Micro Noises 98: Roo beauty!
Good news or blues for 'Roos?
A question without notice for North Melbourne fans. Given that your team is just inside the eight and struggling to make the finals, would you be happy for the 'Roos to make Grand Final but not win it? We ask because history indicates that scenario is very much on the cards, all because the Kangaroos defeated Brisbane by 72 points last Saturday night.
That win was the third in North's AFL history in which the margin has been 72 points. The other two were in round round four, 1974 against Carlton and round 6, 1976 against Fitzroy. In particular, the 1976 win left North in eighth place on the ladder (just as its win last week did), before the Kangaroos went on to succumb to Hawthorn in the Grand Final that season. The good news for North was that they went one better in 1977 to take the flag. And after the Kangaroos' Grand Final loss in 1974, they also went on to the win the following season's premiership.
So there you have it 'Roos fans. Your team's 72-point win suggests a Grand Final loss to perhaps Richmond, but probably Hawthorn, this year, followed by a flag next year. Will that do, or are you too impatient to wait that long?
Ladder logjam - the sequel
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In Micro Noises 97, we flagged the unlikely possibility of 13 teams ending up on 44 points with identical percentages after round 23. One of the prerequisites for the manifestation of that outcome was that Carlton defeat Hawthorn by 100 points last Friday night. The Blues came agonisingly close, falling just 238 points of the mark. So, sadly, the Hawks can no longer finish on 44 points but the good news is that round 17's other results mean that the ladder displayed at right is still very much within the realms of possibility (if not probability). That's right, folks, with just six rounds remaining, we could yet end up with teams from fourth to 15th separated by nothing more than percentage, and where a goal either way could be the difference between a top-four finish and a top-four draft pick. We live in hope!
Déjà vu all over again
If you were overcome by a strange sense of déjà vu by the end of last Sunday's St Kilda v Melbourne match, we may just have the explanation for you. The Saints finished up winning comfortably, 83 to 46 and that scoreline was last seen in an AFL match back in 2009. And which two teams played on that day back in 2009? St Kilda and Melbourne, with the Saints again triumphant 83 to 46.
The 'drawn again' Falcons
In last week's round 14 TAC Cup match against the Eastern Ranges, the Geelong Falcons played out a draw, both sides finishing on 12.10.82. Nothing particularly unusual about that but it so happens that the Falcons also drew two rounds earlier against the Sandringham Dragons. Now that's pretty unusual, but it's not unprecedented. For instance, St Kilda drew in rounds five and seven in the 1977 VFL season.
But not to be outdone, the Geelong Falcons have gone one better. Two rounds before their tied Sandringham match, they also drew Tasmania's under 18 side! So the Falcons' five week sequence has been WIN-DRAW-LOSS-DRAW-WIN-DRAW. If this keeps up, expect the Falcons to go down to Gippsland Power this weekend, before finishing level with the Northern Knights in round 16.
1 versus 100
We're still without a one-point game in 2015, but with Hawthorn's spiflication of Carlton last Friday night the season has now witnessed three games in which the margin has been a three-figure one. Let's hope the next six weeks and the finals give us a few one-point thrillers.
Score Wars - 69 and 78 break free
69 jumped to outright leadership last Saturday afternoon, but 78 wasn't going to take that lying down. Geelong scored 9.15 at Manuka Oval on Saturday afternoon to give 69 its ninth appearance as a final score this year. Not to be outdone, 78 hit back by being recorded through Richmond's 10.18 a few hours later at the MCG. 69 and 78 have now jumped well clear of this year's next most common scores, with 85, 84, 73, 68 and 60 each having come up six times in 2015.
First among unequals
It will come as absolutely no surprise to anyone that Hawthorn's drubbing of Carlton was the first instance in VFL/AFL history of a 173-35 scoreline. Perhaps a bit more unexpected is that Geelong's win over GWS gave us the first ever 69-42 finish. This means that all results in the sequence 69-40, 69-41, 69-42... through to ...69-128, 69-129, 69-130 have now been achieved at least once, except for 69-118.
Postcode of the week
Most footy fans would be aware of the old saying, "Things are crook in Tallarook". And there might be a few Melbourne supporters who uttered just that after the Demons succumbed relatively meekly to St Kilda last Sunday. They had just 3.6 on the board at half time and 5.9 at the last break. It seems rather fitting, then, that 3659 is the postcode of Tallarook.
Ridiculous footy anagram of the week
In just his third game of AFL footy, DARCY MOORE gave Magpie fans cause for hope in their loss to the Bulldogs. The son of dual Brownlow Medallist Peter Moore gave every indication of a long and successful career ahead of him with a five-goal bag against the Dogs. We certainly hope that his career is long and fruitful but we can't help being just a little worried about his body's ability to stand up to the rigours of AFL over time, especially given that he's an anagram of MAY CORRODE.
Micro Noises is Andrew Gigacz's regular, quirky look at all things footy. The name Micro Noises is an anagram of Enrico Misso, who played one game for St Kilda in 1985. He remains the only Enrico and the only Misso to have played footy at the highest level.
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