Author: Tom Briglia

Round 23, 2021
St Kilda 3.0, 6.3, 10.5, 17.5 (107)
Fremantle 1.4, 3.5, 4.8, 6.13 (49)
Crowd: 3,082 at Blundstone Arena, Sunday, August 22nd at 12.15pm

Some things, if allowed, are instantly recognisable and familiar even this far into a pandemic. The late August sun on show, and sitting that much higher. The breeze is that much more accommodating. As 2021 developed into a worthy sequel to 2020 (off the field), the ability of the competition to retain its structure within the calendar year shouldn’t be underestimated. Bob Murphy’s Rhythm of the Season was back. The change in season again aligns with the season’s turn towards history being made, or to a relaxed Spring. Spring nonetheless.

And thus, a sunny afternoon game (in natural daylight!) to finish things off for 2021. We’ve had a bunch of these – Peter Everitt’s 7.7 in 1996 against the Crows on the eve of a much bigger final game of the year for both teams; a loss to the Cats in 2003 on the eve of the rivalry becoming real; a tight win in Fraser’s (first) last game in 2007 at the MCG after several years of challenging; a wet sail win over Carlton in 2012 to cap off an oft-forgotten positive Scott Watters season, and in what was Brett Ratten’s last game at the Blues; the Watters Phase II team smothering a Grand Final-bound Fremantle in Kosi, Blake and Milne’s last game; Roo kicking nine against the Lions in a high-scoring game at the end of 2016 – perhaps the apex of the Richo era, when all of our young kids were untradeable and Roo did in fact appear to be ageless – and a sunny Saturday afternoon in Sydney in 2019 that ended a strange, exhausting year that capped off an era, a decade and indeed nearly a century since the last pandemic.

Like several of those seasons, finals had only become realistically out of reach a week or two before the final game (in 2007, it was the night before). In these instances, the last game of the season doesn’t quite feel attached to the year in the same way. It is isolated in a way that doesn’t apply to any part of a meandering, muddling low-finish season. It lives in smouldering embers and dirt of the hopes and ambitions of a live season.

In a strange way, it’s a victory lap of the year (although by no means a casual ride down the Champs-Élysées). It’s a day to sit back and see the bits and pieces that made up the year – for better or worse – and enjoy the better parts, and know that the rest is pretty harmless, and can’t quite hurt you again in the same way, that they belong to the past now. Really, it’s an opportunity to just to watch the Saints run around. There’s nothing to really play for except whatever you’re feeling in the moment, and spontaneity has been rare lately.

***

After an all-timer 24 (27ish?) hours that rivalled the 1987 last round, trust the Bizarro Rivalry that is shared by St Kilda and Fremantle to ruin the AFL’s carefully-laid fixture plan to keep the entire round interesting. (One for the off-season is to find and re-upload our in-depth looks at the novelty freakshow that is The Bizarro Rivalry; they were lost in The Great RWB Server Calamity of 2021). We looked “on”, while the team whose season was on the line was simply not playing like a team whose season was on the line. Of the first 8.2 we kicked, 7.2 came from defence, somewhere between Freo cbf and us deciding to have another decent week when it suited, and probably not when it was expected (and certainly not when it was needed).

In an immediate sense, what we ended up getting was a strange cross between that last round of 2013 – a 71-point win over the Dockers’ thirds – and the record-setting 18th-defeated-2nd win later in 2014 by the same 58 points we won by on Sunday.

That means some of the better things we were used to seeing this year probably happened. Steele leading all comers for possessions, despite being consistently frustrated by Banfield; Sinclair and his mullet zipping around off half-back; Ben Long putting a sweetly-timed heavy hit on Brayshaw; Rowan Marshall putting in a gargantuan performance (and showing us what might have been if both he and Paddy were fully fit all year); Zak Jones looking for people to try and run around; Brad Crouch perhaps quietly accumulating big numbers; and Jack Higgins working hard up the ground and close to goal.

Of course, the urgency isn’t quite there, and our circumstances and Freo’s attitude opened the door to the slightly-different-timeline novelty happenings that also get offered by two teams just running around and having a kick. Bytel kicked his first two career goals; Zak Jones got called Zak Smith, Tim Membrey got called Stewart; Dan Hannebery played; Wilkie touched a goal with his head; Rowan Marshall handballed it into some guy’s nuts.

***

I knew saying anything about Freo “not playing like a team playing for finals” would tempt fate, and as soon as I put it into the group chat in the shadows of half-time, the umpire decided to bypass the constant coaching of players and just went straight to paying a 50 against Crouch in the shadows of half time. Ah, here we go. This is where the Bizarro Rivalry will really come to the fore – Freo will come back to add to the amazing round and add to our 2020s list of decent margins given up. Peter Carey, Longmuir after the siren, Sirengate, 2013, etc. But like the umpire, they just cbf.

Final games of the year can also be, just quietly, a chance to look forward. A last chance to grab onto something, however small to take into the off-season. Teasingly (in the bullying sense), maybe tauntingly, the AFL used its first opportunity since the handing down of the Carter Report to send a Saints home game straight to Tasmania, hoping to push the joint venture and relocation options before Peter Gutwein forces through the 19th team option early next year.

It’s not Roo’s six goals in Stewart Loewe’s final game in the last round of 2002 (or Spider’s 7.7), but Cooper Sharman minted his transformation from Novelty Name Guy out of the mid-season draft to Bob and Andy and general SEN talkback areas. He kicked 4.1 via high marks, smart leads, strong hands, and played a big presence up the ground, too, capably handling the responsibility of being the key tall target and linkman up forward in Max’s absence.

Much like Max’s first 20 minutes against the Cats, this was a tall forward performance that combined an understanding of the value of constantly being on the move, and an athletic ability to find space on an opponent, time runs, time leaps, and simply hold onto marks. He kicked goals from set shots, from marks on the lead and contested, and at a light gallop in space heading towards the sticks. While he’s a fourth gamer and looks like he’s wearing a retail version of the jumper one size too big, he is 21 and his experience working against mature bodies shows. 

The commentators noted Higgins worked from half-back up the goal mouth for the opener, but Sharman had done the same and was the one who got his hands on the ball in the forward pocket at the end of the run, and place a well-weighted kick from the pocket to Higgins. Sharman’s quick hand-to-foot movements around the ground looked slick and more naturally dynamic in a way we’re still not quite used to.

***

St Kilda’s presence alone throughout a closeish-to-normal season (in its format) mattered. The rhythm of a week, framed by footy – the Monday wash-up, mid-week surmising, the return of Thursday night teams, the anticipation of a Friday. St Kilda matches were a singular event that brought us together, whether it was the occasional game – yes, we actually were able to go to some this year – or the group chat while we watched on TV (Rory, I found a setting on my Samsung that eliminates any weird frame rate mismatch for laptop-via HDMI connections!). And, join the dots between those singular weekly events, a narrative emerges, even one that appears to judder in the same way that most of us have gone in and out of lockdown.

There might not be the same sense of achievement that last year brought, and it’s not redemption in any way, nor a celebration but there is nonetheless a burden easing. Maybe a small sense of achievement. During a pandemic, or outside of a pandemic, the season is long. As supporters, we have done the time, and just getting through right now is worth something.

Round 22, 2021
Geelong Cats 2.0, 6.2, 10.5, 13.7 (85)
St Kilda 5.1, 7.2, 10.3, 11.5 (71)
Crowd: Zero at Kardinia Park, Saturday, August 14th at 4.35pm

St Kilda’s 2021 season appeared to expire multiple times via all sorts of causes since a shoddy outing in Round 2 against the Demons, but the last rites were given by a one-two Kardinia Park punch.

When Mason Wood barrelled through our fifth goal against the Tigers in the Friday night rain at the MCG, I immediately turned to Matt and said “it’s a story if we lose”. It was our first game off the bye and after a 36-0 lead was given up to the Crows in Cairns, prompting all sorts of soul-searching inside the club and a rightful freak-out among the supporter base.

Somehow*, we went on with it at the MCG (*we didn’t know Richmond was plateauing at the time). We’ve made a habit of pissing away big leads – North (31 points) and Freo (37 points) last year, and a narrow escape against the Dogs after leading by 22 nearly 15 minutes into the last quarter of an Elimination Final. This year, that Richmond win was sandwiched between the Adelaide calamity in Cairns and a nearly more horrific calamity at the MCG against Collingwood.

Somehow, the five-goal-to-nothing start given up on Saturday evening is not the story coming out of the game. There was a lot more inevitability in this. Unlike those losses in previous seasons this was to a much more highly-fancied opponent who we knew weren’t going to just roll over with a whole lot more the line than ourselves.

The guy who’d dominated the last time we played the Cats but kicked 1.5 and looked broken for weeks was now dominating again, and in a way that was much more dangerous. He’d kicked 2.1 by the time we kicked 5.1 to 0.0, with a hand in every goal chain. Max was on the move. He wasn’t getting caught under it (it must be said, Jack Henry was doing a great job body-on-body considering he was giving away 12 centimetres) but who’s gonna stop Max once he gets some space or a run-up? Everything was sticking. This was the best footy we’d played. Pressure was good. All five goals were from turnovers and the ball movement was measured and fluid. Steele had seven touches in seven minutes and ten seconds of play. Sharman slotted the set shot from a tight angle.

Just as the camera cut to Max King moving awkwardly on the boundary, D-Mac was paid a free-kick against at half-back, in which the only alternative was for him to disappear completely, and then ex-Saint/one-time-Messiah-to-be Rhys glided across the pack from the resulting entry and kicked their first. The St Kilda fix was in. I harped on about the Cats last time. There’s a lot of grievance flying around at Red, White and Black’s Brunswick West HQ. Our best team ever got their best team ever, and we still can’t even have our best player out there on a day in which our season is supposed to die in an awkward time slot via a Kayo feed and HDMI cord.

***

Perhaps we were in for another strange week for contenders after the previous Round, as we could see Carlton skip out to an early lead over the Power on the bottom-right scorebug? Nah. Jason Dunstall uttered the famous words, “He’s on fire. He is on fire, Callum Wilkie”, but he was busy for a reason and the Cats were already shifting things. To a man, their physical presence in every contest is remarkable. Their list, recruiting and player development has suited their game style incredibly well; just like 361 days ago, when we sat second on the ladder and met them in fifth, there was not much chance we were able to go with them.

Bringing back memories of Hawkins’ poster in the 2009 Grand Final (grievance, but understandable) and the 2010 Qualifying Final (grievance; although we won, and there was a video uploaded to YouTube – since taken down – that detailed several minutes of favourable decisions to the Cats), after the D-Mac decision there were multiple occasions that would have had anyone reasonably shitty about the umpiring and St Kilda history generally. Dangerfield threw the ball just so, so blatantly. Ratugolea ran off with the footy out of the middle after a free was paid our way with no 50-metre penalty given, Menegola was given a touch-and-go decision on the goal line. Max King took a mark in the third quarter in the forward pocket and Blicavs turfed the ball in frustration, and as it trickled away and as Saints players protested, the umpire paused briefly and offered “I didn’t see it”, which is what coaches say in the post-match presser when they can’t be fucked commenting on something shitty one of their players did.

Like I do every time I bring up umpiring in a game (thank you for grounding me in the moment, St Julio), it is also worth noting the comprehensive way the ball lived in their half from the time of their first goal. Our midfielders just weren’t getting the ball, and when we did, we either got Sinclair setting up Higgins with a perfectly weighted forward 50 entry, or Sinclair setting Membrey with a perfectly weighted forward 50 entry, only for the Vice Captain, on his own and in space, to drop it. Hill gave up two shots at goal, including turning over Jack Steele’s mark going back with the flight. At the end of the day, 32 inside 50s will win you close to zero games.

Hawkins was angry and contest by contest was more of a presence from borderline fresh airing it, and by the end was giving off goals and concussing Darragh Joyce (of course he didn’t get suspended) Cameron was taking marks in the forward line and up on the wing. Jack Steele had 20 touches with 11 minutes and 20 seconds left in the second quarter. This whole result was 0% his fault by the way, but more as a reflection go the Cats flexing their top four muscle, he had only (“only”) 21 at half-time, and 30 by game’s end. In the automated app push notification that comes with the Dare Sainter of the Round result, he was referred to as “Captain Commendable”.

Dangerfield might not have necessarily wanted it more than Steele or anyone else, but he did a better job at showing it. This became a rare game in an era defined by systems that had its trajectory changed by repeated individual efforts of a single player who willed themselves across different parts of field. He could do it all on the ground and in the air, and he came up with match-sealing move.

***

By the end, decent moments were few and far between. We had them for 26 minutes, they had us for a bit more than three quarters. This is what the team is. It’s not just the side that was smashed several times over early in the season (depriving us of a slightly more interesting last week of the year), nor the side that kicked itself out of games against flag fancies, nor the side that pulled out wins against flag fancies. It’s the side that did all of those things, whiplashing between them week to week, quarter to quarter, minute to minute.

Remembering that Cooper on a couple of occasions presented with the second effort sprint high up on the wing for the run-past, reflects the mindset of a supporter whose team is done for the year and is looking to the future. Cooper is somewhere between Ryan Gamble and Spencer White for hype, physical build and an oversized St Kilda jumper. In the best and most exciting possible way, of course. Yet, the slightly too excited yelp when he casually bobbed up near goal and nailed the set shot to keep our season going reminded me that the forever competitive part of my supporter’s heart still wanted something from this.

With just over six minutes left, Fox Footy cut to the boundary level camera as St Kilda worked its way forward and Dan Butler got caught up in a tackle. At that moment, there was just a faint tweak that something actually was on the line. That yes, I do want something to come of this year after almost four months of being indifferent about our chances at scraping into the eight, and that if only a few moments had turned out differently-

Round 20, 2021
St Kilda 3.1, 5.3, 7.7, 12.9 (81)
Carlton 5.1, 10.1. 15.2, 18.4 (112)
Crowd: Zero at Docklands, Friday, July 30th at 7.50pm

At the end of a week of unrelenting slow-motion footage of swimmers’ immediate reactions to their placings, their families back home, Abbey and Hamish being just that little bit too over-the-top about it all, the Matildas, the Boomers, Jess Fox, a spiralling COVID outbreak, and, on Friday, COVID at the Olympics, and then a sort-of-bombshell announcement that Clarko would be leaving the Hawks in a few weeks, Carlton’s review being handed in, Gary Ayres being sacked by Port Melbourne, David Teague maybe being sacked as a result of the review and also Clarko being officially available, and Sam McClure – who had run alongside Caro with the Clarko story – confidently saying on SEN the Carlton coach next year would likely be one of Clarko or Ross Lyon, St Kilda was playing Carlton at an empty Concrete Dome.

No matter that St Kilda’s season was on the line. A win would have us in 8th place ahead of the rest of the round. Between flicking across to the main 7 channel to see Sam Kerr, Teagan Micah, et al’s heroics, we were treated to the worst 31-point loss known to science (aside from the 1997 Grand Final, which “in another, more accurate way” was infinitely worse. Touché Justin.).

Three wins following the Adelaide-in-Cairns calamity and the bye, and we looked like we had the season back on track and a more definable game style. After the Brisbane win, we were suddenly favourites for a finals place, but losses of a combined 18 points to Port and West Coast put us in the awkward Mathematical Chance category on the final turn and reminded us that we probably wouldn’t capture any real sustained positive momentum this season.

Because this is the team. It either picks and chooses when to go, or it simply can’t. Hell, even parts of the team – Brett Ratten in the 7 pre-game talking about how the midfield was down last week made me think that given the number of bounce backs throughout this year – the first West Coast match, the post-bye mini-run – that after two weeks and that performance, Steele, Crouch and Dunstan would be primed for a big night. The late withdrawal of Paddy Ryder hurt immensely, in the sense that we might rely too much on a 33-year-old specifically playing with Rowan Marshall. Jack Silvagni was placed in the ruck given the lessened threat and a Carlton backing their mids over ours. We won the hit-out count 70-16 but effectively broke even in the clearances.

Steele had eight tackles at the beginning of the second quarter and finished with 36 touches. He looked genuinely disappointed in the moments following the siren. Crouch got a lot of the ball, and so did Dunstan, but for a second consecutive week their influence again felt well below what it should have been (According to Wayne Carey, Dunstan was going at 0% efficiency with his first eight touches, but this has been disputed).

Max King picked up where he left off. He looked – looks – unstoppable with space in front of him (not that he needs a huge amount at his height). Three tall marks and three goals by quarter-time, giving it to Weitering as he put through the third. A spurious free kick on the quarter-time siren offered the chance to needlessly break his goal kicking confidence – he was on a run of 17.4 from set shots over recent weeks and into that moment, and he hooked the ball trying to make the 50-metre-plus distance.

No matter – he kicked the next one with minimal fuss. The problem was that it came in the last quarter and we were back to the bad old days of April and May, of large losses and a complete breakdown of play. I’ve been thinking about what exactly to write for this part but like those performances, this was comprehensive. Without needing to rack up massive numbers, Walsh, Cripps, Kennedy, Dow and yes, Silvagni took control of the stoppages and it went from there. Another smashing at the Concrete Disney Store, another team that just seemed to disappear in-game. Dunstan multiple times kicked low balls into the 50 that gave zero St Kilda forwards a chance, ignoring the fact that the most dangerous Saint on the ground had given us nine demos in the previous five quarters on what might work. Kent, Butler, Long and Higgins had few moments of impact. Brad Hill demanded the ball off half-back but to no discernible end.

Zak Jones was trying to make things happen and again barrelled his way to the footy, perhaps trying to occasionally do just a little too much once he got it. Sixth-gamer Leo Connolly proved to be the most creative Saint with multiple dashes and slicing through traffic in attempts to make something, anything, happen.

The first quarter saw commentators – for the first time in a long time – openly willing an individual Saint to an exciting performance. That goodwill and anticipation for Max was a distant memory by the final moments of the second term. Webster lost his bearings as James Brayshaw uttered “Saints have the numbers”, and a Carlton kick that was slammed into an open forward line bounced perfectly for Fisher, who neatly gave off to Williamson. His kick on the half-time siren went through, and we’d quietly blown our season.

***

Sharman kicked his first goal as the Matildas stormed their way through to – and then held on for – a famous win. I only just caught it – I’d spent most of the lead-in to the game, quarter-time and half-time following the Matildas’ quarter final.

Outside of the team events, the Olympics is feel-good junk food, or at least is presented that way. We don’t follow individual athletes like we do a club – St Kilda has existed for 148 years and represents more than the sum of its parts. Its on-field history; the experiences of its fans and the collective. But at the Olympics, everyone’s a hero, everyone has done a nation proud, everyone is an inspiration, and according to 7, we’re almost expected to be celebrating just like Ariarne Titmus’s family or the students at someone’s old primary school, to the point where it can wrongfully dilute the passages of athletes like Saya Sakakibara.

I haven’t not watched any of the Olympics; in fact, I have watched and listened to a lot of it. And enjoyed it (but not so much the presentation). Part of me was perhaps waiting all week to watch the Saints and feel smug about how much more real the attachment is. Another showcase from the next Messiah – I was there from the start! Only footy can do this!

Following St Kilda post-2011 has just been a dour lifestyle choice rather than an observable journey. While I’m fortunate enough to be in a position to be able to pay for a souped-up membership every year, it’s silly of me to put pressure on myself (however subconsciously) to feel or experience (and then write about) every match in a horribly fatalistic manner. Friday night is the “every week” in the “I watch the Saints every week”. Sometimes that’s ok. Not every medal winner has to be an incredible inspiration, nor was the “entire country” jumping up and down in the lounge room. But I did take a few minutes out of my day to go to the lounge room and watch Jess Fox in the C-1 final. And I got a thrill out of it!

***

BT tried winding up the prospect of a potential upset with seven or so minutes left. Indeed, there was a minute or so in which the intensity clearly lifted (maybe it was just BT’s slightly-louder commentating) and it appeared we may have the momentum and just a four-goal margin with plenty of time left. The ball fell to Billings for a second set shot in the quarter, on the right side for his left boot that we all assumed several years ago would become a weapon. He missed. In that moment he may have perhaps been a victim of BT trying to keep viewers on 7mate rather than whichever of the others was showing the Olympics, but the connection between this team, its players and this season seemed to fall apart at that point.

Only a run of late goals prevented this from being the eight goals-plus margin that it absolutely should have been. The umpire himself had just given up by the end, paying a free at the top of the square in the final minutes to Jack Higgins while Cooper Sharman claimed the mark. In the spirit of a game played at a lower intensity and in a duller atmosphere than the pre-season match between these teams at the same venue, he left it to the players to decide who should take the kick.

After the bronze medals of the week – some upsetting, some uplifting, some bemusing – and the close-run silvers, and the GOLD FOR AUSTRALIA, and Alastair Clarkson, and David Teague, and Sam Kerr, and 20 rounds of a season, St Kilda is 13th on the ladder.

Round 19, 2021
West Coast Eagles 2.2, 8.6, 11.7, 14.10 (94)
St Kilda 2.1, 4.2, 7.6, 13.8 (86)
Crowd: 43,657 at Optus Stadium, Saturday, July 25th at 4.35pm AEST

Get up off your lounge room couch and move the coffee table to the side. We’re back to doing the dance we’ve done several times over the past few years – a last month of a home and away season that presents a mathematical but very unlikely path to the finals, and we have to ride every mundane and uselessly hopeful minute of it.

In the lead-up, the club wheeled out the remarkable Sunday afternoon in early 1998 in which Daniel Healy and Peter Everitt both kicked six goals on their 24th birthdays as the Saints stormed home over the Eagles at Subiaco to pinch a two-point win (never mind that we lost to eventual wooden spooners Brisbane at home a week later). I thought first-game-as-sub Cooper Sharman might have supplied the novelty material, but while our first-tier players were mostly reduced to bystanders, Max King kicked six goals for the first time in his career to almost pull off a similar heist.

When the Eagles’ lead hit 33 points during the third quarter – as it had earlier this year – I absurdly believed it more likely that we would win. I scanned fantasies of headlines and Fox Footy discussions about the Saints pulling off a pair of 33-point comebacks against the Eagles in the same season, and the tweets referencing 33 points something times two something equals 66 (something equals 1966?). (Worth also mentioning this would have echoed the difficult 2017 late season run that saw a stunning last-minute collapse against the Power and then a juddering win against the Eagles the following week.) There was a constant exchange of feeling like we were in it, that Eagles had an extra gear every time, that they were going to completely blow it open.

***

Perhaps for the first time this year we’ve posted a loss that actually lifted our feelings about the future of this team (it only took 19 weeks). This was mostly built on Max King, Zak Jones, Dan Butler and Brad Hill. The St Kilda group chat at three-quarter time discussed how quiet the captain had been during the game, while also acknowledging his massive last term against the Lions a fortnight earlier. He opened the last quarter with the break out of the centre, helped by Butler timing his run into the middle from the forward line with perfection, and weighted the kick perfectly into the oncoming hands of Max King. As much as I was willing for a bunch of history to repeat itself, Steele never quite got going. Despite 13 tackles, a late forward-50 entry between Saints players and straight to an Eagles defender was more reflective of an un-Jack Steele-like performance. 

He, Crouch and Dunstan had just 53 disposals combined and were constantly outworked by the Eagles’ own midfield. Kelly, Sheed, Gaff and Yeo were all prolific, while Kelly and Sheed kicked goals when the Eagles made their move and when the game needed someone to step up in the final minutes. It also meant the larger US College Jocks got to have their way in the forward line. Kennedy and Darling had five between them by half-time when the Eagles led by 28.

Zak Jones was our biggest presence across the ground, repeatedly bodylining the ball and taking hits, looking to take the opposition on and get the ball moving. Hill used up his almost-obligatory funny disposal for the match early on with a squirted handball but otherwise racked up another busy game off half-back in which he did what he could to get things moving around and ahead of him. King kicked six to make the absolute most of everything that went forward (we’ll get to that) and Butler put in his best performance of the year by far. The quick-thinking, slicker Butler we saw last year was back – good finishes, hard running, and some smart ball work up the ground (including a complete halt and turn around to kick backwards to Billings that allowed for an entry to set up King’s floating mark early in the third; also he pounced on Rotham’s wayward bounce which was a universal lol).

There were some ok moments. Paddy Ryder, in a St Kilda jumper, snapping around the corner to get things going in the first quarter. Billings kicked a goal on his right. Long put on some heavy tackles. Byrnes and Connolly again looked comfortable at the level.

Quieter games and blunders weren’t just for top-liners. Oscar Clavarino made four (maybe five?) outright turnovers by foot that gave the ball straight back to the Eagles in all sorts of the ground. This was a day of few real winners.

***

Which made the result all the more surprising, and perhaps at a second glance – certainly going over the numbers – makes Max’s game all the more impressive. An aimless opening had a pantsing written all over it; no real structure, no real purpose in the forward entries.

For all the issues going forward over recent years, his teammates did the right things by him by putting the ball into the right places. But this was more about a young forward putting on a thrilling display that justified all the hype. He repeatedly flew for marks and they stuck. Edwards being put on him felt a little bit arrogant on West Coast’s part, although there is sense to it. Counterintuitively, I felt personally affronted almost for the same reason when the Eagles put McGovern on him to close out the game. Instead of wilting, he turned McGovern inside out after being outworked in the marking contest, sprinted onto the bouncing ball, got down low and gave off to Butler who brought us back within 13 points, and then a few moments later ran into space on the hill and marked the Brad Hill kick at its highest point, stared down the 43,657 interstate crowd and kicked the goal.

From his first goal – a faultless kick from outside 50 – he threatened right to the end. He got separation on his opponents, he drifted across packs, he launched over defenders. For the first time, the seemingly lackadaisical line-up, the unchanging facial expression and calm action were borne out of confidence, rather than the self-doubt we’ve been projecting that he must be feeling since the Geelong game. We now have images and footage of him flying in the afternoon shadows for a mark over multiple opponents when the team and the season really did need someone. We know what Max King being dangerous and damaging looks like.

***

Paul Hunter giving away a free-kick from the throw-in just seconds before three-quarter time was quietly stunning. Spectacularly St Kilda. All that had to happen on the wing was a break-even contest; instead the US College Jock Captain pushed the margin out to 25 points.

That was barely the reason we lost. Even in the final quarter, for all of Max King’s contested marks and straight kicking, the inability to back up goals was brutal; aside from the obvious scoreboard impact, it never allowed any serious momentum to build. Three of the last quarter’s six goals were replied to within 105 seconds, 100 seconds and 76 seconds – and that includes the time for the ball to go back to the middle and the ground to reset.

Anyone who listened to Grant Thomas on the excellent Unpluggered podcast a few weeks ago heard the former coach suggest how all of the near misses over St Kilda history really just accumulate to something inherently wrong with the club rather than 148 years that can be reduced and summarised as just entirely “bad luck” or “if onlys”. The 2012 season saw four games in which we had more scoring shots than the opposition and/or lost by less than a goal. Turn those results around, and instead of finishing ninth, we finish fourth. Throw in the game in which we kicked more goals than Collingwood and lost by six points – with Armitage running into goal in the final seconds and the umpire paying a free kick against us that the AFL said was a mistake – and we finish third, ahead of premiers Sydney. We could make the same case – as those moments become part of history, the nuances wash away and we’re left with a fossilised core. The bones spell out one premiership since 1873, they spell out a ninth finish in 2012 that no-one need bother remembering.

Imagine if we had all the guys out there! Marshall, Gresham, Clark, Higgins, Highmore, D-Mac, Paton, Battle, Geary. Other teams have injuries too, and waiting around for the perfect moment has never really worked out. If only Max had kicked straight against the Cats, if only Jack Higgins has kicked straight against the Swans, if only we’d used the ball better against Port, if only we were awake in the first part of the game and didn’t fall back asleep during the second. How would a neutral view St Kilda in the context of the wider 2021 AFL season? We wouldn’t really play any major part. There probably isn’t enough upside or time or logistical space for the season to turn from here. Our expectations for the last few weeks are coloured grey. Resurrect the St Kilda Messiah Complex – beyond that, they do look rosier.

Round 18, 2021
St Kilda 2.4, 3.5, 6.9, 8.13 (61)
Port Adelaide 1.0, 4.6, 7.11, 10.14 (74)
Crowd: Zero at Docklands, Saturday, 17th July at 1.45pm

Among the “prune juice iron” and “chicken liver pâté” tabs I can find yet another Google Docs draft that will feature too many words and too many long-winded sentences vaguely recounting a St Kilda loss brought about by poor ball use, some poor marking efforts, poor forward structure, and, of course, poor kicking at goal.

Zero goals from set shots, six behinds. Port themselves finished with a rangy 10.14 (enough to win us the 1966 premiership, mind you), but yet again it’s our mistakes with the ball in hand that are giving us grief.

Watching this felt like playing a 6pm (or perhaps 6.40) game of futsal and you still haven’t had time to get into weeknight warrior mode. Everyone had to double-check the start time close to the opening, no one knew who was going to turn up and when, nothing felt settled, no real cohesion, no sustained momentum. The only constants were not much space, and the ball being camp in one of the halves of the ground. Players couldn’t find each other or link up. It was high pressure, but not quite in the high-intensity finals way. This just needed to be played and put it in the books – yep, Port’s better than the Saints at the moment.

***

Last week may just have been a One Night Only atonement of sins committed through the season. This was the beginning of a new pile. Season on the line in the final minutes; Marshall misses a set shot, everyone drops a mark, Brad Hill does a weird dribbly kick thing twice. Two of those moments burned Leo Connolly producing the best pair of St Kilda field kicks this year, one from a turn against the boundary in the back pocket and a slashing 45-degree left-foot kick to open up the entire ground, the other from the sharpest of deliveries to a leading forward.

Just as we did earlier in the season, we’d banked some wins – the only team to win three out of three heading into this weekend – to feel as though we’d built up enough momentum to go head-to-head against a top four fancy on our home deck and win. The win over a breaking Brisbane was one better than the Max King game against the Cats, but we were going to need to do a lot more than that. All the results had gone our way by Monday night, and Thursday night saw a chunk taken out of Freo’s percentage. It was just like Round 22, 2008, when everyone lost and we beat Essendon by 108 points to finish the season in fourth. Except, it was the beginning of Round 18 and we’re ninth. Then Jack guided Richmond to a very big win and the reminder was there that not so fast – we still have to do stuff ourselves. And this week, not so lucky.

Feel the static air of a non-descript temperature on your face. Bask in the artificial lighting. No, you’re not in the glorified TV studio that is the Concrete Dome – it’s Lockdown V and you’re in your lounge room watching the Saints play another home game in front of zero people. Dwayne is doing some of what he does best – calling games played in front of low crowds. Music doesn’t work after goals at the ground, nor on the broadcast. D-Mac was adding another strong game to his career resurgence and put on a huge tackle on in defence, and was rewarded with a concussion, Georgiades landing on his chest, and a Port Adelaide goal, and having it all broadcast in high definition with some public domain up-tempo, inoffensive dance music over the top.

That was probably the moment I quietly accepted that it just wasn’t going to happen. The first quarter was dominant, in that the ball lived in our front half. Steele and Butler cut through the noise with snap goals out of traffic, and in true St Kilda fashion Port made one meaningful foray and goaled. But there was no clear purpose to a lot of touches.

King was in all sorts of contests – pushed out, outbodied, a touched ball, and then finally grabbed one and missed. Long again appeared to have more of a presence in the forward line. Butler decided to turn up for a bit. That and a 2.4 to 1.0 quarter-time scoreline was promising, if only just to show that we were still keeping the opposition to restricted scores.

But the second quarter was a mirror image of the first. Port had all the play, and made a little more of it. Their seven-point margin at the main change felt much, much bigger. Their talls were creating problems, despite Charlie Dixon being reduced to a hobble at some points, and we were sure to fast-track the rise of Mitch Georgiades, even if it meant leaving him unattended at the back of a pack three metres out from goal for him take a simple chest mark. Or giving him the honours of knocking out D-Mac.

Out only major came from a great contested Ben Long mark and a wild shanked kick as good as his 2.7 record for the season suggested. So much so, the kick was never near registering any score, but of course, Paddy Ryder (*more depressed voice than usual*: in a St Kilda jumper) crumbed the pack and goaled. Of course. Callum Wilkie could have turned the novelty dial up to 11 but missed his set shot.

By half-time, Trent McKenzie – you know, the absolutely not full-back guy – was all over Max King, capped off with a free on half time. The nature of the game made it a certainty that Steele and Crouch again were most prominent, joined by Luke Dunstan. Brad Hill was doing what he could off half-back (and there were plenty of opportunities given Port’s territorial dominance). While the game never quite broke open, Port always seemed to be the next goal away from exactly that happening. 

***

Marshall accidentally kicked a goal from the pocket in the third but the next couple to Port saw the margin out to 20 points. Webster won an important one-on-one out wide as they looked to land what would have really been a finishing blow, and then found himself with the ball just a few moments later on 50 and utilised his left boot in a way that hasn’t happened enough. Game on? It was time to show the footy world what we do best – poor skills and weird bits. On the break with numbers, the ball to a two-on-one to a small forward (Long) who was rightfully pissed. Butler was on very good terms with himself and at the fall of the ball in the final seconds of the quarter dished an over-the-shoulder handball towards goal, and I like to think of his face still looking composed for a moment while the ball trickled away behind him. Ryan Burton was a big presence for the Power all game but made the curious mistake of soccering off the ground backwards to McKenzie in the goal square. King was right with him, found the right positioning and kicked it off the ground himself for a goal.

Going over the game again I was surprised that we were actually in front halfway through the last quarter. I barely remember it. Naturally, the result colours how you see the rest of the game but I’m as convinced of the inevitability of the result as I was during the last quarter. Much like the back end of last year – namely ill-fated late charges against the Lions and the Lions – nothing drastically changed in the way we were playing the game; we were just doing it a little better. Marshall’s snap goal at the beginning of the quarter was huge, his late set shot miss equally so.

What else stands out? The Seb Ross nothing kick deep into the forward line, Crouch’s miss on the run, and Butler running into an open forward line, not seeing or ignoring Hill running with him, no-one leading to him, and he deciding not to kick anywhere near the advantage of the one-on-ones but to two Port Adelaide players 30 metres out from goal. Hill’s two kicks off half-back within moments of each other, which are pretty funny when I watch them over.

If we’re going to be reductive, these may be the hinge moments of a season that from the beginning hasn’t been convincing. It has not found any genuine momentum, or rhythm, or whatever you want to call it. Much like St Kilda’s own, the broader season has been played in social conditions lumpy at best. We could be about to embark on an indifferent and stumbling end to the season. There’s a very good chance we’re 13^th by the end of next weekend.

***

The Fox Footy production team, in another failure to read the lounge room, had Eddie and co talking over the top of the scenes after the final siren, rather than let the song play and the players’ reactions speak for themselves, and to give us a few moments to take in what had just happened and (depending on who you follow) experience the highs and lows of what it means for the afternoon, for your season, or for your lockdown. I know we can’t really go anywhere or do anything at the moment, but just give us a second.

Brisbane Lions 1.5, 4.8, 7.8, 8.15 (63)
St Kilda 1.3, 6.6, 9.9, 14.11 (95)
Crowd: 9,075 at Metricon Stadium, Saturday, July 10th at 7.25pm

Footy moves fast. Within games, weeks, seasons, rebuilds. I said it the other week on this (not that I’m the first, nor the only one to say it.) As we ticked past the halfway point of the second quarter in Cairns, a 5.6 to 0.0 lead over the Crows following a horribly frustrating but encouraging loss to Sydney suggested our mojo was back -never mind the 111-point loss that broke up the similarly frustrating/encouraging Geelong defeat, and a nondescript win over North (which quietly had its own late fade).

Just a couple of hours later on that Saturday night, St Kilda was again decidedly a club looking silly and lost, all over again. We had a whole two weeks to think about it and hate it all, while the president’s letter to members that was intended to calm instead raised anxieties, was slammed as revisionism. That mid-season break was spent pre-empting, and if not, lamenting another failed rebuild.

Seven excellent quarters at the MCG in cold and wet conditions suggested that perhaps we’d established some sort of definable brand of dour footy. For six quarters, 30 minutes and 31 seconds, we’d conceded 4.17 before a dire last term tainted the lot.

***

Only 24 hours before Saturday night, we were given a showcase of the difference between St Kilda’s lack of killer instinct and teams that have earned the praise of the wider footy world. For the second time in 2021, Adelaide went goalless until the second half of the second quarter – they beat the Saints the first time, while on Friday night Essendon went on with it to win by 63 (the 11.18 prevented it from being any more). I know we kept the Tigers to 2.10, but that was the exception in a season of fading finishes, wayward what-ifs, and outright smashings.

Some of these wrongs accumulated over the season were righted, if only for one night. A thundering passage proved the breaking point. Ben Long leapt into the air from a high Wilkie kick and brought that thunder (and the footy) down with him (I love watching on the replay the St Kilda bay going off after the mark). A blatant hold in two acts on Max King’s jumper was not seen (in the same way Daniel Rich’s throw in front of our goal in the second quarter was simply not seen), but Butler was at the fall and spun his way to Billings, who casually roamed the space and found D-Mac, who couldn’t have been a better person to finish off a play that was equal parts thrilling, representative, and novelty. Get the royal fuck out of here.

Max King tore the game apart with three goals in the second quarter. Two of them came from towering marks as he had to deal with All Australian Harris Andrews, and the conversions dismissed any nerves or doubts that might have quickly grown in his head after an early shot from an angle strayed wide. Bringing him higher up the ground kept him active and in the game, and he held his marks – 10 of them – in another big stride.

Play as well as you want, you (we) still need to kick straight. A start of 1.5 reflected the ongoing yips as well as a number of shots having to be taken from out wide. From that point we kicked 13.6, but until the last quarter storm we were again anticipating a side going into preservation mode. Kent and Billings missed set shots on the eve of three-quarter time; Brisbane had made a fast start to the second half, and while their forward set-up had suffered after Hipwood went down and we’d held off their flourish, those shots felt like the last best chances we’d get.

All players taking responsibility was a big theme of the night. D-Mac continued his rise, running hard along the wings and providing a presence at more extremes of the ground. He has added goals to his game, and played provider with a neat hit-up to Membrey in the third. Connolly kicked his late third-quarter goal after running off half-back earlier in the chain. Long shook off his 1.7 record to deliver a massive blow in the final term before touching the Gold Coast sky.

Despite three misses last week, Long has found himself again as a forward after the break. It’s probably where he should have been playing (opening the spot for Nick Hind to play where he should have been played, too, but I digress), although it might have something to say for learning about the game in the back half. Either way, he appears much more likely to make a physical impact on a contest, it seems – his accidental hit on Payne in the last quarter that created Steele’s goal wouldn’t have happened with anyone else – and he’s had eight shots at goal since the bye.

Meanwhile, the Brisbane forward line became Tom Highmore Country. It’s widely known he was picked up as a mature-age recruit from South Adelaide; just two years ago he was playing for the Canberra Demons. Now, he’s joined Callum Wilkie as a no-fuss inclusion into a backline that all of a sudden looks a lot more difficult to navigate. By game’s end he’d moved into “Guess who?” Territory on-sight from the commentators (thankfully Jason Bennett is on greater duty), as well as Post-Match Interview Guy Territory. Combined with Wilkie and Howard, the aerial presence allows for more considered rebounds. Hill can time his runs, Sinclair is there to mop up, and if there’s a mark taken there’s also the chance to take a more measured approach. He’s calm with the ball too. Leave the hot stuff to Dougal.

While Long and D-Mac and Hill and Sinclair have changed and added to their games, Dunstan continued his higher-profile resurgence while adding “annoying campaigner” to his repertoire. He got some back in the last quarter too, and it’s fun to see a Saints player getting their hands really dirty. Some more big numbers, and by the time we woke up on Sunday morning he was SEN news trade talk fodder.

And yes, the inclusion of Zak Jones immediately made the midfield look more complete, bringing a helter-skelter approach to moving through traffic and away from stoppages to go with the grunt of Crouch and Dunstan, while Steele added another dynamic performance to his resume. It wasn’t entirely a four-quarter performance, but that’s what made it more notable. The game needed a St Kilda midfielder to lift after a quieter third term, not just for the immediacy of winning stoppages but also to bring his teammates with him when surely there would be doubts again about finishing off a game. Fifteen touches, a set shot goal to extend the lead early in the last and then a running snap across the body to seal it. While we watch Bontempelli and Petracca and Parish become the in-form mids in the competition, for the moment we have Steele and a midfield that looked that little bit more complete.

***

Hipwood’s injury could be calamitous for Brisbane’s premiership hopes. They’d won 10 out of 11 coming into this, and despite Zorko’s efforts their forward line couldn’t adapt in-game. There’s no positivity in that happening, even if when saying “sometimes it’s just your night” (evidently it was). And yet, at the same time, St Kilda got the fundamentals down. Pressure up, running in support off half-back when the ball was in play and in our hands, working hard to provide options laterally when we had control. Ross, Byrnes and D-Mac all hit leading targets with no fuss. Neat and tidy.

As per last year, Membrey was rewarded by his teammates (mostly D-Mac’s hit-up) and the result more broadly for another Herculean performance interstate. A pair of goals in the third (including one from tight in the pocket where several others had failed) helped weather the Brisbane fightback, and he took 14 marks. They were at both ends as he quietly builds his leadership presence.

That can all add up and give way. The rush of an interstate team that shouldn’t be winning, yet has forced its way in front has all the running, is irresistible. There is no other context in which the ball is turned over by Ross and Marshall, Long takes that mark, and the ball ends up a King fly, the manic Butler and casual Billings combination, and D-Mac snapping the goal. Also, did the umpire give Dougal a pass for the deliberate out of bounds because it was just so obviously a brain fade?

***

With the return of a proper season (for as long as that will last), the year is again framed by the footy season. I woke up on Sunday morning and walked up to get a coffee from John Gorilla, past the trees and dogs of Gilpin Park. The sun was higher, the lighting just that little bit warmer. It tells me we’re already heading into the final part of the season, and – whoever may be playing – that finals are on their way. Footy moves fast.

Round 15, 2021
Richmond 0.5, 1.6, 2.7, 2.10 (22)
St Kilda 3.2, 5.3, 8.7, 9.8 (62)
Crowd: 14,787 at the MCG, Friday, June 25th at 7.50pm

Sometimes you just know.

“I think we are going to win tonight” was a much-too positive message to receive on a Friday morning after I’d gone the Whinge Royale about the Saints the previous weekend..

“Dunstan Ross Steele crouch in the wet”

Nah, still not feeling it. An 86-point loss last time they met, and that one was coming off a stirring comeback win we had all of five days to enjoy. We’ve barely built any momentum this year and this didn’t appear to be the time to do it. How many honest feedback sessions can you have after another pasting or embarrassing loss before it all becomes kind of dull?

However.

That morning I did get the auto-generated on-this-day notification on Facebook. It was a photo Dad had tagged me in – a shot of Roo and some other players going to the fans after the three-point win against the top-of-the-ladder Cats on a Saturday night that helped take us from 2-6 from a 103-point loss earlier in the year to winning eight of the last 11 and missing finals by percentage.

I wrote after the Gold Coast game about that gut feeling, intuition, whatever you want to call it. We all have it to some degree, positive or negative or anything else. Sometimes it’s easy to trace your expectations to form, or history, or opposition. It happens during the season, during the week, during a match. Matt piped up at three-quarter time of the Gold Coast match that we’d pull it out of the fire. In hindsight I shared the same feeling maybe a little. Not overly formed. On Friday, I think I can claim – certainly in hindsight! – I had something more peripheral. I certainly felt that we’d be competitive, but when Matt pressed me I couldn’t commit to anything greater than that. This was just meant to be the first game of the rest of the season.

***

As Friday night progressed that “feeling” turned into simply expecting and waiting for Richmond to come back. The whole stadium shared it, it seemed, to the point at which the Richmond crowd got up and about during the third quarter for no obvious reason (a throw-in from memory).

As soon as Mason Wood took us to five goals to nothing up (straight out of the middle after the fourth) I said to Matt “if we lose it’s a story” (met with an immediate “I understand.”). How else was this going to end? It was either St Kilda beats Richmond on a Friday night at the MCG, or Richmond beats St Kilda on a Friday night at the MCG (and everything that would go with it from that point). Another week of having to deal with the back pages, BigFooty Saints board ECO and 360 chat about the Saints throwing away a decent lead once things just got that little bit too tough. Within exactly 100 seconds, the players had resumed their positions, the between-goal break had run its course, Richmond took it out of the middle, Dustin Martin marked at full forward and kicked the Tigers’ first.

In the same way that the unconvincing, inaccurate and wobbly game style managed to just get the job done for no apparent reason against the Suns, the Richmond challenge just never came. It just…didn’t happen. Nothing changed during the game. The basic skill errors across the ground, missed kicks, slippery hands, they all kept happening. Dusty missed a shot with more time and space than he usually finds himself in. Jack Riewoldt missed Chol in the pocket with a kick that harmessly dribbled out of bounds. Aarts missed a running goal on the eve of half-time that surely would have triggered something, in the same way that Dunstan’s long miss, or Membrey’s wide set shot were the chances we just couldn’t afford to miss and were leaving the door ajar for the Tigers that they were going to bash down anyway.

But it never happened. That spectre of a Richmond comeback loomed at the same time that I quietly trusted Dougal Howard and Callum Wilkie and Tom Highmore every time the ball went into defence. Ryan Byrnes was always moving to the right spots. Mason Wood was a presence whenever he was near the ball. Luke Dunstan, who had been pantsed by everyone when we came back into the team against this opposition in Round 5, was right at home in the conditions. He played the commanding, grinding role we thought he would when we picked him up as South Australia’s Under 18s captain.

This was quietly comprehensive. The beginning was shaky, for sure. Richmond was dominant and on the occasions that we did go forward Rowan Marshall sprinted from one flank to another twice only to be served some very sad delivery. But soon enough it seemed as though Richmond were the ones working overtime for minimal reward. There were more groans of exasperation – and I’d add stunned gasps from Saints fans – than there were roars from what barely amounted to the interstate side-sized St Kilda crowd. 

Paddy Ryder, who plays for St Kilda, dominated the air on a wet night that simply wasn’t made for talls. Rowan Marshall did everything he could at his size on a wet night. I don’t know how healthy it is, how much we appear to rely on the combination, but at the very least soak up every second we have of Paddy Ryder wearing a St Kilda jumper. King and Higgins nailed their early set shots. Murmurs McKenzie managed to kick the first, and Ben Long made much of a positive physical impact as a small forward and echoed Murmurs’ goal with his own off the deck (nutmegging Wood) in the third as the Saints pulled away. Murmurs all but sealed it heading into half-time with a set shot from just on 50 metres. 

***

Surely even just some junk time goals from Richmond would make the score board all the more respectable? Even they never arrived. The novelty goals number of two would stand, a novelty score line of 2.10. Teams kick three goals rarely but often enough in a heavily professionalised era. Let the records list run: Richmond’s lowest score since kicking 0.8 in 1961 (which, incidentally, was against St Kilda and remains the last time a VFL/AFL side was held goalless). Richmond’s lowest score at the MCG since the 1927 Grand Final. St Kilda’s lowest score conceded since 1971.

A night of novelty indeed. Luke Dunstan best on ground, and featuring in “Who was your player of the round?” social media polls. St Kilda dominating on a Friday night at the MCG, dominating the reigning premiers no less. Leo Connolly, just generally. Dan McKenzie kicking the same number of goals as the opposition.

Maddie’s Match in 2017 inadvertently began the Tigers’ reign, and we might well have ended it in a 14% full MCG. The story since Friday night has been all about Richmond. St Kilda is not really a part of the story of the season, much less the last few years in the way the Tigers have, and if the Saints are their character arc has played out. The expectations, the frustrations, the inconsistency, which felt like it came to a head against the Crows and now this. “Where has that been all year?” This record-setting win against the reigning premiers defines this year and team just as much as the ridiculous loss to the reigning wooden spooners in the previous match.

Sometimes it’s your night, and it’s one of those nights for the opposition. This ended up having a feel of somewhere in between the St Kilda vs Geelong and St Kilda vs Bulldogs matches just a few weeks apart in 2016. Balta and Broad went down with serious injuries. Sinclair had energy for one last dance around an opponent tight on the boundary line in the final moments. Footy has been fickle for all fans since the beginning of last year. St Kilda has certainly been fickle for Saints fans. A contradiction. While another season faces its mortality, we have a few days to enjoy this result.

Round 13, 2021
St Kilda 4.3, 7.6, 8.9, 8.12 (60)
Adelaide Crows 0.0, 2.6, 6.6, 9.12 (66)
Crowd: 5,969 at Cazalys Stadium, Saturday, June 12th at 7.25pm

What started as the weekly whinge masquerading as a match “review”, like this is Pitchfork or something, ended up being a de facto mid-season review, or, just really a chance to collect my thoughts about what the hell has happened this year.

Taking a step back reveals an uglier picture than being in the weekly washing machine of lurching between pastings and moments of redemption. The West Coast win planted a seed into our heads that for every 86-point loss on a Thursday night there might be some sort of redemption just a week later; for every Max King or Jack Higgins miss that frittered away a chance to beat a premiership fancy (or similar) we may just be goal kicking practice away from solving all our issues (insert 2009 Grand Final inaccuracy reference here).

Much like we did against very unfancied North Melbourne and Fremantle last year (the latter with almost identical margin flips), we reannounced ourselves last Saturday night as a team with a flat-track bully streak. The Geelong, Sydney and West Coast (and GWS) performances aren’t enough to outweigh all the evidence to the contrary – we really CBF when things get tough. We’re back to playing like millionaires, exactly what we did when Brad Hill adorned the front page of the AFL Record heading into the Fremantle match last year as we emerged as a potential glamour and destination team.

The club again shrouded in questions about the mental – and perhaps physical – fortitude of the side that were asked earlier in the year, or at least it was before the week descended into a circus around Seb Ross and Tim Membrey and then whether what happened to Hunter Clark’s head was more within the laws of the than it was of legal consequence to the AFL in the years to come.

***

Who else can give up a game in which commentators are legitimately talking about the opposition being held scoreless for an entire half, and that record’s rare place in history? Adelaide’s 0.0 became of increasing interest as the second quarter furthered. They didn’t score until beyond the halfway mark of the second quarter, at all.

Until that point it all looked pretty slick. It felt right – you think it’s all working again, especially after another performance against a decent team in which only the goal kicking let you down. Mason Wood pulled out a couple of early goals with some slick moves, enough to prompt a teasing betting company-uses-meme Twitter post. Transition was slick. Dunstan pulled out the most direct and efficient single disposal of his career, a mark behind the centre circle, turn and long kick to the chest of Max King. Max had a couple of goals in the first half, including an excellent bit of body work at the top of the square and finesse to soccer through a goal.

Crouch was massive again. Steele is entering “needless to say” territory. Highmore was great across half back. Contested possession up by 20 at quarter time (we would end up losing it).

There were still moments of millionaire madness. Luke Darcy’s proclamation that Butler won’t miss was met with Butler missing. Lonie’s banana attempt at goal from a nothing angle. Higgins missed more set shots at goal, Max missed some too. All of this didn’t appear to matter while the Crows were still in the process of realising they were actually out on the ground. But once they did the result was two-and-a-half quarters in the making, never mind late goals in the second.

Yet again a St Kilda team was wiped away, or disappears. Maybe it chooses to, I don’t know. Maybe it chooses to just relax. There’s no killer instinct. The team wasn’t exhausted just beyond the midway point of the second quarter. Is it the effort? The effort (the lack of) seems to get a lot of the blame from the coaches. Do we just not try hard enough? Really, from the time Adelaide skittled through a few behinds, St Kilda was anonymous. Forward entries had no real design or intent, and any rare goals that slipped through (only three from that point, and none for the final hour) appeared to be met with relief.

This was going to be an Adelaide win, even if it took both of an umpire on the goal line saying “you tried to stop him from marking” to a defender, and a freak goal from a prodigy. The St Kilda extremes of bemusement and, well…bemusement. These things bend back on themselves and end up in a similar place.

And of course, the way it happens gives the opposition their own amazing highlight and hero. The Saints love making heroes of the opposition. Shane Ellen, Troy Wilson, Eric Mackenzie. The record will show Riley Thilthorpe kicked the last two goals of the game to win it off his own boot, including the winner over his head. McKay looks like a hero after Hamish had only reminded most of us early on in the broadcast that he still existed. Now he’s got more of a presence and profile than he ever did, lauded by his coach in the wash-up, free to play next week.

***

Our next game is a Friday night date with Richmond at the MCG (or, wherever it will be). We were destroyed by this team last time in a prime time slot; around that time we were drawn to play the Cats on a Friday night and considered a laughing stock by an annoyed public. We almost – almost – showed the football world we were better than that. But we didn’t, and we aren’t, and we are now in the midst of an internal review.

We’re also in the midst of a whole lot of mixed messaging and confusion. The club jumped at any going near a “Missy Higgins” headline, but behind closed doors was annoyed by Seb Ross and Tim Membrey spending time with their partners and newborns (and newborns-to-be). We want to be dynasty team, according to David Rath in the members’ forum held during the week, but after loading up at the last couple of trade periods the President’s letter from Andrew Basset suggested the “genuine window” would be open in 2022 more than 2021. Grant Thomas didn’t like like the revisionism,  saying it could easily be used – and, evidently, has been used – as a get-out-of-jail card. Do you hold an internal review if you feel like you’re on the brink? Only if you’re thinking some big changes will do it. Because a global pandemic won’t. A vaccine won’t. Not another lockdown.

Is it the name “St Kilda”? Should we have included “Moorabbin” in the club’s name as initially intended? We’d had 92 years without a premiership preceding the actual move to Moorabbin, so it’s not the plot of land at Linton Street. The red, yellow and black wasn’t wildly more successful than the usual red, white and black.

We’re back to this just being a lifestyle. Any path that appeared to be laid out before us during last year has again become overgrown. Perhaps we’re experiencing a Melbourne-style blip; until we watch them end another long premiership drought, comparisons with Geelong 2006 and Richmond 2016 remain far-fetched. St Kilda playing is again something that just happens on the weekend. I learned that I could hate the club in 2018. The Road to 2018 was actually a road to 2020 (they didn’t need to not factor a pandemic into things to get this wrong), and made as a PR exercise in response to a bewildered fan base. They even changed the fucking song for fuck’s sake. 

The St Kilda circus rolls on. It’s hard to keep caring. The only willing I felt last Saturday night was for the game to end. We knew what the result was going to be, the only thing we were waiting for was to see what it actually physically looked like, recorded on camera in high-definition video and audio. It’s beyond “If you don’t laugh, you’ll cry”. The joke’s worn thin and there’s nothing else to lose.

Round 12, 2021
Sydney Swans 4.6, 6.7, 10.11, 13.14 (92)
St Kilda 3.4, 5.7, 9.7, 12.11 (83)
Crowd: The AFL is still releasing these later than usual at the SCG, Saturday, June 5th at 1.45pm

Amid going back into lockdown, the Northern Territory making its biggest noise for an AFL team, and a mid-season draft, we’d quietly hit the middle weekend of the 23-week home and away season.

Going by March’s season previews, the broader footy community expected the Saints to probably come in around where they were last year at best, while at the same time many pre-empted admonishment of the club saying that they should be taking a step forward, given the younger guys coming through and the addition of Crouch, Frawley and McKernan to Hill, Ryder, Hannebery, etc.

We probably weren’t expecting to be waking up on the first Saturday morning of June in another lockdown with the Demons having cemented their spot at the top of the ladder, while our mates from the 2013 and 2014 drafts the Bont and Trac run around as the competition’s best two players. Nick Hind and Tom Hickey are the recruits of the year, and we now have Richmond’s drafting of Matty Parker to add to the anxiety files (but also I hope he’s awesome there. Mid-season draft bonus: We don’t have two tall Kings – yet – but we do have two tall Maxes.)

The Geelong loss a month ago left me feeling flat as fuck. After a couple of weeks of sorting itself our, the team came out as if it was primed to take on a premiership fancy on the Friday night stage. In front of a home crowd, The Messiah played the kind of game we hoped he would deliver, roaming around and clunking marks, doing everything except kick straight, kicking us out of it in the process. We physically took the ground the week after at most, and then turned in an uninspiring performance last week.

We were due for our once every three or four weeks decent performance, and this one would be uncomfortably, so-unbelievably-it’s-believably similar in style to the Cats loss, except the protagonist was 10 inches shorter. By the time Buddy weaved his way through the forward pocket and a 50-metre penalty had taken Rowbottom to the goal line late on Saturday afternoon, there was no air left. We were just sacks of skin on the couch.

***

Jack Higgins has ridden a wave of goodwill during his Sainthood. Footage has been readily dug up of him on camera in the crowd as a happy young Saints fan during the club’s biggest win in its 148-year history (and in the peak several weeks of the GT era) and in the final quarter of the 2009 Preliminary Final (in the peak match of the Ross era). Today, in his role as the protagonist, he was a hero turned incredibly sympathetic antagonist, and there might be some thinking they were a bit harsh on Max in the fall-out a few weeks ago.

A quick coffee run at half-time to Code Black meant some in-car SEN analysis that included quick chat about Seb’s miss in the shadows of half-time. Justin Leppitsch said it wouldn’t be an issue for the players, because they would move on in the moment faster and be making their own mistakes, while it would take a lot more for a fan to let it go.

For the second time in a month we have a lifelong St Kilda supporter playing what for all intents and purposes is a their breakout game (at least in red, white and black), and a match-winning one at that. I have the feeling that no one would be more upset by this than Higgins (I’m basing this on armchair psychology and his reaction on the siren and post-match). Going by Max’s performances since then, nor is anyone more upset than he is that what happened against the Cats – notwithstanding his back injury issues heading into and during the game yesterday.

Perhaps because of that injury, Higgins played the role of a tall roaming forward, the kind that he and Max would have enjoyed from another former number 12. Higgins took 12 marks as a lead-up target, repeatedly presenting up to the wings. No one else seemed to do it, or able to do within the framework of the team – especially once Wood was subbed out early after a promising start – while Membrey had his hands full in defence and Josh Battle anonymous for most of the match.

As the game wore on, Higgins appeared to rush his set shots in the way that Max appeared to, almost as if to not give a chance for any of those doubts that might have built up in his head to creep in before he’d taken the kick. But defeating your demons doesn’t mean avoiding them (I guess; I’m crippled by fear and anxiety and a lack of confidence).

King himself was mostly anonymous outside of some very prominent moments, understandable in the context of smashed confidence, and even more so given his back injury. He took a huge mark in the goalsquare in the final seconds of the first quarter, and then in the final quarter charged at the ball at ground level to a deep entry and gave off quick hands to Membrey for a goal, and winning a 50 metre penalty for Josh Battle and then a holding the ball free kick, both in curious circumstances, in the final quarter.

He missed the set shot from the latter.

Is it a St Kilda thing? Are we carrying the only two players in the competition who could dominate a game and kick 1.5 and 1.6 in a manner that would starkly change the result? Given this team’s troubles with goal kicking after several years (since the 2009 Grand Final?) I would say yes, yes it is a St Kilda thing.

***

SEN pre-match included some light-hearted discussion around Brett Ratten’s comments that we hadn’t played well and were still sitting at 5-6. We’ve certainly played two games against top eight teams that really left us wondering about the finishing rather than anything else. Again, there wasn’t a huge amount you’d change around the ground. There were some glaring moments that you’d expect from, well, any Saints team at any point in history. Messing around with the ball a little too much in the middle of the ground was costly (Dunstan a repeat offender, and Hill also featured in the missed handballs file), as well as some wayward forward entries (Byrnes right over the leading Membrey’s head in the third, Dunstan’s daisy-cutter early in the last).

Membrey again played a herculean performance in hostile territory interstate, only to have a close match slip away, by hook or by crook or by shank. He kicked big goals in the third and final quarters around the body, while also magically appearing at the other end of the ground to hold up the last line of defence multiple times.

Brad Hill set about rectifying the almost-funny six touches of the previous week and had 18 to half-time, although finished “only” with 25. Steele willed himself around the ground. Brad Crouch was everywhere, getting the ball and giving it to teammates, and finished with 38 touches and seven tackles. Along with Steele, he seemed to step up every time the Swans appeared to get the upper hand, Sinclair continued his very good season off half-back.

Highmore was used in defence, and then attack (he got very excited about Membrey’s goal in the third and celebrated into the goal umpire), and then the wing. Byrnes and Clavarino, and both had good moments, particularly Byrnes with a couple of goals, but the idea of getting games into them adds to the idea this season is slipping away into a manic slop.

***

The Fox Footy team did their utmost to wind up the not-so-seismic Sydney Swans vs St Kilda At the SCG fixture all they could. Footage of the one-point 2009 win to go 18-0, and Plugger’s 1994 demolition derby en route to one of the more famous comeback victories (and also by one point). (They did skip the stirring 1997 win in Round 19, as well as the Swans’ two-point victory in the 1998 Qualifying Final, following St Kilda’s 101-point win earlier in the year).

The small roar of the supporters of an interstate team on the charge is a distinct sound. “He thinks he’s Stewie Loewe!” was the cry from Garry Lyon as Higgins wheeled around for what would be his fifth point. Each of Higgins’ marks in the final minutes, with the excited roar of the St Kilda crowd, were dramatic – the lead-up high mark, and then a sliding mark several deep. Could haves. Should haves. Would haves, too. The moments they would have become, what they would have meant for this season, or for this playing group.

The final seconds of each quarter yielded notable happenings. King’s big mark in the goal square and goal in the first, Parker and Hayward’s goals in the third and last, and Seb’s wild miss running in goal face ahead of half-time. Seb Ross’s miss took us to 5.7, and by the end of the afternoon we were 5-7. We went 5-7 at the SCG in what was Ross Lyon’s second season and went on to finish in the top four and played in a Preliminary Final. I don’t think anyone is thinking we could, or should, be able to pull that off just yet.

Round 9, 2021
St Kilda 0.7, 3.11, 4.13, 5.17 (47)
Geelong Cats 2.1, 4.2, 6.6, 10.8 (68)
Crowd: 26,712 at Marvel Stadium, Friday, May 14th at 7.50pm

A few weeks ago it was considered outrageous that we’d be given a Friday night match (and a Saturday night following). This Friday night had all the air of a group that had set itself to take a big scalp on the big stage and reannounce itself to its fans and the rest of the footy world. Wins against a flat Hawthorn and an unconvincing Gold Coast were enough to think we might give this a shake (but still only 26,000 to turn up).

What we got a was a microcosm of St Kilda from 2000 onwards; ultimately an example of attaching ourselves to a Saints team through attrition. All those nights we spent at Colonial Stadium watching high-intensity losses and faltering finishes of a team featuring a young Roo, Lenny, Dal, et al.; watching Roo take charge of “the worst game ever” from centre half back and Daniel Wulf run in and hit the post, right through to Ben Long and Paddy McCartin bringing back a team to level with GWS and a ballooning Stuv kick going just too high for Jake Carlisle in the last seconds, and the umpire missing an over the shoulder call.

But there was all the other side of this century rolled into it too. This club has been coming down from the Riewoldt generation for years, and – neatly coinciding with the turn of the decade – finally was able to experience the present and look to the future. It’s 12 years on from 2009 – 11 including 2010 – but it’s starting to feel old. Or part of a different era, at least? Of course there are hallmarks, but we’re not quite entirely consumed by the comedown of the Grand Finals and the Riewoldt generation. Also, the past never dies. There is something about the Cats. That rivalry of the 2000s has never gone away for us, while the Cats have gone to a decade since that has featured a premiership, another Grand Final, and constant finals appearances. The navy and white hoops perennially represent trouble.

Yes, you can find traces of history in everything if you look hard enough, but there was simply too much going on here. We had Round 14, 2009 wheeled out during the week as you’d expect. That’s an afternoon that really just now brings a sadness, that that group of players never saluted, and the frittering away of multiple shots on goal on Grand Final Day of that year, down by one goal when the siren went despite huge pressure and not doing much wrong around the ground (our final score was 68 in the 2009 and 2019 Grand Finals; Geelong last night kicked the same).

Would have, could have, should have. The tone was set early with Marshall missing. And then Max King. And then Membrey. These weren’t hard shots. Max King would have torn the game apart, but for poor kicking. Bad kicking is bad football, and his ability to take in 10 marks can co-exist with his ongoing want to shank set shots. Our equivalent of a toe-poke moment in the third quarter (see how much lower the stakes are for us) ended up with our Messiah tripping over his own feet. Membrey was right there but, given his chest mark drop just before the siren a couple of minutes later, who the hell knows how that would have turned out. Tuohy glided through and away without breaking stride. Lonie’s effort backing into two oncoming Cats deserved so much more than that, and, watching the replay, deserved BT to actually call him as “Lonie”, not “Higgins”). Anyone who watched Front Bar would have seen Heath Shaw talking about the 2010 Grand Final Replay smother. This felt like some sort of horrible reverse 2009 toe-poke and smother mash-up.

The roar and groan was the anguish and frustration of a supporter base learning in real time that tonight is not its time, and this is not yet its not yet its time. Maybe soon, but there’s more waiting required.

***

For a few days at least, Max King is his own topic of discussion. Goal kicking is something that can be fixed, and we should note that he has been building towards a performance in which his presence genuinely becomes a cause for anxiety. He’s now kicked 13.18 this year (and 35.38 in his career). He took 10 marks in an otherwise towering performance, let alone what he’s shown he can do at the fall of the ball or moving through opponents in the forward line. He is still 20 years old and has played 26 games, having missed effectively the entirety of his Under 18 year with an ACL and almost all of 2019 due to the recovery and then a syndesmosis injury. He is way, way ahead of where he should be, or where anyone else would be. He remains our next Messiah. He’s a tall unmissable forward, he grew up as a St Kilda supporter, he wears number 12.

An unwillingness from umpires to not pay holding the ball or incorrect disposal against Geelong players, yet pay a mark clearly dropped at their half-back and then get sucked in by Gary Rohan’s dive, giving them a goal. When I think about this the more indignant parts of me scream that they’ve been doing it since Tom Hawkins hit the post in the second quarter of 2009 (and including to the point where several minutes of free rides from the 2010 Qualifying Final was compiled for YouTube; now sadly taken down). Brad Hill legged and holding the ball, Ratugolea awarded a mark with Ryder in front. Max King hit the post to bring the margin back to 10 points in the final term and firmly wrestle back the momentum but hit the post, and the ball went straight up the other end to the guy who hit that post in 2009, who kicked the sealer. Straight through.

The umpiring generally was enough to draw out an aggressive comment from a St Kilda coach. The last time that I really remember that happening led to Whispers in the Sky, but it’s still refreshing to have someone who is universally respected across the AFL landscape and having a crack at the AFL also be the coach of St Kilda. I think he is getting very attached to the team and the club.

For all of those wayward decisions, the St Kilda Football Club will raise us all of those set shots and missed opportunities that when into the 0.9 start and the 5.17 finish (not that we need any real reminding or convincing). King tripping over, Membrey dropping the chest mark (I smacked the seat next to me twice and my hand remains sore but in a stable condition), Ben Long being unable to land the ball anywhere near the advantage of Josh Battle charging goalward, Hunter Clark fended off an opponent and kicked over the top of the leading Membrey’s head.

The best and worst thing is that nothing really needed to change around the ground, at all. For all intents and purposes, this was our best performance of the year. Again, how much can a team rely on a 33-year-old ruckman at his third club? More than it does Rowan Marshall, who might be our second most important player. His loss in the third quarter coincided with a drop in share of the footy, but even while Crouch was off the ground and without Zak Jones, we still had the opportunities on goal. They were good chances all the way throughout, too. Whereas the 8.15 scoreline against the Suns made perfect sense because our ball use and movement going forward meant so many of the shots were rushed or from difficult angles, this 5.17 was purely waste.

***

Geelong always appeared to have another gear. The no-frills rebound that led to Hawkins’ first goal, the combination of their widely-acknowledged bigger bodies that ties in with their game style, but the addition of Isaac Smith and Higgins with Cameron, Hawkins and Rohan up forward gives them a rightful confidence they can move the ball a little more quickly. Menegola’s care-free goal off a step at that crucial moment early in the last, Rohan making the most of his gift chance, Hawkins putting the sealer straight through without a care.

And yet, we were sitting back in our usual seats, having lost lost to Richmond here in our last prime time outing by 86 points, and had the team that beat the tigers last week by 63 on the ropes. We could be going 5-4! Maybe we’re back! Some short-term redemption, at least, for a horrible three-out-of-four weeks. Instead, we left the ground like a loose cable snaking around and spitting our sparks and smoke. It’s draining and exhausting in the moment. It’s a fucking whirlwind and it’s overwhelming. It’s frustrating, comical, infuriating and embarrassing. A volatile mix of pride and frustration and indignity.

These are the games that get you attached to a team. Matt said it was a surreal night at the footy. It did feel that way. Things get surreal when they matter again, and as you learn to trust a group with representing the St Kilda Football Club, as you feel a pang of disappointment as you learn Rowan Marshall is out of the game and that Brad Crouch is being assessed. After coming down from a cagey walk in the post-game crowd crush and the tram trip home, thinking about umpires and Geelong and missed shots at goal and 2009, and after going over Friday night again and reliving it through writing this, I land back here on a Sunday evening in 2021, thinking about Max King and Rowan Marshall and Dan Butler and Jack Higgins and Hunter Clark, and that rather than pulling us down, the timeline for this team is now unfolding in front of us.