Do that to me one more time
– Captain and Tennille
In the immediate aftermath following the 2010 drawn grand final, the media, former players and the fans were deep in analysis, thousands of conversations extending into the early hours of the morning, argument about who would win the replay.
Collingwood, by virtue of hammering Geelong and the Western Bulldogs were installed as favourites, albeit narrower. It was clear the bookies weren’t impressed by St Kilda’s remarkable second half comeback. Domination for a half counted for nought.
Opinion, naturally, was divided. The Magpies had a shocker, pure stage fright, giving up a four goal half time lead, just the forth club since 1970 to let such an advantage slip. Depressed supporters mused Collingwood was lucky not to lose while Saints fans slipped into expectant bliss, next week would be different. A second-half comeback would not be necessary.
What the Saints achieved in the historic drawn grand final couldn’t be replicated. There would be no second half heroics. Predictions of many experts, how bigger bodies and big-game experience would again rattle the Magpies proved false. St Kilda was humiliated.
It was inevitable the replay wouldn’t match the hype that drove the industry into overtime and sent football nihilists into rage. This was no two goal defeat after fierce battle on a soaked, windswept MCG – it was an anticlimactic embarrassment. The bigger bodies were cumbersome and slow.
Collingwood’s attack was incessant from the outset. After 20 seconds Travis Cloke marked in the goal square, a certain goal until Dane Swan gave up a stupid free kick. Cloke, denied a goal, set one up a few minutes later with a pass to Tyson Goldsack for the first of the grand final.
Minutes into the opening quarter it was clear Collingwood was quicker and better skilled. The Saints couldn’t get forward of centre, contested possessions or find targets. With numbers around the ball, the Magpies protected their team-mates and found space.
Ten minutes in Dane Beams marked on the fifty metre arc and passed to Ben Johnson who scored a long range goal from directly in front. Fifteen minutes in St Kilda hadn’t scored. Only desperation in defence and uncharacteristic hesitancy by the Magpies kept the margin at 14 points.
Twenty minutes in, a fist by Collingwood’s Ben Reid sent the ball into the middle. Brett Peake gathered the ball, passed to Sam Gilbert who kicked forward to Leigh Montagna. Saints captain Nick Riewoldt was bolting forward into space as Montagna fired a handpass to Adam Schneider. Seventy metres away, on the opposite flank, Heath Shaw, who was running beside Steven Milne, sprinted after Riewoldt.
With the Saints trailing by 14 points, Riewoldt marked Schneider’s kick and ambled into goal, oblivious as Shaw closed the distance. Thinking he had plenty of time, Riewoldt lairised, taking an extra step, wanting to boot the ball into the second level. Shaw dove as Riewoldt went to kick, knocking the ball from his hands. While Riewoldt’s boot completed its extravagant, upwards arc, the ball tumbled sideways, Shaw finding turf as the foot he’d disrupted swished air. The ball bounced through for a rushed behind.
Shaw’s 50 metre run, which seemed certain from the outset to be wasted effort, will become one of the most famous dashes in grand final history. His desperation and anticipation to bolt forward, in mad scamper to prevent a goal, will be remembered as the most famous smother in grand final history.
‘That was unbelievable Heath Shaw,’ Dan Lonergan shouted on ABC radio as it happened. ‘Heath Shaw got him on the line. I thought it was a goal. That emphasises how desperate Collingwood is.’
Shaw kicked it in, regained possession and the ball along the wing, Nick Maxwell to Tyson Goldsack, back to Maxwell who kicked it to Luke Ball, who was still on the wing. Ball moved it to Alan Toovey who got it to Steele Sidebottom. Dale Thomas couldn’t mark Sidebottom’s long kick but Brent McCaffer gathered the crumb at the top of the square and kicked the ball over his head for a goal.
If Riewoldt scored a goal, the margin would’ve been seven points. Less than a minute later the margin was 19-points. The grand final had been lost in the goal square, when Riewoldt’s boot found air. Shaw late described his effort as the smother of the millennium. It wouldn’t matter which millennium he was referring to.
It must be, perhaps, Riewoldt’s most embarrassing moment in football. Already the smother has been replayed repeatedly, getting blamed or lauded as the turning point of the premiership. The Saints skipper was far too casual, enjoying the moment as hundreds of goal-kickers have throughout history, running into an open goal without a care, ready to accept the accompanying adulation. Shaw took it all away.
The margin at quarter time was three goals. It quickly blew out to four goals when Alan Didak teamed up with Travis Cloke for the opening major of the second term. St Kilda, though Sam Gilbert, Jason Goddard and Nick Del Santo, dominated play for ten minutes but couldn’t find the goals. Gilbert kicked three points, the Saints scoring five consecutive behinds before Goddard kicked his team’s opening goal from a free kick, fifteen minutes into the second quarter.
Twenty minutes in, the margin was 15-points. Dane Swan had been quiet, just four possessions. Collingwood had been inside 50 just three times for the quarter. The Saints attacked again, a searching kick to Steven Milne, who dropped the chest mark in the pocket. Dale Thomas took the ball forward but Lenny Hayes got a handpass to James Gwilt across half back, who found Peake by hand.
Peake kicked wide to the loping Ben McEvoy. A bad kick, the ball hit the ground and took a right angle, bouncing over the ruckman’s head. Darren Jolly capitalised on the fickle bounce and passed to McCaffer, who kicked a goal. It was a horrible turnover, one that wrecked St Kilda’s momentum and pushed the margin out to 21-points.
From the bounce, Jolly got the tap decisively to Scott Pendlebury who kicked to half forward. Jolly, having won the tapout, sprinted forward as Steele Sidebottom gathered the ball on the flank and passed to Jolly, who took an uncontested mark on his knees in front of McEvoy.
From 40 meters out, the ruckman calmly kicked his 24th goal for the year. Inside a minute, Jolly had set up a goal and kicked one. The big man was dominating. Collingwood led by 27-points.
For the next eight minutes the ball swung back and forth, defence, attack, congestion. Though St Kilda was able to close the play down, they couldn’t score. Inside the last minute, Robert Eddy passed to Adam Schneider, who marked 30 metres out on a slight angle. As he set to kick, the siren went. Schneider, who didn’t restart his routine, missed a sitter. The Saints went in at half time having kicked one goal and eight points.
In 115 grand finals, only ten clubs have gone into half time with one goal or less on the scoreboard. As the table below shows, St Kilda has become the first club to do it in fifty years. The Saints have created another slice of unfortunate history.
| Year | Club | Goals | Result |
| 1901 | Collingwood | 0 | loss 27 |
| 1905 | Fitzroy | 1 | win 13 |
| Collingwood | 1 | ||
| 1906 | Fitzroy | 1 | loss 49 |
| 1913 | St Kilda | 0 | loss 13 |
| 1920 | Collingwood | 1 | loss 17 |
| 1921 | Richmond | 1 | won 4 |
| 1927 | Richmond | 0 | loss 12 |
| 1960 | Collingwood | 1 | loss 48 |
| 2010 | St Kilda | 1 | loss 56 |
Only Fitzroy and Richmond won the premiership after kicking one goal to half time. The last time it happened, 1921, was 90 years ago. History, certainly, was going to hurt St Kilda after half time. Though the Saints had missed easy shots on goal, they were being humiliated. Their defensive game was good but they couldn’t match Collingwood’s pressure in attack.
The expectation among many was St Kilda’s bigger, stronger bodies and experience would influence the stoppages. Those attributes led to the remarkable comeback from a four goal deficit at half time in the drawn game. By half time in the replay, the Saints were gone, their coach Ross Lyon looking bewildered.
Mick Malthouse is renowned as a defensive coach. At West Coast, he squeezed the game shut. The Eagles would kick nine goals and win by four. It was effective, ugly football good enough to net two premierships. At Collingwood, Malthouse has perfected defence through attacking pressure, ensuring the ball remains forward of centre, forcing the opposition into turnovers. There is no time or space to move or think. Malthouse has described his game plan as a box.
The subtleties in the game plans were simple. Whereas St Kilda maintained the pressure across half back and went forward slowly, from deep in defence, Collingwood went long down the boundary, often in four kicks, to half forward. If no one marked on fifty, the ball was squared to a wave of midfielders spread across the ground. The forwards form another line with space at the back. When the ball went inside fifty, the defenders pressed up. The players moved forward in box formation, thus, the pressure on the Saints was relentless.
Inside the first minute of the third quarter, Schneider ran into an open goal and hit the post, St Kilda’s third poster for the match, the perfect start wrecked by timber. It could be argued Riewoldt should’ve taken a set shot after marking on fifty instead of handpassing on.
Stephen Milne hadn’t had a kick for the Saints. Instead of playing deep in attack, he was on the last line of defence, getting tackled and smothered at the base of the pack. Lyon wanted fresh legs around the ball, someone else to get it.
At the four minute mark, pressure paid off. Scott Pendlebury kicked the ball to the top of the square. Lenny Hayes and Zac Dawson shared the ball under pressure. Chris Dawes smothered Dawson’s handpass, the ball bobbing up. Dawes swung his right foot, hacking the ball as it floated, suspended on air, for a goal. The margin was 34-points.
A week earlier in the drawn game, Hayes had acted as a third ruckman, especially in the second half when regular ruckman Michael Gardiner was off with an injured hamstring. Ten minutes into the third quarter, hard tackling deep in the Magpies forward line led to a bounce. As the umpire set the ball down, Wellingham burst through the pack, snatching Hayes’ tap out and running into an open goal.
Collingwood, it seemed, had learned every lesson from the draw.
When Swan gathered the ball at the bottom of the pack after a marking contest, his floating punt pushed the margin out to 46-points. On Channel Seven, Bruce McAvaney called the game. I know it’s a long way to go but they’re killing them now.
St Kilda was unravelling. Exhausted, dispirited, they had nothing left to play for but fighting spirit. The Saints had stopped running and didn’t present to get the ball. When their stars had to stand up, there was hope, a goal to Koschitzke from a Riewoldt pass, but hope didn’t last long.
As the ball went back to the centre, Sam Fisher was limping off with an injured hamstring. From the bounce, Ball kicked the Sherrin forward. Dawson grabbed the ball, handpassing to James Blake who kicked in haste. Alan Didak smothered the kick, gathered the ball and proved, once again, that smothers in grand finals almost always lead to goals. Didak’s right foot snap was a miraculous blend of skill and luck, the ball curling uncannily from a hopeless position. The goal was the best of the match, made better by being on Didak’s non-preferred football.
Twenty minutes in, Riewoldt was in defence. Two minutes later, Hayes kicked a goal from the outside of his boot under fierce pressure. There was little joy as the players reset in the middle.
The difference in class was apparent at the 24-minute mark. In defence, Thomas lunged at a pass from Farren Ray and got a finger on it, the ball rebounding to Macaffer who punted it forward to the wing where Dawes spoiled Dawson and handpassed to Pendlebury. The pass went to Sidebottom, who took a mark forty metres out then kicked a goal.
It took seventeen seconds, two contested possessions from three kicks and one handpass, to move the ball from defence to attack for a goal. Collingwood has played like that all year.
When Gilbert kicked a late goal, the margin at the last change was 41-points. St Kilda had been inside 50 just 28 times.
Breaking free from the huddle, Magpies assistant coach Nathan Buckley told Channel Seven’s Matthew Richardson the message from Malthouse was clear. ‘All credit to the 22 blokes who are there at the moment for doing three-quarters of the job so let’s finish it off.’
The Magpies finished it off. Dawes marked in the pocket less than a minute in and kicked a goal from the boundary. It was junk time, 47-points up in the last quarter of a grand final.
Five minutes in, when Thomas kicked a goal under pressure from the goal square, Magpies president Eddie McGuire started to cry as the chant, Colling-wood, rang out around the MCG.
Del Santo goaled for the Saints not long after and the Magpies slowed the game for a while, keeping the ball wide. From a free kick at half back and a 50-metre penalty awarded against Dawson, Harry O’Brien bombed a long goal and celebrated accordingly.
Minutes later, Stephen Milne proved no good deed goes unpunished by out-marking O’Brien and playing on for a goal. St Kilda hadn’t kicked consecutive goals for the match, unable to exert any scoreboard pressure.
Smothers in grand finals often lead to goals. It can happen on the inverse too. Heath Shaw’s kick at half forward was smothered by Schneider. Cruelly the ball rebounded to Shaw, who passed to Wellingham who ran into an open goal.
On Channel Seven, Tom Harley criticised the lack of pressure as Wellingham ran free. ‘Nothing tough about that,’ Harley said. On ABC radio, Gerard Whateley was effusive. ‘It’s something to live through, I can tell you that,’ he said of the crowed baying for victory.
This was the best of Collingwood anyone had seen in twenty years. When Riewoldt took a mark on the wing as the game wound down, the crowd spared him no mercy, an insult to his ability and highlighting an ineffective performance. Thousands of Saints fans were streaming out from the MCG, disgusted and upset. Riewoldt, though, wasn’t the only culprit.
Milne kicked his second goal at the 27-minute mark, when nothing mattered but time, fractions of football life, seconds counting down to the end. Mick Malthouse left the coaching box to enjoy the final moments from the bench, his third premiership as coach secured. From the boundary he watched Sidebottom kick a goal and the Colling-wood chant assaulted the MCG.
Malthouse, at 57, became the oldest coach in AFL/VFL history to win a premiership. He joined Ron Barassi and Leigh Matthews as the only men to play and coach in premierships at three different clubs. Malthouse needed another premiership to justify the legend and got it.
The last score of the game, fittingly, almost harrowingly, was a point to Lenny Hayes, who kicked that famous point in the drawn match a week earlier.
Collingwood won by their biggest ever margin in a grand final. Alan Didak had the ball when the siren went. Most of those left in the MCG went nuts.
Good old Collingwood forever…
Goddard held his jumper over his face to hide the tears as Mick Malthouse gave a few words to Matthew Richardson.
‘I take my hat off to the Saints, they’re no less special,’ Malthouse said. ‘I just think there’s so many things there for the Collingwood army, they’ve put up with a lot. I just think it’s a great relief.’
Nick Maxwell, in direct contrast to last week, was jubilant in victory. ‘How good are grand final replays,’ he said to Richardson. ‘It’s been unbelievable where these guys have come from, so many individual stories. The whole week was know your role, play your role.’
Collingwood knew their role and played to perfection.
Luke Ball, harshly dealt with last year by Ross Lyon, found a new home at Collingwood in the off season and found heartache in victory as he talked to Tim Watson.
‘It’s a weird feeling Tim to be honest,’ Ball said. ‘I’m just so happy for the Collingwood footy club and supporters and for Mick, they gave me a chance.’ Ball looked over Watson’s shoulder, at his former team-mates gathered, grim-faced in a miserable huddle, Lyon walking among the group.
‘I do know how they’re feeling,’ Ball said, taking his eyes off his former team-mates. ‘I’ve got some great mates over there and I really feel for them. I’m so happy for this group, it’s such a long year, it’s been even longer this year after what happened last week, they deserve it, they worked so hard, but there’s part of me that does feel for them.’
There’s always an enormous amount of sympathy for the vanquished, especially when their history includes just one premiership from 113 years of football. After the siren, the Saints observed the Magpie celebrations in mute impotency, numbed by another grand final loss. The MCG, in all its vastness, couldn’t absorb the hurt. Fans sat silent in the stands, thousands more had left, their hearts broken once again. To be a football fan, especially following a club like St Kilda, too often becomes masochistic.
Riewoldt congratulated Collingwood then told the crowd the Saints wouldn’t give up. It was a short, disappointed address from a completely gutted captain.
Pendlebury, who won the Norm Smith medal, Malthouse and Maxwell all paid tribute to the Saints, words falling at the feet of the vanquished like meaningless, heated tears. Few people remember their tears, but memories of pain linger. St Kilda, in losing, created another painful memory, more misery their fans must endure forever.
The loss has created another unfortunate statistic, with St Kilda becoming the twelfth club in history to lose consecutive grand finals. The last club to lose two in a row was Collingwood in 2002-03. Through 2004-05 the Magpies bombed out of the finals before the rebuild. It would be easy to forgive St Kilda’s failure if they don’t make the finals next year.
Although Riewoldt suggested the Saints wouldn’t give up, it’s hard to see, after the 56-point point loss, where the improvement will come from. Too many players were exposed as ineffective.
The table below shows clubs who have lost consecutive grand finals. Only three clubs, Collingwood, Essendon and Hawthorn have won a flag after losing consecutive grand finals. Generally, clubs who lose twice in two years cannot rebound, proof it is tough getting over the mental disintegration provoked by failing on the biggest stage in football.
| club | years | flag |
| Carlton | 1909-10 | |
| Collingwood | 1925-26 | 1927 |
| Richmond* | 1927-29 | |
| South Melbourne* | 1934-36 | |
| Collingwood* | 1937-39 | |
| Essendon | 1947-48 | 1949 |
| Collingwood | 1955-56 | |
| Collingwood* | 1979-81 | |
| Hawthorn | 1984-85 | 1986 |
| Geelong | 1994-95 | |
| Collingwood | 2003-04 | |
| St Kilda | 2009-10 |
* Lost three consecutive grand finals
Alan Jeans is St Kilda’s solitary premiership coach. He’s been in poor health recently and is reportedly desperate to pass the mantle. Ross Lyon has had two attempts, taking the underdogs into the grand final and proving the bookies right.
St Kilda under Lyon has been excellent, but there is something attached to the club, a spirit Lyon can’t reach, infiltrating their psyche, rendering the club impotent when it comes to grand finals.
One premiership from eight attempts is proof of sad history. Expectation of failure is the reason why Magpie fans were distraught when the siren sounded the draw last week, while St Kilda fans were thrilled. Nothing had been lost.
Now it has.
Postscript
I was supporting Collingwood. My prediction, earlier this year that Collingwood wouldn’t win the grand final was wrong. I won $30 on the game by betting on the Magpies at +25, the same bet I made last week.
The following was a short letter to the editor from The Australian on Monday. I feel sorry for C. E. Newman, because he doesn’t love football.
Now that the bonus dollar benefits have been counted, will the AFL marketing experts decide to establish a grand grand grand final each year, or perhaps a grand final grand final as part of the normal football season fixtures?
C. E. Newman, Doubleview, WA
