Strange things are afoot at the Circle K(ing)

Nothing says 'unexpectedly good season' like sitting comfortably inside the finals race, winning twice as often as losing, but also being a little bit disappointed with conceding meaningless junk time goals. This completed the rare hat-trick of allowing a top team, middle team, and bottom team to all take something from a game they should've gone home miserable about. Enjoy the dignity, we'll console ourselves with 12 premiership points.

Halfway through the first quarter, we were bleeding goals at such a rapid rate that allowing humanitarian scoring late in the last quarter seemed highly unlikely. Our biggest vulnerability in this otherwise blessed season has been allowing quick movement inside 50, there was plenty of that on offer. Lever and Turner made heroic attempts to hold back the tide, but fell victim to the overall 'standing around, staring blankly' role of Hawthorn in Launceston. Our recovery was less explosive, but by virtue of not getting 96 points down in the first place, it achieved the right result without undue stress or worry.

Now that we've won, the obvious highlight of the first quarter was Charlie Spargo doing exactly what you'd expect and having the time of his Arden Street life against us. Charleston has lifetime Premiership player legend status, but I'm reliably informed he's not done much for lots of money at North. Then, 18 games into the year it looked like he'd been holding back for this occasion. Two goals - admittedly one from a free, and another after a belated going-away present shizen turnover - and was in everything. My theory that he's a cherry on top player when your side's going well received a boost when he proceeded to do bugger all for the rest of the game as North were slowly overhauled, and gently put away with the footy equivalent of a perfumed silk pillow held over the face.

Now that you know what happened, it's a source of pride (?) that we corrected course and kept them quiet until the result was sealed, but at the time, they looked on for an enormous score. Once we stemmed the bleeding, things didn't look so bad, but it was hot knife meeting butter for a few minutes. Apparently Jack Darling is still playing, and has been going so long that we've had time to draft another Lucas Cook(e). I choose to treat it as a valuable learning experience now, and even while they were on pace to kick about 48 goals, I was struggling to get outraged due to the expectation that we'll always do something muppetish when starting as favourites.

It wasn't all one way traffic, and there were Pickett family goals amongst the carnage, but nothing to even feign excitement about, because it was otherwise one-way traffic to the left of screen. After the second, Dwayne blew his stack and declared Latrelle "Fists the air!" 'Punches' the air will do fine next time, thanks. Later, Russell rushed to clarify his description of JVR as the "hottest player in the league" by making sure we knew he was talking about footy, just in case you thought he was keen on a spot of Jacob van Rooting.

Last week, we were negligent in not mentioning the spaghetti-armed boundary umpire who couldn't throw the ball in far enough. Either he, or somebody else with malfunctioning upper limbs was back for this game. Your mate Dwayne offered much-needed support for the beleaguered umpiring fraternity by trying to blame the ruckmen for standing too far back, even though every viewer with eyesight could see that the ball had practically been thrown straight up in the air. Could I piff a footy over my head into the exact right spot every time and/or commentate an AFL game? No, and not if I have to call opposition players.

Just when things were looking grim, enter Jefferson, who officially crossed over from 'emerging' to 'promising' in two minutes. We've established that he takes marks, but so far the set shots have been generously described as "a touch dodgy". From the resulting centre bounce, there was a ruck free where neither side had any idea who it was going to, and even Jack Steele nearly stopped mid play-on, waiting for confirmation. Somehow, this ended in another perfect kick for Jefferson, who went back-to-back and left Melbourne fans everywhere collectively saying: "Yes please, I'll have some more of that". 

As we've seen from the up/down career arc of the league's hottest player, just take the signs of promise and don't expect he's going to do this every week. But now we've confirmed he is capable, and he's got every reason to believe in himself, then *rubs hands together in anticipation*.

Those goals got us out of jail, cutting the margin back to what still felt like an undeserved 12 points. Still, now I was open to the prospect of gradually wearing them down across the next three quarters and winning. The phrase TITS UP re-entered the atmosphere after conceding the first. In his 'can't play Richmond' every week comedown game, Fitzgerald saw Pickett (K) dancing around the boundary line and spelunking through tight spaces, thought "I'll give that a go", was caught HTB, and contributed in a roundabout way to us conceding.

If you were worried that goal was going to inspire North to run riot again (hello), I'm pleased to announce it was a false alarm. They only got one more before the game was shot, and that's with Turner going off after a knee to the ribs. In other injury news, we had Pickett going off wiping blood from his mouth, but still stopping for a neighbourly slap of hands with Tom Sparrow on the way off. Bad luck Tom, it means you're now linked by blood as well as flag, and are legally required to sign a contract extension. 

After one of the best games of his career, I'm coming to terms with him definitely leaving at the end of the year. Which is all sorts of shit just as Jack Viney falls apart in multiple ways, and while Steele only has a few years left. Maybe if we'd played him at more than 6.6% of centre bounces last year, they'd have sorted the contract out before the rest of the competition discovered who he was. Maybe it'll end up with Langford going bananas in the middle? 

The tide was on the verge of turning, but not before we were egregiously jibbed out of a 50 when three separate offences were detected. First the North player yelled at the umpire, then he wouldn't give the ball back to Bowey, then finally delivered it as a petulant piff that whistled straight into the fence. I'm sympathetic to umpires not being able to determine whether a kick went 14.9 metres, but would've thought the ball getting lobbed into the fence was a blatant enough misdeed to warrant a ceremonial 50 from the back pocket.

No need to go full "We were rorted" conspiracy though, because the unintentional square-up was what looked a lot like a red-hot holding the ball in front of goal being paid a dangerous tackle. Things turned back in our direction after van Rooyen pulled off the Holy Trinity of a great lead, and a strong contested mark, and an accurate set shot. Like Jefferson in the opening quarter, JVR got another chance straight away. Arguably, the whack around the bonce disguised as an alleged 'spoil' should've ended in a 50 but no. He missed this one, but somehow we were only two goals behind despite having spent the first half holding on for dear life.

Against all good sense and logic, we made half time just four points behind courtesy of Original Recipe Pickett setting up Latrelle's second through midfield rompage. His kick carried the pack and landed in (L)'s arms with back to goal, before he played on with excessive haste, spinning around, and adding the extra degree of difficulty by kicking it on the 'wrong' side for a shot from that distance/angle. For a second, I thought it hit the post and was about to throw the biggest tantrum in recent history. Turns out it just bounced back off the fence, thank god.

Once Sharp put us in front early in the third term, the disappointments of the first half were forgotten. We even got a genuine seven point play when a kick-in was punted straight to Jefferson, who curled home a snap for his third of a career best four. We nearly gave it straight back, saved by a pox North set shot.

As Turner's ribcage exploded again, you won't be surprised to discover that we failed to put the foot down. The end-to-end transition was better, but what chance just cartwheeling away from a side in these circumstances? I was ready to forgive Jefferson for missing a chance at his fourth, even before he pulled down a mark at the back of the pack in the square (assisted by Melksham shoving a North player with vigorous force) and dinked it through from the line. There was nearly a Reverse DemonTime fiasco when they missed a shot with one second left, but overall very nice stuff. If you had any faith in our ability to hold a lead, things were looking up.

When Sparrow got one 20 seconds into the last quarter, there was some absurdly early (but, to be fair, correct) "they can smell victory" presumption from the commentary box. The cynical would say it was just to set up the gag involving Sparrow having a blood nose blocked up. Meanwhile, something in Jiath's leg burst, leaving us two defenders down and with Gawn forced into a cameo defender role. After the siren, he proved his versatility by mediating an argument between Max Heath and Tristan Xerri. Despite spending about 75% of the game on the bench, the death blow was struck by Heath, after plummeting to the ground when pushed semi-forcefully in the back.

After dominating the second half, we gave away a couple of consolations at the end to make the margin less impressive. Considering the injuries, I'm happy just to overcome a difficult start and win comfortably. Like many of our victories this year, it was workmanlike, professional, and won't be remembered next year. Perhaps the most notable incident was this most baffling post-match photo:

Old mates. 🥹 You're forever a '21 premiership player, Spargs. #DemonSpirit pic.twitter.com/VDTRbf1T8F

— Melbourne Demons (@melbournefc) July 18, 2026

Copies are available at the Demon Shop, signed by Jacob van Rooyen, Tom Sparrow, Jake Melksham, Bayley Fritsch, and Ricky Nixon. 

I don't see anything wrong with this - especially because we won - but it doesn't make it any less odd. We've played against Jordon, Jackson, Oliver, and ANB without pausing for a happy memories snap, then all of a sudden, here's a sheepish Spargo roped into posing with a collection of random teammates, half fellow flag winners, one guy who didn't play in the final, and another who wasn't on the list for the greatest day in human civilisation. 

If the tables were reversed, we'd have fans blowing up about it, so it's reassuring to see North fans in their 'Veil of Negativity' era, where it feels like things are going ok but should be better, do their block over something that means stuff all in the grand scheme of things. Tell you what matters - finishing in the top six, and we're well on the way towards that. Seventh to 10th? I'll take it if that's all you're offering.  

2026 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Tom Sparrow
4 - Kysaiah Pickett
3 - Jake Lever
2 - Matthew Jefferson
1 - Jack Steele

Apologies to Bowey, Fritsch, Gawn, Rivers, Tholstrup, and van Rooyen.

Leaderboard
25 home and away votes left, but we're now better than a 99% chance of playing at least one more game, which is nice. There's a heartbeat in the Jako race, with Pickett slashing the gap to two and a half BOGs. You'd still want to be on Maximum to win overall. On that note, there's no point pretending he's provisionally won the Stynes, let's upgrade that to a not-remotely-surprising confirmed victory. Turner remains +1 BOG ahead in the Seecamp, and surprise leader Fitzgerald remains atop the otherwise empty Rising Star field.

48 - Max Gawn (WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
36 - Kysaiah Pickett
29 - Tom Sparrow
24 - Jack Steele
--- Needs at least one final ---
20 - Daniel Turner (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
18 - Jacob van Rooyen
--- Needs at least two finals ---
14 - Jake Bowey
13 - Ed Langdon
--- Needs at least three finals ---
12 - Harvey Langford
11 - Jake Lever
9 - Kade Chandler
--- Needs something ridiculous to happen ---
6 - Harrison Petty, Caleb Windsor
4 - Bayley Fritsch, Brody Mihocek, Koltyn Tholstrup
2 - Blake Howes, Matthew Jefferson, Jake Melksham, Harry Sharp
1 - Jai Culley, Joel Fitzgerald (LEADER: Nathan Jones Rising Star Award)

Next week
As the Richmond game only gets a top timeslot because of the occasion, Geelong on Friday night is our on merit return to prime time. They made a hundred changes this week and won comfortably anyway, which is no surprise because you couldn't shift these bastards from finals contention with an atomic bomb.

This week, Casey went to Arden Street, the only ground where the timekeeping offering includes milliseconds. In the bits I watched when the AFL website wasn't crashing, there were plenty of decent performances in a win, but nothing outstanding. I was thrilled to see the return of Forward Sizzle. This was either tactical or insurance against Petty's hamstring dissolving. You decide.

Jiath is confirmed cactus for several weeks, and I'm assuming Turner will be rested. I'm all for giving Cooke another go, and Salem didn't do a massive amount but played a full game, so get him back in.

You may instead choose to take the views of somebody who watched the game properly, instead of through a live stream that missed the first four minutes of the last quarter because somebody had either knocked the cord out or just forgot to turn it back on.

I confess to having NFI about the Geelong result. Feels like it'll be the 'loss we had to have', but at the same time, there's a great argument for winning. Which is just the sort of in-depth analysis I know you come here for. 

IN: Cooke, Salem
OUT: Jiath (inj), Turner (inj)
LUCKY: Melksham, Windsor
UNLUCKY: Cross, McDonald

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
The Sharp one? Or Latrelle's turnaround as payback for thinking he'd missed. Either way, Cross vs Collingwood leads.

Final thoughts
More wins, give me all the wins, let me swim through wins like Scrooge McDuck in his vault of money.

Water way to have a good time

Now that the AFL season is one long quest for clickbait, it's harder than ever to find a glamour match. Despite our status as the league's #1 surprise packet, and a sudden ability to score 100 points while not looking overly impressive, this was never going to have neutrals queuing around the block for a ticket. And that's before it pissed down for 75% of the afternoon. 

Even Richmond fans couldn't be bothered, making up a pittance of the alleged 32,000 in attendance. Can't blame them. If you offered three flags in exchange for several years of putrid football afterwards I'd sign before reading the contract, but it would be hard to feign excitement for the long, tedious process of losing to everyone while rebuilding. It was one thing suffering through the depths of the #fistedforever years when there was a half chance of the club carking it before returning to finals, I can't imagine what it's like to go from Dustin Martin et al to an injury-ravaged side that's 25% premiership heroes on their lap of honour, and 75% raw kids with stuff all in the middle.

The good news for newly long-suffering Tigers fans is that if there's any finals contender they could rely on not to heap further misery on their 2-14, worst percentage in the competition season, it was us. At the start of the season I thought we'd wreck a team eventually, but it's been a year of letting the underprivileged down gently. We're now finished with our games against the league's undisputed worst sides and have beaten Richmond x2, West Coast x1 and Essendon x1 without ever going too far over the top. 

Other than the massive Sydney '93 style anomaly of letting one of them win their only game for the year, there's no serious grounds for complaint. In another universe we'd struggle to win four times all season, so I'm grateful/somewhat astonished to be in the frame to make the real finals. Still plenty of action before we know that for sure, but a foothold has been established, and I'm extremely grateful to coaches and players alike for that.

Doesn't mean you'd ever watch the replay of this again. It was a professional win, where we put down brief early resistance to do as expected without over-extension, injuries or suspension. Obviously, I'd love to have piled on 10 goals to nil in the last quarter and cracked the ton but until we get tipped out of some important ladder position by the barest of percentage margins, then a good old fashioned four points will do me nicely.

No matter how far the ledger is tipped in our favour, I've always got a "this could go horribly wrong" feeling. This wasn't helped by first losing Fritsch, then Petty to mystery injuries. Just as the former got back into goalkicking form, and the latter returned to play an important part in our forward line. We shouldn't have needed them against the reigning worst defence in the competition - and didn't - but the panic button part of my brain wanted to believe danger was afoot. That we'd somehow combine reduced forward power and wet weather to lose 58-52 in a reverse of Essendon 2012. It never went close, but you know the only saying about following Melbourne - best to think the worst and be pleasantly surprised.

During the week I annoyed a Richmond fan by accidentally saying Melbourne "Just need to beat the shit teams", and was subject to a lecture about how they're "not shit" but [insert list of excuses]. Sorry but you've won nine games in three seasons, it's best to accept your place in life. Doesn't mean it will be that way forever, but carrying on about promising young players and injuries doesn't detract from the fact that right now your senior coach has a worse win/loss record than Mark Neeld.

I'm not here to solve Richmond's problems, because other than Adem Yze's feelings I don't care, but they're really lacking the Bernie Vince/Daniel Cross/Jordan Lewis style experienced ring-ins from other sides. Yay for having several multiple-time premiership players in the side, but surely they're all depressed by now. They need players with a couple of years left and something to prove to bridge the gap between promising kids and fading veterans. Good luck with that, feel free to keep losing to us twice a year for another few seasons. 

The only thing Outraged Richmond Man got right was saying "van Rooyen will kick goals against us". Though the logic that "he always does" was a bit faulty. By this point I was desperate to escape the conversation so I didn't argue it at the time, even though Petty was the only person I remember kicking anything close to a bag against the Tiges in their declining years. Turned out it was cobblers, unless you stop the clock at 2023, when JVR got seven of his eight previous career goals against Richmond. But he got plenty here, and that's all that mattered.

When van Rooyen beat his opponent all-ends-up for the first mark and goal it looked like he might double his career tally against Richmond in the first half alone. For the first five minutes all the play was at our end, and there was the definite hint of floodgate opening. Before, in a none-more-Melbourne twist, we found ourselves trailing, courtesy of failure to press home advantage. This came via the scrappiest lead-up play to a goal you'll ever see, then a first gamer called 'Peucker' doing his own goal assist by botching a bounce that propelled the ball forward enough to allow him to keep running, regather and kick it. 

We remain vulnerable to quick transition, but I can't take teams succeeding by propelling the ball forward by any means necessary. The positive is that good teams don't play like this, so as long as we make finals it won't be fatal. They should've kept doing this, it was more successful than trying to kick goals properly - at which point Lever/Turner went into Lever/May overdrive and stopped everything. And when ball hit ground off went Bowey in the opposite direction at 100km/h, without an opponent in the vicinity. This was all very nice, but it was telling how much less dangerous we looked whenever Gawn went off. 

Late second ruck entrant Johnson had a crack, as you'd expect from somebody who looks like Nathan Jones' evil twin, but our reliance on Max - even when playing a good but not great game - is... interesting? It's not a bad thing for the 85% of the 100% of games when he's on the ground, but it won't be an earthshaking surprise when eventually our season dies because we concede three goals in three minutes while he's having a rest. You could get away with it here, but there are vastly bigger tests to come.

Meanwhile, the even later late change Jake Melksham is now into the top 10 of oldest players to ever take the field for Melbourne, and after looking half-shot in his previous two appearances, he spent the first quarter launching a bid for the best ever performance by somebody not originally named in the side. He set up van Rooyen's first, kicked two of his own, and was in full 'winding back of clock' mode before not doing a lot more than missing a couple of set shots but it was still very enjoyable. The Hollywood ending of him and May tearfully reuniting on the dais post-flag is finished, but even if he's best relied on as one of the moving parts rather than a single-handed match winner, he could still contribute to surprise finals action.

Otherwise, the first quarter was about as casual as we're ever going to be in opening a game with five goals. It was simply good, solid stuff, quietly shutting the door on a side who deserved to have it slammed in their face. The only real let down was when, after van Rooyen's second, we stormed out of the middle for Jefferson to mark 40 metres out, directly in front for what should've been a double. He missed this, and his next two set shots as well, but I'll take somebody who knows how to get the ball but can't kick straight over a key forward who is accurate but needs to be ball delivered on a first-class silver platter every time. 

The straight kicking will either come with experience and confidence, and until then he's convincing enough in the air that it forces the opposition to pay him attention, instead of all swarming towards JVR whenever the ball goes inside 50. In a Mihocek-less end to the season, playing decoy for the main event and chipping in with goals here could make him an important player at the spicy end of the season. A van Rooyen/Jefferson/Petty tall forward group is the dictionary definition of 'unconventional', but I can see it working - if we can tighten up the crumb when they don't mark it. 

After barging into the 'best player in the universe' conversation, Pickett (K) has been off for a few weeks, and we really need to reintroduce his terrifying, existential threat to defences whenever he has the ball within 60 metres. Otherwise, the small forwards and forward-adjacent players are a bit meh at the moment. Laurie and Pickett (L) aren't making enough chances, Chandler is doing a lot of good work further up the ground, Sharp has slowed down in the last few weeks etc.. etc.. It's not bad that we've got things to improve on at this stage of the year, better than unexpectedly sitting sixth on the ladder after 18 rounds courtesy of absolutely everything going right, with no room for error.

Richmond came out full of excitement for the second quarter, but got stuff all reward for it before the momentum ground to a halt, and Gawn nudged the famous door a little bit closer to shut with the first goal of the term. We missed a few chances to start clobbering their brains out, before Bowey turned up for one of his rare but always appreciated Howitzer blasts from outside 50, then JVR added two at the end. The sense that the Tigers had done their bit and were satisfied to escape without getting thrashed was helped by us immediately cancelling out their only goal of the quarter. Nothing about this was vintage, but it was good enough for where we're at. What about we keep winning in solid but unspectacular fashion, then launch another surprise outburst of bulk scoring in September?

The weather clearly had a sense of humour, because after pissing down at random during the first half, the rain stopped during the half-time break until exactly the point when the players came back after half time. These were not conditions conducive for launching a landslide win, but nor was a hapless opposition likely to wind back a five goal deficit after not kicking that in total during the first half. But even with an opposition 20,000 leagues under the sea compared to last week, the fear of another second half collapse was still active in the darkest corners of my mind. This made no sense, but I can't help who I am.

There was another brief start of quarter rally by the opposition, which came to nothing because they couldn't kick goals for shit. We've all been there, and while I'm sure their players were just happy to not be conceding in bulk at the other end, it's depressing to watch as a fan. Better anyone than us. We ultimately got four goals - and I've seen us kick less in a full game - but the motions were certainly being gone through. I'm glad Jefferson converted his set shot, because he appears to be a 100% confidence player and kicking 0.3 with one OOF may have set him back a year.

In an accurate preview of how the game was going to end, the kid chosen to run for Lego at three quarter time realised there was no way he could lose and walked to victory without breaking a sweat. When JVR kicked his fifth in the opening minute, there was briefly the sense that we might be about to make up for last week by unloading a full (Jacob van) rooting on them, before it turned into us keeping our powder dry for the important stuff, and Richmond attempting to avoid being dragged into a 'sad music' montage on AFL360.

We let them get four consolation goals, which wasn't ideal but hardly anything to keep you awake at night thinking about. The star of the last quarter was Joel Fitzgerald, the man who the word 'coalface' was invented for, who kept racking up possessions left, right and centre. Unless the ex-Williamstownian is miserable about having to drive to Cranbourne all the time, I dare say it won't be long until he'll be getting an extension beyond the standard mid-season draftee contract - especially as Sparrow inches closer to the end of the year, and a lucrative date with free agency, with no sign of a deal.

After becoming the first Melbourne player with back-to-back five goal haul since Jesse Hogan (remember him?) in 2018, the best bit about the final term was van Rooyen equalling his personal best with a sixth. If you prefer your analysis in the format of 'actual', rather than me going entirely off the vibe, here's an explanation of his performance beyond just "look at that guy thrashing some hapless defenders". Featuring a presenter with a very large television, continuously being interrupted by Kayo while trying to make a point. He's stuffed when they start making you watch ads after every unpause, so enjoy it while you can.

Developing as a key forward is all about what strings can you add to the bow.

As a junior, usually the key forwards are levels above their opponent that it doesn’t really matter what sort of ball comes into them, they’ll make it work.

That doesn’t work in the AFL, so… pic.twitter.com/5xkmI8N7LC

— Davisjarra (@davisjarrafooty) July 12, 2026

And, err, that was it. We won the last quarter because Sharp kicked a goal after the siren, and if anyone was disappointed that they had to listen to the Grand Old Flag instead of Sweet Caroline, I challenge you to a fight outside Gate 4.

I don't want to sound blase about a win, because I appreciate them all more than you'll ever know, but this was just another banana skin to be avoided while we wait for the important stuff to begin. I still don't believe our form is sustainable against top sides, but at this point everything is a bonus so all aboard the wild ride and let's hope for something truly silly to happen at the end of the year.

2026 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Jake Bowey
4 - Jacob van Rooyen
3 - Jake Lever
2 - Daniel Turner
1 - Joel Fitzgerald

Massive apologies to Chandler and Sparrow. Lesser apologies to Gawn, Howes, Jiath, Langdon, Melksham and Steele

Leaderboard
No votes for the top four, but the big news is that we finally have a leader in what can now be revealed - as if it hadn't been given away in a pre-season post nobody read - as the Nathan Jones Rising Star Award. The unprecedented scenario of a mid-season draftee potentially winning has thrown the pre-season betting markets into disarray, but what we know right now is that the dreaded 'NO ELIGIBLE PLAYER' result is off the table. 

The only other interest is in the Seecamp, where Turner both gets votes, and loses ground to the fast finishing Bowey. Otherwise, there's 30 votes left in the Home and Away season + god only knows what to follow. It means the line of doom is snaking up the leaderboard, but also that every week Pickett doesn't gain ground on Gawn, the chances of Max romping to a big win increase. Watch this space.

48 - Max Gawn (PROVISIONAL WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
32 - Kysaiah Pickett
24 - Tom Sparrow
23 - Jack Steele
20 - Daniel Turner (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
18 - Jacob van Rooyen
--- Needs at least one final ---
14 - Jake Bowey
13 - Ed Langdon
--- Needs at least two finals ---
12 - Harvey Langford
9 - Kade Chandler
8 - Jake Lever
--- Needs at least three finals ---
6 - Harrison Petty, Caleb Windsor
4 - Bayley Fritsch, Brody Mihocek, Koltyn Tholstrup
--- Come on, let's not get silly about this now ---
2 - Blake Howes, Jake Melksham, Harry Sharp
1 - Jai Culley, Joel Fitzgerald (LEADER: Nathan Jones Rising Star Award)

Next week
After (eventually) accounting for a contender and an also-ran in consecutive weeks, the task is now to conquer the sort of mid-table mediocrities I thought we'd be this year. It's North Melbourne at Docklands, in a rematch of the Round 2, 2025 game that all but blew the doors off the Simon Goodwin era. At that point you'd have thought they were going to hurtle away from us, but it turned out to be a Gather Round style false alarm. But they are getting better, and even with the odd 20 goal loss randomly thrown in, we'd still want to be better than this week to guard against another surprise.

Didn't see a cracker of the Casey game, where they lost to the locally based VFL club called the Lions care of having their side ransacked to cover our late withdrawals, emergencies, and requirements to play a returning Salem for half a game. No comment on any additions from that game then, I'll just assume Fritsch and Petty were late withdrawals out of caution/quality of opposition, so they can come straight back. Surely they're not going to pick Salem off half a game in the suburbs when he hasn't played since Round 5.

The question of "does Max Heath still play here?" is that he'd got a shoulder injury, so he's not an option for the second ruck, but I'd rather Petty do it 15% of the time and provide a decent threat forward than uninspiring Johnson cameos just because he's got a larger frame. Otherwise, I'm losing confidence in Windsor, but for lack of obvious replacements may as well give him a few more weeks.

We should win, but when has that ever meant anything?

IN: Fritsch, Petty
OUT: Johnson, Laurie (omit)
LUCKY: L. Pickett, Windsor
UNLUCKY: Cross, Henderson

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
Not a huge number of top contenders this week, but I like the Melksham one from the boundary that got the party started. Cross retains the lead.

Final thoughts
We're on the verge of being involved in something baffling and crazy this year. I don't think there's enough quality at the bottom end of the team to think about it ending in premiership contention, but anything's better than the sinking feeling of 12 months ago. I'm not yet at the stage of having enough hope that it'll kill me when we lose a final by 1 point, but the lid is starting to bubble.

Best of times/not quite best of times

Despite what Anthony Hudson would have you believe, the sequel is rarely as good as the original. For this reason, I set my expectations for the rematch of our best performance of the season to 'Medium', but when the margin was 96 points halfway through the third quarter, it looked like Godfather II + Lethal Weapon 2 ^ Rocky IV. 

Then, just when you thought it was safe to be happy, the game became a multiplier of every Police Academy movie from Citizens On Patrol onward, as we went uncomfortably close to putting five goals on top of the all-time greatest VFL/AFL collapse, then recovered to win by a margin you'd have wounded yourself to get a slice of before the first bounce. 

This was comfortably one of the stupidest games I've ever seen. It wasn't as important as the 2002 Adelaide final or the 2021 Kardinia Park komeback, and lacked the horrific finishes of Essendon '92/St Kilda '25, but pound-for-pound there's never been a more ridiculous score progression in a Melbourne game than being 111-15 ahead at the 13 minute mark of the third quarter then conceding 12 goals unanswered, to the point where the margin never got close enough to make it really scary, but wasn't far off.

How stupid was it? We've just won a game by 35 points and ended up on the wrong side of this...

Previous most consecutive goals by a losing team (2001 onwards) I think is 3 way tie on 9 between North Melbourne in *that game* vs Essendon; Geelong v Melb in the final round of 2021, and Hawthorn v Melbourne in 2002.

New record is 12.

— Emlyn Breese (@EmlynBreese) July 4, 2026

... and while we can't officially say 'unprecedented', there can't be many other occasions since 1897 where the conditions existed for a team to kick that many goals in a row before losing - and certainly not by this much. Dead set madness, perfectly encapsulating the MFC/Aeroflot experience of unconvincing highs followed by terrifying plummet. But we won, and the opportunity for a mass-Bermuda Triangle job was set up by one of the confirmed all-time great first halves - with a 77 point lead only marginally trailing a 1927 romp against Essendon as the most we've ever led by at the stage of a game. So let what happened at the end of the game not detract too far from that.

'Not going on with it' is in our DNA. The big clash with the Same Olds battle in '27 only saw 10 points added to the margin by the end, and in 1941 a record half-time score of 127 finished with a win of 'just' 40 points. Job done by extracting premiership points from a tricky game and furthering the campaign to play real finals, but I'd really enjoy kicking the piss out of a team one day. For now, let's just get excited by winning 10 games (and counting?) in a season again/Gold Coast spicing up the pre-swapped first round draft pick by being shit.

Even before a game that would've caused the dead to rise, I'm sure you were on edge, wondering if the teased loss of interest in footy before the bye was a one-off, or the first week of the rest of my life. I'm pleased to say that it took until about 1.03pm, but the pre-match elation/dread was back exactly where you'd expect it to be. Things were still a bit ropey mid-week, I'm usually fanging for the teams on Thursday night, but completely forgot to check until the email came out. Possibly because I didn't even know it was Thursday, which is a slightly more worrying symptom than any one-off mid-season footy malaise.

In the week celebrating Hawthorn's 25 years in Launceston, the highlight of the pre-match was Leigh Montagna reading a prepared statement about how the wonderful relationship between club and state with the enthusiasm of a man who had the Tasmanian Premier and Hawthorn CEO holding a gun to either side of his head. Until now, York Park was about the only fringe AFL venue we haven't played at. Ground management is obviously already preparing for a Hawk-less future, because there were Death Valley-style patches of sand at key points around the ground. Probably auditioning for a job at the new stadium if/when it's ever built. 

When you think about the cast of injury replacements and randoms in Hawthorn's side, a six goal win seems perfectly reasonable - if you ignore the insanity that got us there. Apparently, half of Hawthorn's backline was missing, but most of the time that's all you need against us this year - he thought just before we had two players kick five each for the first time in 15 years. 

If at this point in 2024 you'd told me I'd be enthusiastically welcoming Harrison Petty back as the saviour of our forward line my jaw would've dropped out of its socket, but when we started with Pickett (K) kicking OOF, and a pass bouncing off van Rooyen's chest like he was made of trampoline I was ready to get PETTY FORWARD FOREVER tattooed across my forehead. In the end, he was overshadowed by JVR and Fritsch kicking 10 and was one of many players to enter the witness protection program midway through the third quarter but unlike a spew, he is better in than out.

What turned out to be the biggest first half party since the Prime Ministership of Stanley Melbourne (Dees man?) Bruce, started with Fritsch getting his eye in early with one from the boundary line, then Langdon rolling one through from an obscure angle in the pocket to take the clubhouse lead of best ever 'mons goal at York Park. I wasn't getting too excited just yet. The earlier win over Hawthorn that made people roll around on the floor in joy also started with the first two goals, before we humoured them for a bit, ran away with it, then pulled the pin at the end. This had the start, the finish, and the end result in common, but little else.

There were missed opportunities, but at the second opportunity Petty successfully converted over the Copacabana Beach in the left of screen goalsquare. According to Gerard Healy, Petty was back playing "where he made his name". Which is only true if you didn't know who he was before playing in a flag. Healy then called the Hawthorn coach "Neil Mitchell", and does seem like the sort of person who'd love a spot of furious, audio finger-pointing talkback radio.

With Fritsch temporarily off with a farked finger, Jefferson stormed in for a fourth, and I'd have been more excited if we hadn't gone missing after a strong first quarter against Adelaide. Eventually, we'll get to the point where you can believe in a good start. Whether it's this decade or the 2030s is to be determined. Alternatively, get so far in front that even stopping as if shot for the last 1.5 quarters isn't enough to lose.

To nobody's surprise, Hawthorn's first came from somebody associated with the phrase "Hasn't kicked a goal yet this year". Re-enter Jefferson, who has got the marking bit of playing as a forward covered but is still ropey from the set shots. Nevertheless, and allowing for him never being seen again once the opposition turned up, he's showing enough to have won the argument over Kentfield for a spot in our forward line. 

We're not in a place to be wasting set shots yet. But off the back of Gawn ruining his opponent, your friend and mine Jefferson (never, ever JEFFO) set up Laurie, and this was getting quite interesting. See also Pickett (L) getting a questionable free for the Hawthorn player doing a handball while tackled. He considered hanging shit on his opponent before Pickett (K) arrived to tell him to calm down, converted the set shot and it was getting VERY interesting. When (L) spun into a tackle, somehow didn't get pinged for HTB, and Sharp got the seventh goal of the opening quarter straight after I was still thinking "how are we going to stuff this up?"

The underrated highlight of a rampant first quarter where the opposition were reduced to gibbering wrecks was Jiath coming back for a second go at dicking his old team. It rarely works a second time, but he had a shit hot first half before vapourising along with everyone else. 

It's just over a hundred years since Fuchsias d. Mayblooms in the flower derby by a record 141 points, a milestone that nobody celebrated but which looked half a chance of being overrun when the margin was out to +50 before halfway into the second quarter. Apparently, Hawthorn were exiting the lucrative Tasmanian market early. Meanwhile, Gawn was dominating his opponent to a degree not seen since the day he had 82 hitouts in a VFL game. Even after giving away a free, he dropped back and intercepted his opponent's kick.

Between regular reaction shots from Sam Mitchell looking like he was about to strangle someone - highlighted by them blowing a chance to walk into an open goal via sludge handball - this was quality riot running. The goal streaks in the 2021 R23/Prelim/GF were all more consequential, but they came at a time you still thought us capable of such a thing. Even after a season where we've regularly kicked decent scores, I'm still expecting to end games on 8.8.56. Nearly kicking that in back-to-back quarters does not compute.

At 67-8, our win probability was about 99%, but I was still on edge for a humiliating reverse. If we were the -8 I'd expect a 200 point loss, and without having any idea of the absurd finish ahead of us was already clenching up as the commentators started talking about percentage boosting. But at the same time, to make up for our dodgy free in the first quarter, Gawn got robbed out of one 30 metres out directly in front, which led to Hawthorn kicking from exactly the same spot... and missing. Cripes.

Even we couldn't blow a 77 point half time lead, so the question was how much/if any extra misery could be heaped upon the nominal home team. Conceding the first goal after half time wasn't part of Operation Battery, but Sharp got it back quickly, and at first I thought he'd signalled his own goal in the spirit of that Swedish bloke from (OBLIGATORY WORLD CUP REFERENCE!) USA '94 (NOT TO A TOURNAMENT THIS CENTURY!), but it turned out to just a generic double figures-out celebration, which is a bit disappointing.

By the time Van Rooyen got two more, and Pickett (L) his second, we were 96 points ahead by christ. Maybe Trent Rivers was a childhood Hawthorn fan or felt sorry for them, because he gave away a needless 50 from the next bounce to even things out. This kicked off footy's biggest power outage since the Waverley blackout.

You know things are going well when the lead is massive, and you're worried that it's going to become slightly less massive. I didn't expect it to become not massive at all, but despite what happened later, parking Gawn on the bench for 10 minutes was the right thing to do, both for the future of our season and for the humane treatment of his opponent. It did, however, coincide with Hawthorn's survival instincts kicking in, and what looked like 186 South ended with us only winning the third term by a point. Never mind, when you lead by 77 points at the last change, there's never going to be anything to get worried about is there? Turns out that in a game where the teams politely took turns standing around watching the other do as they liked, the extra half a quarter of work came in surprisingly handy.

Enter a last quarter that was baffling and bizarre. When they went straight to the left of screen for a goal in the opening seconds the mood was "Yeah, good luck with that", then after a couple more "It's a shame we've missed the chance to brutalise somebody, but this is still going to be a comfortable win", and by the time it was under 50 points with plenty of time left panic was starting to bubble up. 

It wasn't even like the Docklands Disaster when we occupied all the time St Kilda wasn't scoring by blowing chances to win the game, this was 25 minutes of witches hats coming to life and putting on a training drill. We couldn't get the ball for long enough to calm things down and waste time to protect our 11 goal three quarter time lead.   

I'm not a regular possession heatmap consumer (except when one of the Wagners made the cock and balls shape), but thought the fourth quarter version was worth a look:

So almost all of our limited possessions were desperate, usually failed, attempts to escape defence. Look at that left half forward flank, redefining the concept of 'Starvation Corner'. 

Not featuring anywhere in that graphic, Lever, Pickett (L) or Sharp, who all had zero fourth quarter disposals. Howes, Jefferson, Petty, and Laurie only had one each, which I can believe considering we could barely get hands on the ball while the Hawks went almost unstoppably ballistic.

After not going near it for a half, Chol suddenly had five, they couldn't miss, and it was getting uncomfortably close to SURELY FUCKING NOT territory. I tried convincing myself that there was no possible way that they could keep going in the time available, but when the margin was down to four goals with about as many minutes left, Pickett (K) fumbled the ball after a centre bounce, and Ginnivan was pelting inside 50 my innards nearly dissolved like an Ebola virus patient. 

We've been humiliated in so many different ways over the years that it's hard to find a unique source of misery, but putting several goals on top of the all-time greatest comeback in history would've been something. You'd think Hawthorn was still going to run out of time, but if Ginnivan converted I'm scared to think about how close we'd have gone to confronting the in-game apocalypse. My football life wasn't flashing before my eyes yet, but there was some DEEP clenching going on. If this were Hawksblog I'd be saying "Thanks for the comeback, but maybe don't get 96 points down in the first place?" 

Finally, one of those rare dots on the right of the heatmap - not even enough to generate the slightest hint of red - led to us kicking over the top of the first gamer who had about 10 intercept marks and a spot on the Kingsley waiting list, and for Fritsch to make absolutely sure of winning. Odd that a sealer was required after starting the quarter 77 points up, but that's how we roll - downhill, like a car you're trying to trade-in before it catches fire. 

van Rooyen cashed in on arguably his best game yet with a fifth, and it never got close enough to risk my blood pressure cracking the world record mark, but like Hitler invading Britain and Scully winning a flag with GWS, we can spend the rest of our lives pondering how awful it would've been if worst came to worst. But, until we miss out on a vital ladder position by 0.01%, the most important thing is four premiership points against another team in our neighbourhood on the ladder. 

Let's appreciate the joyful romp of the first half and call the second a 'learning experience'. It was like Clive Palmer building up an enormous fortune, then squandering shitloads of it on dinosaur models, a recreation of the Titanic, and shit election campaigns. He's still rich, we still won the game by a decent margin, and let's hope that's the last time we're connected to the Titanic in any way this season. 

2026 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Max Gawn
4 - Jacob van Rooyen
3 - Tom Sparrow
2 - Bayley Fritsch
1 - Daniel Turner

Apologies to Jiath and Steele.

Leaderboard
Seven home and away games left + god only knows what after that, and it's looking good for back-to-back Max. Turner tightens his grip on the Seecamp, and the Rising Star is edging closer to our first 'No Result' since 2005. The last exciting battle could be the podium race between Sparrow, Steele, Turner, and hopefully van Rooyen - because if he's kicking goals we'll be winning.

48 - Max Gawn (PROVISIONAL WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
32 - Kysaiah Pickett
24 - Tom Sparrow
23 - Jack Steele
18 - Daniel Turner (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
14 - Jacob van Rooyen
13 - Ed Langdon
12 - Harvey Langford
9 - Jake Bowey, Kade Chandler
--- Needs at least one final ---
6 - Harrison Petty, Caleb Windsor
5 - Jake Lever
4 - Bayley Fritsch, Brody Mihocek, Koltyn Tholstrup
--- Needs at least two finals ---
2 - Blake Howes, Jake Melksham, Harry Sharp
1 - Jai Culley

Next week
After this, playing a side who should (on paper) be crushed, at a ground we're unbeaten at this year, is either going to end really well, or REALLY BADLY. And hello, here's 17th placed Richmond, turning up at just the point where people are starting to wonder if the rebuild they were whacking off about a year ago is a mirage. We should win this comfortably, but FRO with any talk about margins or percentage. Just get the job done and proceed - unexpectedly - towards September.

I watched half the Casey game then forgot to check the final score. Turns out they blew a lead too. Never mind. Even if I was never impressed by Henderson last year, he was very good here and deserves a chance to show that he was just being weighed down by playing the first five games of his career in a pox side. Johnson was also good, but I don't see a role for him unless one of the forwards is injured. Otherwise, pick a side to get through to the other side with the points - and our spot in the top six - intact.  

IN: Henderson
OUT: Laurie (omit)
LUCKY: Windsor
UNLUCKY: Heath (not sure if still alive) 

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
It has to be the Langdon one from the boundary line that got the party started, though I have rarely appreciated a simple goal in a (relatively) comfortable win than Fritsch from the top of the square in the last quarter. Cross vs Collingwood still leads.

Final thoughts
Nothing to get excited about, just a solid 35 point win over a finals contender.