By Peter Ryan
Snap Shot is a weekly column taking a look at the lighter side of football.
Here’s one for the St Kilda sceptics who think the ladder may be lying as a different top eight seems to lob like Tattslotto numbers after every round of football.
Between rounds nine and 16 this season the Saints stayed anchored in fifth spot, despite winning just three of the seven games they played in that period and not stringing together two consecutive wins.
No one could dislodge them as they became the AFL’s Jenga masters on the fringes of the top four.
Each week they held on to the spot by percentage and each week, until the days before round 16, that percentage became smaller bit by bit – holding a lead on percentage of 18.3 over the Western Bulldogs after round nine. The percentage gap narrowed to 11.5, then 9.6 per cent, before the Bombers took up the chase from sixth spot with the gap at 8.7 per cent.
They then closed within 6.3, but the Saints held firm, somehow clinging to fifth as the gap dropped to 2.2 after round 15. The Bulldogs then jumped back into sixth as the Saints stormed clear to create a buffer of 4.1 per cent.
Can Ross Lyon lead the Saints into the finals in 2023?Credit: AFL Photos
Alas, it could not last, could it? The Saints then lost to Melbourne, Essendon beat Adelaide, and Collingwood beat the Bulldogs to switch positions, with Essendon taking fifth (by .03 per cent) and St Kilda sixth while the Bulldogs fell to seventh.
The Saints’ ride as the peloton leader of those scrambling for spots outside the top four appeared over when Geelong jumped to fifth, and for the first time since round eight more than mere percentage separated fifth and sixth.
Saints coach Ross Lyon could see the humour in the assumption that the Saints were tumbling down the ladder like they had landed on a snake in the board game, telling Fox Footy after defeating North Melbourne: “You hear the narrative and then I click on [to look at the ladder] and think ‘oh, we are sixth, how does that happen?’,” Lyon said. “Everyone tells me the ladder doesn’t lie. Does it lie?”
The Bulldogs claimed fifth after round 18, just ahead of St Kilda, but this mob might be tougher than we think under Lyon’s coaching and, by the end of round 20, or as Snap Shot refers to it, upsy-down-town round, the Saints reclaimed their spot in fifth place, again on the same points as sixth but this time with a lead on percentage of 4.1 over a new chaser, Greater Western Sydney.
So, it’s all there for the Saints as they play Carlton in round 21, with a loss to the Blues certain to again dislodge Lyon’s men from fifth spot.
Meanwhile, throughout that time, Collingwood, Port Adelaide, the Brisbane Lions and Melbourne have remained in the top four since round nine.
Poor Essendon got tired chasing St Kilda and are 13th after dropping three games, while neither Sydney nor Richmond have been in the top eight since round five.
BUDDY’S FAMOUS NO ... 38?
Now-retired champion Lance “Buddy” Franklin made his No.23 famous, kicking 1040 of his 1066 goals wearing the number for both Hawthorn and Sydney, but he could not pass dual Norm Smith medallist and Crows champion Andrew McLeod, who holds the record for most games in the number.
Top 5 or top 7 would be OK for the Saints who are holding their top eight spot.Credit: Getty
McLeod played 340 games and wore No.23 from start to finish with the Crows, while Franklin’s career ended on 333 games in the number.
Franklin assumed jumper 23 at the Hawks after a year wearing the not-so-famous 38. The number had been vacant for a season after Nathan Thompson joined the Kangaroos in Buddy’s first campaign.
He then took over 23 when he arrived in Sydney, when good-natured veteran defender Jordan Lockyer, who is making his way back from a knee injury with Subiaco in the WAFL, agreed to hand it over to Franklin. Lockyer wore the number in two years at Sydney before wearing 18 in his final season (his number as a junior) at the Swans, with Franklin thanking Lockyer at the time for his gesture.
“Jordan Lockyer was a good bloke about giving me the number and I really appreciate it,” Franklin told the club website at the time.
Franklin wore No.23 with distinction, but it was not the only number he wore in his career.Credit: Getty Images
Franklin wore 38 in his first season at the Hawks, playing 20 games and kicking 21 goals, after taking that jumper over from Nick Stone, who The Age reported last month is the highly successful CEO of coffee company Bluestone Lane, which earns annual revenue of more than $100 million.
He wore No.38 on debut, coincidentally against Sydney, where Adelaide coach Matthew Nicks was running around in the Swans’ No.23.
Since Franklin’s short stay in the jumper, six Hawks – Travis Tuck, Mitch Hallahan, James Worpel, Darren Minchington, Denver Grainger-Barras and, in 2023, Max Ramsden – have worn the slightly less famous No.38, kicking nine goals between them.
Franklin also kicked five goals wearing No.67 in round 10, 2017 to mark 50 years since the 1967 Australian referendum succeeded, ensuring sections of the constitution that discriminated indigenous Australians were removed.
Of course, the only thing Franklin did not do in his exceptional career was wear 23 in a premiership at the Swans.
The last man to do that: Bob Pratt in 1933. That’s good company.
On the coach’s whiteboard
Before you go, here are ...
Five key questions Snap Shot believes Port Adelaide should ask their players if they are involved in a head-banging clash during a game:
- Can you sing me the chorus of Never Tear Us Apart?
- Do we hate the Crows?
- Are you feeling scatty?
- What is a prison bar jumper?
- Is David Koch still on Sunrise?
They said
“He just f---ing grabbed my nuts,” ex-Brisbane Lions skipper Dayne Zorko to the field umpire after the Suns’ Touk Miller tackled him.
But they forgot to say
“He just f---ing grabbed my nuts, and you still don’t pay holding the ball. It’s confusing.”
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