I don't believe what I just saw

OK it's almost three weeks too late, but I have to have my say on what happened on Friday May 23rd. That, in case you didn't know, is the night that the Collingwood Football Club beat Geelong, the defending premiers - BY 86 FREAKIN POINTS! I mean, come on. Considering how bad Collingwood played against Hawthorn, and how average they looked against St. Kilda, there was no way we were going to win this match. Right? OK I said there was no way we were going to beat Geelong. Not exactly true. Obviously. But for us to beat Geelong, winners of 27 of 28 prior to that match BY 86 FREAKIN POINTS in wet weather too mind you, I would have said that was physically impossible. And I still stand by that.

I'm still not sure how it all happened. Well actually I do. Collingwood had been thinking about that preliminary final loss for eight months, Geelong had doubts over their ability to beat the Pies after that match, and the Cats hadn't played a legit tough opponent. They hadn't played Hawthorn, the Dogs, Collingwood at the G' or Adelaide. Yeah, they played Brisbane and Sydney, but minus Simon Black, Jonathan Brown, Tadgh Kennelly and Barry Hall. Adding to that they were both played at Skilled.

So you have to figure that Geelong were thinking 'we simply can't be beaten. We haven't lost since like Round 5 2007. The Port game didn't count, we had like half our team injured and who is Dominic Cassisi anyway? We can be down by 25 points in the last quarter in Perth and still win. Pavlich hit the post, BECAUSE WE ARE GEELONG THE GREATEST TEAM OF ALL (by the way, did anyone EVER actually genuinely believe Fremantle were going to win that game? They were up by 39 points at one point, led by 25 at 3/4 time, and had their captain taking a relatively easy set shot in the final minute of the game to win the match, but never did I think Fremantle had a legitmate shot at winning that match. Even when it seemed off the boot Pavlich had split the middle, there was always the sense 'Somehow, someway Fremantle are going to find a way to lose this match' And surely enough, they did.)

Geelong basically coasted through the first eight weeks of the season. Aside from the first two rounds anyway, which were genuinely impressive. But they cooled off and settled for light easy 5 goal wins against teams like Melbourne and Richmond and a depleted Brisbane at home, whereas last year they would have demolished them by 100+ points. Last year the feeling with Geelong was unrelenting. They sent a simple message to their opponents "We're going to kill you, then we're going to bury you, and then we're going to kill you some more". This mentality was very much reflective of what Mark Thompson's mindset must have been after the hell he was put through in 2006. There was simply no mercy for the opposition. This year it's a completely different story. Now the message is more like 'OK, we're going to beat you, but not because we hate you, just because we're better than you and we're expected to beat you'. The team has mellowed. And when Collingwood came out with the greatest ever display of intensity and tackling I have ever seen (Robert Walls will back me up), the Cats simply had no chance.

You get the sense that after the disaster season of 2006 for Geelong and the amazing turnaround of 2007 and how quickly it all happened, the players have a bit of jet-lag. It was an amazing journey for Geelong, emotionally and physically, and after the euphoria of 2007 something dangerous may have overcome the Cats - satisfaction. Are the Cats satisfied with just having disproved their critics? Are they satisfied with the one premiership? The difference between a one-off champion and a dynasty is all about hunger. Do Geelong have it? I guess we won't know until September, and right now I'm guessing that's the one month Geelong won't want to face the Mighty Pies.