AFL Grand Final Day

The season comes down to this. There is something marvellous about spring in Melbourne; one of the factors is that the weather can either be wintry and miserable or 30+ degrees.

Today, for that one day in...err October, it's bloody cold.

Colingwood, the best team of the year (clearly) and the largest club in Melbourne (if not Australia) are taking on Geelong, premiers from two seasons ago and the best team of the past five years. Too often the best clubs do not play off so this year, hopefully, it will be a cracker of a game.

It is with a heavy heart, though, that I must tip Collingwood to go back to back. oddly enough, until three weeks ago, they were overwhleming favourites and the question was only "Who could even challenge them?"

Then the Cats did just that. They beat Collingwood by 96 points, albeit in a dead rubber in the final home and away round, and the Woods have looked vulnerable since.

Now, Geelong are favourites.

I have a suspicion that, once the game starts, we'll see early that Collingwood have come to play. the excellence they have displayed all season will come to the fore and they will win comfortably. I suspect we will wonder why we ever doubted the outcome; excellence does have a way of winning through.

Sadly, if I am right, Collngwood will equal the record number of Premierships currently held by my beloved Essendon and Carlton.

But, as they and their supporters are generally an uncouth and unlikeable bunch, taking gloating and bad sportsmanship to new levels (what is with this booing of opposition captains in the Grand Final lame kiddie Parade for God's sake???)

Even my own flesh and blood, my nephew Will, usually a decent, honest and civilised young man succumbs to it. And, despite my unending love for the boy, part of me (OK, all of me)is just hoping for a Geelong victory so I can rub his cheeky little nose in it. And, as for his dreadful father (my brother in law), revenge for 1999 would be so sweet..Maybe In can even resurect the trick I played on Will for many years, convincing him my cat (Jessie) barracked for Geelong. His embarrassment was so acute when his best friend looked at him like he was Joffa at a black tie dinner with those metal pointy things on the table...Aahhh, generalisations at twenty paces...

Does the cruel, fiendish plot taking shape in my mind officially mean I have become a bad uncle?

But I digress...

Sadly, I suspect it will all come to nought. Collingwood by a long 7 goals to send off both their coach, Michael Malthouse and the Geelong era, into the ether...

Go Dons!