Two weeks ago the Giants knocked St Kilda out of the finals. The dust has since settled, and so with a clear head Daniel Cherny of CODE Sports helps us look back on the unqualified success that was 2023.
St Kilda’s 150th year, the return of Ross the Boss, the emergence of Mitchito Owens and others, and what state the list finds itself in as trade season creeps up on us. Will Callum Wilkie be captain in 2024? Has Jack Billings played his last game for the club? Is Mitchito “the guy” in the midfield? Did Phil Raymond actually make his debut in 2007? Richard Lee and Daniel turn over all these stones and more.
2023 2nd Elimination Final St Kilda 2.3, 6.6, 9.8, 11.11 (77) GWS Giants 5.3, 10.5, 13.9, 15.11 (101) Crowd: 68,465 at the MCG, Saturday, 9th September at 3.20pm By Tom Briglia
The Year of Exploration led us to September.
A wistful look through the 2023 season scores on AFL Tables in the coming decades will show we spent the entire year in the top eight. But really, week-to-week living was rollicking from taking wild shots at the top four and being on the brink of falling out of the eight entirely, and beyond that, looking like a bottom-four side through the depths of winter. It seemed like the players and the crowd late in the Geelong game thought we locked for finals – that night really did feel celebratory – and then at the Nixon afterwards (you couldn’t get into the heaving Platform 28) I thought we were actually there when Keays kicked that “goal”. Calamity ensued, and it looked like we were going to have to stare down a tense week of needing a win against the Lions at the Gabba, but more than likely be sweating on two games on the Sunday. We’d already had enough tension in the previous weeks to go with the Matildas ffs. World Cup into September hey. I was spiralling towards a menty b, frequently checking the ladder predictor to see just how much we could lose to Brisbane by, how likely it would be that Sydney and the Dogs win, and just how much GWS could beat Carlton by before we became a cross between the Blues of 2022 and Melbourne 2017. Instead, the next day we were assured of finals thanks to *checks notes* West Coast winning.
The day after Jamie Cripps hauled his old team over the line, Saints merch was already prominent at Union Square Coles. The Saints AFL mini-gnome was smiling enthusiastically up front, while on the next shelf sat the disc-shaped three-in-one bottle opener ($8, I bought it). Round 24, ultimately, was all about where we would finish. A home final looked unlikely on paper until Melbourne rolled Sydney for no reason and Carlton shat out a couple of late goals against the Giants, who came close to pulling off over two weeks a very watered-down version of our 2008 finish to pinch a top-four spot from Adelaide (GWS actually sat in sixth place during that last quarter of the season).
Gerard led the next morning’s Whateley with reflections on the nerves of Saints fans throughout Sunday’s matched. All of a sudden Ross’s mid-week press conference had a microphone in shot that isn’t just a St Kilda-branded microphone held by the internal boofhead.
Swamp and others noted that this was the first time in St Kilda’s history – in its 150th year – that we had played finals in more seasons (28 now) than having finished on the bottom of the ladder (27 times). St Kilda evidently doesn’t often make finals often. This was a little bit of St Kilda history. There was every chance it could be over by the second quarter of the first weekend, but a little bit of history nonetheless. Rory and Andrew and others wrote about how they haven’t been able to take their children to finals yet.
The MCG is a sacred place. For a day, it was ours. In fact, it was for the second time in a year, following the 150th anniversary match. Unheard of. It was a far cry from what Richmond had for the 2017 Preliminary Final against GWS, and it wasn’t quite the 2019 Collingwood vs GWS Preliminary Final, nor the Semi Final between those teams the year before. This was a Diet Lite Caffeine-Free version of that, an Elimination Final, mixed with anticipation Richmond’s first final 12 years in 2013, the Elimination Final against the Blues.
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And while the different permutations were being considered and spat out by the ladder predictor, and while we rode a great first part of the season and a dull winter, I knew that for the first three weeks of the finals series I was going to be in Mexico City and then San Luis Obispo, California. Family stuff that I really couldn’t get out of, you see. When we booked the flights it was Round 6 and St Kilda sat on top of the ladder; Hoyney and Kingy were rolling out stats about the team and Mitchito weekly as near-confirmation we were set for our first finals series in a “normal” season – i.e. anything that isn’t 2020 (at least 2021 was a full season with full-length games) – and I was going to be on the other side of the world’s biggest ocean. Incredible stuff. Part of me of spent most the year resenting Ross the Boss’s coaching capabilities because I’d be missing a Qualifying Final and a Semi Final and a Preliminary Final at the MCG – which then, as our season deteriorated, became ruminating on missing the experience of Carlton vs St Kilda in an MCG Elimination Final in front of 91,000. I sulked about being on an incredible holiday, I sulked about the prospect of being in a blanket on the couch at 3am in my hotel room with a dodgy internet connection, as if my experiences and memories are more important than those of the hundred-plus thousand St Kilda supporters. A search for “Aussie bar” and “Mexico City” came up with an inconclusive 2011 thread from a forum that may or may not still exist. A call-out on Twitter yielded nought, and I was left on “Pending” in the 74.5k-member-strong “Foreigners in Mexico” Facebook group. In the lead-up to the game (i.e. the beginning of my holiday) I was rattled and I accidentally replied to Tim Gossage (confirmed by the excellent Unpluggered as a St Kilda fan last year) on Twitter simply with my search for “East Fremantle”. It was one of those weeks where you either couldn’t sleep or could only sleep.
There are some real first-world problems being experienced out there, and I can tell you I was fortunate enough to be having those on a Friday night in Mexico City. Twelve years is a long time, in footy and in life. St Kilda’s first final in Melbourne in 12 years, by definition, happens only once every 12 years. My heart secretly sank on the Monday as Sam Edmund declared nearly 65,000 tickets had been sold. Then there was mid-week talk on 360 of 70,000. Oh, my heart indeed. I had it rubbed in just that little bit more by Matt and Dad who requested that I get online and get the tickets for them and a couple of friends and family. I wore my 150th Year membership scarf to the Melbourne airport, on the flight to Auckland, at Auckland Airport, on the flight to Los Angeles, at Los Angeles Airport, on the flight to Mexico City, and in Mexico City. I brought my 150th Year jumper with me and wore that during the game.
The MCG in September. The Saints ran out to the Fable Singers and I may or may not have shed a small tear. As it ended up being, I was on my hotel bed watching via the OK-ish Watch AFL connection, OK-ish wi-fi and laptop-into-TV via HDMI set-up at 11pm on a Friday night, stress-eating a bag of jalapeño-flavoured Sabritas, with a couple of cans of Modelo and a bottle of Baileys. Another tear as I watched Max King, Mattaes Phillipou, Mitchito Owens, Nasiah Wanganeen-Milera and Marcus Windhager lined up for the national anthem at the MCG on a Saturday afternoon in September. Ross’s boys. The rain made way for the sunshine.
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Rowan Marshall and Cooper Sharman had the first say, Roma got the first clearance and then grabbed the mark in the centre circle from Lachie Ash’s return kick. Cooper – fresh from having had an AFL.com.au feature article written about him – hauled in a strong mark and kicked the first. Without Membrey he would need to have a big day in the forward half.
But that was immediately erased as the Giants nudged it forward and soft efforts from Higgins and Wilkie allowed Toby Greene to pounce. As good as our pressure was in the opening minutes, the Giants had bigger bodies and were switched on from the start. Some good moments – Sharman taking a big mark on the wing, Caminiti’s huge grab on the 50-metre arc that led to a worried GWS backline giving away a free to Roma for our second – were broken up by fumbles from all of Sinclair, Higgins and Wood.
Marshall appeared set for a big day. Briggs won the clearance immediately after his goal but Roma won the resulting clearance out of defence and you could hear the murmurs in the crowd coming through in the broadcast, “Oh that’s Rowan Marshall again”, “That was Marshall”, Murmers McKenzie-style. It took a long time before GWS had their first mark, which showed we were having things on our terms but like so much of 2023, we couldn’t convert. A Max pirouette led to nought as Connor Idun a big few moments, Max was found on the lead but still wasn’t willing to put the arms out after his shoulder injuries (and also Ross mentioning his ACL wtf) and Perryman put in a fist. Promising high turnovers were dented by more signs were there that something wasn’t quite right. Sinclair made errors he hadn’t made all season; he dropped a high ball on the wing that became a GWS shot on goal, and was guilty of messy ball handling and wayward kicking when so often he has been an architect. Wilkie left his man and didn’t make an impact on multiple occasions. He dropped marks he’d usually take. The ball went straight through an otherwise anonymous Butler’s hands as we tried to get out of defence and O’Halloran found Bedford, who went back and owned the moment. Max couldn’t complete a mark at the top of the goal square after another high turnover, GWS took the field on and went up the other end and a fortuitous on the full from Crouch’s boot led to a big Jesse Hogan marking and goaling from close range. From our Airbnb room in San Miguele Chapultepec, Gracie next to me said, “That whole thing was very St Kilda”. Unpluggered, I think there’s something in this. Contact me and we can workshop the wording.
Mitchito cut through the noise with a great tackle up forward that earned a holding-the-ball free kick but his set shot kicking let him down, and it was just to the right. It was a moment that needed to be taken, because GWS were getting the game on their terms. They cut across the ground, Kelly and Tom Green were extracting, they were spreading, they pedalled harder. A menacing ball from Greene into the goal square saw a frantic exchange between Brown and Keeffe against Nasiah and Zaine and Brown managed to just get it to his boot. Three in a row for GWS. The Saints were getting frustrated. A free kick was given up on the wing and O’Halloran and Kelly were quick to react and ran it straight up forward to Daniels. Four in a row. The crowd had been taken out of it (when have he ever used that terminology about the Saints?).
There was worse to come. Finally, a neat transition from defence to the forwardline but we – to put it simply – fucked up a three-on-two; Mitchito and Max couldn’t get enough separation on their opponents and then competed for the same ball. Mitchito landed heavily and no one had stayed down, and no one was at the fall. We had the entire MCG to ourselves and bottled it in front of 68,000 fans. Aesthetically, on the broadcast, it looked like Grand Final Day. Sam Landsberger had pondered during the week whether or not this would be the most Saints fans ever at the one game.
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We’re supposed to be the number-one defence in the league but we’d given up five goals in the first quarter. Someone needed to rise above the game because the team system was getting sliced up. Seb Ross engineered his own moment, catching Callan Ward holding the ball 45 out, but hit the post with a wobbling kick. Wilkie was finding his feet with a couple of strong marks. Butler had a massive moment after a massive dive earned him a shot on goal, but his kick around the corner was weak. A long ball to the top of the goal square for all intents and purposes found Phillipou, but Caminiti – who was surely told to just go for everything – crashed into his own man. A harried kick out was won by the Giants and Green, Ward, Perryman and Callaghan went straight up the other end to Hogan one-out for a goal. Bedford then won a pressured handball, Wilkie dropped the mark, and his man Greene gave off to a Riccardi who executed a classy banana goal. Wilkie couldn’t collect a Kelly clearance, Greene danced around him a few moments later and Lloyd was harder at the ball than Hunter Clark, turned and curled another. Daniels and Hogan fashioned a small chain of knock-ons small kicks in the forward pocket that ended with Kelly. You could hear 68,000 groan as they realised the ball was making its way to him, unmarked,15 metres out. Four goals in less than 10 minutes. A 42-point lead.
GWS had made their move. There is something irrepressible about a team making its move in a final. Orange tsunami, orange wave, whatever you want to call it, orange jumpers (fantastic design btw) were surging in numbers across the ground, scoring at will from stoppage (they ended with 8.6 from stoppage). Eight straight goals. This wasn’t the Ross Lyon-controlled game we’d seen for all bar one or two weeks this year. It was September, things are turned up, and the Saints looked out of their depth. A Year of Exploration, a day of finding out.
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While Gerard’s narrative on the Monday following Round 24 suggested an absolute premium on a home final, tipsters seemed to favour the Giants off the back of nine wins in 11 matches. They were certainly favourites with the bookies. They had a whirlwind of good press after knocking over Carlton in the final game of the home and away season. Toby Greene was named All-Australian captain. David King had GWS as his fourth seed on Whateley.
All this came alongside all the feel-good social media faff – “Which Saint is booked in for a finals haircut?” “Which Saint will step up in September?” Using the term “September” implied a length of time, not a weird week off and then a singular game in which we were nopal halfway through the second. Tempting fate, the club posted a bandwagon graphic for everyone to tag their friends in. AFL 360 played that “I’m coming home” Ross video again when it had him on the show – finals build-ups get bigger every year, and this implied something big was brewing. But it’s not ready just yet.
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With all of 10.10 left on the clock in the second quarter, the camera cut to a St Kilda fan tearing up.
Jack Steele – who played his best game probably since 2021 – simply said after the game that the Giants’ contest and spread was better. Sometimes footy is simple. Sometimes it’s about winning the ball in the midfield, about body positioning, about having bigger bodies to work with in the first place, about class, about fighting harder when the other team has the ball and running harder as defence becomes offence. About forwards not getting in the way of each other at the top of the goal square.
For all intents and purposes the game was over, blown apart so quickly that it was already lost before we could pull the usual break-glass-in-case move of Sinclair into the middle.
There was a “but” in this game, however. There would actually be a few “buts”.
Sharman, doing justice to the feature, rose higher than Whitfield from a quick Marshall and Crouch clearance to get a much-needed win back the other way in that tactical battle, and slotted a goal.
Max King had been anonymous – unfortunately, an accurate word here for a few guys on the day – but there is still something to say about a player who can have little impact minute-to-minute and then in a few moments alter the trajectory of a game. The first moment was actually a shocking miss from close range after our best transition with the footy all game; Butler lowered the eyes and hit him in the pocket, but he never settled and blasted the ball around the corner and missed to the narrow side. A few moments later, Sharman and Butler and then Phillipou and Owens got the better of Ash and Green at half-forward in a rare physical contest win, and Gresham, in one of his best games for the year, neatly screwed a pass to King 40 metres out. He’d found some separation on Taylor and managed to hold on, go back and kick the goal. The whole ground was effectively the St Kilda end, but the St Kilda end was starting to stir. Just a little bit.
Gresham took a sliding mark from Steele’s clearance and hardly had a chance to look for a lead when Sam Taylor most likely lightly brushed Max in the forward pocket, 20 metres out. Max went down and the umpire went with it. Max, probably at his least favourite distance from goal, put it through. He celebrated with the fans. The crowd was a factor again.
Well, it was a factor for 102 seconds. Cumming, Bedford, Ward and Whitfield shirked Hill, Windhager and Steele on one flank from the bounce and the ball drifted to the outer flank. In not the only instance of iffy umpiring leading to a GWS goal, Wood caught O’Halloran and the ball fell out of his hands, was soccered forward and found Kelly. He settled and kicked the goal on his left near the boundary from 45 metres. Cliché: it oozed class. We simply don’t have players (yet) who can do that sort of thing.
But. Kelly’s goal was after the 31-minute mark and it seemed like a mini-fightback had been snuffed. There was just enough time for Gresham to win a ground ball on the wing and give off to Steele with 20 seconds on the clock, who launched to Butler in a one-on-four the Giants’ way, but Butler was held. St Kilda supporter Jack Higgins decided to show up and ran onto the bouncing ball (I instinctively thought it was Gresham and yelled at the TV) with Idun on his hammer. He gave off an awkward long, low handball to Hill in the goal square, who was dealing with Bedford, but Hill used the momentum of the tackle to swing his leg around and sneak in a goal – which, nearly grazing the Tom Hawkins post, had to go through an agonising goal review.
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The big news news that landed during the week was the announcement that the club would be wearing the 150th Year jumper in the match. It was going all-out for a 150th Year celebration victory lap in front of the home fans at the MCG. As an aside, surely the feedback (and response from the club on the run) suggests something like it will be made permanent?
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The day had gotten off to an awful start with the awful news about Tim Membrey. We don’t need to speculate, and I probably don’t need to say more other than I hope he’s getting every bit of help he needs, and that he is ok.
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The momentum was ours at half-time, but we were a lapse in concentration or the Giants spreading harder from the game being gone again. But – there’s that word again, and it will be used again – the team came out with a high-energy, aggressive approach that minted a change in the fabric of the game.
It just couldn’t kick a goal.
Sharman flew but couldn’t bring it down. Crouch, having a disappointing day given his output through the regular season, missed a shot on the run that he simply had to kick, in time and space and given the magnitude of the situation. The pivotal moment was a transition out of defence with Battle going wide and finding a launching Dan Butler on the wing for the Bertocchi ham mark of the day. Hill was cruising past and hit up Mitchito on the corner of the square, ahead of him was Sharman goalside of Himmelberg 20 metres out, but Mitchito’s kick floated just wide enough that Himmelberg could command best position, knock it to ground, and then run onto the footy, give off to Green, and the Giants were out of danger. It could have brought the margin to just 15 points.
GWS wasted a couple of good opportunities in front of goal but they had weathered the storm. Phillipou dropped a mark he should have taken and then followed up with a soft effort on the wing, Perryman cleared to Green and his perfect pass found Callum Brown in front of goal. Mistakes were happening again. Sinclair on the rebound kicked to Himmelberg. Wilkie kicked out on the full. “St Kilda up against the ropes,” Jason Bennett declared. And then there was the non-free kick call on Lachie Whitfield for a throw in the Gresham tackle at our half-forward, and Giants spread hardest again. A couple of handballs and Bedford was out, and he was able to kick to the advantage of Riccardi one-out, 20 out. They were just doing the things we couldn’t do. Back out to 37 points. Briggs worked off Marshall at the bounce and knocked on to Green, who had pushed off Steele, and the ball found Bedford for another.
43 points.
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But.
Given all the momentum we’d had for so much of the quarter, we hadn’t kicked a goal; that does make some sense given the team’s stats on forward efficiency, and it was something that we couldn’t correct during the season and would hurt us come finals. With little more than 2.45 on the clock, Mitchito, for 2023/old time’s sake, found one out the back of the pack after Sharman launched again, claimed the ball, and had the awareness to give off behind him. A muted crowd reception. Zaine Cordy put in an immense aerial and then ground effort as GWS looked to transition through the middle and Webster found Sharman, who had worked hard to find space, who found Hill, 40 out on a decent angle. Hill went back, gathered pace and kicked it. He was proving his worth on the big stage.
We worked the ball forward again and with 18 seconds left, Roma summoned all of the energy in his big frame to work off Briggs at a forward pocket throw-in and kick the ball on his left; it went higher than it did longer (and possibly slightly backwards) but he tracked it, worked off Ward and caught it, gave off to Hill, to Windhager, to Nas 45 metres out. He took a step, feigned a kick, took two more steps, and thumped it through on the siren. In San Miguel Chapultepec, there were multiple wide camera shots of bays of St Kilda fans out of their seats on the Airbnb TV. Three goals in less than three minutes of play. Twenty-five points at the final change.
Our biggest quarter of the year was required. Our biggest-ever comeback from three-quarter time in a final was required. After two weeks of build-up and anticipation, after a whole season really – having the fantastic start to the season – it would take something historical to extend the Year of Exploration, and not have it all snuffed out in a couple of quarters.
Good signs. We picked up where left off again. Butler had another shot early in the last and again went the snap instead of drop punt to useless effect. Ross the Boss was only just getting back into the coaches’ box with an orange Gatorade as Nas took a contested mark on the wing as GWS sought to rebound; he changed things up and went short in-board to Gresham, who went central to Marshall, and Battle was rushing past. Battle wound up but the kick was more of a chaos ball, but it still found the outreached fingertips of Snags directly in front. Instead of quickly going around the corner or trying to blast the cover off the ball and making himself nearly fall over, he went back and kicked a neat, low, tidy drop punt to bring the St Kilda end up again. Just 18 points. Four goals in a row, and the momentum was ours, our pressure was high, the crowd was back in the game. So much time left on the clock.
But.
That was really the last time this team had a genuine place in season 2023. Immediately out of the middle, Briggs came over the top of Marshall, Windhager was in front of Kelly but was forced to ground, Kelly took the bobbling Sherrin and quickly gave off to Green, who had gotten away from Steele. His left boot entry found Riccardi, a metre or two clear of Battle. Riccardi kicked a simple goal. GWS simply had another gear when they needed it.
Riccardi missed a close-range shot at goal for momentary bemusement purposes but that gave way to the fall of the face and sinking of the heart that come as you watch your season slip away in real-time. Snags and Hunter got a bit confused from the kick-out turnover and gave away a 50. Callaghan kicked another easy goal.
Thirty-one points. Enough for GWS really to just ice the game for the bulk of the final quarter. I remember Dennis Cometti in the final stages of the 2008 Grand Final saying “Well, right now, Geelong are being milked with cold pliers”. GWS wasn’t quite employing the keepings-off game perfected by the Hawks in those final moments but St Kilda was doing a lot of the work itself with tired ball and unimaginative movement, keeping the result out of reach, just out of reach, no matter what they threw at it. Pou had been moved onto the ball; as a Year of Exploration faced its mortality, there was still a longer game in mind. Max took a great high grab and kicked his third, but that moment belongs to the aether, not really consequential to the 2023 season, and there’s no carryover to next year. There was only watching the season evaporate for a third time in one afternoon.
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There’s a reverse or mirror image of 2011 in 2023 but I’m not exactly sure what it is. In Ross 1.0’s last year, 2011, St Kilda finished 6th, beating 5th-placed Carlton at the MCG in the last game of the home and away season to secure a home final, against a Sydney team (the Swans) at Docklands. In that game, 6th-placed St Kilda lost a home final to 7th-placed Sydney. This time, in Ross’s comeback year, St Kilda lost in the last game of the home and away season but still finished 6th, despite Sydney team GWS beating 5th-placed Carlton at Docklands, but not quite getting enough percentage to secure a home final. St Kilda’s 2023 home Elimination Final was this time at the MCG. Sixth-placed St Kilda got the home final but ended up losing anyway to a 7th-placed Sydney team. There’s something in all of that I’m sure. It’s in there. It’s somewhere.
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~~~ YES I KNOW HE IS PROBLEMATIC ~~~
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Brad Hill said during the week that we brought our best against the top teams. We certainly didn’t bring our best against the bottom teams – we squeaked out eight-point wins against North Melbourne and West Coast, while Hawthorn and Gold Coast both rolled us. Finals, we learned, are a different beast. Our midfield was exposed, our smaller bodies were exposed, our pace was exposed, our class was exposed.
In a Year of Exploration, we made a habit of dirty days and nights at the footy at home games. Having Port laugh in our face again on a Friday night, pissing away the Hawthorn game, and prime time slots against Brisbane and Melbourne becoming really difficult nights of watching bad, frustrating footy that almost-but-didn’t-quite come off. Fittingly, the season closed with an Elimination Final loss at the MCG on a September Saturday afternoon in front of 68,465 against an AFL billboard with a few hundred fans.
This day really did get big on the club. Its first final in Melbourne in 12 years, under the returning Ross Lyon, and perhaps the biggest congregation of Saints fans in history. The team couldn’t rise to the occasion. I closed last season trying to somewhat quote Nilüfer Yanya with “In some kind of way, the club is lost.” This feels like part one of a long game, and one that may not necessarily be all upwards from here. But Saturday still takes the wind out of you. One minute there’s a new logo and there are all sorts of fun jumpers, there are media features on Mitchito Owens and Cooper Sharman, Sam Landsberger is highlighting a momentous piece of Saints history, Max, Pou, Nas, Windy, Mitchito are all lining up for the national anthem, and the Saints fans are making the MCG look like Grand Final Day; the next, the Giants have hammered on eight straight goals and your season’s over by halfway through the second quarter. The Year of Exploration, in the club’s 150th Anniversary Year, is done. Ross, who so much of the club and this year revolved around, didn’t break character in his press conference. He simply opened with, “It comes and goes quick, doesn’t it?” Centuries come and go.
