AFLW 2019 AFLW Grand Final: Adelaide vs Carlton, Sun Mar 31, 12.30pm ACDT

[Teen Wolf]

If a gameday thread eventuates on the mainboard, I’m happy for this to be a mere preview. Otherwise let’s put all discussion (before, during and after) in here.


BASIC DETAILS

What: 2019 NAB AFLW Grand Final
Who: Adelaide vs Carlton
When: 12.30pm ACDT, 1pm AEDT
Where: Adelaide Oval, free entry
How: Televised live on the 7 Network and other various platforms

Other info:
https://womens.afl/news/17536/aria-award-winning-amy-shark-to-appear-at-aflw-grand-final

ARIA award-winning Amy Shark will perform songs from her debut album Love Monster before the AFLW Grand Final.

ROAD TO THE GRAND FINAL

Adelaide
R1: L vs Western Bulldogs by 1 point at Norwood Oval
R2: W vs Carlton by 13 points at Ikon Park
R3: W vs Geelong by 29 points at Norwood Oval
R4: W vs Fremantle by 42 points at TIO Stadium
R5: W vs Nth Melbourne by 35 points at Avalon Airport Oval
R6: W vs GWS Giants by 32 points at Unley Oval
R7: W vs Melbourne by 60 points at Casey Fields
PF: W vs Geelong by 66 points at Adelaide Oval

Carlton
R1: L vs Nth Melbourne by 36 points at North Hobart Oval
R2: L vs Adelaide by 13 points at Ikon Park
R3: W vs GWS Giants by 29 points at Blacktown ISP
R4: L vs Geelong by 5 points at GMHBA Stadium
R5: W vs Collingwood by 4 points at Ikon Park
R6: W vs Brisbane by 16 points at Ikon Park
R7: W vs Western Bulldogs by 3 points at VU Whitten Oval
PF: W vs Fremantle by 36 points at Ikon Park


STAR POWER

Adelaide boast 9 players in this year’s All-Australian squad of 40: Allan, Rajcic, Randall, Marinoff, Hatchard, Phillips, Jess Foley, Thompson and somehow Jones. Also in previous years, Cramey and Angela Foley have made the team and squad respectively.

Carlton managed a moderate four representatives through Pound, Harrington, Prespakis and Davey. They do however have five players selected for the squad (or better) in the past: Vescio, Downie, Stevens, Harris and Moody.


NUMEROLOGY

Adelaide and the number 17

Adelaide were premiers in 2017

Adelaide’s lowest-ever score: 17 vs Carlton in R3 2017 (the last time both teams made up the top 2 spots in the competition) which the Crows actually won by three points. They also scored 17 in their one-point loss to the reigning premiers in R1 this year.

Adelaide trailed by a game-high 17-points midway through the 3rd quarter in their R2 comeback victory against Carlton earlier this year.

Jessica Sedunary, #17 for Adelaide, is yet to play a game this season. Coincidence??

Adelaide’s season to-date: 1 loss then 7-straight wins

Last week Adelaide kept Geelong to a new lowest AFLW score of 1.1.7, while kicking the 2nd-highest AFLW score of 11.7.73

Ooooh spooky…


BEEN THERE, DONE THAT

If there are no changes to team line-ups from the Preliminary Finals, 12 of Adelaide’s starting 21 will have previously featured in an AFLW Grand Final: McCormick, Varnhagen, Marinoff, Phillips, Thompson, Cramey, Mules, Randall, Cox, Hatchard, Allan and Angela Foley. These all occurred for the Crows in their successful 2017 campaign.

Carlton have just one player with similar credentials in Harris, who as a then-Lion was beaten fair and square by Chelsea Randall on the day (and unfairly by the elbows-and-knees of Ang Foley, don’t h8 just a fact). Nevertheless she managed to kick one goal for the match and squandered the opportunity to kick another which could’ve swung the cup Brisbane’s way.

The Blues probably aren’t too shy of the big stage, though, having played a couple times at a packed-out Princes Park.


AND THEN THERE WERE THREE

Ebony Marinoff, Stevie-Lee Thompson and Deni Varnhagen are set to play their 24th AFLW game on the weekend, more than anybody else. Up until now, the rather meaningless record has been shared by a dozen-plus players.


THE YOUNG AND LESS YOUNG

Each team is likely to include three teenagers: Chloe Scheer, Danielle Ponter and Eloise Jones for the Crows; Georgia Gee, Madison Prespakis and Charlotte Wilson for the Blues.

Jess Foley at 35 and Alison Downie at 34 are the oldest players for Adelaide and Carlton.


OUT IN THE COLD

Sometimes the players not on the ground can be just as significant as those that are.

Carlton’s inaugural captain Lauren Arnell headlines that list, having been traded after the 2018 season to Brisbane. This year the Lions failed to reach the grand final for the first time in the league’s short history. Former Blues Nat Exon and Bella Ayre, traded for Tayla Harris in 2017, are also sitting it out with her in Queensland.

Ex-Carlton duo Danielle Hardiman and Kate Gillespie-Jones won’t be present on grand final day either, despite vocal prophecies by some commentators when they joined North Melbourne for the 2019 season.

Sophie Li may be the only one who upgraded her 3.0 finishing position by leaving Princes Park, moving back to her hometown during the off-season and now lining up for the Crows on Sunday.

Adelaide will leave out several of their 2017 premiership players for this match, likely Sarah Perkins (form) and definitely Rhiannon Metcalfe (knee) among the names.

No disrespect intended but the absentee I personally regret most is the exciting Ruth Wallace, hopefully she will be back next season for the benefit of her club and the league in general.

There’s more but you get the idea.


ALL-ROUNDERS

If you want to get rrrrrreally shitfaced in a short amount of time, tune in on Sunday arvo and take a drink whenever somebody’s multi-sport/dual-athlete/cross-code career is mentioned. Players to be most prominent in this category include:

Marijana Rajcic and Jenna McCormick – soccer

Erin Phillips and Jess Foley – basketball

Chloe Dalton and Brooke Walker – rugby sevens

Tayla Harris – boxing

Ailish Considine – gaelic football

Breann Moody – horse stuff


FOR THE NEUTRALS

Those of you intrigued by the women’s game but are without an AFLW team to support yet, don’t worry, there’s still reason to take a vested interest in this match. A number of players are linked to YOUR club, through state league football or other means, and could possibly sign on in the future. Here are some of them:

#36 Jayde Van Dyk – Hawthorn (so too #28 Sarah Perkins)

#8 Amelia Mullane – Richmond (played for the Tigers VFLW team last year alongside fellow former Magpies Emma King and Christina Bernardi)

#20 Charlotte Wilson and #22 Rhiannon Watt – played last season with St Kilda’s VFLW team the Southern Saints (#1 Bri Davey, #18 Tilly Lucas-Rodd, #10 Sarah Hosking, #11 Jess Hosking and #32 Natalie Plane have a history with either the St Kilda Sharks or Seaford, which isn’t the same thing, but guaranteed it means Peta Searle and co. have got their eye on them too)

#15 Danielle Ponter – Essendon. Played half-a-dozen games for their VFLW team last season, but obviously not the only club in which family members have excelled at. Like Van Dyk and the Hawks, Ponter may still not have even entered her prime by the time the Bombers secure an AFLW license.

#13 Erin Phillips – Port Adelaide (no telling how much longer she’ll be playing football, this could be her last game for all we know, but Port have recently made their desires for an AFLW team clearer than ever and you would think Phillips will have a role there in some capacity if she wishes)

#26 Chelsea Randall – West Coast? She is a former state captain for Western Australia as well as having played in exhibition matches with the Eagles.


PREDICTIONS

I am going to tip an upset: Blues by 4 points… IN EXTRA TIME! We haven’t had a draw in 2019 yet, and in the pre-season predictions thread I vaguely floated the idea of it happening between the league’s two most unpredictable teams in Carlton and Adelaide. Every other forecast of mine was dead on so lock this in too.

Best on Ground: Nicola Stevens, because I always tip somebody who has shown the capability of dominating but rarely does.


A MORE SERIOUS “PREDICTION”

The previous section is all just light-hearted guesswork of course, so here’s something I absolutely want on the record: If Brianna Davey is allowed to play her natural stand-and-deliver style of footy, it will be Adelaide’s undoing. However, this does not mean the Crows must limit the amount of possessions she gets.

I have already talked about it a bit recently, and it was reaffirmed on the weekend. So frequently opposition teams, either by design or dysfunction, swarm to Davey in droves when she gets the ball. This is a fatal flaw because even multiple tacklers rarely bring her down completely, it simply creates a loose Carlton player on the outside to dish off an easy releasing pass to.

Take this example from the weekend:



Fremantle left multiple Carlton players all by themselves because they were so worried about the bigger, scarier body of Bri (and Prespakis, but it’s the same premise). Does not work. Her kicking and handballing skills are fine, can be thumping at times, but she’s not a devastatingly accurate or Pearce-ing pure user of the ball. Committing just the single worthy head-to-head opponent, drying up those open options and forcing her to hit up manned team mates is the only solution.

Even though there are other important details to focus on for Carlton—Harris opting for reserved disposals on the wing and flanks (and yes, not smashing the post from a metre out), Prespakis and whoever else (Brazzale/Loynes/Mullane) providing more clearance help, Vescio being her opportunistic best—they are secondary to the performance of their captain imo.

For Adelaide, we should be pretty confident about what they’re going to bring offensively. If they put up a performance in the realm of what they’ve shown over the last 7 weeks but lose or just get over the line by a goal or two, we will have witnessed a terrific display of football by both teams.


AFLW Tipping

Congratulations to BlueGum on winning the AFLW tipping comp on 27 points:
https://www.bigfooty.com/forum/pickem/aflw-tipping-2019.3/

 

[TheFool]

Gutted I can't watch this live as I'll be on my way to the Bulldogs mens game. Hopefully they'll be showing it somewhere at the G so I can at least catch the end, but I'm seriously flat about it.

 

[radiojake]

Go Crows

 

[NikkiNoo]

Teen Wolf how did Jones make the AA squad you keep asking. Well, by having the most score assists in the competition and she also applies a huge amount of defensive pressure and creates turnover - two key things for smaller forwards in the game. Combine this with getting on the scoreboard herself (although she has some kicking issues in close like Harris does when neither of them should be missing those shots). Although the AFLW want to forget that she is also up for mark of the year (their tweet mentions voting for the other three players but never mentions Jones), that ability to take high marks means she provides a hard match up for opponents because of her speed, high leap and good skills (see that bullet pass from an intercept mark that leads to the goal after the siren from Phillips).

Add in to the drinking game that Jones turned down a College basketball scholarship in the US before entering the AFLW draft. Stevie-Lee was a rugby player and only played Aussie Rules for a year before being drafted by the Crows in their inaugural team. cmndstab is doing a great thread on profiles on our Adelaide players and their path to the AFLW that has been really interesting to read.

 

[Teen Wolf]

Extended squads:

ADELAIDE

B: D.Cox 31 S.Allan 39 J.Mules 23
HB: M.Rajcic 32 C.Randall 26 A.Foley 3
C: E.Phillips - C 13
HF: D.Ponter 15 C.Scheer 4 C.Cramey 22
F: E.Jones 2 S.Thompson 14 D.Varnhagen 9
Foll: J.Foley 24 A.Hatchard 33 E.Marinoff 10
I/C from: H.Martin 6 R.Forth 27 S.Li 19 A.Considine 16 N.Gore 7 S.Riley 8 J.McCormick 5

In: N.Gore, S.Riley
Out: None

CARLTON

B: J.Van Dyk 36 K.Harrington 9 N.Stevens 21
HB: C.Dalton 15 C.Wilson 20 G.Pound 6
C: B.Davey - C 1
HF: L.Brazzale 12 B.Moody 16 T.Lucas-Rodd 18
F: D.Vescio 3 T.Harris 7 B.Walker 14
Foll: A.Downie 30 M.Prespakis 4 S.Hosking 10
I/C from: G.Gee 19 J.Edwards 25 J.Hosking 11 A.Mullane 8 K.Loynes 2 R.Hicks 24 N.Plane 32

In: R.Hicks, N.Plane
Out: None

@Teen Wolf how did Jones make the AA squad you keep asking. Well, by having the most score assists in the competition and she also applies a huge amount of defensive pressure and creates turnover - two key things for smaller forwards in the game. Combine this with getting on the scoreboard herself (although she has some kicking issues in close like Harris does when neither of them should be missing those shots). Although the AFLW want to forget that she is also up for mark of the year (their tweet mentions voting for the other three players but never mentions Jones), that ability to take high marks means she provides a hard match up for opponents because of her speed, high leap and good skills (see that bullet pass from an intercept mark that leads to the goal after the siren from Phillips).

I know the reasons she was picked but think they're heavily outweighed by the reasons she shouldn't have been. Certainly has a lot of ability though and maybe Sunday is the match she morphs from role player to key differentiator, which would be quite an achievement for a 19yo.

 

[Kick It 2 Me]

Saturday arvo, no games scheduled in the AFL until 4.30pm....giving the AFLW 3 hours of clear air to play their GF.

Instead Gillon schedules it for Sunday arvo when North are playing the Lions.

Woeful scheduling AFL. Woeful.

 

[Dirty Bird]

Saturday arvo, no games scheduled in the AFL until 4.30pm....giving the AFLW 3 hours of clear air to play their GF.

Instead Gillon schedules it for Sunday arvo when North are playing the Lions.

Woeful scheduling AFL. Woeful.

You’re so short sighted
You’d have to make it a 10am game to let fans out and in between games today
Right decision was made.

 

[Kick It 2 Me]

You’re so short sighted
You’d have to make it a 10am game to let fans out and in between games today
Right decision was made.

You need to look up the meaning of short sighted methinks.

There's a pretty simple way around it really.

Crows v Blues AFLW GF 1.40pm ACDT
Cats v Demons AFL 4.40pm AEDT
Power v Blues AFL 7.50pm AEDT

 

[cmndstab]

Not sure they want to be rescheduling the season on the fly though.

 

[PT Bar None]

Gutted I can't watch this live as I'll be on my way to the Bulldogs mens game. Hopefully they'll be showing it somewhere at the G so I can at least catch the end, but I'm seriously flat about it.

Expected this to be on this afternoon, not tomorrow - nice gap in the FTA schedule. Came here to double check the date of the game 'cause I couldn't find it. I'll miss it now - going to the same game as you!

 

[Aardvark]

I don't mind who wins so long as it's close. Hope it's a great game.

 

[Dirty Bird]

You need to look up the meaning of short sighted methinks.

There's a pretty simple way around it really.

Crows v Blues AFLW GF 1.40pm ACDT
Cats v Demons AFL 4.40pm AEDT
Power v Blues AFL 7.50pm AEDT

And what about any Carlton fans who may have scheduled the last flight out of adelaide to head home.
They now expected to leave at quarter time?

 

[SunGirl89]

Gutted I can't watch this live as I'll be on my way to the Bulldogs mens game. Hopefully they'll be showing it somewhere at the G so I can at least catch the end, but I'm seriously flat about it.

do you not have a mobile phone?

 

[SunGirl89]

You’re so short sighted
You’d have to make it a 10am game to let fans out and in between games today
Right decision was made.

The AFL deliberately left the afternoon free for the AFLW Grand Final. What do you think about that decision?

The Crows were one of the favourites so the AFL fixture should have ensured that an Adelaide team did not play on the Saturday.

The game could have been scheduled as per originally planned and started at 12:30.

 

[SunGirl89]

Blues confident of an upset: https://womens.afl/news/17579/-we-re-just-riding-the-wave-blues-confident-of-upset

You expect a team to talk themselves up but I'm not sure how they can seriously be confident, especially given that the game is in Adelaide. Carlton beat the two wooden spoon teams by a combined 8 points. They will join Fitzroy (AFLM 1916, 81.6%) as the only top-level teams to enter a grand final with a percentage below 100.

I hope it's a good game and the weather holds off, but I expect Adelaide to dominate and win by at least 4 goals.

 

[TheFool]

do you not have a mobile phone?

As we all know, it's perfectly legal to watch footy on your phone while driving and everyone also has unlimited data all the time and no distractions ever occur whilst in transit.

If I could watch it, I would.

 

[Kick It 2 Me]

If the AFL were smart they could've made us all happy.....and Carlton supporters, already in Adelaide, able to watch their club lose twice in one day!!!

 

[Darkyprotector]

So in effect today's game shows how far this competition has to go

A game between a state team propped up with a heavily subsidised territory team vs a team with a top pick they shouldn't have got and a few paid under the table they pinched from other clubs

Here's a thought afl
Get fair dinkum
3 year contracts and a full dispersal draft allow current clubs 8 each with 2 being under 21 a
Make sure rules are followed , (no salary cap in Vfl women's )

Then it might be a competition

Until then it's a novelty an event to watch with popcorn
Currently dosent spread the talent and insecure clubs looking for cheap glory prevail

Dosent help development
Dosent maintain interest and no continuity

It needs to change

 

[Our Game]

Saturday arvo, no games scheduled in the AFL until 4.30pm....giving the AFLW 3 hours of clear air to play their GF.

Instead Gillon schedules it for Sunday arvo when North are playing the Lions.

Woeful scheduling AFL. Woeful.

Wouldnt reckon the North v Lions to be a crowd favorite no matter who was playing against them on TV.

 

[smoking joe 3]

Just for fun - 0.00001% chance. $50 down the drain

 

[kaiserchief13]

Go Crows - put this undeserving (conference system) team down

 

[DevilsAvocado]

Go Crows! Would be a travesty if the blues won.

GREAT CROWD!!!

 

[Dynamics]

Go Crows. Need to stop the Ill discipline and they'll win.

This central umpire has no idea what holding the ball is apparently.

 

[VictorianCrow85]

This umpiring is bloody sus, a skeptic would think the AFL is desperate to ensure it stays close to make their conference system seem like a winner.

 

[SunGirl89]

This umpiring is bloody sus, a skeptic would think the AFL is desperate to ensure it stays close to make their conference system seem like a winner.

Agree 100%. Umpiring has been a joke. Some may have been there but some definitely weren't.

Let's see how the rest of the game goes but smells like an AFL edict to ensure the Crows don't win by 8 goals.