After the weekend.

Well. All I can say is that it has been an interesting round for footy. So much was the build up especially with a couple of games and some didn't disappoint and some did.

Friday night's game on paper matched up pretty good. Both teams came off really good wins. But Collingwood came out and did to Essendon what they did to Carlton the week before, running away to win by 35 points.

To Saturday. And the build up to a game between the two teams Melbourne and West Coast, two teams that are down the lower half of the ladder had been huge, ever since Jim Stynes announced that he was battling cancer on Tuesday. It was a hard fought game by the two sides, Melbourne getting in front and even there was a challenge by West Coast but Melbourne held them off to win by 20 points. Saying that they needed this game was an understatement, but the most important thing was doing it for Jim Stynes. That will mean more I reckon than the win itself. I was so pleased for the Melbourne Football Club even though I don't support them.
To the other games. At AAMI Stadium, and this saw Port Adelaide host Brisbane. For about two and a half quarters it was close and at three quarter time there was not much in it. But then in the last quarter Port kicked away to win by 48 points.

To Saturday night and Richmond hosted Adelaide up at Gold Coast Stadium. Adelaide lead all the way but not before a fightback from the Tigers to win by 17 points.
At Etihad Stadium Western Bulldogs hosted Hawthorn. After a blitz by the Dogs in the first half, not allowing the Hawks to score a goal, they ran way to win by 88 points. It was an unbelievable performance by the Dogs and I reckon it would make the AFL world stand up and take notice that they could be a serious premiership contender.

To Sunday. Sydney hosted North Melbourne at the SCG. This game proved to be a tough game and for a moment there you thought that North could cause an upset. But Sydney's home ground advantage helped them and the Swans held on to win by 15 points. To me I believe that North Melbourne are close to win the way they are playing under their caretaker coach Darren Crocker.

Sunday afternoon saw the battle that the footy public had been looking forward to, and it did not disappoint. The build up to this game was massive, Grand Final like. A sell out game that saw the AFL shift the game time to suit the television network 7 due to their schedule. When and has that ever happened? The great thing is that the game was live into Melbourne. To the game and the start built up big and St Kilda came out firing and applied the pressure to lead in the first quarter by 31 points and to be honest I thought they were going to run away with it. But to Geelong's credit, they came back and were right in it at quarter time. The rest of the game was an arm wrestle, the Cats getting even at one stage. But St Kilda proved that they are the real deal holding on to win by 6 points after a shot at goal from Michael Gardiner with not long left in the game. Well all I can say is that thank goodness it wasn't a blowout and it did live up to the expectations of the build up. St Kilda do look good and proved it against Geelong. My question is "Can they win on the big stage of the MCG come September?" maybe, maybe not, but that will be the true test and will ask the question of how good they are. Someone did say to me that whoever loses this game will win the Grand Final, I sure hope that's true!

To the last game of the round. Fremantle hosted Carlton at Subiaco. In the start Fremantle started well and I thought that maybe this was going to be a badly needed win. Then Carlton came back and applied the pressure going on to win by 15 points. The first time the Blues won there since 2001. Carlton played in an all yellow number for Cancer research, good one!

Well that's another round of footy gone. Can you believe that we will be up to round 15 next week. Who would have thought?

Catch ya!