GIGSTUFF 52

by Andrew Gigacz

What a round, eh? The 150^th draw in VFL/AFL history (and third in four rounds), Geelong defeated Sydney by the average player-age of the Cats (27) and congratulations to Brisbane and St Kilda, who both managed to get through Round 4 without losing. And in even better news, at least one of them will not lose again in Round 5. If those two teams draw on Thursday night – and why wouldn’t they when everybody else is? – we can look forward to the headline “No Loss for Ross or Voss” in the papers the next day.

TRULY DRAWFUL

Just when you thought I couldn’t say anything more about draws, I can. For a start, we are still on target for a Meatloaf season of two draws in every three rounds. The dream of 16 home and away draws, two extra time finals and a drawn Grand Final is still very much alive.

And here’s more on the draw that I hope will not bore:

• The record number of draws in a single season is five. That was in 1921, when four draws were recorded in the first five rounds, plus another in Round 17.

• There were four draws in each of the 1914, 1935, 1944 and 1977 seasons. There have also been 10 seasons (prior to this one) that have had three draws.

• The most number of individual teams to draw in a season is seven, when St Kilda drew twice (in three weeks), and Footscray, Essendon, Richmond, South Melbourne, Collingwood and North Melbourne drew once each.

• 79 is now the sole holder of the title “Drawing-est Score in History”. Prior to the Carlton-Essendon game on Saturday, 79, 76 and 66 had each been the final score in six different drawn matches. 79 now inches ahead to seven.

• Carlton and Essendon have now drawn five times in history. The previous occasions were in 1911, 1924, 1993 and 2006. In the first three cases, Essendon went on to win the flag in that season.

• Carlton and South Melbourne are the pair of teams that have drawn the most. They’ve tied six times but haven’t done so since the Swans became Sydney.

• The last four draws (including Saturday’s) and eight of the last nine draws have been at the MCG. The last ten draws have been in Melbourne. The last one that wasn’t was when Brisbane and Sydney drew 63-63 in 2007.

THIS WEEK’S LADDER

OK, I promise this will be the last thing about draws until we have another one. But I couldn’t let the moment pass without mentioning that Carlton and Essendon were already way out in front of the other teams in terms of number of draws before last Saturday. Now they’re even further ahead of the pack. For the record:

Team	Draws
Essendon	34
Carlton	33
Collingwood	26
Fitzroy	26
St Kilda	25
South Melbourne	23
Footscray	22
Geelong	21
Richmond	21
Melbourne	20
North Melbourne	18
Hawthorn	11
Brisbane	8
West Coast	5
Port Adelaide	4
Adelaide	1
Fremantle	0
Gold Coast	0

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE 100+ LOSING SCORE?

Remember when your team could rack up a score of a 100 or more and still get done like a dinner? Well those days are gone it seems. It hasn’t happened once in 31 games this year and only eleven times last year did a team top the ton and not win. And the only one of those games that was a real shellacking was in Round 6, when Collingwood beat Carlton 155 to 102.

Compare those figures to 1978. In Round 7 of that season, Melbourne kicked 21.15 (141) and lost to St Kilda by 63 points! Seven weeks later, the Saints themselves kicked a respectable 16.10 (106) but they fell short of Footscray by a lazy 107 points!

In that year 39 of the 132 home and away games resulted in the losing side topping the ton. In only four of the 22 rounds that year did no side finish with a losing score of triple-figures.

Obviously not much “Saints Footy” around that year.

THE ALMANAC SECOND ELEVEN

The Year: ’11.

The Facts:

(a) Previous year’s flag won by Collingwood.

(b) 3 draws in the first 4 rounds.

(c) A draw between Carlton and Essendon.

Those facts, by the way, are from the year 1911.

<Insert Twilght Zone theme music here>

DESMOND UPDATE

Richmond were the first team to take the plunge this year and score 2.2 (14) in a first quarter. Despite a spirited third-quarter fightback, the Tigers ultimately succumbed to a Magpie mauling.

In line with last year’s 2.2 trend, and to paraphrase the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld, “Tigers – no flag for you!” Not this year anyway.

THE MARGINAL MEDAL

The Blues-Bombers draw (oops, sorry! I did mention draws again) means that zero is now leading in the Marginal Medal. It’s on 3, one ahead of 11 and 20.

TODAY’S HOROSCOPE

CAPRICORN – Tonight, expect yourself to be covered with ham, mushrooms, olives and… no wait, sorry. That’s CAPRICCIOSA.

POSTCODE OF THE WEEK

Want to know how far off the pace North Melbourne are at the moment? Then check out how many goals they scored in each quarter against Fremantle. That’s right it was 4, 4, 1 and 5. Then put those numbers together: 4415.

Now go to http://auspost.com.au/apps/postcode.html and enter 4415. Look at the sixth entry in the list. That’s right. It’s MILES.

RIDICULOUS FOOTY ANAGRAM OF THE WEEK

He flew for marks all over the ground, he kicked six out of his team’s ten goals, and he was generally on fire on Saturday. And at 24 years of age he’s still just a boy really. No wonder Buddy Franklin is an anagram of “FLY AND BURN, KID!”