Setting up a top four spot is the goal for every team in footy, but for three of them every year it comes with a brutal way to get knocked out of the finals.
Losing a grand final obviously speaks for itself in terms of a rough way to go out so we won’t include that — although there are obviously worse ways to lose a granny, as Collingwood fans will attest from 2018.
For the top four sides that don’t make the big dance though, there are varying degrees of how brutal a blow the finals exit can be — and also varying degrees of how much you can kid yourself that it wasn’t that bad, actually.
Ahead of the upcoming prelim weekend, we’ve ranked the 7 most brutal ways for top four teams to get knocked out of finals before the big dance.
MOST BRUTAL WAYS TO GET KNOCKED OUT OF FINALS:
7: Losing the qualifying final, winning the semi, and then losing the prelim to the eventual premier
Every year has to have two losing preliminary finalists, and this is the one you can justify to yourself the most easily when reflecting on your team’s year: “We were never beating them, they were way too good. It was just their year. We probably overachieved even making the prelim!”
RECENT EXAMPLE: Geelong in 2021
Maxy Gawn put on an absolute clinic in Perth that left Cats fans stunned but also gave them an easy out. 20 touches and five goals from a ruckman? No one can budget for that! Plus it helps that he’s such a good bloke. The alleged ‘illness’ that ran through the Cats camp can’t have helped either.
Daisy Thomas and Kate McCarthy previewed the preliminary finals on the latest episode of Footy Talk – check it out here:
6: Same as above, but losing the prelim to the runner up
This is similar to number 7, but normally you would have lost to the eventual premier in week one so you can tell yourself you just got unlucky with having to play the best side first up.
For a double helping of self-delusion, if you lose a close one to a side that goes on to get smashed, you can even reassure yourself that your mob would have put on a better showing than the team who made it.
RECENT EXAMPLE: Collingwood in 2022
Only Cats fans could actually enjoy the 2022 grand final, but no one was saltier about it than Collingwood fans — they still reckon they probably should have beaten Geelong in the qualifying final, and if they had made it through the prelim they DEFINITELY couldn’t have gone worse than Sydney did, right?
5: Winning the qualifying final then losing to the eventual premier in the prelim
Now we’re hitting the proper mental gymnastics areas to compensate. Losing a prelim after winning the qualifying final means you’ve lost to a side that came the long way around, which means if if they go on to the win the flag they’re either a) a dynasty team or b) the 2016 Western Bulldogs.
From here it’s a relatively simple path to self-justification: your team wasn’t the main character of the season and were relegated to a footnote in a bigger story. You can even pretend you were happy for the team that went on to win if you’re prepared to lie to yourself that much.
RECENT EXAMPLE: Port Adelaide in 2020
The Pear crushed the Cats in the qualifier (although everyone did back then), but had to step aside to let Richmond (well, let’s face it: Dusty) fulfil their destiny as a triple premiership side. Port fans probably still wake up in a cold sweat thinking about that deliberate call on Hamish Hartlett.
4: Straight sets when you get comfortably beaten in both games
We know what you’re thinking: there’s no way there’s three more brutal ways to get knocked out of finals than any straight sets exit. Hear us out though — you can make plenty of excuses for this one if you think hard enough.
If your team gets done handily in both matches these self-delusion options are open to you:
1) We overachieved finishing in the top four. Our list isn’t even that good, so our coach must be a genius
2) We got unlucky with the fixture in having to play the best side from the bottom half of the eight
3) The pre-finals bye sapped our momentum
With all that said, however, there really is no hiding from how ugly this one is. Straight sets is straight sets, and even if you finely craft your excuses you’ll end up super salty anyway because your team is about to become the subject of a million memes.
RECENT EXAMPLE: 2023 Port Adelaide
To their credit, Pear fans didn’t even try and excuse last year’s straight sets exit. Instead their coping mechanism was loudly calling for the head of the coach, who now has them a game away from a grand final.
Ben & Harry McKay can now call themselves award winning podcasters! Check out the latest episode of Ben & Harry here, featuring Ben’s hilarious acceptance speech:
3: Winning the qualifying final and then losing a home prelim to the runner up
Winning the first final normally means you have one foot in the grand final, and the week off gives you that extra time to get up and about, analyse the opponent’s form and game, and just generally be a nuffy dreaming about flags.
Then it comes to game day and all of a sudden you’re five goals down by quarter time and it’s all slipping away. Then there’s a mini-resurgence but it’s not enough, and when an opposition defender kicks a goal to put them up by 51 midway through the third quarter all of a sudden your flag dreams feel about as attainable as home ownership for people under 30.
The only way to try and justify this one is to cling on to the qualifying final win as an example that your best is still good enough. But gee next September feels a long way away.
RECENT EXAMPLE: 2021 Port Adelaide
Sorry to keep picking on you Pear fans, but this is the quintessential version of this. In that case the unlikely third quarter goal kicker was Josh Schache.
3a BONUS: Mason Cox tears you apart in a prelim
Surely the most brutal example of the trope we just talked about. Eight contested marks and three goals playing on Alex Rance!
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2: Straight sets when you could or should have won at least one game
Now this is truly bleak. A whole off-season of dwelling on single moments, selection decisions, injuries, when the momentum shifted — how did it happen? The whole footy media wonders aloud if the window’s closed, if you missed a golden opportunity; even the role players are under the microscope and in the gun.
And then even worse than that is the opposition fans. Straight sets teams are the lowest hanging fruit imaginable, and easy pickings for even the worst meme makers you know.
There’s no way to delude yourself into feeling good about this one — you just have to make the decision that it’s cricket season and throw yourself headlong into whatever the domestic one day comp is called now. Matador BBQs? The Marsh Cup? You’ll be very familiar with it by mid-October.
RECENT EXAMPLE: 2023 Melbourne
32 more inside 50s than Collingwood and 8 more scoring shots than Carlton and lost both games — it was an absolute horror show from which the club still has’t recovered. Fans strongly encouraged to put the 2021 GF DVD on again.
1: What happened to GWS this year
Easily the most brutal way to get knocked out of the finals. 27 points up at the 24 minute mark of the third quarter against Sydney, 44 points up at the 12 minute mark of the third against Brisbane; they trailed for 16 minutes total across the two games. To lose one game in those circumstances is a sickener, to lose both is the kind of thing that has you convinced voodoo curses are real.
Hopefully for the Giants fan’s sake the Panthers can complete the four-peat.
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