Their finals exit was an opportunity squandered. Their post season function was appalling. Their scratch matches were lifeless. They were missing their best onballer. And their premier forward was unavailable after he hurt his thumb in a toilet door on a bus.
But the GWS Giants brought the heat yesterday and they left Collingwood limping and reeling. Before the game, their coach Adam Kingsley spoke of “violence and aggression,” of straddling the rules of the game, of bringing an intensity and physicality that had been absent in their final practice match. They certainly did that. They hit the Pies hard, closed in on them at high speed and in great numbers, and generally gave them no room to breathe.
As the Giants squeezed and harassed the life out of them, so many of Collingwood’s forward entries were rushed and sloppy. You can train all summer and rack up hundreds of thousands of kilometres on the GPS, but nothing prepares footballers for that kind of onslaught in early March.
It was hot and humid in Sydney and the players were cramping and chugging pickle juice by midway through the third quarter. With Toby Bedford in his back pocket, Nick Daicos had a torrid afternoon and was seizing up in muscles he never even knew he had. But it was the home side who looked the better conditioned outfit. In enervating conditions, they were the ones running on top of the ground.
Photograph: Dylan Burns/AFL Photos/Getty Images
The Giants are peerless when they play like this. They’re an excellent team at handballing their way through traffic and trouble. In heavy congestion, they use their triangular handball chains to great effect. And they just keep pumping out these small-to-medium hybrid forwards – endurance athletes suited to the modern game, and players the Giants have adapted their game to get full bang for buck from.
But it was their pressure that stood out yesterday. Their tackling and front-on pressure was personified by a Josh Kelly smother and run down tackles from Toby Greene and Lachie Ash.
It was a breakout game by Finn Callaghan, who recently knocked back what would have been the most lucrative contract in the history of the game. Up until yesterday, most rusted-on footy fans wouldn’t have recognised Callaghan if he walked past them in the street. They will now.
Photograph: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images
He was outstanding – his big frame, his power running, and his thumping left boot hurt the Pies all day. Until now, he’s been a bit of a fumbler and occasionally a butcher, but he was excellent yesterday. A fortnight ago, St Kilda’s offer seemed like the act of a desperate club, but it makes some sort of sense now.
Across half back, the Giants set up a wall – a kind of orange, Trumpian fantasy. Sam Taylor in particular is so demanding of his teammates and himself, and still tends to blow a gasket whenever a goal is kicked on him. But his positioning, his ability to read the ball off the boot and his risk assessment of when to go for a mark and when to spoil make him one of the best defenders in the sport.
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And a shout out for Lachie Keefe, who’s now been in the system for 17 years – nearly half his life. He is footy’s great survivor. Is the less politically correct world of boxing and wrestling, he’d be called a ham-and-egger. His 117 games have come under seven serving Prime Ministers. He was delisted and re-rookied last year. He was called up as a willing and occasionally able replacement for Jesse Hogan. But when Kieren Briggs was stretchered off with a neck injury, he was thrown into the ruck.
It was a frustrating day for Collingwood. They made a game of it in the second term but were gradually overwhelmed. They had so many half chances, so many dinky misses, so many dropped marks. Their disposals were constantly rushed and they were half a foot off with their kicks all afternoon. The club recently released a documentary titled ‘The Grind’ which detailed a pre-season where nearly everything had seemingly gone according to plan. They thought they were fitter and better prepared than this time last year.
In 2022 and 2023, even when they were four or five goals down, the Pies would walk to their three-quarter time rev-up with nostrils flared, believing anything was possible. Yesterday, after 20 inside 50s for just four behinds, they trudged to the huddle – a tired, banged up and totally outclassed team.
