On the final day of the 2024 AFL home and away season, Carlton will take the field against St Kilda with a straightforward equation: Win and they will play finals.
But if the Blues slip on the banana peel, succumbing to Ross Lyon’s surprisingly unshackled Saints, there’s a repechage of sorts later that day, when the Fremantle Dockers – positioned ninth entering this round – meet Port Adelaide in Perth.
Carlton will hang on to eighth in the event of a loss, subject to the Dockers being upended by Port Adelaide in the last game of 2024.
“For us going into the final game, you just want to win,” said Anthony Koutoufides, the ex-Carlton superstar and candidate to be Melbourne’s Lord Mayor. “Kouta” will be working the rooms at Carlton-St Kilda, not to generate support for his tilt at the mayoralty, but as a Carlton man communing with his constituents in navy blue.
A dejected Charlie Curnow and the Blues take in the narrow loss to Collingwood that ended their 2022 season.Credit: AFL Photos
“You want to keep the momentum going into finals,” added Koutoufides, when I pointed out that the Blues can lose and still qualify for the finals if Freo slip up.
Earlier on that same afternoon, in Ballarat, the Western Bulldogs will face Greater Western Sydney –a team they’ve not liked much for nearly a decade – with similar stakes. If the Dogs win, they will finish no worse than sixth and theoretically as high as fourth. Lose and it’s possible they will be dislodged by the Dockers (subject to Carlton and Hawthorn winning, too, and retaining their spots) and miss September action.
Realistically, the Dogs are playing for either a finals berth and/or a home final – albeit they would be at the MCG, not Marvel Stadium – v Hawthorn/Carlton or Freo.
Patrick Cripps absorbs the defeat two years ago.Credit: AFL Photos
It is possible that Essendon might upset the Brisbane Lions at the Gabba. While it would be on-brand for the Dons to win once they’re eliminated, it still seems improbable.
But the chances of the Dogs also overtaking Geelong (4th) and taking a coveted top four spot – which requires Geelong losing to dismal West Coast AND the Bombers slaying the Lions – are about as likely as Collingwood and Richmond fans barracking for the Blues this weekend.
The round begins a Friday night clash that shaped as a potential final, between Melbourne and Collingwood, clubs which had premiership aspirations that have been beset with injuries and off-field dramas, especially the Demons, who have not recovered since a traumatic pre-season in which Clayton Oliver’s health issues forced him to take away from the club and the popular star Angus Brayshaw abruptly retired due to concussion.
Collingwood’s sputtering season has followed the Geelong 2023 script of the failing reigning premier, losing their first three, recovering (“here they come” we cried, mid-season), before a raft of injuries and form issues have conspired to see them miss the finals.
So, Melbourne-Collingwood is a dead rubber without consequence, as is Richmond’s Saturday afternoon encounter – it can hardly be called a “clash” – with Gold Coast, with the Tigers unlikely to lose bottom spot and pole position in the draft.
Hawthorn are short odds to trample on 17th placed North Melbourne in Launceston on Saturday afternoon – an outcome that will deliver Sam Mitchell his first finals series as senior coach and the first that the Hawks have seen in six years; the Hawks can climb up to sixth if the Dogs lose and up as high as fourth if the Cats and Lions stumble.
But it seems much more feasible that they will win and secure a finals berth. Lose and they’re in the same boat as the Bulldogs – they can drop to ninth, pending whether the Dockers and Blues get up.
The Sydney Swans are assured of top spot and all the rights that entails (a home SCG final, probably v Geelong or GWS), irrespective of what happens in their Saturday night game against the Crows.
Fittingly, what could be the most consequential game of the round has been scheduled as the last of 2024’s regular season in the men’s competition, Fremantle hosting Port Adelaide. Should GWS down the Dogs, OR if the Cats obliterate the Eagles by a massive margin at the Cattery (a reasonable chance), the Power can slip from second – and home final rights – to third or fourth.
Fremantle, of course, have to win to have any prospect of playing finals, and others, such as Kouta, might be barracking against the Dockers, too. Any Port in a storm.
In a dramatic season of small margins separating teams from first to 11th, of teams blowing and overcoming “insurmountable” leads, of outcomes snatched just before or after the siren, the shape of the eight won’t be final until the very end.
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