and so the football season is as good as over. but wait you say, surely there are another two rounds to play. yes but for tigers fans the season effectively ended in fremantle just a few hours after their glorious victory against the hawks which had reawakened dreams of finals football, when st.kilda beat freo, a game which, had the saints lost it, would have kept the tigers with a chance of a spot in the eight.
but wait you say, surely they threw away their chances with that hapless performance against adelaide last week. well yes they did, but there was still the slightest hint of a possibility : if they won all three of their remaining games against hawthorne, freo and melbourne and some of the other contenders lost. the fact that richmond played possibly their best football for the entire season in the game against the hawks and won comfortably was a good start, but the other contenders brisbane, collingwood and st.kilda all won difficult games which we were all hoping they would lose.
this leaves the saints and the pies one game and the lions half a game ahead of the tigers in the race for seventh and eighth position with two games to go. the pies or the saints have to lose both their last games and the lions have to lose against either carlton at the gabba next week or sydney at the scg in round 22. the saints have two games at the dome : one versus adelaide and the other against essendon, whilst the pies face freo in the west and sydney at the dome.
we can hope i guess, but i wouldn’t put any money on it. once again we might have to be content with ninth : the best of the rest. see you next year.
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