A week off

The Footy Bogan takes the opportunity to watch an enjoyable game of footy: St Kilda v Fremantle.


I'm sorry, Mr Malthouse; you're wrong. Teams do come to play; and others don't. Round 18, St Kilda, bottom of the ladder, came to play; Fremantle, looking to finish the year top two, didn't. There's just no more apt way to describe it.

The footy gods were against St Kilda. Going in, they'd lost 11 games in a row; Fremantle had won 8. The Saints lost Dempster to concussion early in the first quarter. What hope now, the wooden spooner?

But the play! Oh, the play! They fought and ran and tackled and ran some more. Riewoldt up forward taking marks was expected; Stanley, not so much. The call from the commentators was for Lenny to play on.

St Kilda were not always clean; they committed their share of clangers. But they completely out-Femantled Fremantle. They hunted in packs; they tackled in multiples. They kept applying pressure. Note that none of these characteristics refers to football brilliance. There was no mark of the year; no goal of the year. (Some of Stanley's marks were impressive.) Just hard work, tackling and pressure. Even the cellar dwellers can do that. And they did. As a result, they didn't look like cellar dwellers at all. Actually, Freo did.

They had some luck; but they also made their own luck. A player attempts to take possession in the forward pocket, fumbles but pushes the ball in front of goals - where Riewoldt runs on to it and snaps from 15. At no stage did any player try to do it all. Get the ball; move it on quickly. Get the ball; hold it up; wait for an opportunity; pass into F50. The stingy Fremantle defence was split wide open. St Kilda players kept running; as they did, the constellation in F50 changed. Crowded one instant, wide open the next.

A St Kilda player makes a lead to the flank imploring his team mate for a pass. The excitement attracts a crowd of defenders. Behind him, two Fremantle players are momentarily static, no natural opponent in the vicinity. A St Kilda player leads to a point between the defenders - and marks unopposed, the two Fremantle players trailing in his wake for the last few steps.

Eddie makes a salient observation: the St Kilda supporters deserve a medal next to their memberships for sticking with them through the bad times. That's really what footy is about: sticking fat through the hard times. Because the unexpected against-all-odds victory is the sweetest.

In the end, St Kilda played very attractive footy. Because, of course, the more they stuck to the basics, the more their confidence grew. In the third quarter, the ball movement was a delight to behold.

Watching Savage, I wondered whether we'd got the wrong ex-Hawk.

If, like me, you haven't seen any good footy this year, I can recommend this game.