Micro Noises 172: Weak streaks and mighty Blighty
Where have all the streakers gone?
There's an old saying about Melbourne's weather: "If you don't like it, wait five minutes". In recent weeks, that advice hasn't had much of a ring of truth to it, but adapting it to the 2017 AFL season would bring an air of accuracy: "If you don't like how your team is going, wait three weeks". Such is the nature of this season, that is perhaps more of a truism this year than it ever has been before.
Four clubs - Port Adelaide, Essendon, the Western Bulldogs and Gold Coast - have not gone more than two games without a win or a loss this year, while six other clubs have three games as their longest winning/losing streaks. Even those sides who have had longer streaks have now left them behind. Adelaide, Geelong and Richmond started the season with winning streaks of six, five and five but all three have since gone on to mix up their wins with losses.
At the other end of the scale, Sydney, North Melbourne and Hawthorn started with losing streaks of six, five and four games respectively, but since then, the Kangaroos and Hawks have not gone more than two games without winning or losing, while for the Swans that figure is three.
Such is the current state of play, there are now only two teams out of 18 that have a current winning or losing streak of more than two - Melbourne has won its last three matches, while Fremantle has lost its last three. And yet it's only a couple of months since the Dockers defeated the Demons at the MCG.
What does all of this tell us about what's about to happen next in this season? Probably nothing, but if your footy tipping is going as badly as ours is, maybe it'll at least help you feel a bit better about it.
CLUB | 2017 STREAKS | LWS† | LLS† |
Adelaide | 6W, 2L, 2W, 1L, 1W* | 6 | 2 |
GWS | 1L, 5W, 1L, 4W, 1L* | 5 | 1 |
Geelong | 5W, 3L, 3W, 1L* | 5 | 3 |
Port Adelaide | 2W, 2L, 2W, 1L, 1W, 1L, 1W, 1L, 1W* | 2 | 2 |
Melbourne | 2W, 3L, 1W, 1L, 1W, 1L, 3W* | 3 | 3 |
Richmond | 5W, 4L, 2W, 1L* | 5 | 4 |
West Coast | 2W, 1L, 1W, 1L, 3W, 3L, 1W* | 3 | 3 |
Essendon | 2W, 2L, 1W, 2L, 2W, 2L, 1W* | 2 | 2 |
Western Bulldogs | 2W, 1L, 2W, 1L, 1W, 2L, 1W, 2L* | 2 | 2 |
St Kilda | 2L, 2W, 1L, 3W, 3L, 1W* | 3 | 3 |
Fremantle | 2L, 3W, 1L, 3W, 3L* | 3 | 3 |
Sydney | 6L, 3W, 1L, 2W* | 3 | 6 |
Collingwood | 2L, 1W, 2L, 1W, 2L, 3W, 1L* | 3 | 2 |
Gold Coast | 2L, 2W, 2L, 1W, 2L, 2W, 1L* | 2 | 2 |
Carlton | 2L, 1W, 2L, 2W, 3L, 2W* | 2 | 3 |
North Melbourne | 5L, 2W, 1L, 2W, 2L* | 2 | 5 |
Hawthorn | 4L, 1W, 1L, 2W, 1L, 1W, 2L* | 2 | 4 |
Brisbane | 1W, 9L, 1W, 1L* | 2 | 9 |
*current streak. † LWS = longest winning streak, LLS = longest losing streak
Dogs have already turned it around
If you're a Western Bulldogs fan (and we refuse to comment on the rumour that we are), then you're almost certainly going to be pretty unhappy about the Doggies' efforts of the past couple of weeks. A loss of 46 points followed by another one of 57 points is not the sort of thing to lift your mid-winter spirits, and you'll be hoping the Dogs can turn things around quickly.
Well we've got good news for you. The Bulldogs already have turned things around. After registering a score of just 6.6.42 against Sydney in round 12, the Dogs kicked 8.8.56 against Melbourne last Sunday. They still lost the match, but the final score was a 33% increase on their previous one, If they continue to increase their score by 33% each week from here, they'll be back on the winners list in no time, if not this week with a score of 75, then in all likelihood with a score of 100 in round 15.
And continuing the 33%-per-week extrapolation, by round 23 the Bulldogs will absolutely flying, and they will beat Hawthorn with a jumbo-sized score of 747.
'What a legend!' or 'You beauty Blighty' or 'Mighty Blighty' or 'Definitely not a Blight on the game'
Congratulations to Malcolm Blight, an Australian Football Hall of Fame inductee who was very deservedly elevated to Legend status at this year's award ceremony on Tuesday night. Here's a couple of fun facts about 'Blighty' that you might not have known:
1. He is the only one of 12,545 V/AFL players to have the surname Blight.
2. Not one of the 341 games Malcolm Blight coached in the AFL and the SANFL ended in a draw.
3. If Malcolm Blight added "urnbull" to the end of his name, he could be prime minister.²
4. Blight, who wore number 15 at North Melbourne, made his VFL debut on the 15th of April. He played 15 games in his debut season, and on round 15 of that year, had 15 disposals. Against Collingwood that year, Blight had 15 touches on a day which saw North kick 15 behinds. In the following year he had 15 possessions against the Pies on the 15th of May and had 15 kicks in the return match against Collingwood later that year.
In the final minutes of the 1976 Preliminary Final, Blight took two saving marks at full back as North held on for a famous victory. It was the Roos 15th win of the season. The following year at VFL park, Blight had 15 kicks against Essendon, which scored 15.15 that day. In July he had 15 kicks against Footscray on a day North kicked 15 behinds and the following week - round 15 - he again had 15 kicks.
Three weeks later he had 15 kicks once more against Geelong, which scored 15 behinds. Four weeks after that, Blight had 15 kicks again, this time against South Melbourne, which finished with 15 goals. The next year when North played South, Blight had 15 disposals in a match which saw the Swans kick 15 goals and the Kangaroos 15 behinds.
In round 15 1979 (played on the 15th of July) in a match that saw North trail by 15 points at quarter time, Blight let everybody down by having only 14 possessions.
Not good enough Blighty!
(P.S. While Blight did not wear number 15 as a coach, his teams did win 15 finals during his tenure and in V/AFL coaching game number 225 (15 x 15), his Crows won for him kicking 15 behinds.)
Happy 100th for the happy team at Hawthorn?
Tonight's match between the Crows and Hawks at the Adelaide Oval will be the 100th V/AFL match played on June the 22nd. The one and only draw amongst those 100 was the very first¹ of them, an 1897 match at Brunswick Street Oval that saw Fitzroy and South Melbourne finish locked together on 5.13.43.
Looking at tonight's combatants, the outlook appears to be a good one for Hawthorn. The Hawks have played 11 previous matches on June 22nd, and after losing the first five of them, they have won the last six. The Crows have played just once before on the date, which for them was a loss to Melbourne.
ZIP code of the week
Some Port Adelaide fans were slightly disappointed that the Power's winning margin over bottom side Brisbane was only 40 points. To make them feel better, we can reveal there was a very good reason for that. Port deliberately orchestrated the margin as a tribute to former player Troy Chaplin, who made his debut for the Power in 2004 but unfortunately could not be squeezed into the team that one the club's inaugural flag later that year. As a mark of goodwill, the Power set up Saturday's win with a score of 121-81 and, as we all know, 12181 is the ZIP code of Troy.
Postcode of the week
Though Port's winning margin might not have been as high as its fans would have liked, the truth is that the Power was a pretty much a 'lock' to win the game by quarter time. At that stage they led 5.6 to 3.3 and the certainty of their win was backed up by the fact that 5633 is the postcode of Lock.
Ridiculous footy anagram of the week
This week's Australian Football Hall of Fame inductees included field UMPIRE BRETT ALLEN, who officiated in 346 matches between 1992 and 2007. Funnily enough the very start and end of his career can be summed up by his anagram: BALL UP; RETIREMENT.
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.
Footnotes
1. Well one of the first, at least. Four VFL matches were played on that day, all with a scheduled start time of 3pm. For the purpose of this article, we're making an executive assumption that the other three games played on that day all started a couple of minutes late.
2. For those who might not be aware, our current Prime Minister's full name is MALCOLM BLIGH Turnbull.
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