Round 18
Collingwood v North Melbourne
7:40pm, Friday 10th July 2026
Marvel Stadium
By Dan Lonergan
At the time of my entrance into the world which is years ago in 1969, yes! I am old with a body that is sore and starting to fall apart, North Melbourne was a regular straggler in the VFL since they played in the 1950 Grand Final, when a very powerful Essendon side beat them easily.
There were a couple of other finals appearances in the 50s, but the 1960s was a disaster. In the early 1970s, Brian Dixon (former Melbourne star and multiple premiership player) coached North in 1971 and 72, where they tasted victory just eight times over that two year period. By 1973, North had some astute people on the board like Albert Mantello and former player, Allen Aylett as President and started the process of making their club relevant and hopefully a powerhouse.
The first piece of the puzzle was appointing the great Ron Barassi as coach, who had surprised the footy world by standing down as Carlton’s coach in 1971 just a year after that amazing comeback victory to secure the 1970 premiership. He had 1972 off working in his office furniture business and dabbling in the media, but by his own admission, the itch to coach returned that season. North pounced and got their man and he had the big job of lifting them up from the bottom.
They had some good young talent who went onto become greats in David Dench, who was captain at the age of 21, future Brownlow Medallist, Keith Greig, and Wayne Schimmelbusch along with the precocious but inconsistent talent of Sam Kekovich. That gave them a platform to build, but they required experience and that was where the ten year rule came in before the 1973 season. This was introduced allowing players who had played for 10 seasons at their club a chance to cross to another team of their choice without a clearance.
Every side was in favour of it except North, but they took the attitude if you can’t beat them join them and the Kangaroos spoke to every player eligible and were successful in signing three of the best, Essendon champ Barry Davis, who was appointed captain, star South Melbourne defender, John Rantall and great Geelong full forward, Doug Wade. There was, as the three of them have publicly stated over the years, bags of money to entice them.
After just missing out on the finals in 73, North did indeed become a powerhouse from 1974 to 1980 under ‘’Barass’, making the finals every year including winning their first flag in 1975 and another in 77 during a run of participating in five consecutive grand finals.
North also became a destination club for interstate players to try their luck in Victoria recruiting Magarey Medallist, Malcolm Blight from Woodville in the SANFL in 1974, and getting brilliant Rover, Barry Cable back from WA. Cable had one year at the Roos in 1970 before returning home, only to cross the Nullabor again three years later.
The man behind these recruiting coups was one of the best sports administrators in the league, Ron Joseph. He had an eye for talent and with North embarking on their best era on the field at that time, he had lots of success securing the services of good players.
The sublimely talented Brent Crosswell, who got on pretty well with Barassi when he coached him at Carlton, but had a love-hate relationship with John Nicholls when he was coach, joined North during 1975 to be the icing on the cake in their quest to win that all important first premiership.
Champion Footscray ruck Gary Dempsey also joined in 1979 after those grand finals. The Roos, through Joseph, added losts of excellent players from the WAFL to their list like Ross Glendinning, who won a Brownlow along with dual Sandover Medallists, Phil Kelly, who played well when not injured, and Peter Spencer who didn’t have the same impact.
Add Kevin Bryant, who was serviceable, and Peter Jonas who came with a huge reputation as a clever forward from Central Districts in the SANFL and showed some glimpses of that talent, but injuries were an issue.
Blight became one of their greatest ever players, and so did Cable along with Rantall and Davis, who despite only playing there for three years, they both won best and fairest and were named in North’s team of the 20th century. Kym Hodgeman, who had already developed a fine reputation as a rover in the SANFL with Glenelg was also targeted by North and won a best and fairest.
One of many of Joseph’s astute recruiting moves was bringing over the exciting Krakouer Brothers, Jimmy and Phil from WA. They took the game by storm with their talent, especially when they shared the footy with each other. It was a sight to behold with the tricks they produced.
Two all time greats from South Australia also arrived at Arden St in four time Magarey medallist, Russell Ebert and Glenelg star Graham Cornes in 1979. Ebert played the whole year travelling back and forth from Adelaide and was solid while Cornes only lasted a handful of games. Unfortunately they came at the back end of careers, but North was certainly a destination club for interstaters with big reputations.
North may not have had the biggest supporter base, but they were always innovative and when successful businessman Bob Ansett was president in the 1980s, North campaigned for Friday night footy and to be the custodians of that, and got their wish. Friday Night footy is now an institution in the league and usually the marquee match of the round especially from a lucrative broadcasting perspective.
The Roos played in the first Friday night game in round one 1985 against Collingwood at the MCG, when with a bigger crowd than anticipated turning up, some of the gates at the MCG were for some strange reason not open. To get in and not miss the start of the game, people virtually pulled those old wooden gates down and those pictures captured of that chaos are constantly shown and are now part of the then VFL folklore.
Fast forward 41 years and North last Friday for the first time in seven years were scheduled to play on the Friday night stage, with Collingwood ironically their opponents. This was a big match for North, who due to six poor seasons results-wise on the field had generally been consigned to Saturday afternoons, no longer a big or prominent time slot, Saturday twilight and particularly the early game on Sunday or twilight Sunday.
North though had improved considerably this season beating all the teams around them specifically fellow cellar dwellers in recent years in Essendon, Richmond and West Coast, and pushing the better sides without winning.
Collingwood had won their past three to be in the race like North for a wildcard spot. The Roos had also notched up a three game winning streak and were 8 wins and 8 losses. It had been a long time since North had been square with the card in regard to having the same number of wins and losses in a season, so they were certainly getting better.
This contest was worthy of a Friday night fixture and I watched most of it at the Sporting Globe part of one of the biggest shopping centres in Australia, Chermside in the inner Northern suburbs of Brisbane. I was up there to broadcast and cover a masters or over 40 cricket tournament, which is fast becoming a permanent part of the Brisbane sporting landscape. It was the third year it was staged and played in a T20 format, with two pools of five playing each other once, before semis and finals on the last day.
The venue was the Norths cricket club, the home of some of the greats of Australian cricket, like Ian Healy, Ray Lindwall and Bill Brown along with other star Queensland players who represented Australia in Geoff Dymock, Jimmy Maher, Nathan Hauritz, Robbie Kerr and Nathan McSweeney, who is now playing for South Australia. The games were played on three ovals with the marquee one named after Ian Healy and one of the other two containing Geoff Dymock’s name.
The teams were made up of many ex-first grade players mainly from Brisbane and some cricketers who represented their state like Queensland pair, Ryan Broad and Steve Paulsen and South Australian and Victorian quick, Mark Cleary, who took the only hat trick of the tournament.
It was great cricket and the masters form of the game continues to grow with Australian teams playing overseas. For what it’s worth the Cattlemen batted first and made 156 on the Ian Healy Oval, which seemed about 20 short considering how good their opponents, the Manta Rays, had been all tournament being undefeated going into the decider and how well the wicket was playing. However, the cattlemen successfully defended that total with some excellent fielding and wily and canny bowling to win the title by 32 runs.
It was incredible to be commentating cricket in Australia in the middle of winter, but Brisbane was very pleasant with temperatures hovering in the mid 20s compared to very cold and wet Melbourne. At least the roof was on at Docklands for the Roos and Pies clash and it was high quality, although goals were hard to come by, particularly in the first half of the third term.
I had enjoyed a smokey BBQ chicken parma and a Coors Beer watching the game or any other sport that tickled my fancy. Being a sports bar, everywhere you looked the many TVs had sport on: like the NRL, where Auckland continued Wests Tigers long losing run, India and England were doing battle in a womens test match in cricket, the soccer World Cup Quarter Final replays were on and the start of another day of semi finals at Wimbledon.
My eyes though were transfixed on the footy as the scoring deadlock was broken by Collingwood kicking two goals to open a 16 point lead and threatened to break the game open. However, Nick Daicos, who as usual had starred in the first and second terms, showed he was human on the footy field, fumbling the ball once in his life and shanked a kick on his left and he drifted out of the game allowing the Roos to hit back.They kicked five of the next six goals either side of three quarter time to lead by more than a goal and looked the likely winners.
Thristian Xerri used his brute strength in the ruck to kick a freakish goal and that brilliant young midfield was having the better of the Magpies, despite Josh Daicos being influential. Nick Larkey, the Roos captain, started to get on top of Billy Frampton, but he could not find his kicking boots often enough finishing with three goals 4.
Nick Daicos though, after being idle playing forward, took over in the last and with the game beginning to slip away for Collingwood, did what he does best, turned the contest with his blistering runs from stoppages and also kicked a crucial goal to put them less than a goal down. He was also involved in a Patrick Lipinski monster kick that put the Pies in front, but the goal was overturned by the controversial goal review. The goal umpire believed it was a behind as Cam Zurhaar touched it on the line and the goal ump had a birdseye view, but the review which was played constantly, I don’t believe was clear cut to show he had got a finger on it before the ball crossed the line, but the verdict was umpire’s decision.
That shocked everyone at the Sporting Globe watching, which was many, eventhough we were outnumbered by those concentrating on the one-sided NRL clash. As Gerard Whateley constantly mentions, the review system is broken and must be fixed. For what it’s worth I agree with him.
This game was close, decided by less than a kick and in some ways played a part in the result even though Collingwood fell over the line. What if the goal review technology decides a grand final by looking at whether a ball was touched so close to the line and having to have a million replays to try and find something that’s probably not there? A riot would occur if that happened and obviously I am against that, but would understand the anger of the fans of the club, who had the controversial decision go against them.
It was Nick Daicos who helped restore the lead for the Pies, and get them the valuable four points, by again dashing out of the middle, burning off opponents and being instrumental in setting up a set shot for Tim Membrey, who slotted it. There were desperate acts everywhere in this high quality encounter and North showed they belonged again in the fixture they created, but fell short by four points in a game that may cost them a wildcard spot.
For the Pies, their ability to win close ones, which was the feature of 2022 and the their premiership year 2023, but had eluded them somewhat this season, had returned at the right time. However, North, after experiencing a barren period like those dark days of the 1960s and early 70s might be emerging again and mirroring ’73 and beyond. If that happens, it should take those loyal Kangaroos supporters on a wild and long-awaited happy journey.
COLLINGWOOD 4.4 7.5 10.7 13.11 (89)
NORTH MELBOURNE 3.4 6.6 9.10 12.13 (85)
GOALS
Collingwood: McStay 3, Lipinski 2, Membrey 2, Schultz, Pendlebury, Swadling, Cameron, N.Daicos, Crisp
North Melbourne: Curtis 3, Larkey 3, Trembath, Darling, Banch, Spargo, Hardeman, Xerri
BEST (Dan’s best)
Collingwood: J.Daicos, N.Daicos, Cameron, De Goey, Howe
North Melbourne: Xerri, Parker, Sheezel, Zurhaar, Larkey
INJURIES
Collingwood: Lachie Schultz (ankle)
North Melbourne: Tom Blamires (concussion)
Crowd: 48,369
Malarkey Votes
3 – Josh Daicos (Collingwood)
2 – Nick Daicos (Collingwood)
1 – Xerri (North)
Read other round 18 match reports HERE
Read more from Dan Lonergan HERE
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