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There were the giants, and there were the Giants. In a titanic contest, the team of the season prevailed over the team of the moment. The Magpies had their army, but the Giants had their tsunami, and they made for a mighty preliminary final match.<\/p>\n
After Jesse Hogan\u2019s goal 19 minutes into the last quarter, neither team scored even another behind, and that suited the Magpies just fine. Giants captain Toby Greene might have won it for his team with an outrageous banana snap in the dying moments, but Steele Sidebottom was where he has always been for the Magpies, on the line. It was that breathlessly close.<\/p>\n
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Nick Daicos and Toby Greene.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>AFL Photos \/ Getty Images<\/cite><\/p>\n GWS were comically outnumbered everywhere in and around the MCG except where it counted, on the emerald greensward. There, the Magpies\u2019 fabled extra could not make themselves felt for more than a half as the Giants silted up Collingwood\u2019s patent running game and looked set to elbow their way into the grand final.<\/p>\n For nearly two full quarters, the Magpies were so stymied that they could not kick a goal. But a more attacking formation after half-time opened up avenues, albeit leaving slits for the Giants. It\u2019s footy\u2019s eternal trade-off. Five goals in fairly quick succession wrested the ascendancy away from the Giants, and there it stayed. Just.<\/p>\n Comical the aesthetics might have been, but for Collingwood, it was no laughing matter when they trailed by three goals early in the third quarter. At the beginning, Collingwood army\u2019s chant was ominous. Then it was plaintive. Then it was urgent. Then it was euphoric.<\/p>\n Other numbers were against the Giants: a six-day break, a third road trip in these finals. They\u2019ve dealt with these handicaps as occupational hazards, but perhaps now they became a back-breaking straw. The Magpies were at home, and at home. When everything was on the line, their best were their best: Scott Pendlebury, Jordan de Goey, Isaac Quaynor. But the Giants lost nothing except the match.<\/p>\n So another high-flying Collingwood season lands them in the grand final. Collingwood have been indisputably the best value round-one-to-preliminary-final team in VFL\/AFL history.<\/p>\n They\u2019ve played in 11 preliminary finals in the past 22 years and won six. Last year, they lost a prelim by a behind, this year they won by that same irreducible margin. One-kick results have become their motif and hallmark.<\/p>\n They\u2019ve won more games than any other club, 125 more than the next most, Carlton. If they win the grand final, that will make 1600.<\/p>\n If. It\u2019s the next step, the fatal last, that is their historical problem. That becomes next week\u2019s intrigue. They go again. As surely as floreat pica, it\u2019s their motto.<\/p>\n Collingwood came from the clouds last year, GWS from another galaxy this year. In round two, they lost to West Coast, an inauspicious feat if ever there was.<\/p>\n Both are probably a couple of years ahead of where they might have hoped to be when they changed coaches, but Collingwood\u2019s Craig McRae had a year\u2019s start on the Giants\u2019 Adam Kingsley. So nearly did he and the Giants leapfrog the Pies, but they were stopped mid-air. Footy is a game that does not stand still.<\/p>\n The coaches worked together under Damien Hardwick at ascendant Richmond. Both have flattered by imitation, each playing a Richmond-style game, but with customised touches. This was Kramer versus Kramer. So it proved; there was not the depth of a scoresheet between them.<\/p>\n There is something even more final about a prelim than the finale. Grand final paraphernalia was being erected around the MCG, but only one team and one horde of fans will back for it. For the other, it\u2019s oblivion. This year, that\u2019s the gallant Giants.<\/p>\n Everyone at least remembers who loses a grand final, but few remember the vanquished prelim finalist. You don\u2019t think so? In the past 10 years, all but three clubs have proceeded at least as far as a preliminary final. This surprises people. For all their achievements this season, GWS become a stat. Whoever the Magpies play next week, whatever happens, history will remember it.<\/p>\n The vastly different histories and provenances of these two clubs made for a starkly asymmetric aspect in and around the ground. The Giants\u2019 orange is distinctive, but in the sea of black-and-white was as hard to spot as a four-leaf clover but not as lucky. The AFL sold tickets to 1000 Giants fans.<\/p>\n By one behind and by 95,000 people, the Magpies had the numbers.<\/p>\nMost Viewed in Sport<\/h2>\n
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