Following last week's debacle I went along to this game without any great expectations. But it was a great day to be out in the sunshine, and Waverley has previously been a slightly happier hunting ground for Freo than the MCG, so I decided to risk it.
This game was in many ways over-shadowed by Jason Dunstall's retirement. This was his final match, and thousands of the Hawthorn faithful showed up to be a part of his farewell. The official crowd estimate was about 40,000, but I'd say there was a few more than that. Not too many of them were there to watch a game of football though; most were there to watch the Pig. The disappointing aspect from my perspective was that Dunstall's high profile over here completely over-shadowed Gerard Neesham's farewell from Fremantle, although that had largely been taken care of the previous week.
The umpiring in this game was bad at best, and completely diabolical at times. The finest example of this came in the first quarter, when one of the Hawthorn players was tackled on the outer wing. He responded by putting the ball on the ground and hitting it away. This was deemed to be legal by the umpires. A couple of tackles later, and still on the same wing, Fletcher was tackled and did exactly the same thing. When he did it though, it was labelled a throw.
After Kingsley Hunter managed to hook one from a forward pocket, Hawthorn definitely had the better of the first quarter. O'Reilly also managed a couple of snaps at goals, but most of the traffic was to the far end from where I was sitting. Dunstall kicked one, but most of the damage was done by Aaron Lord, who seemed to be giving Bond the run around.
In the second quarter Freo looked quite a bit more competitive, but were struggling to finish. Eventually Spider drifted forward a couple of times, created a different option. Waterhouse got his hands on the ball a couple of times inside 50. Someone has obviously told Clive he needs to pass it more often, because he didn't even look at the goals, and was always looking to pass the ball. Fremantle were only 3 goals down at half time, and very much in the game.
Freo started the third quarter pretty well, and closed to within a couple of goals at one stage. For a few moments it looked like we might get to see a repeat of last year's game, but it wasn't to be. Hawthorn were able to recover, and began to look very menacing at the end of the quarter, when they peppered the goals, but struggled to find the big opening. Even so, the 3.9 that they kicked was enough to see them extend their lead.
The final quarter was pretty much all Hawthorn. They piled on 11 goals to Fremantle's one to turn a three-quarter time lead into a thrashing by the end of the game. Despite the rain of goals at our end, Dunstall only managed to boot one, but the crowd loved that one. According to reports in the paper, Dunstall volunteered to go off at three-quarter time. Can't say I blame him, since he didn't contribute too much all day. On the other hand, its kind of embarrassing to have to admit that Fremantle were thrashed by a team who could only field 17 fit men. The only real highlight of the final quarter came just after Dunstall had kicked a point, when two guys staged a mini-pitch invasion. The first one managed to elude security for a minute or so, and covered most of the ground. The second guy got as far as Craig Trelevan, who was about 20 metres from the boundary; Trelevan tackled him easily and that was the end of his fun.
Gerard Neesham refused to talk to the media at the end of the game, and I can't say I blame him. Apparently the AFL are considering fining him though.
And I can't finish this without a bit of a whinge about the Hawthorn crowd. I have now been in the crowd for every Melbourne-based club, and I have to say that I find the Hawthorn crowd to be far and away the worst. Pretty much every other crowd I have been a part of has been has spent more of their time supporting their own team than they have rubbishing their opponents. Particularly once they get to be more than 10 goals up. The Hawthorn fans, however, just got more and more vocal in their abuse as the game progressed. The abuse was both racist and homophobic, which even the Collingwood fans managed to avoid. I now know why Hawthorn are pretty much the only club in the AFL never to have had an Aboriginal player. Oh, and they seemed to be under the impression that Fremantle were obviously much worse than they were, despite the fact that Freo will finish exactly one win behind them this year.
From his media engagements, I have formed an opinion of Jason Dunstall, which is that he is a man with a veneer of politeness and good humour, beneath which is a very evil and unfriendly individual. Its no wonder the Hawthorn fans like him.
Final Score : Hawthorn 22.17-149 defeated Fremantle 9.6-60
timnfromoz
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