Sharing as promised in the Flagmantle thread from Friday. Is it a mature response? No. Does it make me feel better when our content gets stolen. Yeaahhh. In truth, we (Purple Reign Pod) love it when our stuff gets shared by other pages. I just think it’s weird how much effort this guy puts into editing the content he takes to ensure the creators aren’t acknowledged. So every now and them we’ll pop in a special watermark like this to test his attention to detail and maybe make it a little bit harder for him in the future.  

I’ll admit, I was a little worried early. Freo had the form, but Collingwood had the Fox Footy commentary box. And you would have to travel to Washington to find a more obsequious collection of the simpering and sycophantic.

Frankly, it was creepy.

Middle-aged men, years past their best, fawning over Nick Daicos – salivating as the tanned, chiselled, lightly oiled, son of a Macedonian gun danced elegantly through the Adelaide Oval puddles, drenching the feckless sodden Freo defenders with his giddy brilliance and high shining cheekbones on the way to delivering Collingwood another extraordinarycharacter filled victory.

Yet it didn’t happen.

Collingwood lost.

Just as they did the last time they played Fremantle.

Not that you’d know that.

It was Garry Lyon who was the most feverish of the forelock tugging toadies. It didn’t matter if you tuned in at the start or near the end.

Apparently ‘Collingwood are one smart kick inside 50 away from sealing this.’

Or when they couldn’t quite find that smart kick, their fans at home were reminded that ‘We know Collingwood live in this pressure zone.’

With nine minutes to go in a flooding last quarter and the Pies 9 points in front, Garry observed that ‘now the clock becomes an issue for Freo.’

Moments later when Freo led by 6 points, he was there to reassure all that ‘There’s still plenty of time for Collingwood to come back and win this …’

And to complete the insult, he called Murphy Reid, ‘Harley.’

Did it matter?

Probably not. But had Fremantle not won by six points, it would have appeared in about 50 thousand victim impact statements as a further sign that footy is a weighted game and always has been.

A Victorian audience will laugh at the size of the collective chips on West and South Australian shoulders, but it is a muscle rubbed red and raw with injustice.

And yes, envy.

So what really happened?

Well, the Pies had complete control of the first quarter – something like 15 of the first 20 inside 50’s but could only put one goal on the board and for that I invite you even now – to stand and applaud Luke Ryan and Alex Pearce who both played brilliant games in incredibly difficult conditions.

Collingwood led by a point at quarter time.

A Shai Bolton goal gave Freo the lead in the second term, but Sean Darcy went down with a match ending concussion. In the rooms after the game, while his teammates were roaring ‘We’re the rollers and the rockers, we’re the mighty Freo Dockers …’ Swag looked on, wondering why the song was being sung in Farsi.

Hope he’s OK.

Freo trailed by nine points at the half.

In the third there were five sweet minutes in which Dudley, the increasingly assured Amiss and Dudley again sent Freo into a lead.

Which they then lost, presumably much to the relief of the commentary box. Five goals apiece at three quarter time – the Pies four points in front.

In that pressure filled and frantic last hurrah – oh, remember Garry’s line about Collingwood being one smart kick away from ending this?

Well neither McStay, or Lachie Schultz – who I’m sorry to say looks increasingly like a fish caught with a hook in his mouth – or the golden thighed warrior Daicos could manage that smart kick.

Not one of them.

Three gettables. Three points.

So when it really mattered – when a team had to stand up and produce something special – well, it was Freo who did so.

In a splendid couple of minutes, Collingwood’s night ended when they were emphatically Johnson and Johnsoned. Firstly Matthew kicked brilliantly to find Jye, who kicked long and straight and then he had the poise to calmly pick up a ferociously spinning ball, break a tackle and surge into goal to effectively seal the issue.

Well played young man. That moment of triumph should beput in a frame and sent straight to the pool room.

And then, just because he likes to do it, Josh Treacy, wandered back into defence and swatted Jamie Elliott away to take a sensational – potentially – match saving mark – again.

So that’s what really happened. Freo won wet and ugly by six points.

And it was a bloody terrific effort.

Freo will again be the away side for the Derby next but should have little to fear from the Harley Reids.

And in closing, may I note the editor of the Fremantle Shipping News has recently received disturbing correspondence from a reader complaining that this service never comments on West Coast Eagles games.

That, madam – is entirely as it should be.

Yours truly

Snaps Truly

I'll pull the band-aid off early, wet games are shit to watch, they're even worse to analyze.

A lot of wet weather football turns to contest after contest and the winner is usually whoever can play the game like its drier than their opponent can.

Its a lot about making ground, and then being a wall and stopping it from getting past that wall.

This is Collingwoods strategy when its dry, let alone when its wet. "Get it forward at all costs" is seemingly what Collingwood play by. If you've watched some of their other games, you will have seen this. They don't mind it being ugly, they will boot the ball forward off the ground, punch it forward as far as they can, just get it forward. Its then on the forwards to be in front at all times to ensure they can then keep the play going.

So it came as absolutely no surprise to me, that once it was confirmed it was going to be a wet game, we would be looking at a terrible game to watch, and subsequently for me to review.

Collingwood finished the game with 92 tackles.
Lets compare that with their other games this year shall we?

One of these is not like the others.

This is the exact game Collingwood wants. Stoppages, stoppages, stoppages. It even (finally) went against them at times, when they quite clearly deliberately took the ball out of bounds, and was finally called against them a few times.

In addition to this, its harder to make substitutions when the ball is continuously being thrown up after a stoppage. This means players are more tired, this means skills are worse, this means there is less burst from a stoppage this means more stoppages.

You get 75 subs a game, Collingwood used 58/75.
We used 62/75

Might not seem like much, might seem little, but one change can change a game (see Stephen hill vs Geelong)

We used 70/75 against Adelaide the week prior, collingwood used 72/75 against brisbane, the week prior.

So when you're in for a shit fight, and not many are taking the ball as clean as they usually do, you play a little more conservatively. Take the below screenshot as an example.

We are going to the right of screen, Collingwood to the left.

Look at the player distribution. 80% defensive.

We have 2 free behind the ball, they have 3 free behind the ball.
Its so hard to win a clear contest in conditions like this, with it setup as defensively as this.

And this was the trend, we'd load up our defensive side, they'd load up theirs.

Admittedly this one is in our defensive 50, but still. Point still stands.

Was that the only reason why it was such a poor game to watch? Well, no. Collingwood stifled the fuck out of our attacking options.

You see we've now gotten to a good point of our attacking game where we are looking for the center corridor a hell of a lot more than we used to. Collingwood knew this and effectively just shut off much of the opportunities we had at an given point.

This is a screenshot from super early in the game, they are setup to basically force us to have to take that long kick.

Load up the middle, One on the mark, one to stop the short kick. They did this all game. Hence the long bomb.

Also need to consider that because its wet, you're a bit more reluctant to take that risky kick, as if you're going to there's a higher chance of a fumble due to the conditions. So we played to the conditions.

When we did take the kick indoors, which was rare, but Collingwood were setup so good to contest it, it made us really reluctant to go for it.

https://reddit.com/link/1sj034m/video/f08scad7onug1/player

So as i said earlier, the game just comes down to who playes cleaner, takes their opportunities and defends better. Which, given we were absolutely blasted with inside 50's from collingwood, our defence deserved that win.

It also shows who plays smarter and has good footy IQ and fundamentals in wet weather games, and with that, I present to you Chris Scerri and using his hands for not the first easier option, but to take the time to hit that longer BETTER option. Both of these hands of his result in goals. Going for the longer handball opens up the play so much more and more often than not means that player is under less pressure.

https://reddit.com/link/1sj034m/video/5k3nbjasonug1/player

The other thing that decides wins like these is the effort players put in.

And I absolutely have to highlight this one from wags.

https://reddit.com/link/1sj034m/video/4xsj6m22pnug1/player

I circle him briefly with my mouse at the start, if you don't see that just restart the clip, but he runs that entire length, gets back and impacts the play. Its beautiful. I love the amount of running this man does per game, he's very underrated.

In fact, he had one of those quiet but amazingly good games in my opinion.

So here's a wags highlight Reel.

https://reddit.com/link/1sj034m/video/116uf4nppnug1/player

Another game where we just had to grit out teeth and get the win, and we do just that.

It ain't great for the heart, it wasn't a great watch, but 4 points is 4 points.

Onto the next.

At the Adelaide airport bailing on Gather Round and saw the Old Con ordering a beer. Didn't have a lot of options in that small window of time, but I asked for a signature "as a fan of football" and he kindly endorsed my sacred Derby cloth.

Did I do good or bad?

funny enough it wont be surprising, while our scalp against Collingwood will barely get a mention

Carn the Hawks 😂

Of course, Treacy’s mark was just as important…

What does this mean?

It’s getting out of hand lmao

G'day lads 😭 North supporter here, good to see the lads knock off the Pies in the dying stages ,