siren. If he’d been content with a zig he would have been fine but he essayed a fateful zag. Dave’s tackle slipped down into a trip but umpies don’t care these days. We trailed 6.3.39 to 9.6.60.

The ageless Kam McIntosh scampered through the wing and set up Dan for his second. Shai executed another squiggly run and finished off with a goal that could have been remembered forever if it hadn’t brushed the post. Probably for the best as Bruce’s call of it deserves to be forgotten. Riewoldt took a difficult pack mark and slotted one to get us within nine points, and arguably we had the flow. Time ticked on, and our desperation started to work against us. Hipwood wasted a chance to seal it but Buggerlugs didn’t, giving the Lions a deserved 15 point win, 10.9.69 to 8.6.54.

The Benny

5: Graham carries such a load now for a young player – 9 tackles.
4: Cotchin had seven clearances and a goal
3: Short had 22 touches and always had his eyes up
2: Prestia is working back into some form
1: Astbury is unsung but was our best defender today

Leaderboard
30: Martin
22: Bolton
20: Short
18: Grimes, Vlastuin, Graham
15: Cotchin
14: Balta
12: McIntosh, Lambert
10: Riewoldt, Baker
9: McIntosh, Prestia
7: Pickett
6: Soldo
5: Higgins, Eggmolesse-Smith, Chol, Houli, Edwards
4: Caddy
3: Lynch
2: Aarts
1: Castagna, Astbury

Maurice Rioli Grip of Death Trophy for Tackles
Graham 60
Pickett 59
Lambert 54
Cotchin 47
Bolton 45

Exciting to have Shedda back in the side. He was one of 4 changes, coming in with Lord David Astbury, Marbs and Caddy for Lynch (injured) Shai (rested/injured) Soldo (proper injured) and Markov. The Crows have had a dog of a season but have just started to turn it around in the last few weeks. Never a chance of winning but likely to be obstinate opponents.

Crows goaled first and had their tails up. We hit back with goals to Caddy, Jack and Aarts to lead 3.0 to 2.2 at quarter time, although they looked the better side, getting over the back of our defence a few times. Shedda contributed to Aarts goal with this millisecond give and gather.

After quarter time we kicked 9 goals to two and our relative quality was obvious against the wooden spooners. Noted chillout-merchant Brad Crouch pushed Cotch in the back, Cotch remonstrated and Crouch swung a nose-breaking left hook just shy of his hooter. The free kick to Cotch was overturned when Toby quite rightly flew the flag.

Benny Votes

As usual this season I have copied these votes and notes from the mighty @Tigers_of_Old. This season he’s made his own excellent Richmond merch, check it out if you haven’t yet.

5. Shedda. Couldn’t have been a better return.
4. Dusty. Constant danger.
3. Graham. Our workhorse.
2. Lambert. Timely return to form.
1. Baker. Flawless down back.

Leaderboard
30: Martin
22: Bolton
18: Grimes, Vlastuin
17: Short
14: Balta
13: Graham
12: McIntosh, Lambert
11: Cotchin
10: Riewoldt, Baker
9: McIntosh
7: Prestia, Pickett
6: Soldo
5: Higgins, Eggmolesse-Smith, Chol, Houli, Edwards
4: Caddy
3: Lynch
2: Aarts
1: Castagna

Maurice Rioli Grip of Death Trophy for Tackles
Pickett 55
Lambert 53
Graham 51
Cotchin 46
Bolton 44

This was another low scoring affair, won by the Tigers – but at great cost. We lost Soldo for the season and probably a good chunk of early 2021, and Lynch went off with a hammy in the 3rd and won’t play next week. We were the better side; Geelong are chock full of big (ageing) names that just don’t deliver consistently. They had one goal to 3QT. Our radar was off; we kicked 2.5 in the first quarter and 2.8 in the third. We should have been gone out of sight by 3QT. Cameron Ling: “Richmond should be ten goals up”.

In the last quarter when we were undermanned they made their move with their 2nd, 3rd and 4th goals in quick succession.

Important side note about Soldo’s injury: it was directly caused by Hawkins shoving his defender Balta into the pack. It’s dangerous, it’s against the spirit of the laws of the game and to my eyes it’s against the letter also. With HQ so keen to tweak rules at the moment I expect this get attention, but all that’s really required is umps to pay frees that are already in the rulebook. Hawkins copped a lot of hate through the week but he is not the only one who does it, probably just the strongest.

Castagna settled the game with a wonderful running goal. He received a handpass from Lambert on centre wing, then exchanged little passes with Graham and Bolton, before galloping to 40 and saluting. Wonderful stuff, and it came off the back of Hawkins down the other end marking then playing on and spraying a shot out of bounds.

It’s so far from the game most of us wanted, but Richmond’s mental disintegration of Geelong has been bloody impressive.

— Andy Maher (@AndyMaherDFA) September 11, 2020

Benny Votes

As I love to do, I am working smarter not harder and I have lifted the votes and notes from Richmond legend @Tigers_of_Old.

5. Grimes. Best game all year against the best oppo.
4. Vlastuin. Not far behind just brilliant.
3. Riewoldt. Never write off a champ.
2. Balta. Challenge accepted.
1. McIntosh. Ran hard all night.

Leaderboard
26: Martin
22: Bolton
18: Grimes, Vlastuin
17: Short
14: Balta
12: McIntosh
11: Cotchin
10: Lambert, Graham, Riewoldt
9: Baker, McIntosh
7: Prestia, Pickett
6: Soldo
5: Higgins, Eggmolesse-Smith, Chol, Houli
4: Caddy
3: Lynch
2: Aarts
1: Castagna

Maurice Rioli Grip of Death Trophy for Tackles
Kane Lambert 48
Marlion Pickett 42
Trent Cotchin 42
Jack Graham 41
Dan Rioli 38

We’ve seen a lot of games like this in 2020 – low-scoring, constipated affairs played without much flair or fluency. There always seems to be too many players around the ball, especially in the forward 50-metre zone, where it’s inordinately hard to find any space or win clean possession. It’s frustrating to watch, and you can see that it’s frustrating for the players and coaches as well. In summary, this game was an unattractive scrap from which the Tigers did well to emerge with victory, on the back of only two quarters of good play. Looking for positive things to say about it all, this is what comes to mind:

Marlion Pickett seems to have really lifted his game in the past few weeks. His peculiar loping style is a pleasure to watch, and he’s one of those players who seem to make the game slow down when he has the ball. He has a special talent for subtly changing the angle of the play too, and I thought he was our best on the night. 

Jayden Short’s run and dash has been a pleasure to watch all season. His ability to transfer quickly from defence into attack is as good as anyone’s and I don’t reckon he’s played a bad game all year.

Fridge Graham has been playing with terrific, sustained intent. Get tackled by this bloke and you stay tackled. He’s not flashy but he’s brutally effective, and I hope his strong performances over recent weeks will be enough to cement his place in the team.

Kamdyn McIntosh seems to have new hair but, fortunately, this hasn’t changed his distinctive running style or his cartoonish Popeye arm-flexing routine when he celebrates a goal or some other notable passage of play. In a game where a lot of our mid-fielders didn’t rise to any great heights, it was McIntosh and Pickett on the wings that carried much of our game ‘between the arcs’ (as they say in the commentary booth). 

I don’t think this was a match than anyone will really want to revisit. But the Tigers won, so that’s what counts. Our next game against Geelong promises to be a bigger and better occasion.

Benny Votes

5. Marlion Pickett
4. Jayden Short
3. Jack Graham
2. Kamdyn McIntosh
1. Jake Aarts

Leaderboard
26: Martin
22: Bolton
17: Short
14: Vlastuin
13: Grimes
12: Balta
11: Cotchin, McIntosh
10: Lambert, Graham
9: Baker, McIntosh
7: Prestia, Riewoldt, Pickett
6: Soldo
5: Higgins, Eggmolesse-Smith, Chol, Houli
4: Caddy
3: Lynch
2: Aarts
1: Castagna

Maurice Rioli Grip of Death Trophy for Tackles
Kane Lambert 46
Marlion Pickett 42
Trent Cotchin 39
Jack Graham 38
Dan Rioli 36