More like it

In a growing trend of farcical scenarios involving me and the AFLW premiership season, I thought the game started at 7.30, and fortunately tuned in slightly early to find we were already a goal up. Which, it goes without saying, is better than the alternative. Especially if you also have injury list nerves, and thought that this might be the night for the sort of zany upset we've avoided for several years. 

The absences of mystery neck region injury victims Austin and Hore shouldn't have spooked me so badly, but it did. This paranoia was the centrepiece of a rare in-depth all-male workplace W chat on Thursday, as I tried to convince Mr. Richmond Fanatic that they were every possible chance of keeping this interesting. Which I suppose was technically true, if you count playing victim to our third highest score. Despite that, I hope he wasn't cursing me in front of the TV for raising the prospect of a fiasco, because if you exclude sort of important elements like the score and the margin, Richmond weren't too bad. Call it a moral honourable loss if you want. 

We'll just have to be content with premiership points, guaranteed finals football, and ongoing participation in the surprisingly competitive race for a double chance. This lacked the savagery of some of our other big scores, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. At this stage of the season, a glorified training session against traffic cones wouldn't have done much good. Better to get a bit of a test before going nuclear. Buggered if I know what it means for the rest of the season, but it's exactly what was required after that blip against the Suns last week. New glamour club Gold Coast (a status that lasted one week) may have broken their duck against us, but the Tigers are now 0-5. And if they're lucky with the inefficient AFLW fixturing, they could avoid dropping into double figures until the mid 2030s.    

I tuned in to find us pressing heavily for a second goal, but my prediction of a potential mishap briefly looked like genius when Richmond got one via a close-range snap through traffic (which we clearly took offence to, piling on about nine replies from point-blank distance), and spent a few minutes looking like another one was just around the corner. After a few anaemic attempts at scoring, I was lightly shitting it about the end of an era (moan/whinge/panic) when they got a free kick 30 metres out. It just failed to carry the distance and was touched through, kicking off a pre-quarter time glory era that began with a bit of luck, with an attempted pass to a player on her own in the square going wrong, but bouncing through to Livingstone for goalsquare stuffage. This was followed by a strong mark and set shot from Gall, and another to Wotherspoon after the siren that made things look a shitload better than they had a few minutes previous.

We're all about long-term storytelling at Demonblog.com (even though that shortcut still doesn't work, and frankly I CBF following it up), so went all-in on the Tahlia Fellows quest for a possession after starting her MFC career empty-handed. We're pleased to announce that she rocketed up the leaderboard with eight disposals, and now sits just one shy of former Rent-A-Player option Sarah D'Arcy. The all-important opener came in the first quarter, and she nearly got onto one in the forward pocket at the start of the second that would've lifted the roof off in these parts. 

Instead, after conceding early, we steadied after a Mahony free, which was arguably already holding the ball before the tackle slipped high, but no arguments from me. The standard these umpires judged holding the ball by, you could probably have seven bounces, then run into a tackle and throw the ball up in the air while playfully yelling "wheee!" and they'd have called play-on. We were the major beneficiary of this lax application of the rules, but mainly due to having the ball more often. To be fair, one of the field umpires got something right when they denied an outbreak of FellowsMania after her second kick nearly cleared multiple defenders in comical fashion. The goal umpire was 100% going to pay it, before the AFLW review system of the field umpire asking, "Are you sure it wasn't touched?" convinced him to change the decision. And, in this case, fair enough, but is somebody sitting in the ARC office getting paid to eat chips while these games are on and the umpires are working it out between themselves? If not, how did we get dudded by that review at Casey earlier in the year?   

Another goal may have killed the game off right there, but our cause wasn't helped by Bannan dropping a mark in the forward pocket, then fumbling the loose ball over the line. A sour post-boundary crossing bump from her opponent caused a bit of light push and shove that briefly looked like going nuclear before dying out without any acts of wanton aggression. Nevertheless, this was Bannan's best game all year. Maybe it had something to do with Gall playing deeper in Austin's absence, but if you're going to peak this would be a good time of the year to do it.

Usually, you'd never trust a 21 point half time lead, but in this case I considered our win probability to be 'Pretty bloody likely'. That was upgraded to 'Almost certain' care of Gall kicking the first of the third quarter. Thanks to the defender who contributed with a clumsy attempt at a tackle that gave away the free at a range even a middle-aged fatty like me could convert from, if AFLMAF ever becomes a thing.

It soon became clear that the strain of having a whole-hearted but mostly pointless crack in the second quarter was as good as it was going to get for the Tiges. Speculation that they'd realised there was nothing left to play for was helped by Fitzsimon doing the most casual soccer of all time through the middle of two defenders, with added momentum from another shoving her towards the loose ball. I sensed my Richmond contact shaking his head in disappointment when a kick-in went straight down Wotherspoon's throat, and from an ensuing goalmouth melee, Bannan activated floodgate release with another bit of crumb.

To even things up a bit for the viewing audience, the community-minded Heath-Barker got done for a free, then stood up and gave away a 50/goal for pushing her opponent over. The Match Review Officer saw it as a strike, aided in part by the opponent going over like she'd stepped barefoot onto an ice rink, but should be content that SHB didn't have a flashback to her taekwondo days and kick someone in the head like a Street Fighter character. The goal lasted about 30 seconds before Bannan willed a loose ball towards goal and kicked another one from close range. Even allowing for sub-par opposition quality, this was the best we'd looked since the opening quarter against North.

The crumbstravaganza continued with Wotherspoon booting another through off the ground, and at this point Richmond may have thought about introducing a goalkeeper. They didn't, and the next goal came from Harris rolling one through the as per usual unguarded square. It didn't feel like we should be nine goals in front before three quarter time, but as usual we give thanks for supporting a team which might have the odd down week but almost always bounces back quickly. 

We nearly extended the lead to 60 when Harris marked just before the siren. The Channel 7 producer refused to acknowledge this and started playing Fatman Scoop (you know the song, there's only one), before realising they had to wait for her to take the shot and shutting it off well before Mr. Scoop's famous question, "Who fuckin' tonight?" Answer - collectively - the 'mons, despite Harris missing here.

This could have gotten very ugly if Richmond didn't dig in for some grim last quarter defence. There was no sign of our side going easy, despite the 10 page injury list. Richmond did kick the first goal, but it again lasted all of one centre bounce before being cancelled out. The ball-up was so low that Campbell basically just pushed it forward, then regathered, ending in a Wotherspoon snap. Referring to somebody as 'a spoon' was a second rate insult in the early 90s, now you would be honoured to be referred to as a Wotherspoon.

We tried to make Richmond feel better by conceding a goal after kicking straight to them inside 50. This time it survived us pelting straight towards our attacking end from the restart, before we activated ALL IRISH ACTION. Where were the Stereotype Dancers when Goldrick randomly turned up inside 50 to set up Horisk's first career goal. E for name, A for effort, F for excitement, as she was completely nonplussed at opening her account, despite being vigorously mobbed by teammates. There was a theory on commentary that Irish players don't get as excited by goals, because in Gaelic Football they have to immediately start defending again. Which sounds like cobblers, but is just wacky enough to be true. Horisk then followed up with one of the worst set shots of all time, somehow hitting the player on the mark's hand despite going over the boundary line at near right angles. They can't all be classics.

In a classic case of death by a thousand cuts, we were up to 13.9 with several minutes left, and an outside chance of challenging the 107 points kicked against a COVID-ravaged Freo side who were forced to call around for players hours before the match. Then Wotherspoon got another from close to goal, running onto a loose ball, refusing to acknowledge the player attempting to tackle, and bringing up a career best fourth goal. This caused the ground announcer to make noises like their appendix was about to burst. 

Wotherspoon almost got a fifth with a kick off the outside of her boot, which promoted it to our all-time scoring podium. There was one last chance to ton up via a free from the Richmond player losing the will to live and not being arsed even to fake attempting to dispose of the ball. It ended in no score and we had to be content with just 94 points. Richmond had been better than conceding a score like this - but get used to it with games against Gold Coast and North to finish the year. 

But who cares what happens to them (although a blockbuster upset win against either would come in handy thanks), with two games to play before finals, it's all about getting ready for the important stuff/spicy reunion with Mick Stinear and a Geelong team in top form. If teams can stop our top players, and good luck keeping Hanks and Purcell away from collecting bulk possessions, they may be able to take advantage of some wonky depth players at the other end of the side. But is it not the same for all the top sides? Maybe not North, the only two time defending premier with the room to wheel a former #1 into their side, but I'm keen to find out how much further we can push things in 2026 before collapsing under the weight of injuries.

Whether any of this is good enough to beat form teams like North, Geelong, and Gold Coast (?) will become clearer soon. I'm genuinely baffled as to whether we're a legitimate Premiership threat or just hoping for top contenders to brutally stack it in front of us. Would be good to win it on merit, but I'm prepared to settle for the 'take advantage of the misfortune of others' method if it means flag.

Whinging about the AFL corner
This week the idea of the season starting even earlier was floated in one of those transparent "soft launch it with a journo" scams, then the league started spruiking how the all-time attendance record has been SHATTERED with two rounds to play. Which you can read in conjunction as 'they're definitely going to do this'. For whatever benefits are expected (e.g. attendance records set thanks to double headers), it's probably going to be the end of our half-baked AFLW coverage. I don't know how much time these dickheads think we've got in our lives for footy, but I've barely got enough to fully invest in one game a week, much less two. Especially if one will be taking place while I'm in transit to the other. 

My preference would be to ring in guest writers (or, if you're absolutely mad for it - a single Demonblog AFLW correspondent. I'll even pay you 99% of the profits generated by this site and Demonwiki combined) and continue posting. At the very least I want to keep the votes going just for the historical record, but I'm just gloomy at the prospect of not being able to watch this team as closely. You write 'Melbourne' on something AFLish (-North -Port -South), and I'll follow it, but a man's got to know his limitations. I'd rather post nothing than be basing it off highlights, or the sort of semi-interested/distracted attention I give Casey games.  

So, let them do what they like and find out the hard way that there's nowt to be gained from burying the women's game even further down the coverage ladder. I'll be here to say "I told you so" when the already limited novelty of double-headers wears off, players get sick of being treated like the All New Reserves, and the competition still has a niche - let's call it 'cult' - following, but with TV figures so low that coverage gets outsourced to the Home Shopping Channel.

Alternatively, it might be a smashing success. Which I won't have to admit if no longer posting.

2026 Daisy Pearce Medal votes
5 - Ryleigh Wotherspoon
4 - Tyla Hanks
3 - Olivia Purcell
2 - Georgia Campbell
1 - Alyssa Bannan

Apologies to Allen, Fitzsimon, Harris, Chaplin, and Mahony

Leaderboard
No matter what Purcell does, the task of overhauling Hanks is becoming more difficult by the week. Thanks to guaranteed finals, there's hope for her yet, but with the utmost respect, it would be shite for us overall if Hanks stopped scoring now, so may they both go 5-4 for the rest of the season in whatever order until the big one is in the bank. The minor awards are still open, but Allen looks home in the Rising Star and I'd be surprised if any of the ruck options polled from here to cost Campbell her inaugural win in the category. Stand by for a Lauren Pearce miracle comeback after winning in nine of the previous 10 years.

36 - Tyla Hanks
28 - Olivia Purcell
--- Needs three finals ---
16 - Tahlia Gillard (LEADER: Defender of the Year)
13 - Maeve Chaplin
--- Needs three finals and neck relief ---
12 - Kate Hore
--- Probably not going to happen ---
9 - Mia Austin
8 - Ryleigh Wotherspoon
7 - Tayla Harris, Eliza McNamara
6 - Jordyn Allen (LEADER: Rising Star Award)
3 - Georgia Campbell (LEADER: Ruck of the Year), Megan Fitzsimon
1 - Alyssa Bannan, Shelley Heath-Barker

Goal of the Week
The Wotherspoon snap was good, but Horisk gets the encouragement award for not only recovering from a dropped mark to kick her first career goal, but then displaying world class stoicism immediately after.

Next week
It's off to the Western Oval, graveyard of late season ambitions in the early stages of this competition, to play the good/not great Footscray. It's one thing walloping perennial strugglers like Richmond, this will be the real test of our chances of doing something memorable in the finals. As Hore and Austin are still stuck in TBC injury list hell, I doubt they're coming back. Paxman was managed this week, so we assume she returns. Otherwise, there's not much more in the tank other than picking Pisano for a week, then dropping her again. This could go either way, and if it doesn't turn out well I'm going to jump to conclusions about our finals campaign ending quickly. 

The All-New W. Bradbury Plan
Named after Steven's cousin Wendy, who won the meat tray raffle because holders of the first three tickets had already gone home.

Fremantle d. Geelong in an unexpectedly MFC-free Zanker/Stinear reunion
Richmond d. Gold Coast (unlikely)
West Coast d. Sydney (only slightly more likely)
North d. Adelaide (Long term thinking. I'm prepared to concede top spot to try and ruin Adelaide's morale before we play them in the last game)
GWS d. Carlton

And who gives a rats on Port vs Collingwood, St Kilda vs Brisbane, or Hawthorn vs Essendon.

Final thoughts
Apologies to anyone who I falsely led into thinking this might be close. Never mind, there are close games to come. Just not involving Richmond.

Great Barrier Grief

The management of Demonblog regrets to announce that due to a Self-Inflicted Colossal Kockup (SICK), for the first time, a match review will not be based on thoughts collected live during the game. In the shambolic early years (before the radicalisation of 2007 set my course for the Unabomber Manifesto Era), the odd match was skipped entirely due to competing priorities, and there was that time Kayo fritzed out on delayed viewing and blew the result, but while there have been some really half-arse posts over the years, I've never seen the result first, then watched a replay and reported on it.

Your views may vary, but there was a very good reason why I intended to watch this game on a three hour delay. Insert flashback harp music here, but two decades ago when I had spare time and would've put my head in the oven if you'd told me I'd survive to my mid-40s only to end up living on the urban fringe, I enjoyed several tremendous seasons watching South Melbourne in the late NSL/early state league era. It was the exact opposite of how I view AFL spectating, where other fans are best avoided, the community around that club made it great. 

Eventually, life got in the way and I had to pick one winter pursuit (and it's only getting worse, even my MFC membership came out to about $125 per game attended this year), but when South made the Australia Cup final, I morally owed it to the people who have battled on for the last 20 years to watch that live and come back to the top eight grading game at a ground sponsored by a water feature later. I'd still watch as if live, our reporting commitments would be fulfilled for the nine people who care, and we'd get back to the normal schedule next week. 

After South won, in circumstances that made it the second most satisfying thing I've ever watched on TV after the 2021 Grand Final, and the joy on the faces of true believers I met 25 years ago had me on the verge of tears for the first time since the blessed 25/09/21, it was just after 11pm and I was finally ready to switch gears back to something more relaxing. 

God only knows why, after just watching 120+ minutes of sport on my television, I decided it was a good idea to start the replay on my phone, but picked it up, accidentally opened Twitter, and instead of showing my feed that hadn't been refreshed since before either game started, it showed the dreaded 'For You' list - which decided what I really wanted at that point was a big fuck off graphic saying:

And they're not done yet 😎 #AFLWSunsDees https://t.co/KPaMJEtYzl

— AFL Women's (@aflwomens) October 10, 2026

Not much room for misinterpretation there. So I knew we'd lost, and god bless anyone who has the commitment to knowingly watch the replay of a loss, but for me it's all about the thrill of the chase, so I wasn't going to do even the most brutal time-slicing viewing just to see whether it was close or not. I just went back down the feed, looked at the MFC posts, and saw that after recovering a slow start, the last three quarters involved slow deflation of balloon, and a comfortable defeat.

You could complain about having to play at novelty venues like Mackay, but given how much benefit we've had from the 'unique' conditions at Casey over the years, it's only fair to occasionally get tripped up by playing somewhere exotic. It's happened in Cairns and Darwin before, and we'll probably lose our first match against Tasmania at the site of the Beaconsfield mine disaster, but need not be fatal IF the last three matches of the season can be successfully navigated with an injury-riddled list that required Rent-A-Player to fill the emergencies.

We may have had an emergency Burn, but at least it was the same week that Hose came back. And quite frankly, if this wasn't my only opportunity ever to do that gag then I may not have written a post at all. But, just a few weeks after being talked about as the only hope of stopping a North three-peat, we're in danger of being finished off by injuries. Has a team ever lost three more important players to above-shoulder injuries? 

And if you think this post is phoned in, I draw your attention to a) none of the player photos coming through, giving everyone the 'we have no idea who you are' generic silhouette, b) no indication of whether Hore's mystery neck is equivalent to McNamara's shattered jaw, and c) tooltips on the right that do nothing when you hover over them. As flagged last week, before Austin suffered a random case of throatus explodus, we're not even certain of a top four finish. 

Our good friends at AFL(W) Live Ladders still predict second, but even taking the risk of assuming avoidance of disaster against Richmond next week, there are big fat danger games against Footscray and Adelaide to follow, and there's still a chance of finishing as low as 7th. This is potentially disastrous considering how the season started, but as AFLW still uses the traditional (e.g. good) top eight, it will give me the chance to reboot all my sour complaints about the men's competition wildcard. So not all bad news then.

To have any hope of getting back to where we were 18 minutes into the game against North, we need Austin and Hore back. We've got top end stars, but fishpond depth = death in this competition. I'm not judging Tahlia Fellows' first club game for obvious reasons, but one tackle in 40% of game time definitely qualifies as an inauspicious debut. She'd best go all out to get picked again, including pushing teammates down the stairs if required, because Hose's successful five touch return from injury leaves Fellows as the only MFCW player on zero career disposals. 

If there's any upside, it's that no disposals mean you can't go backwards, so Elise Strachan's 2017 record -10 career metres 'gained' is safe. We're pleased to report that at least one of her two disposals was via an intercept mark, in a close win, so I'll have her negative 10 over zero anything in a loss. It's our duty to follow the Fellows disposal storyline closely for the rest of the season, and we hope she bounces back to challenge her previous career best 11 as a Hawthorn player.

The good news is that I've got to this point without yet having seen anything other than a spoiler, a final score, and out-of-context player stats, and we've still covered more ground than half the matches this year. An emergency committee meeting has determined that the safest way to cover this match under the circumstances is to watch the AFL website mini match and comment on the highlight provided. If I don't throw the internet-connected device out a window when it crashes seven times. This doesn't play to my spectating strengths because it probably won't have any of the stuff that really excites me, like shit commentary or goal umpires copping a bouncing footy in the dick. Nevertheless, it's the best we'll get so here goes - 11 minutes, 36 seconds of carefully curated/created by AI highlights.

First quarter
* Regardless of whatever heartwarming story our pride jumper was telling, it looked shithouse. More fearless fashion analysis in the future.
* I know where it all went wrong - we did the 'win centre clearance, kick it straight to defender' move without even getting it inside 50.
* Suns got a point. NFI how, it just appeared in the next highlight. Fair enough not to include every pissy score in the extended highlights, but I'm already feeling out of the loop. But never mind that shit, because you knew exactly what was going to happen when the next one involved the Suns going forward. Then a player who later continued the great tradition of MFC facilitating Rising Star nominations took a mark, ran off without anyone noticing and kicked the opener. Never mind, plenty of time to get that back right?
* They have goal replays in the mini-match. Why?
* Mackay local Ryleigh Wotherspoon celebrates her homecoming by clotheslining an opponent in a tackle. Gets the free, comes up clutching shoulder, surprisingly isn't horrifically injured like the rest of the list. No score results.
* Next opposition goal features Brancatisano, who I'm sure we've previously discussed is the only AFL player yet to be drafted from my (adopted in 2019 at the last relocation of Demonblog Towers) local team and must've been THRILLED to find out she had to go to Casey for training. Mind you, now that I know where Mick Stinear was coming from, I've got less sympathy for anyone having to get to Cranbourne from this side of Port Phillip Bay. Goal kicked by Havana Harris, which is the most rock and roll/Grand Theft Auto: Vice City name in footy history.
* Sanity temporarily restored after Hanks mows down an opponent dithering in front of goal with a heat-seeking missile of a tackle.
* A special look at one of our behinds, as Mahony put the ball in front of Bannan, only for the second nearest player to my house ever drafted by the MFCW to get BAMBOOZLED by the bounce.
* But maybe the reason they included that was the dramatic foreshadowing of a Mahony/Bannan goal combination in the dying seconds? (Via a dropped Gold Coast mark in the middle). Enter Bannan for a terrific close-range, high-angle snap to put us back in front at quarter time. That didn't get a replay, but we did get to hear the Mackay siren - which appeared to have a lot more bass than the versions we're used to. Should've had one off a ship to continue the nautical theme.

Second Quarter
* Chaplin gets tackled by the future Rising Star. Not really worth including.
* The nautical theme does get a re-run, as we begin to sink without a trace by leaving a player in several regional electorates' worth of space inside 50. They nearly bugger it up with a handball over the top to a player in the square, but there's nobody close enough to take advantage of a fumble.
* Not great signs when the next highlight comes from a centre bounce won by the Suns, but we narrowly survive an attempt at kicking Goal of the Year from a bizarre angle. This player is called Dakota Baron, which is almost as good a name as Havana Harris. They should form a WWE tag team.
* If you didn't know the result of a game, watching it this way would be like playing Football Manager - when you never knew whether to trust the highlight if your team was attacking, but it was probably just to fool you about an upcoming lightning counter-attack. Like when we were going forward, only for Paxy to be clamped in another huge HTB tackle.
* Enter another quality name in Darcy Davis, via a pass from Sunny Lappin - who I would suggest just needs to adopt a more tropical sounding surname and can join in the finest collection of player names in Australian Rules football history. Darcy goals from an angle and the margin is only nine but this is starting to go tits up.
* This is confirmed with three consecutive marks to the Suns inside 50, another goal, and the sense that even though I know what's going to happen now, this was the point where I'd be mentally conceding defeat if watching live.
* Obviously NOTHING happened in the last five minutes of the half, because that's your lot for the second quarter highlights.

Third quarter
* I suppose 16 points should be gettable for a good team like Melbourne, but fat chance of coming back after the Suns' opener involved players freewheeling around the 50 doing whatever they wanted. If you take the view that Bannan is no longer primarily a forward, I don't think I've seen any of our attacking players in this video since the Wotherspoon decapitation tackle.
* Right on cue, there's a cameo appearance by Harris standing somewhere near an intercept mark
* GENUINE HIGHLIGHT ALERT - As Livingstone benefits from an opponent failing to pick the ball up cleanly, receives a neat tap-on from Ebert, storms the 50 and boots one from distance that couldn't have turned any better once it landed in the square. For all the players over the years who've been dudded by kicks landing on the line and bouncing sideways/backwards, this one arrives diagonally, landed, and tracked perfectly through the middle of the goal. Very enjoyable, no bloody help to the result.
* Especially when the next highlight was old mate Baron taking a reasonably simple mark at close range. If that qualified for the highlights, either she was going to kick the goal, miss horrifically, or get punched in the head straight after kicking. Alas it was option A, and Livingstone's goal survived about one minute.
* I got the Football Manager treatment when it showed the Suns pelting forward again, only to be rewarded with a Gillard intercept mark. But then the highlights played the Uno Reverse card, her kick missed the target, and the ball was scooped up for another Gold Coast major.
* The ground announcer appears to have used the line "another great goal by the Gold Coast Suns" every time they kicked one. This would've given me the shits if watching live, but in this format he gets cut off halfway every time.
* Campbell takes an intercept mark, and this time it's not just a way of tricking you before the opposition score again.
* Horisk gets caught in a perfectly normal holding the ball. The Irish embassy should write in and demand this be removed from the clip.
* Gold Coast start to feel sorry for us and give away a silly 50 to Campbell, just as she tries to handball to Hanks anyway. She kicks straight, the margin is back under four goals at three quarter time, and you just never know do you? Except in this case, you do. 

Fourth quarter
* With only 1.32 left in the video, and one goal each to be kicked, this should be a quick segment. The first one went - inevitably - to the Suns after Chaplin decked one of them in a tackle.
* So the good news is that the last thing we see should be a Melbourne goal. Alas no, as there's time to see a Suns player leg it down the wing at top speed before flubbing a handball
* But we get the real deal eventually, as Hanks puts through a goal that wouldn't be fair to describe as "rolled" though because you don't often see that much oomph put into a kick that bounces along the ground. She's the best, just needs to get some teammates back off the injured list.
* And, with 23 seconds left in the video, there's one more highlight and... oh piss off it's just the final siren.     

As I'm too lazy to look it up myself, does 6-93 to 61-39 represent the greatest turnaround in two matches between teams? I know the Suns have enjoyed a big academy player boost, but their current run is proof that you can turn a side around and don't have to be rock bottom slop for years on end. The youth of South East Queensland must be significantly outperforming the ones in [wherever GWS' zone is]. Meanwhile, we've got the wobbles a bit, so form a prayer circle and hope for an outbreak of good health or we could be in a bit of trouble here.

2026 Daisy Pearce Medal votes
If we'd won comfortably, I'd have been able to flat-out steal from the Coaches' Votes here. As none of our players got any of those, rankings were compiled as a consensus from various sources, and if you have any objections, please send evidence via the normal channels and we'll reconsider/delete without comment/fold like a house of cards.

5 - Tyla Hanks
4 - Olivia Purcell
3 - Tahlia Gillard (see, it's not just me)
2 - Maeve Chaplin (I mean, I could've just cherrypicked the sources, but no this is legit)
1 - Megan Fitzsimon

Apologies (based on the criteria applied) to Allen and Heath-Barker

Leaderboard
Let's put all this unpleasantness behind us and recognise that this is now almost certainly a two player race. The first elimination line is set at 20 points (3x home and away, 1x guaranteed final), but everyone below Purcell is just playing for bronze and/or one of the minor awards.

32 - Tyla Hanks
25 - Olivia Purcell
16 - Tahlia Gillard (LEADER: Defender of the Year)
13 - Maeve Chaplin
12 - Kate Hore
--- Needs two finals ---
9 - Mia Austin
7 - Tayla Harris, Eliza McNamara
--- Needs three finals ---
6 - Jordyn Allen (LEADER: Rising Star Award)
3 - Megan Fitzsimon, Ryleigh Wotherspoon
1 - Georgia Campbell (LEADER: Ruck of the Year), Shelley Heath-Barker

Goal of the Week
The Livingstone one may have been the only thing worth watching for. It seems cheap and nasty to say it when I first saw it on a Twitter highlight clip, but I think this was the best goal we've kicked this season. But I'm hoping somebody goes better, because it wouldn't feel right for this game to produce a winner. Apologies to the Bannan snap, and Hanks taking out her frustrations on a footy.

Next week
It's back to Friday at Princes Park, as we hope for a better result this time against a 4-5 Richmond. They've lost 4/4 against us over the years, but so had Gold Coast before the Mackay Massacre. But only one of them played us off a five game winning streak, at a funky regional venue, so you'd hope this will prove a steadier - unless half the list has to be replaced after suffering mid-week bizarre gardening accidents.

Final thoughts
Apologies for the shambles.

Slowly getting to the point

In a 12 game season with one team apparently still several miles ahead of anyone else, the remaining storylines at end of the season are pretty much a) teams playing for seedings #2 - #8, and b) can St Kilda go one better and score nil sometime in the next month.

Our job was to recover from the disappointment of caving in against North and do the obvious thing by beating a 17th placed side, who had just struggled to their first win of the year against one of the other dreck teams. Which happened, and was never seriously in doubt, but with injuries starting to cause problems, it was more procedural premiership point accrual than an inspirational sign of future finals glory. At the moment, that'll do nicely.

It was also an opportunity, at the second chance, to celebrate a 100 game milestone by winning. As a foundation player, Paxy would've beaten Kate Hore to triple figures if not for being concussed in that dog-related fiasco a couple of years ago, but unlike the captain it meant not risking the chance of being chaired off after losing to the greatest team in AFLW history. As long as we didn't proceed directly to banana skin and stack it against one of the naffer teams in a competition chockers with them. As we like to say in these parts (because it can only happen after winning), all's well that ends well.  

Whether deliberate or not, I enjoyed the random "kicking to the left of your radio dial" reference before the first bounce. It was also nice not to concede an inside 50 in the opening seconds for once. Or so I thought, because instead of the opposition just punting it straight to the Great Wall of Gillard, they instead launched an end-to-end counter-attack which nearly led to the opener.

Collingwood's team had something for fans of various MFC eras, with Rigoni and somebody called Trengove who keeps being called Trengrove. Meanwhile, to add to the confusion we had the debuting Aoife Horisk, who has two names not pronounced as spelt. The latest member of our AFLW Irish Experiment has plenty to learn after only playing the game for a few weeks, but can be pleased to have gotten out of her first game with a 100% disposal efficiency. Sure, five of the six were handballs, but go and round up some random Australian-born bozos on the street and see if they can hit 5/5 targets by hand. May she end up on the Blaithin Mackin plan of going from never playing the game to winning a flag in the space of a season.   

The opening minutes did not look like team with one win vs team with one loss, but the difference was eventually demonstrated when we went ping-ping-ping and found Austin in the square for the opener. She had three by half time, and while we've ripped Carlton off blind in AFLW trades before, this could be the record. Unless they draft two absolute rippers with the throwaway selections we gave up for Austin, this has turned out close to thievery. We'll ignore that the first might not have happened if the pursuing defender's attempted tackle had been better, Austin has been more than good enough to compensate for Eden Zanker's departure.  

While that goal was the MFCW you know and love, it sadly didn't rip the floodgates off their hinges. Indeed, we were lucky not to concede immediately after, courtesy of a dropped mark while standing in miles of space. Which was helpful. But once again, we went from being unnecessarily on the back foot to having a shot at goal. Gall missed, but in the interest of scenario training, it was nice to try a slow and steady start to the game rather than going three goals up before imploding. 

Collingwood did well to keep us to one goal, but had to dodge double late drama to keep it that way. First, Harris missed a shot that she'd usually eat for breakfast, then Gall had another shot after the siren (assisted by gratuitous shoving of opponent before the mark) but barely snuck a rancid set shot in for a point. It was not ideal, but in the week where a side was 0.0.0 until the dying seconds of their game, let's reflect about how good we've had it over the years. It would be rude to complain about the occasional flatter than the proverbial quarter.

Meanwhile, there was some really odd stuff going on in the background at Victoria Park. In the first half, you could hear somebody who sounded like they were speaking through an old tyme walkie talkie. Later, there was a random clanging sound like somebody furiously slamming metal gates shut. This is the sort of 'anything could happen' atmosphere that you only get at suburban grounds. Another random AFLW element is the mysterious goal review system - which appears to have been turned on once this season before being replaced with the old school method of umpires conferring before coming up with a decision that could've easily been made by one person. In this case, it denied the Pies a goal from a toe-poke on the line, so in this case we say thank you very much.

We were the better side, but attacks were continually dying miserably on the half-forward line. In the injury-enforced absence of Kate Hore, mystery neck injury victim, it was Tyla Hanks' turn to do the old "get out of the way and leave it to the superstars" move, and snap the second. Considering their lowly status, Collingwood had been better value than three points to halfway through the quarter, and finally got one to keep it too interesting for my liking. Which was immediately cancelled out via Austin, who appeared for her third not long after, and from being surplus to requirements at Carlton, she is now firmly in the running for Hore's record of 24 goals in a season.

There were more chances left on the table in the last minute, but considering things were feeling a bit unpleasant after Collingwood's first, 19 points was a reasonable lead. In a third quarter short on highlights, I liked when the umpire whistled for a mark the moment the ball hit a Collingwood player's hands, leading to an awkward scenario when it was dropped, and everyone just played on as if the whistle had never gone.

At the third attempt, Gall converted a set shot, but unfortunately, this provoked Collingwood's second. 17 points felt more secure here than - just a random example, at the end of a men's Grand Final - but it was still important to put down any thoughts of a rebellion. They nearly got the next one too, and were getting on top around the ground, which was worrying for both this game, and our future as the second best team in the league. We were in the unusual situation of needing a steadier against a team on 2.7, and after doing more defending than seemed necessary, another chance to goal after the siren was incinerated by Bannan shanking bejesus out of the ball while looking for extra distance, and the door remained slightly open for something farcical to happen in the last term.

Under the circumstances, the last thing we needed was to concede at the start of the last quarter. Then, the otherwise very good Fitzsimon got caught in a tackle which involved her flying in the air like a slapstick comedy. Thankfully, the shot missed, and we survived another attack that reached the last line of defence. Sanity began to be restored by Harris taking a mark amongst several players on the wing, which sent the ball down our end for a few minutes, and appropriately ended with Harris reappearing to kick the decisive goal, after a pass from your friend and mine (but not Carlton's) Austin.

The team that looked vaguely threatening at 2.7 ended on 2.9, but they did have plenty of chances. I liked the one where the player thought she'd try and bump Gillard out of the way, and ended up flat on the ground, looking up at what turned out to be an uncontested mark. We didn't pile it on at the end, and there was a near milestone moment when Paxman had a shot in the last 30 seconds. Alas it missed, but at the presumed tail-end of a great career, I'm prepared to accept with any sort of Paxy content on offer.

This was not a perfect performance, but at this stage of the season it doesn't need to be. Just one more important step towards a top four finish - and let's be honest, top three is preferable to avoid you know who. The rest of the year is almost pointless (just like St Kilda). Any danger of a COVID-style immediate progression to the finals?  

2026 Daisy Pearce Medal votes
5 - Tyla Hanks
4 - Olivia Purcell
3 - Mia Austin
2 - Megan Fitzsimon
1 - Tayla Harris

Apologies to Chaplin, Gillard, Paxman and Wotherspoon.

Leaderboard
The brief moment where it seemed defenders were ready to launch a surprise challenge has passed, and it's become a battle of two. I can't see Hanks losing from here if she stays fit, but other players may feel free to launch a challenge. The ongoing success of the top also heralds the arrival of our famous line of elimination. We'll include at least one final in the calculations for now. 

27 - Tyla Hanks
21 - Olivia Purcell
13 - Tahlia Gillard (LEADER: Defender of the Year)
12 - Kate Hore
11 - Maeve Chaplin
9 - Mia Austin
7 - Tayla Harris, Eliza McNamara
6 - Jordyn Allen (LEADER: Rising Star Award), 
3 - Ryleigh Wotherspoon
--- Needs two finals ---
2 - Megan Fitzsimon
1 - Georgia Campbell (LEADER: Ruck of the Year), Shelley Heath-Barker

Goal of the Week
It's an other round of Thanks Hanks. 

Next week
Last year Gold Coast become one of the many interstate teams to fail the 'Survive Casey Fields Challenge', kicking 0.6 and losing by 87 points. But let's not hold that against them, because they've turned out to be half decent this year. With six wins in a row, a reasonable percentage, and live hopes of a top four finish, they've got all the motivation required to make a statement by doing us over in a 'sure, why not?' fixture at Great Barrier Reef Arena in Mackay. Will they? I wouldn't rule it out based on our last seven quarters and lengthy injury list. And how much does a fancy bit of ocean have to pay to get naming rights for a stadium?  

Regardless of the novelty venue, we should win, but after North's adventures in regional Queensland don't bet a vital organ on it. And if we don't, things could start to look a bit ropey. A thumping percentage, and a season ending with games against the current 11th, 6th and 12th placed teams should ensure a top four finish regardless but there's a massive logjam of teams from 2nd to 7th so everything's on the line, including having to play bloody North again in the first final. It goes without saying that the safest option is to keep on winning.  

Final thoughts
Despite being second on the ladder 75% through the home and away season I'd be baffled if we won the flag from here, but very much willing to have a crack at it.

Record winning streak bid falls marginally short

For top events of September 25, good luck ever beating the greatest day in the history of human civilisation, but five years on from that blessed event I was prepared to slot an All Stars South d. All Stars North result somewhere beneath it on the list of memorable moments. And for the first quarter that looked like a live possibility, before normal service resumed with a vengeance.

With the big game feeling already deflated due to North's unexpected loss last week, and COVID-era flu chaos during the week offering them a handy excuse to go back-to-back, you could have been excused for thinking big at three goals to zilch in the first quarter. But we've seen this before, in our very last start against the same opposition, on the same ground. This time it only (?) ended with a generic midseason loss, but at least that day the hot start kept the game alive until deep into the last quarter. This was like ye old luxury ship suddenly meets iceberg.

This page is practically a Chaplin/Gillard fan site now, so I'm pleased to say that North got things off to the traditional start by punting their first inside 50 directly to the latter. Not for the first time in recent weeks, the problem was clearing the ball without it flinging straight back towards the backline for another go. Enter three minutes of North piling on pressure for no reward, before counter-attack gold when, on our first time across halfway, Harris plonked a kick to Fitzsimon's advantage for the opener. She almost went back-to-back, but was foiled by last-gasp intervention from still-reigning 'Last MFC ex to win a flag' Libby Birch, who played with enough strapping on her leg to get a bonus job playing movie extra 'Air Disaster Survivor #6' on the way home.

Now, it was our chance to pin the ball in attack for a while without reward, but though nothing initially came of it, I'd like to draw your attention to a kick from Hanks to Mahony that would adequately be described as 'laser-like'. North filched our move of scoring at the first successful escape from defence, aided by a downfield free against Bannan that I deemed a bit pissweak. It missed, before Chaplin made a goal-line save to add further weight to her case to be named the most entertaining defender on the face of God's green earth.

If you're the one person at AFL headquarters who actually cares how this league does, you might have been disappointed that it wasn't the sort of free-scoring game as when shit teams are involved. I say, if you didn't appreciate the desperate defence at both ends of the ground you're a bum. That was, if you were watching in the first place. Not that I helped by watching from home, but the crowd of 3105 was absolutely dire for a fixture of this magnitude, so god knows what the TV audience was like, or how depressed Channel 7 executives were at having to spend money broadcasting it. Meanwhile, I like to think somebody caved their TV in when Kate Hore's brother-in-law was seen wearing Dees-related merch in the crowd.

In a turn of events visible from several galaxies away, attention was largely diverted to a certain game being played the following day. Maybe that didn't matter and this is just where the competition is at, but keep all this in mind when the AFL try to pretend everything's going well based on rorted attendance averages inflated by double headers.

Anyway, enough of the semi-regular misery session about the state of the competition (especially because I have no decent suggestions to offer on fixing it), we were busy building a house of cards lead. The second goal came from set shot mastermind Austin, after a free against North for cracking the shits at an umpire. There's a rule you forgot existed. Like suspensions for belting somebody in the guts.

When the ball ended up at their end late in the quarter, I thought we were going to activate footy's original '[X] Time' gimmick and concede in the last 90 seconds. Instead, there was a tremendous end-to-end move that wound up with Pisano setting up the Kate Hore 100 game celebration with a lovely kick. For a top draft pick, successive administrations have had little faith in Pisano, and she barely touched it again for the rest of the game, but they should be showing her that pass on repeat Clockwork Orange-style this week. The talent is there, she's got to release the beast eventually.

We'd played a great first quarter, but buggered if I was getting overexcited about a three goal lead against North at Princes Park after last time. Four was the minimum to start thinking big, but the opening minutes of the second quarter featured bulk inside 50s for zero goals. Whatever version of the plague North had they looked rattled, but it turned out to be the biggest rope-a-dope since Ali in Zaire. You'd have been forgiven for thinking that their laboured first goal, which nearly went wrong multiple times and only narrowly avoided being kicked straight into Gillard, was another example of their imminent demise. Spoiler - it was not.

If you're into voodoo concepts like luck, momentum swings, and expected score, everything went wrong when Livingstone was pinged for a kick off the ground going straight over the boundary line. The subsequent free was seemingly booted out on the full, but recalled for a boundary throw-in because the ball had never entered the field of play before it was kicked. The AFL has changed every other rule under the sun, how have they not got to this one? If you can't successfully put the ball back into play, it should be considered as good as OOF and result in a free the other way.

Worse than prompting philosophical discussion about the rules, this soon turned into North's second goal and my 'no excitement' policy was looking prudent. Our problem was that the goals had come from 2x turnover and 1x telling the umpire to GAGF, but whenever they had time to set up the defence it resulted in kicking to a rotating clump of defenders, with nobody looking remotely likely to pull down the sort of big marks required to get away with that. We had seven marks inside 50, and the only contested ones were after the game was shot. There was also no crumb, and you know what happened next.

In a confirmed case of 'Can't play [insert list of the shit teams here] every week', North hit the front. I'm all for players wearing #60, but not when they're setting up teammates 20 metres out directly in front. This goal was followed by post-goal celebrations that looked like drunken school mums trying to copy something they'd seen on TikTok. There were no such shenanigans after their next goal, which proved how much things were turning in their favour by coming as the replacement for an injured player appearing on her own (and a half-volley off Campbell's shin), and finding teammates in attack with so much free space that they would've needed to communicate via semaphore. 

There was a near miss from another shot right on the siren, and like the Prelim all over again, you suspected that once North turned up we couldn't maintain the early rage. Half time failed to arrest the declining trajectory of the game, and we soon allowed a player who'd just kicked OOF to have a second shot where lessons were successfully learnt. Austin missed a shot (NB: not an easy one, to be fair) to bring the margin back to single figures, and I was pining for more goals after opposition players told the umpire to FO. Later, there was a free for calling a decision 'bullshit', but by then we'd been sapped of any will to live and kicked it straight to a defender.

Any sort of luck was welcome at this stage, but even the great Chaplin was in a bit of disarray. First she finished a patient build-up with a perfect pass to a North player, then gave away a shizen free kick, and dropped a mark that led to North's six in a row. When you're grouse 97% of the time, who am I to complain about the remainder?

Just when you thought things couldn't get any worse, injury drama broke out as we cut to Heath-Barker on the bench having her leg strapped up like Tutenkamen. She was visibly upset, so the natural reaction was to keep the camera on her for as long as possible, then replay the footage at three quarter time. None of this was ideal. Meanwhile, Gillard was having the Steven May '23-'24 finals experience of doing absolutely everything possible to keep the side in the game, only to watch chances galore go down the drain at the other end.

After nearly killing the Irish dancers during the male version of Jim's Game, we hadn't kicked a goal since the first quarter, and they spent half the night doing bugger all on public holiday rates. I'd given up hope of a famous win, but just wanted to keep it interesting for as long as possible, but it was clearly not our night. Even when Harris fended an opponent into an alternate dimension, the follow-up kick went nowhere. Then, when the captain put a kick to the advantage of two players in goalscoring range, they both stood back, said "you first", and watched it bounce past. Surprise third-party candidate Bannan was next in line but couldn't do anything with it either. 

The dancers remained literally unmoved as Livingstone took a nice mark, then opted not to extend her #40 goals record by handing off to Harris... whose kick didn't make the distance. To use the technical term, this was officially 'shithouse', and that was before North kicked the sealer. Still nothing for the dancers to do. I hope they were keeping warm, just in case we got onto a surprise junk time goal and there was hammy carnage. Everyone else has sued the club this year, why not the cast of Riverdance too?

We should've got our money's worth by making them dance when North started scoring left, right, and centre down the other end. This was a setback, but I don't blame our players for sticking cue in rack so violently it ripped off the wall. There's plenty more important work to be done this season - no point dying for a lost cause. The big jig finally broke out again thanks to two consolation goals for Austin, and there was enough of a delay after the first that I think they may have had to run back from the bar after the mark was taken.

The result was long decided, but the final insult was the player who'd previously kicked 1.8 this year picking now to start kicking straight. May as well have sent mattress leg Birch (112 games, 1 goal) to full forward while they were at it. Luckily I hung on until the siren out of obligation to see the aforementioned wayward kicker indulge in a bit of VIGOROUS CHAT with Gillard after the siren. Tahlia was fighting with the wrong side, after giving maximum effort to keep us in the game while under constant barrage, she should've been berating her own teammates instead.

So, it's RIP winning streak and The Big Six has turned into Big Stuff All. I hated 75% of it, but if we have to live in a world where North are practically unbeatable, what better motivation is required for the last five rounds and finals than getting another shot at them when it really counts. Maybe next time we could concede the first three goals and see if that helps.  

2026 Daisy Pearce Medal votes
5 - Tahlia Gillard
4 - Tyla Hanks
3 - Kate Hore
2 - Mia Austin
1 - Olivia Purcell

Apologies to Allen, Ebert, Fitzsimon and Harris

Leaderboard
Vital breathing space for Hanks, as we're getting close to the 'needs finals' elimination line starting to eliminate anyone who hasn't polled yet. Last week's prediction that the defender race would prove the spiciest award contest in football was moderately debunked by Gillard going BOG here, but the gap is still close enough to keep it interesting.

22 - Tyla Hanks
17 - Olivia Purcell
13 - Tahlia Gillard (LEADER: Defender of the Year)
12 - Kate Hore
11 - Maeve Chaplin
7 - Eliza McNamara
6 - Mia Austin, Jordyn Allen (LEADER: Rising Star Award), Tayla Harris
3 - Ryleigh Wotherspoon
1 - Georgia Campbell (LEADER: Ruck of the Year), Shelley Heath-Barker

Goal of the Week
They were all reasonably dull, so the joint encouragement award goes to Hore's set shot and Pisano's kick to set it up.

Next week
Unless injuries and post-defeat demoralisation have a crazy effect, you'd hope that Collingwood aren't going to take inspiration from finally winning a game in Round 6. Here's to them doing the honourable thing and standing aside so that we may continue to offer some form of resistance against RoboNorth. Lucky this wasn't Hore's 100th, or Corey's brother wearing Melbourne merch would've gone down poorly with two sets of fans. 

Final thoughts

Look down and live

In a huge week for Australia's female athletes shitting themselves, it's boo to North Melbourne for going a week early and ending their never-to-be-repeated 30 game winning streak before we could (let's just assume, now that it can't be tested) do it. Sure, it took them having to play in a Cairns sweatfest to finally reach the realisation that you can't keep winning forever, but as the only team in the league with a home ground that has its own weather pattern, I'm struggling to find sympathy for the two-time and counting defending premiers.

The other part of the Round 7 'All-Star Game' equation was that we had to keep winning too, which was no guarantee against a third place side, with wacky winds blowing diagonally across the ground. You might remember Carlton, not for recent unpleasantness involving our men's team, but as a side we last played in the AFLW just over FOUR seasons ago. Which is some of the most shambolic, half-arse scheduling in the history of professional sports. If you play 12 teams one year, how are the other five not the first written into the fixture for the following season? This would assume the AFL care, beyond pretending everything's going well because they rorted attendance figures with a couple of double headers.

The off-field may be as shambolic as ever, but no arguments about how our team is playing. Fans of other clubs, especially the ones destined to act as traffic cones for the rest of the league for years to come, can make their own judgements, this is the best football Melbourne AFLW has ever played. Whether it's good enough to overcome the Evil Empire in finals is TBD, but the ball movement is better than I've ever seen. Shame you've got to be a card-carrying enthusiast to even know the competition is on thanks to the minor issue of all the focus going to the men's finals. That ship has sailed, so the general public can amuse themselves by piffing bottles at umpires, I'm getting into the hope of converting quality footy into quality flag.

What the ladder looks like 50% through the season means chuff all for what happens at the end, but even after North stuffed up the blockbuster, I still really wanted to remain the only unbeaten side in the competition, even if it meant nothing to the big picture. That could've gone wrong quickly if Carlton had any idea how to play the local conditions. Casey remains a detriment to the game, but I'll accept the benefits in the interest of ongoing winning.

The magic and mystery of the Cranbourne Bureau of Meteorology was on full display when we opened with a Fitzsimon set shot that was going straight from 30 metres out, then swung so violently that it landed in the forward pocket without scoring. The atmosphere was not helped by some flange blowing a Vuvuzela in the crowd, but for reasons unknown we did have to hold the game up after a goal because a set of car keys were found in the middle of the ground. 

I understand how that could happen, but not how it could take so far into the game for anyone to notice. It was a bit of a bush-league incident, but fortunately the greatest game of AFL football ever played came along later that afternoon and ensured there was no room for key coverage. Maybe a disgruntled Hawthorn fan buried them in advance just in case they had a reason to sook about umpiring at the end of a game that hadn't started yet? Lucky a player didn't get injured, and hopefully the owner had to catch the bus home.

After a few Casey games where the wind was either not a serious factor or politely blew up and down the ground, you could tell how it was going to go from that first set shot. Carlton had the better of what advantage it did provide, and did bugger all with it. Instead, after they flubbed a couple of chances, we got the only goal of the first term when Hanks spelunked into a tackle and used her regional knowledge to steer the resulting free kick home.

The wind advantage seemed dubious when Carlton attacked first in the second quarter, but like a replay of last week, the visitors were wasteful and eventually paid the price. This time via a Gillard rocket run through the middle, which set up Austin's mark from a distance that any tricky crosswinds couldn't get hold of. This would count as the old "stick it up your old team" move, if she hadn't been good in every appearance so far this year. May have come in handy at the other end, but I'm sure the Blues will enjoy the second and third round picks they got in exchange.

This was nearly followed by another goal when Hanks belted straight out of the middle, but the wind was exposed as nothing worth getting excited over when Carlton kicked two in a row to take the lead. The first came via a hopeful snap from a pack, which survived a review that home viewers didn't get to see. So that means in three games at Casey this year we've had reviews, a) where the footage was shown but probably interpreted incorrectly, b) where the umpire just asked his colleagues if they had any objections, and c) where the full forward/rewind experience was conducted off-camera, while the players stood around waiting for the game to restart.

We almost let in three straight, only surviving because a handball failed to reach a player standing on her own inside 50. I was a bit worried, before Fitzsimon crumbed the shit out of a contest in front of goal to restore the half time lead. Still didn't make winning inevitable, as we didn't yet know that Carlton's quickfire double would be 66.66% of all their goals for the afternoon.

Then it was time to go whack, with four goals in a row making sure the Big Six would be achieved. O'Hehir opened her career account with what I'd describe as a 'lucky' kick if the other side did it, but becomes a moment of great skill simply due to being done by somebody in a Melbourne jumper. By the time Purcell was lobbing through back-to-back set shots, viewing of the live ladder was much appreciated.

Even after conceding a late goal, we were clearly going to win. Carlton helped make this a reality by failing to score in the final term. With the opposition now struggling for interest, we pinged away at will for 1.5. I'm almost certainly the only person on the planet who cares about fringe topics like AFLW jumper number records, but Jorja Livingstone enjoyed the rare feat of qualifying for the record books on debut, by opening the account for #40. 

God only knows why she's wearing it when we don't have numbers 34 through 39, but I couldn't be more supportive. In a league where a player gets about in #60 it hardly qualifies for cherished 'silly number' status, but I advise sticking with it and refusing any suggestions about changing to something lower. Mark Jamar is an All-Australian ahead in overall impact wearing the number, but the W games/goals double is just three games away, so double (digit) down and go for glory.           

Not for the first time this year, the point where there was nothing to play for except avoiding injuries was greeted by somebody getting injured. This time it was Campbell copping an elbow in the throat, and immediately having a couple of voms on the turf. Bad news for anyone else who left personal objects on the turf. Campbell has been very good this year, and with L. Pearce clearly winding up a great career there's a full time ruck job on offer for years to come, so hopefully this wasn't anything more than shock from an unexpected blow to a sensitive part of the anatomy. We haven't heard about a Gareth John-style career-altering larynx-shattering, so I take that as a good sign.

Other than that, and Tayla Harris ending the game with the 'injured' tag, this went about as well as you could hope for. Solid opposition dismissed without undue effort, and a warning to the competition that it may not be 12 rounds to find out who loses to North. It could still turn out that way, so the best thing to do is keep the good times rolling by metaphorically punching the bullies in the face on Friday night. 

2026 Daisy Pearce Medal votes
5 - Tyla Hanks
4 - Maeve Chaplin
3 - Olivia Purcell
2 - Kate Hore
1 - Shelley Heath-Barker

Apologies to Allen, Fitzsimon, Gillard, and Harris

Leaderboard
Exciting stuff at the top as the leaders open a full BOG lead over the trailing pack. Not much chance of a first-time winner this season, but we're set for a battle royale in the Defender award, as Chaplin becomes the third different leader for the season. And there remains as much chance of Allen being overtaken for the Rising Star as aliens participating in the Grand Final entertainment.

18 - Tyla Hanks
16 - Olivia Purcell
11 - Maeve Chaplin (LEADER: Defender of the Year)
9 - Kate Hore
8 - Tahlia Gillard 
7 - Eliza McNamara
6 - Jordyn Allen (LEADER: Rising Star Award), Tayla Harris
4 - Mia Austin
3 - Ryleigh Wotherspoon
1 - Georgia Campbell (LEADER: Ruck of the Year), Shelley Heath-Barker

Goal of the Week
For all the scoring this year, we're lacking any absolute blockbusters, but I'll have O'Hehir's debut goal as the new clubhouse leader for the season.

Next week
It's the biggest game of the year. And the next day there's a Grand Final on. We've played opposition between third and godforsaken, and it's all been leading up to the challenge of a team we had on the run early in last year's Prelim, but who otherwise walked over everyone until last week. Now they've had the big reset/reality check, and will likely be desperate to remind everyone to be scared of them. So it would be piss funny to win, and it's a live possibility, but let's not draw too much from them losing one game in the tropics.  

Final thoughts
Six of the best. Only 25 more to the record.

The beatings go on

Following Melbourne (W) must be like supporting Geelong (M). We might not always win the flag, and are vulnerable to the occasional semi-down year, but you can be reasonably sure that when starting as hot favourites nothing weird's going to happen. Our elevation to 'Unflushable nugget' status is still a long way off, and may be difficult to claim while North go on their merry way towards winning 50 straight, but it makes for a more relaxed supporting experience than I'm used to.

The 'piece of piss wins' era faces its greatest challenge in the next two weeks, and it'll be interesting to see what happens when close games start happening again. Maintaining the current level of scoring across a whole season just isn't possible, but enjoy it while it lasts because there's probably never going to be another five (plus?) weeks of raining goals on the opposition like this again.  

Winning by 51 points has lost all shock value over the last few years, but my favourite bit about this one is that Port Adelaide weren't all that bad. Usually, half century wins are reserved for flotsam/jetsam teams, or Brisbane when all their players died simultaneously, but this was death by a thousand cuts disassembly spread over four quarters. And it served Port right for turning up dressed like the 1990s New South Wales State Of Origin team.

Given that we'd lost the only competitive match against them (a total which is well on-brand for AFLW fixturing featuring a team in the competition since 2022), I reserved the right to be nervous. Just because you know the result will almost certainly go as expected, evidence is still required to ensure there's not something stupid on the cards. So I didn't think much of losing the first centre bounce without much of a fight. Fortunately, they split the difference from the last two weeks and fed Gillard an uncontested chest mark.

I imagine the Port coach was looking for objects to hurl through the Casey coaching box when this unnecessary turnover led to the ball instantly pinging down the other end. If there's anything the first four rounds showed, it's that the last thing you want to do is feed Melbourne counter-attacking chances. This one didn't directly lead to a goal, with the spoilt for choice inside 50 kick missing a bunch of players standing on their own. It did, however, set the table for Austin to be tackled high and kick her eighth goal from as many shots this year. 

Without bothering to check the records, I'm going to say nobody's gone 8.0 for our (W) team before. Or, if you prefer, 9.0, because Austin got another one straight after. It was finished by her barging through Port's defence and kicking it from the square, but the conditions for it to exist weren't there without Chaplin bamboozling an opponent in the build-up with candy selling so extreme that the City of Casey is tendering for international experts to extract a Port Adelaide player from the turf. The Roadrunner never went past Wile E. Coyote that savagely, and it kicked off her best game since returning from injury. Amongst our galaxy of stars, there's an argument that Chaplin is up there with the most entertaining players on the list to watch.

Port won all the early centre bounces, but when they didn't convert it was only a matter of time before the ball went our way at speed, and they could only stand around hoping that it wouldn't be converted. They were generally not, but if 'Eyes Light Up Cam' was a thing, it would've activated at full power when Fitzsimon saw a ball sit up in the square to be smashed home, before a defender threw herself in the way goalkeeper style. Never mind, soon after Hore arrived for her customary mark and goal, and this was a classic case of one team taking their chances and the other blundering them horrifically.

Not surprisingly, we lost the following clearance, but even more predictably they expertly picked out Gillard again. Sadly, the subsequent pox attempts at extraction ended with Port getting what may have been (but wasn't) a critical goal into the wind. This was followed by us finally breaking even at a centre bounce, only for the umpire to extract a holding the ball free from the keister and allow them to get the ball inside 50 anyway. The quarter still ended down our end, without further scoreboard drama, but as the other lot broke even in most departments except the most important, the second quarter would show if the wind had helped, or whether we really were the better team (spoiler: yes).

As you'd expect, the visitors emerged from quarter time with all the enthusiasm of people who'd heard mystical tales of the famous Casey breeze and now finally got the chance to use it. For the first few minutes they put on plenty of wind-assisted pressure, but couldn't convert for shit. And when the ball hit the ground, our defenders were scooping up ground balls in the same way robot vacuums will deal with your pets after AI goes rogue. 

The combination of poor finishing and desperate defence saw them finish their inaugural Casey wind quarter with a string of points. Which wouldn't be so bad if they didn't let in goals down the other end. Enter Harris to bust past their entire backline to mark at the top of the square, nearly get another one straight after, then celebrate Fitzsimon's dagger to the heart goal after the siren by starting a fight with about seven opponents at the same time. 

For all the recent vigorous self-gratification over 'Wharfie Time', it should be noted that DemonTime has been around much longer (can I cash in somehow?), and was fully in play here, as we spent the last 90 seconds offering Port chances to kick goals that they couldn't grasp. Then Fitzsimon's played the DemonTime reverse card, and while a 19 point margin was a touch unfair considering Port's effort, if you don't convert you've got nobody else to blame. And if they felt hard done at this point, it got a lot worse in the second half.

We were so comfortable with the lead, that in the week Allen got nominated for the Rising Star after a storming start to her career in defence, she was sent forward to have a crack. There was one moment of high excitement when she burst through a gap, before an absurdly premature bounce went awry and ended it all, but I still choose to interpret from this sliver of evidence that she's going to be ace at either end of the ground. There was a pass that set up a goalscoring opportunity in the third quarter that was as good as any seen at Casey Fields.

When the ill-fated McNamara snatched the ball off the pack for classic crumb, our win probability was somewhere around 99.9%. It may have gone backwards if Port took advantage of storming inside 50 with multiple players on their own, only to botch it by handballing straight up in the air rather than to any of the free players available ahead of the ball, then hitting the post from the next stoppage. It was the story of the game. They had enough chances, but torched them with poor forward play. By the time they hit 1.9, we'd also left a few goals on the table, which isn't as important when you're five goals up against bulk chance incinerators.  

Insurance against the most unlikely of last quarter comebacks came from a late double of Mahony's snap, and Bannan's first of the season after the siren. The margin was now getting unexpectedly brutal, and while the commentators unconvincingly tried to keep the prospect of a miracle alive, they may as well have said there was a chance of world peace by the final siren. To be fair, Port did kick the first goal of the final term, rejecting the temptation to continue the theme of the afternoon and miss from the square. 

There was nothing more to be gained from this game, so as long as nobody got suspended or injured... oh, and here's McNamara having her jaw smashed to bits by a failed bump. I get the impression that this goes beyond the standard jaw injury, and we'll be unlikely to see her for the rest of the season. Aside from the unpleasant road ahead of her in recovering this injury, what an absolute pisstake from a football perspective when she'd been on fire as a forward this year. As somebody who has previously come back from a fractured spine (!!!), I'll back her to return successfully - hopefully in time for finals. Until then, it's a fair old gap to fill just as we get to the most important pre-finals weeks of the season.

McNamara's demise delayed a Harris set shot, and the Port players must've been thinking about how long their teammate was going to be rubbed out for (answer: 3 weeks, which was fair enough) because they surely could've stopped the ball going over the line with any semblance of defensive organisation. This was the start of them conceding the sort of goals that show a team has lost the will to live - it was followed by a player being pinged HTB on the goal line, then allowing Wotherspoon to finish with the deftest touch off the side of the boot you'll ever see from somebody about to be swamped by multiple defenders.

And so, after another good-not-great performance, we somehow found ourselves winning in an on paper romp. It's confirmed good stuff, but after five weeks of warmup, things are about to get really serious.

2026 Daisy Pearce Medal votes
5 - Maeve Chaplin
4 - Tayla Harris
3 - Tahlia Gillard
2 - Olivia Purcell
1 - Kate Hore

Apologies to Allen, Austin, Hanks, Heath-Barker and Lampard.

Leaderboard
There's obvious action in the main event, but stand-by for a wild race in the DOTY - especially if Allen can avoid being DQed for playing forward too often.

13 - Tyla Hanks, Olivia Purcell
8 - Tahlia Gillard (LEADER: Defender of the Year)
7 - Maeve Chaplin, Kate Hore, Eliza McNamara
6 - Jordyn Allen (LEADER: Rising Star Award), Tayla Harris
4 - Mia Austin
3 - Ryleigh Wotherspoon
1 - Georgia Campbell (LEADER: Ruck of the Year)

Goal of the Week
Plenty of contenders, but against public opinion I want the Wotherspoon one due to its delicate nature.

Next week
Cease all advance talk about Grand Final eve blockbuster against North, first we've got to get past the side that just pushed them harder than anyone since us in last year's Prelim. Carlton is a 'one season good/one season bad' toss of the coin team on par with Melbourne 1998-2004, and are currently on the up, so for god's sake let's take them seriously.  

Final thoughts
The season begins now. But with a five win headstart.

Ease West

The obvious follow-up for any team called Melbourne to 'thumping win over perennial contender leads to premiership contention talk' is a disappointing loss to lowly opposition at the first opportunity. Fortunately Melbourne (W) has largely avoided such obscene bloopers over the years, but for the first few minutes of this 3-0 vs 0-3 glamour clash, it seemed we may have finally been about to stuff things up big time. Quality prevailed comfortably in the end, and with another relatively big score, but at three goals to one down I was silently preparing for the worst.

In the finest traditions of games broadcast from Western Australia, we got the full WABC experience. Will Schofield is the honorary life president of this organisation, but he sounded like a committed federalist compared to the co-commentator Nikki Harwood, who was so keen on local content that she may as well have been draped in the state flag while reading from a pro-secession manifesto. Interstate viewers will say this is what they have to put up with from Victorian callers, but if you think anyone here is defending Dwayne or BT when they say allegedly mean things about [insert state here], you're not paying attention.

If the early trends continued and West Coast pulled off the upset win of the year, sparks were going to fly from whatever studio they were watching from. Thank god for the quick reintroduction of sanity, even if the rapidly expanding margin didn't stop repeated references to Fun Fact #1 - that we supposedly don't travel well. I was scathing about this idea while watching - and you can't really blame the one after the siren last year on failing to adapt to conditions - but it turns out we were 1-5 interstate in the last two seasons. Still, even if the stat works on paper, I'm sure it's got more to do with the teams fixtured against, than the process of leaving Victoria.

Conveniently not mentioned - our last comfortable interstate victory was a 70 point mauling of the Eagles at this exact venue, WW2 siren and all. In the interim, they fell into the eight last year (still something to aspire to in this competition, he says, to lay the boots into the wildcard system one last time (?) in 2026) before quickly departing, and have done nowt so far this year. Still, the good news is that they might have converted a good start into defeat, but 6.8.44 was one point better than their combined score in four previous games against us. That's something to work on. Perhaps.

Having reviewed footage of Brisbane madly panic-bombing kicks into the hands of Tahlia Gillard, West Coast decided to alter their angle of attack, keep the ball lower, and kick it to Jordyn Allen instead. Getting this week's Rising Star (and, in a great moment for the Defenders Union, our first since Gillard) at pick 16 may turn out to be the biggest theft since the Great Bookie Robbery, because despite looking younger than her draft number, this is what you get from the first generation of AFLW players who grew up with the prospect of a professional career. She's turned up knowing what to do, and has been fantastic.

Everything turned out alright in the end, but there was light brickage during the first quarter. It was one thing conceding first, but we got that straight back, only to let another one in almost immediately. We looked dire, were feeding their scores with turnovers (including one to somebody called 'Abbygail', which seems unnecessarily complicated when you could just say Abigail), and lost Goldrick to a knee injury. Hooray for the defensive cockup that allowed Gall in for a settler late in the first term, reducing the margin to a workable six points.

I liked to think class would win out, but didn't expect it to happen so rapidly. Cue a 5.2 to nothing.nothing second quarter that left the commentary team sounding like they were being forced to call an atrocity. Forget the slow start, this was the Melbourne vs strugglers matchup that seemed regulation now, but we'll cherish the memories of when equalisation finally arrives in AFLW.

Inside 50s are a rotten stat, except when they prove your point - and scoring 2.1 from three entries suggested that the floodgates could open if we got the ball down there regularly enough. We did, and they did. The tone was set by Harris basically just saying "PISS OFF" to an opponent and pushing her out of the way before kicking the first, and it was off to the races then - behind dominant performances by Hanks and McNamara. 

Now we were the ones getting all the scoring from turnovers, as the home players who went to the quarter time huddle with a dream in their heart suddenly realised the crushing futility of the task before them. The Eagles soon achieved 'target practice' status, and even if by our standards conceding six goals wasn't ideal, junk time stretched for more than half the game, so no real harm done.  

After making fugly giant eye jumpers famous, Tayla Harris has now provided us with the best all-purpose MFC reaction image since thumbs aloft Jake Lever. Her apology after realising what she'd accidentally done while displaying a finger injury was even better. Overall, very enjoyable content, and you can get used to seeing this screengrab on repeat for the next several years.

With the game already decided, West Coast had a reasonable crack at kicking with the wind in the third quarter. We sensibly decided to run with the ball and link up with handballs instead of just madly bombing it into the wind. The locals narrowly won the quarter, it's a tactic that will come in handy at certain other venues that put on the occasional force 10 storm.

In the interest of full disclosure, even I lost a bit of interest in the last quarter while we were going through the motions of winning effortlessly. Pisano got a second, which is nice because they don't seem to have much faith in her, so I'm glad that she's getting the opportunities to get on the scoreboard. But otherwise, West Coast did a shitload of defending, most of it was successful, but we still got three goals from seven scoring shots. It was a solid, professional win. Nothing to get excited about, but we reintroduced the super-important Chaplin after injury (albeit at the expense of Goldrick going the other way), and put another all-important win on the board. As they say in better forums than this - what's not to like? 

... and even if it's all blown up for her team after a promising 2025, the Eagles coach has always got this medal being named in her honour: 

2026 Daisy Pearce Medal votes
5 - Eliza McNamara
4 - Tyla Hanks
3 - Jordyn Allen
2 - Maeve Chaplin
1 - Kate Hore

Apologies to practically everyone. TEAM EFFORT.

Leaderboard
New leader alert, as Purcell conserves energy after a hot start and waves Hanks through for her turn at the front. There's also action in the Defender award, as Allen morally retakes the lead that we didn't credit her with the first time around. Chaplin also lurks, in what could be the ding dong battle of the season. And beating Allen for our version of the Rising Star will require somebody coming from the clouds with the same impact as the spaceship from Independence Day.

13 - Tyla Hanks
11 - Olivia Purcell
7 - Eliza McNamara
6 - Jordyn Allen (LEADER: Defender of the Year, LEADER: Rising Star Award), Kate Hore
5 - Tahlia Gillard
4 - Mia Austin
3 - Ryleigh Wotherspoon
2 - Maeve Chaplin, Tayla Harris
1 - Georgia Campbell (LEADER: Ruck of the Year)

Goal of the Week
There were more spectacular goals, but I quite enjoyed Harris shifting her opponent out of the way like a cardboard cutout.

Next week
At the extremely friendly viewing time (for me anyway) of 12:35 on Sunday, it's one of the two sides I've still never met a fan of in Port Adelaide. After contributing to our dire interstate record last year, they come to Cranbourne with the hope of a) planting a flag in the finals race, and b) not suffering the same fate as most visitors to Mt. Variable Weather. We should win, but as always I'm on guard for the unforeseen surprise reverse double secret stitch-up.

Final thoughts
Still not sure we're beating a North team that just won by 92 points, but I'm happy to get one step closer to an all-star game against them in Round 7.