It was a great Grand Final with two superb Australian Football League teams battling it out for the honour of the 2008 Premiership title. Drawing the biggest crowd at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 22 years, 100,012 people witnessed Hawthorn’s 26-point victory over Geelong last Saturday September 27.
After losing just one game in the 22 Round home and away season, the reigning premiers for 2007, the Geelong Cats choked under the Hawthorn Hawks pressure 11.23 (89) to 18.7 (115).
The static for the not-so-cool Cats will build at Skilled Stadium as the media and fans will rub their fur the wrong way all summer long. But the happy Hawks will celebrate their win as whispers of how to avoid a Premiership hangover for 2009 will grow at their training and administration facilities in Waverley Park.
Perhaps Geelong, who had been almost faultless for two seasons, were overwhelmed by their success and the pressure to rise to the occasion each week may have gotten the better of them. They had shown weaknesses against the Western Bulldogs in the Preliminary Final the previous week, but most expected them to return to their clean disposal and exemplary execution that had seen them lose just two games of the prior 44.
The Cats, who led by just one point at quarter time, then kicked a wayward 1 goal 9 points to 3.1 in the second quarter and were expected to come out after halftime and convert their dominance around the ground into results on the scoreboard. After all, the Cats’ 6.12 (48) to Hawthorns’ 8.3 (51) at halftime told half a tale of missed opportunities – the other half being rushed behinds.
Take nothing away from the AFL’s new benchmark, Hawthorn; they were fantastic, while Geelong looked rattled.
Each time the ball sailed between the Hawks’ goal posts, their self-belief grew and by the end of the third quarter, they led by 17 points – 9.18 (72) to 14.5 (89) – it was all but over. It’s widely understood that the third quarter (known as the Premiership Quarter) is the vital one in the AFL, with a come-from-behind win very rare. This year was the 25th year since a team has been unable to come from behind at three quarter time to win the Grand Final.
Rushed Behinds
The 2008 AFL Grand Final also featured what many perceive as a blight on the game – the rushed behind.
As a defensive measure, when a player is fearful of losing possession, or to spoil a goal, he may force the ball over the score-line – either by carrying, handpassing, kicking or knocking it – and therefore concede a point known as a rushed behind.
Hawthorn gave Geelong 11 points in this manner – setting a record in Grand Finals.
In recent years, there have been a growing number of rushed behinds in AFL. A great deal of this can be attributed to a rule change, which allowed the defensive kick-in to occur without waiting for the goal umpire to finish waving the flag to signal the score. With aims to speed the game up further, this change allowed the defending team to bring the ball into play much quicker and enabled them to clear it from the back half of the ground – and therefore travel the 165-metre length (approximate average) of the oval to score easier. This instant kick-in rule meant that if a team were to score a behind (or point) it could almost be considered a penalty, when they are often under immediate threat of a goal (worth six points) being scored against them.
With the ball moving basketball-like up the field, many find that rule change (which did increase the speed of the game exponentially) strangely appealing; but the instant kick-in took a lot of intense drama out of the game when teams had more time to reset themselves and fans took a deep breath after what had been a near-miss.
Now, commentators and media are calling for a further rule change to stop or limit an advantage of a rushed behind, when a simple return to rules pre-instant kick-in would solve the problem in an already extremely fast game. Either return to the old rule or leave them alone and let the players and coaches figure out ways to counter that tactic I say!
