AFL Round 19 – Carlton v Fremantle: At home with Fremantle

Fremantle versus Carlton
7.40pm, Saturday, 3 August
Docklands

Les Everett

It was midway through the last quarter and Fremantle were safe. Another win on our favourite ground – Dockerlands. “I wonder how many etiquette rules we’re breaking,” I wondered out loud. A couple of the dinner party guests turned from the TV screen, looked and said nothing. Others took the opportunity afforded by a break in play to take another bite of the incredible dhufish caught just a day previously somewhere near Rottnest.

The game plan had been simple enough. Travel wasn’t an issue – we live 50 metres from the hosts, the other guests are even closer. We would gather at around 5.30pm, go through the preliminaries and charge glasses ready for the 5.40 bouncedown – soup at quarter time, main course at half time and just desserts after the final siren. Too late we realised that it was a delayed telecast… starting 6.40pm. We were all over the place. Total disarray.

We went to the TV room. Carlton began best – Chris Judd kicked a goal: “White pointer,” said our host, “protected species.” But the Dockers soon settled down. Son Son Walters banged one through and the game was looking like our kind of game – hard, close and just a little brutal.

Something went wrong with the breadmaker but it wasn’t an issue. The soup was, as they say, hearty. At half the Dockers led by nine points and looked the better team. Zac Clarke was matching Kruezer and had Aaron Sandilands as a handy back-up while those famed small forwards of Carlton weren’t doing much. The game was tough – it was hard to get a kick.

Straight after half time Zach Tuohy kicked a couple of goals and the Blues were in front. The game became frantic. Hayden Ballantyne had his jumper ripped off and then, while Blues were shaping up and fans were boiling over the little forward did the sort of thing that makes us love him. Andrew Walker was calmly bringing the ball out of defence when Ballantyne with jumper flapping appeared like a Mini from the blind spot – holding the ball, 50-metres (of course). Goal.

Fremantle kicked five in 10 minutes but the Blues kept fighting and got the last three for the quarter including one from Jeffery Garlett after the siren.

There was confusion during the mayhem. I thought someone said we should take Mayne off at three quarter time. What a ridiculous idea. But no, we were going have main course at three quarter time. Excellent idea.

Nathan Fyfe was putting on his second master class in a row and so was Ryan Crowley. Phones began to alert their owners to text messages but we maintained our delayed telecast discipline and hoped the messages were something like “Heave ho” and not “How the #$%! could we lose from there!!!

Fremantle cruised into the four. Matthew Pavlich and Luke McPharlin will be back soon and for the first time in 19 seasons we can contemplate consecutive finals appearances.

Just desserts.

 

Carlton                        3.1 6.2 11.6 12.8 (80)
Fremantle                4.3 7.5 12.10 17.14 (116)

GOALS
Fremantle:Walters 4, Ballantyne 3, Hill, Neale, Suban 2, Barlow, Mzungu, D Pearce, Sandilands

Carlton: Tuohy 3, Henderson, Garlett 2, Armfield, Judd, McLean, Rowe, Watson.

BEST

Fremantle: Fyfe, Walters, Ballantyne, Crowley, Mzungu, D Pearce, Dawson.

Carlton: Simpson, Scotland, Tuohy, Henderson, Judd, Walker.

Umpires: Meredith, McInerney, Mollison

Official crowd: 30,457

Our Votes: 3 Fyfe (F) 2 Walters (F) 1 Ballantyne (F)

 

About Les Everett

A Footy Almanac veteran, Les Everett is the author of Gravel Rash: 100 Years of Goldfields Football and Fremantle Dockers: An Illustrated History. He is the footyalmanac.com WAFL correspondent and uses the money he makes from that role to pay for his expensive websites australianrules.com.au and talkingfrankie.com and fund the extravagant Vin Maskell at scoreboardpressure.com

Comments

  1. Neil Belford says

    A perfect weekend of football really. Who was managing all those results.
    Rohan Connolly was banging on about Collingwood in this mornings Age without seeming to notice the true implications of that game. The third week in September is could be pretty quiet in Melbourne.

  2. What, no votes for the incredible dhufish?

  3. Didn’t go the full three courses Vin.

  4. Any humble pie for afters?

  5. Sean Gorman says

    Sadly PB all the humble crumble was scoffed by Jako and Barra a few years back.

  6. Sean Gorman says

    Sadly PB all the humble crumble was scoffed by Jako and Barra a few years back after the Boz steak main.

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