Three-Peat Lions, One Eye Already on the Pies

Well, carn the Pies, because that’s about all I’ve got left in me after watching Brisbane do it again. Four goals in a row to finish it off, Fremantle’s heart ripped clean out in front of 100,000 people at the MCG.

Three flags on the trot. Say what you want about the Lions, and believe me I usually do, but that’s a serious footy side.

The premiership itself

Let’s give credit where it’s due, even if it hurts a bit typing it. Brisbane finishing with four straight goals in the last quarter of a grand final is not luck. That’s composure. That’s a team that’s been there before and knows exactly what it feels like to have 100,000 people screaming at them.

Fremantle will be shattered. Genuinely shattered. They’ve been the form side for large chunks of the year and to get all the way to the last Saturday in September only to watch the cup get carted off by the same mob for a third straight time? Brutal. Their fans deserve better than that gut punch, I don’t care what colours you wear.

But this isn’t really a Fremantle story today, is it? Everyone’s talking about the same bloke.

Neale’s appeal and the eyebrows it raised

Lachie Neale rocks up to the MCG with a one-match ban overturned on appeal just two days earlier. Convenient timing? I’ll let you decide that one, footy fans, because I’m not about to cop a please explain from the lawyers.

What I will say is this: plenty of our readers reckon it looked awfully soft that a dual Brownlow medallist gets off a ban right before his own grand final. You could argue the Tribunal system bends for the big names. You could also argue it was a fair appeal decided on the merits and I should pull my head in. Both are fair positions. I know which one I lean towards, and I reckon you can probably guess.

Either way, he played. Reports have it as his 186th game for the Lions, and by all accounts his last. That’s a big call to hang over a grand final week, appeal or no appeal.

The Neale to Collingwood question

Now here’s where I sit up in my chair. Word is Neale could be Collingwood bound.

Let that sink in for a second. A dual Brownlow medallist, three-time premiership player, walking out of Brisbane and into the Holden Centre. If that happens, and I stress if, that’s the sort of signing that changes a list overnight.

Should we be excited? Course we should. Are we going to pretend it’s not exactly the kind of ruthless list move that gets Collingwood fans out of bed in the morning? Nah, mate, we love it.

But I’ll say this too. Bringing in a bloke at the tail end of his career, straight off a grand final dais, straight off a Tribunal appeal, straight off 186 games of wear and tear on that body? That’s not without risk. We’ve all seen big names arrive at new clubs and the magic doesn’t always follow them across state lines.

Still. A Brownlow medallist in the middle for the Pies? I’d take that deal every day of the week and twice on Anzac Day.

Should he have even played?

This is the bit that’s really got the From the Pocket crowd fired up. Some of our subscribers reckon a bloke fresh off an overturned suspension has no business lining up in the biggest game of the year, appeal won or not.

I get the sentiment. If the MRO thought it was worth a one-match sanction in the first place, there’s clearly something in it. The appeal process cleared him, and I’m not saying otherwise, but it does make you wonder whether the process moves a bit quicker when there’s a flag and a legacy on the line.

Would we be saying the same thing if it was a Collingwood player copping the same treatment? Honestly? Probably not, and I’ll own that. That’s footy tribalism for you.

What it means walking into next season

Brisbane now sit alongside the genuine great sides of the modern era. Three flags back to back is not something you fluke. Chris Fagan’s mob deserve every bit of the credit that’s coming their way, and I’ll be first in line to acknowledge it even though it’s like swallowing a mouthful of vinegar.

For Fremantle, the rebuild questions start almost immediately. When do you get another crack at it after a loss like that?

For us Collingwood supporters, though, the real story starts the moment Neale’s boots are packed into a box marked Lions and possibly, just possibly, unpacked again at the Holden Centre. If that move happens, our midfield rotation looks completely different heading into next year. It’s the kind of headline that gets tossed around at the pub for weeks.

The Daz verdict

Brisbane deserve their flag. Three in a row is special footy history and I won’t take that off them, even through gritted teeth.

But the story that’ll follow us Pies fans around all summer isn’t really about Fremantle’s heartbreak or even the Lions’ three-peat. It’s about whether Lachie Neale, dual Brownlow medallist, three-time premiership player, walks into our rooms wearing black and white next year.

If it happens, I reckon we’ll look back on this grand final week as the moment everything changed for Collingwood. Definately one to watch.

Carn the Pies. Bring him home.