Contrary to what people who love content say, there's nothing wrong with an end of year slopfest between rubbish sides. Feel free to explain how this game would've been more interesting if played as part of Group D in the AFL Mid-Season Cup. The moment it was over it meant nothing, but we won, and mysteriously picked a windy day to start kicking set shots so who's complaining?
The MCC will be right behind mid-year cup games in front of 1500 people at Arden Street because it will clear the July calendar for them to put on half-baked friendlies involving popular European soccer teams. It's obviously a for profit organisation now anyway (though I bet not as far as the taxman knows), or they wouldn't shut half the stadium and create Chinese traffic jam style congestion in the lower concourse at half time.
One thing I'll say for the clods who run the place is that nobody expected the third largest home and away crowd ever between these sides. Bad news for the lucky ground staff who got a shift and thought they were going to have an easy day with none of the usual Collingwood fans smuggling in guns or texting in threats to Michael Voss, only to end up managing people movement more chaotic than the Fall of Saigon.
Big club fans would scoff over 35,844, but it's off the charts considering where these teams are at. The turnout can either be credited to whoever came up with the Kid's Day theme, or both sets of fans thinking their side was a chance of winning. Neither applied to me, it just happened to be a rare case of my schedule aligning with the fixture instead of Melbourne either being interstate or having a bye every time I was free to go. This was by no means worth watching again, but it did leave me 2-2 in live games this season. It doesn't make up for all the great wins missed in our fleeting glory era, but it's a Melksham-esque comeback from watching our season-defining capitulation to North.
Other than a few trashbag quarters spread over to games against Gold Coast we'd been better than you'd expect from a 5-11 team but that's a pretty sad consolation prize. The highs haven't lasted long enough, which is why we're in this mess. Still, this result puts the Spitebury Plan back on the agenda, as we're now one spot ahead of last year. In 2024 we finished 14th with 11 wins, now there will be (restrained) street parties and possible mid-table mediocrity if we get that. It's a funny old game.
The theme may have been young people (and lucky we didn't lose, or it would have been called the Hitting The Skids Game), but our only attempt to match it on-field was playing Jefferson even though he's got the physical presence of Cale Morton on a three week hunger strike. I'm pleased to say that even adjusting for opposition quality this was easily his best game, but I'll still be huffing oxygen before Round 1, 2026 if we haven't found somebody sturdier to play down there.
I'm all for the playing of what limited 'kids' we have, but after Gawn's rare hands-down loss at the hands of North last time, I'm biased by novelty but thought this might be the week to go down the other end of the age/experience scale and give him some help by picking Tom Campbell. Instead we opted for the proven strategy of running Gawn into the ground/costing van Rooyen vital development time as a forward, but we won (not because of either of these things) so after recent disappointments I'll take it.
Joy of premiership points aside, I still think we're heading towards a massive cliff in the next couple of years. After looking like they were about to rocket past us in Round 2, North has settled back into the 'emerging' category, waiting for enough draft picks to pay off so they're not still in a crumpled heap by the time we get there. North showed signs for the future here, but as we know from the #fistedforever decade sometimes teams build to a certain point, then nuke themselves with internal turmoil and general stupidity.
If we'd lost you can guarantee I'd be saying it looked like going wrong the moment Pickett swooped on the ball at the first centre contest, then stuffed up a bounce which led to North going into attack. It wasn't good, but struggles to qualify for the top 20 blunders in a first half where we took bad options, and handballed like everyone was wearing a prosthetic arm. The good news was that we looked inept, but North failed to make the distance from a 40 metre set shot and it's lucky Essendon and Richmond had just put on a game so bad nothing could compare.
In the end, this turned out a decent game if you could turn your brain off and accept that both sides had fatal flaws. Unlike most of our games it may have even had some attraction for neutrals, even if the appeal was more of the slapstick "thank god this isn't us" variety. For about five seconds it looked like we might be on our way, despite North having plenty of opportunities we got two goals from close range. The closest of range for the first one, with Pickett disposing of his opponent and waltzing into an open goal. Turned out that was about as far out as he was comfortable with in this game, going on to miss a couple of sitters and generally not doing much. They can't all be classic performances.
We were held back early by North dominating stoppages and generally playing keepings off (actual analysis from their perspective here), but they weren't good enough to do anything with the majority of possession. Might have been different if Nick Larkey was out there, but the late withdrawal of Steven May was covered by Tom McDonald walking back into the side like Hulk Hogan entering Madison Square Garden and saving us on several occasions. In light of Melksham having an all-time career renaissance they'd be insane to rush him out the door at the end of this year, but I can understand if he wanted to have one or two seasons elsewhere at either end of the ground instead of touring dogshit covered suburban grounds in the VFL.
The McSizzle comeback story was helped by North picking a shitload of tall defenders to take on a forward line where the key position players haven't fired a shot in 12 months. Given that May wasn't there, his replacement hadn't played seniors in two months, Lever has been ropey, and we're the #1 side in the competition for letting players have one-off great career games, they should've sent whichever backmen had the least career goals into attack and let him run riot. At first, this didn't seem necessary, Paul Curtis continuing his hammering of us from Round 2, before Boomer Harvey Jr. signed up for the Kingsley shortlist by kicking four goals after barely playing a game in three years.
I usually trust the votes from the coaches as a better professional indication of the best players than me deciding everything on the vibe, but it's a mystery to me how they both had Petracca best on ground when he spent the first three quarters shanking kicks all over the place. Either that or the bit where he burnt JVR to a crisp inside 50 and instead made Langford try to bring back the spirit of that Hawthorn game where he was pulling down contested marks like a madman. No fault on the effort but you've got to do something when you get it. On the other hand Salem got nil when I thought this was his best game for years, so either that award has gone midfielder-only too, or I know dick. Pretty sure it's the latter.
The lead felt a bit flimsy (not as much as last week mind you), so I wasn't all that surprised when North were suddenly in front. It was all a bit Round 2, we seemed the better team but couldn't get far enough ahead to shake them off, leaving open the prospect of another epic last quarter implosion. Speaking of playing the hits, we did a DemonTime special to end the quarter, horrifically blowing what should have been a safe exit from defence, and turning it into a shot on goal for North. When they got another one minute into the second quarter I was mentally preparing for fans to enter carnage mode.
Appropriately, this was my once a year trip to the Redlegs seats, and while the regulars were pretty calm I could sense they were ready to blow up if things didn't get better. It wasn't your storm the race and abuse the players type audience, but they were definitely ready to sook up in the workplace, on talkback, and across the internet. I was a bit unmoved by the prospect of losing by a reasonable margin. Another white flag waving disaster would be different, but I was just sitting there thinking this was all very much on brand for Melbourne 2025. And as we've struggled to beat North in recent years even when good (plus one random thumping that makes no sense now), another loss here would be no surprise. None of us would like it, but you'd hardly bust out the spraypaint or dump chicken hearts on the steps at this stage of the season.
The turnaround - which had the gentle turning circle of an ocean liner - started in the most unexpected circumstances. After twice kicking out on the full from the right forward pocket, Jefferson tried his luck from the left side and converted. Then what was heading towards the best game Fritsch has played in over 12 months continued with him setting up Langdon for a snap and the game looked to be back on our terms. They certainly weren't being allowed to happily punt the ball around amongst themselves anymore, though we were still doing our best for blooper compilation videos with wacky turnovers.
Just when you thought we might go on with it, there was a few minutes of the bonkers goalkicking you've come to associate with this season. Unlike some other weeks they had the decent excuse of a crosswind, which makes it even more ridiculous that by the end of the game we were potting set shots like they were training drills. Where was that at [insert every venue we've played at, but especially Alice Springs]?
It still looked to be going our way when Chandler kicked his first, before we spent the rest of the first half on the back foot looking vulnerable to complete structual collapse at any moment. But thanks to playing a team very much in our weight division, they couldn't take advantage. There were set shots that missed, set shots that fell short, and snaps to a wide open goalsquare that went wide. Meanwhile, with Melksham off the ground with what looked at first like a blown shoulder/elbow (but turned out to be a minor inconvenience), our forward line was invisible again.
The second half was a lot more watchable, and not just because we won reasonably easily. I'd had enough of listening to people talking nonsense around me so fled for the only available level 4 safety in the Olympic Stand. The transfer via the ground floor of the Southern Stand was where I discovered the absurd crowd crush. The queues for food took up about 80% of the available space, forcing people moving in both directions to squeeze past each other against the fence behind the seats. It was dangerous as fuck, and anyone who had to get kids through there should be seething. One day somebody will shout fire or cause a commotion in a situation like this and people will die. Feel free to send the MCC a complaint and see if you have better luck getting a response than either time I've written in to the cowards.
Once I had the traditional several rows of free space, my attitude to attending games at half shut stadiums improved. Before it got better on-field, we had to survive a few minutes of pressure. It got better from the unexpected source of a Gawn free kick. When the free was paid Xerri implored the umpire to watch a replay on the big screen as if that ever works, and they didn't shown one anyway. It was threatening to rain and the scoreboard operators were obviously trying to find that cringy window wiper animation. Xerri would be involved in another incident later that didn't get a replay, and in that case he was probably happy not to see it.
Maximum lined up free from a distance that freed him from the pressure of a normal set shot and he delivered one of his classic intercontinental ballistic missile roosts that flies through post high from 60 metres. It felt like North had done all they could and were ready to lie down, we just had to put them away before they got a second wind. Their mini-revival started with the popular method of winning a free kick by diving headfirst into a tackle while pretending you really wanted to get the ball.
Melksham responded, before Lever and Turner had a "you first, no you first" disaster at the other end. They nearly got another after we gave a player all the time in the world to pick his spot before he hit the post, then they dropped a mark unopposed in the square. Then, after doing bugger all for 2.5 quarters, Zuurhar went from last in the phonebook to first in goalkicking with his third goal of the term. That cut the margin to three points, and within a few minutes we'd gone from the verge of running away with this to playing spooked again.
It took a bit of luck to get us going again. We'd just stuffed up a chance when multiple players got in the way of Jefferson's lead, but from the bounce Chandler snatched the ball off a pack for a neat snap. After a few weeks where he didn't have much influence, this was a good time for Chandler to play well before they did something silly like dropping him for Spargo. Then we got even luckier when a North defender was pinched for deliberate in the dying seconds. Not that he didn't do it, but bad luck finding the one umpire in 10 who'd pay the free under those circumstances. There's no way the same thing would happen late in a thrilling last quarter, or at any ground where the penalised team had a majority of fans but it worked for us here so happy days.
Those goals gave us a 16 point lead, but I still wasn't convinced it would be enough. We looked vulnerable in defence, and couldn't rely on the forward line to end it. I could imagine a quarter of the teams punting it back and forth to each other in the middle of the ground, and us falling over the line by a single digit margin after three goals were kicked in total. Instead, it ended like the West Coast game, where both teams chucked defence out the window and churned out a total score far beyond what the contest deserved.
Enter Melksham, continuing the greatest career revival since John Howard, for two goals in a row. Both were lovely, low, slicing set shots that beat the windy conditions. It made him the first Melbourne player to kick four goals three weeks in a row since prime David Neitz, which is both a great achievement for him and an indictment on 20 years of our forward lines. Then Tholstrup kicked a very nice one from close range to theoretically seal it. It's good that he had this positive moment, because he pretty much did nothing else and somehow became the only Melbourne played fined for wrestling despite multiple grapples during the last quarter.
There was a bit of 'surely not' when North got two goals in a row, but there was no realistic way of us crumbling from here. Doesn't mean I wasn't still shitscared of it happening at the time. Any half chance of something stupid happening was finally rubbed out by Petracca's goal, and all that was left was to get through to the the final siren and go home happy.
Tom Sparrow wishes it had been that simple, because he ended the game being carted off in a neckbrace after being knocked out cold in a collision with Xerri's swinging fist. I was watching when it happened but must've blinked at just the moment of impact because when the crowd went "oooh" and Gawn took off to retaliate I had absolutely no bloody idea what was going on. It was quite a hit because he was out before hitting the ground, and for obvious reasons it took several minutes to make sure he was alright and get Sparrow off the ground.
After other famous incidents where one of our players was clobbered into oblivion, I don't blame the players for flying the flag and going for Xerri but realistically it was an accident. Less of the alleged 'football action' than the Maynard incident, more just recklessly hanging a ruckman sized clenched hand in traffic where anyone could be running. Lucky he didn't collect an umpire in the week the AFL pretended to crack down contact with officials or they'd have given him 30 weeks, but three seemed a fair result for the combination of action and outcome.
Somehow not a single Melbourne player was fined for the afters, though it would be funny if Oliver got fined despite his fake commitment to the fake fight, as he grabbed a partner for some swing dancing and was clearly going through the motions in the hope of not having to write a cheque.
And, err, that was it. The prospect of a serious injury took a bit of joy from the last few minutes, but once Sparrow was confirmed to be in decent shape I was happy to focus on the enjoyment of gathering premiership points and trying to pretend this result meant anything for our future.
Next Week
We won't beat good teams playing like this, so thank god we're playing Carlton next. I'm not assuming victory because it would be pure Melbourne to kick 5.26 and lose to a side who look like they all want to curl up in a ball and die, but it's an opportunity for two in a row.
I didn't know the Casey game was on (let alone on TV) until half time and missed the quarter when they beat the piss out of Werribee. By the second half it was just half a side of AFL listed players going around semi-professionals like traffic cones and (surprise, surprise) lacking forward power to win by a huge margin.
There was certainly nothing to throw selection into chaos, as if we're not just going to be ultra-conservative losers for the rest of the year anyway. Maybe they scratched the itch was first gamers in Round 1? I'd forgotten Henderson existed until he made the squad here, and it's sad that nobody important cares enough about these things to ask how he ended up playing that game after a pre-season campaign consisting of one practice match for another club. I assume his two touches in this VFL game were down to playing limited time then being packed away in case he was required on Sunday. I'm happy for him to hang around as depth next year, but nothing in the first five games of the year suggested he's the answer to any question.
It's too late for four club Campbell now, so in the interest of not tormenting Gawn's body it's time to give Will Verrall a crack. He might have rucked on Saturday against somebody who's taken the game up in the last week for all I know, but everyone except our selectors is aware that it's time to start playing randoms.
A few weeks after I moved him to the recycling bin (immediately before getting a new contract) Kentfield took a couple of contested marks that made you think he could cope with the shitbox delivery into our forward line, then I looked at the stats and he only had three marks total for the game. Now that Jefferson has had a positive performance he may have missed the boat, but there's something to work on for next year. He could get a token run as part of any late season throwing of magnets - see also Adams, Brown, Laurie etc... Not Billings, because with respect it won't help with future development or protect anyone important from snapping in two.
And I've got NFI why they picked Windsor here only to make him the sub, but there's no point not playing him for the rest of the year. Also from the NFI file, how team balance would work with my proposed changes but it's not like they're going to happen anyway so it won't be an issue.
IN: May, Verrall
OUT: Sparrow (inj), Tholstrup (omit)
LUCKY: Lindsay, Windsor
UNLUCKY: Campbell, Laurie, Petty
2025 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Christian Salem
4 - Jake Melksham
3 - Tom McDonald
2 - Bayley Fritsch
1 - Harvey Langford
Apologies to Chandler, Gawn, Petracca (for effort over execution) and Viney
Leaderboard
Six games left, 30 points on offer, pretty much everyone eliminated. Gawn would need to fall down a well and Pickett play out of his skin to win it from here, but for now there's hope for everyone all the way to the Melksham miracle. In the minors, Langford is already the moral winner of the still unnamed Rising Star Award but is still vulnerable to being swept away by a single BOG from Lindsay.
46 - Max Gawn (WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
29 - Kysaiah Pickett
24 - Jake Melksham
20 - Jake Bowey (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
17 - Christian Petracca
--- Abandon all hope ye beyond here ---
15 - Daniel Turner
14 - Clayton Oliver
13 - Steven May
11 - Harvey Langford (LEADER: Rising Star Award), Tom McDonald
9 - Kade Chandler, Ed Langdon
8 - Christian Salem
7 - Xavier Lindsay, Jack Viney
4 - Bayley Fritsch, Tom Sparrow
2 - Jake Lever, Harrison Petty, Trent Rivers
1 - Harry Sharp
Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
With apologies to any of Melksham's set shots, or the Tholstrup curler in the last quarter, Chandler's snap in the third was both important and aesthetically pleasing so it wins the weekly nomination. Pickett vs Port still leads overall.
Final thoughts
Imagine how excited you'd be if this was a cup quarter final?
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