Faith/Void

If we’re being honest, if we’re going to attempt impartiality, if we’re going off recent form and stats and player availability and finals history, or even just applying the “whiff test”, then Geelong has little chance to win Friday night’s Prelim Final. But this isn't problematic for Geelong, it’s therapeutic.

As this season more than any other has shown us, the gap between Geelong’s best and worst appears to be largely a mental one. With not much to play for The Cats often cruise through long periods of matches, producing 20 or so minutes of devastating football when they have to (see their third quarter record this year), before putting the cue back in the rack again. This is as frustrating as it is promising; if they’re down you never count them out, you just wonder why they’re down there in the first place.

Rightfully, every man and his dog are saying this is the best chance Hawthorn will get to knock the Geelong monkey off their back. And The Hawks are doing a lot of talking about exactly that this week. They've talked about the preparation they've had, about the 10 weeks of research they've put into Geelong, about how they need to do something different, about how the past doesn't matter and about how the past can’t be ignored. But what they’re saying isn't really that important, it’s that they’re saying so much of it. They haven’t been thinking about this game for two weeks, they've been thinking about it for five years.

The memory of past success steels self belief. It is what has made Geelong’s eleven-match winning streak over Hawthorn possible. It’s what made last week’s third quarter blast against Port Adelaide probable. Geelong will go into this match with the clear conscience of an underdog and the quiet confidence of a champion that habitually beats another team for no reason other than they simply don’t like losing to them.

Similarly, the memory of past failures, of falling at the same hurdle time and again, can instill doubt and hesitation and breed bad habits. Hawthorn will go in to this game the red-hot favourite, with a healthy list, a week’s rest and a convincing victory over Sydney behind them. They will also carry with them the burden of five years of expectation as well as that of their own minds.

Bad habits are never really broken; they’re just replaced. Good habits? We don’t change those at all.

You Can’t Win: Notes From Underground

1.       The Kardinia Park home ground advantage is overblown

Yes, the record of 45 wins from the past 47 games (or whatever it is) is very impressive, but not as impressive when you consider that a) Geelong’s KP opponents are almost always bottom-eight teams and b) Geelong’s record would be similarly excellent at any venue over the past six years. The Cats have a handful of losses TOTAL since 2007 so it’s no surprise they consistently beat bad teams at home. Plus, when’s the last time Geelong actually played an entertaining, “Geelong-brand-of-footy” game at Kardinia Park (games against the Demons notwithstanding)? They are usually scrappy, untidy battles and not the slick, end-to-end Cats game-style we’ve come to know and love.

2.       Tom Hawkins’ dodgy back > Josh Walker

It seemed a strange time to rest the man-child and a huge occasion to throw a pretty good VFL footballer into the AFL finals furnace; surely the time to do this is any time other than a qualifying final. On a related note, the game-plan of continually bombing the ball long works much better against teams who aren’t flooding their entire 18 into the backline (and when Hawkins is there). A mobile, medium forward able to lead-up at the ball would have been handy: Daniel Menzel, get well soon.

3.       That’s why they finish in the top two

Geelong has got another chance and another final, this time at the MCG, and they should be stinging. In this era the Cats have rarely played two bad games in a row and the physical, contested nature of last weekend’s loss should see them well and truly warned about the required intensity for finals. Port Adelaide is no pushover but, given Collingwood’s recent track record against Geelong, it is the favoured match up. (And without looking past Port Adelaide, the winner of this final would face Hawthorn in the Preliminary final – a blessing in disguise as I don’t think I could handle a Geelong-Hawthorn Grand Final.)

4.       Hunt, Hunt and hunt (Murdoch)

Unfortunately, the seemingly indestructible Corey Enright will miss this week’s game (and likely any further finals action) after an awkward collision injured his knee; here’s hoping he comes back next year. Fortunately, both Josh Hunt and Taylor Hunt are available and willing replacements, and both may end up playing as Josh Caddy showed up to Sunday recovery in a moon boot. Among the other candidates, of which there are a few, The Cats forward pressure has looked it’s best when Jordan Murdoch is in the side.

5.       The mountain awaits the boulder once more

So much of the AFL season seems to slip past with Sisyphean-like meaninglessness that it appears there are actually two seasons every year; the one that finished a week ago and the one in play now. Geelong’s task is no longer the repetitive monotony of doing just enough to win: Out of second chances, their credentials questioned again, the true challenge lies naked before them. The courage required to climb a mountain is tied to the ultimate meaninglessness of the act itself – the courage to repeatedly climb it, pushing an impossibly heavy boulder with you, is of an entirely different kind. Pass me the rock.