Membrey’s Miss Sums Up Our Whole Bloody Season

Three points. Three lousy points. That’s the difference between us dusting off the boots for another week and packing it in for the summer, and it came down to a set shot that Tim Membrey will be seeing in his sleep for months.

Carn the Pies, I hear you say, but geez it’s hard to carn anything after that one. The Bulldogs hung on at the MCG in a wildcard final that had my heart rate up around the danger zone from about the first bounce, and in the end we were left kicking ourselves over the moments we didn’t take rather than the ones the Dogs did.

The Start We Didn’t Need

Eighteen minutes into the first term and we’re already turning the ball over in defensive 50, which is exactly the sort of thing that gets Collingwood supporters reaching for the stress ball. Nick Daicos found himself alone on the wing after the Dogs fumbled their exit, Sam Swadling floated through for the handball, and suddenly Dan McStay’s got the first shot at goal of the afternoon.

Now, credit where it’s due, that’s good improvisation from our blokes when the opposition hands you a gift like that. But it also tells you something about how scratchy this game was from the get go. Neither side could really find their groove early, and when you’re playing finals footy that kind of scrappiness usually favours whoever’s more clinical in front of the big sticks.

Spoiler alert: that wasn’t us today.

Daicos Being Daicos

Can we talk about Nick Daicos for a second? The kid is a problem. Every time the Bulldogs looked like putting three or four goals together and running away with it, there he was, popping up on a wing or through the middle, doing something ridiculous with the footy.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — watching him play is one of the genuine joys of following this club at the moment, even on a day when the result doesn’t go our way. He’s the sort of player opposition fans grudgingly admit is special, and today he gave the Dogs headaches all match long even when the scoreboard wasn’t fully reflecting his impact.

The Mistake That Cost Us

Look, I’m not going to pretend this was some injustice cooked up against the Pies. This one’s on us. We had the ball in dangerous positions all day and we just didn’t nail the conversion rate you need in a knockout final.

There were a couple of moments in the second half where I reckon the umpires could of paid a free kick or two our way and didn’t, and yeah, it’s hard not to feel like the whistle went against us at the pointy end when it mattered. But I’m not going to sit here and blame blokes in green for a three point loss. We had our chances. We just didn’t take enough of them.

The Bulldogs defence deserves credit too. They scrambled, they smothered, they made our forward line work for absolutely everything, and when your forwards have to manufacture every single opportunity from scratch, the misses start to add up.

Membrey’s Moment

Which brings us to the moment everyone’s going to be talking about around the water coolers this week. Tim Membrey, set shot, last gasp, chance to snatch it for the Pies and send Whitten Oval into meltdown.

He’s kicked hundreds of goals in his career. He’s kicked goals under way more pressure than that one, probably. But footy’s a cruel game sometimes and this was one of those shots that just didn’t want to go through. It drifted, the Dogs faithful held their breath, and then let it out in one enormous roar of relief.

I feel for him, I really do. Nobody wants to be the bloke remembered for the miss. But that’s finals football — someone’s always going to cop the headline, and today it was him. Doesn’t mean he’s not a quality player. Doesn’t mean this loss sits entirely on his shoulders either. There were twenty one other blokes out there in black and white who could of done more across four quarters to make sure that shot didn’t even need to matter.

Where Does This Leave Us?

Definately not where we wanted to be this time of year. Wildcard weekend was always going to be knife’s edge stuff, and we knew going in that Collingwood in September doesn’t come with any guarantees anymore, not the way it used to feel like it did a couple of years back.

But there’s plenty to build from here too. The midfield brigade competed hard all day. Daicos was electric. Our forward line created enough looks at goal that if we sharpen up the conversion, this is a completely different result. That’s cold comfort at three points down after the final siren, I know, but it’s the truth.

The Bulldogs will take plenty out of this contest heading into their next assignment. They found a way to win ugly, which is often the mark of a side building something for a genuine finals tilt. Whether they’ve got the legs for three more weeks of this intensity remains to be seen.

The Pies’ Reality Check

So where does this leave the black and white army? Bruised, obviously. Frustrated, definitely. But not without hope for next year, because a lot of the pieces that got us into this position are still young enough and good enough to go again.

Is it going to sting for a while? Course it is. Should of, could of, would of — that’s the soundtrack of every Collingwood fan’s drive home tonight. But we don’t rebuild a whole season’s worth of good work over one three point loss in a wildcard final.

We turn up next year hungrier, meaner, and hopefully with a set shot or two more falling our way when it counts. Until then, chin up Pies fans. It hurts now. It’ll hurt for a bit yet. But carn the Pies regardless — there’s always next season, and this club doesn’t stay down for long.