​Believe it or not, I've actually seen us win at Kardinia Park (or whatever they call it these days: my preference is TFS for Taxpayer-Funded Stadium).

It was 2003. The surprising thing about pulling off this rare feat was that it was in a year we added to our stellar collection of wooden spoons. In fact we only won three games for the year; astonishingly enough this included defeating the Cats twice. 

Geelong's team that day contained many of the players who'd form the nucleus of the great era which was yet to dawn. Our team included luminaries such as Daniel Bandy and Patrick Bowden, a few ageing remnants from our tilts in the '90s, and some newish players who would go on to find Geelong an insurmountable hurdle in the years 2008-2010.

There was also an unheralded rookie called Matthew Boyd, wearing number 42 and playing his fifth game.

Still, as someone famous once said, we've all passed a lot of water since those days.

I used to have a grudging admiration for the achievements of the Geelong dynasty later that decade. Now I've allowed myself to wallow in just the grudging.

About that benighted ground, where we can just about pencil in the loss of four points each year, yet where, in an unfairly lopsided fixture, Collingwood, Essendon, Carlton and Richmond never have to play.

About my well-known antipathy towards anything Scott-brother-related; now that Petulant Brad has departed, all my angst can be directed squarely at Morose Chris, who's added a George Hamilton-style tan to reasons to dislike him.

About how they're always able to attract and top up with blue-chip talent - with one new addition being among my (admittedly bulging) all time list of Most Detestable: 'Jezza' Cameron, no less.

About the air of entitlement that hangs over their players, who are genuinely astonished if ever a free is paid against them.

About why they can't just bottom out, rebuild and stop annoying me so much. 

As a counterpoint, however, I remind myself the Bulldogs have won a premiership more recently than the Cats.

That's all I've got.

In contrast to the 2003 clash which had little riding on it, in this 2021 match there is much at stake. The Cats are scratching at our top two spot on the ladder. We need a win for our credibility as a top four aspirant, having failed tests against Richmond and Melbourne.

It must be time, at last, to rid ourselves of the TFS monkey.

Fortunately, even if I wanted to, I was unable to purchase an exorbitantly priced seat at the stadium. It saved me from being condemned to watch most of the match on the scoreboard anyway given the weird shape of the ground. COVID restrictions mean  7000 of their supporters are allowed at the match, and only 200 of ours - I guess it preserves the usual ratio between the two clubs' attendance even without a pandemic.

The Libba Sisters are far from sorry that instead of huddling in the cold surrounded by Feral Cats, we'll be watching the clash on the couch. Settling into our accustomed positions, we don't really talk about what we expect, or hope for, on this wintry Friday night. At this ground, against this opponent, anything, sadly, is possible.

In the first quarter, though, we begin giving each other those silent nods of acknowledgement. Our Boys are 'on.'

Their execution isn't always matching the intent. Blessed with the Docklands stadium roof, we play less outdoor footy than most, which means we don't handle the wet and slippery conditions cleanly. But there is no doubt of their endeavour, no sign of that curious flatness which marred our game against the Dees.

By the third quarter, our hopes have gone beyond just a 'let's not capitulate' low bottom line. Our engine room purrs into life. Jackson Macrae, Tom Liberatore and The Bont rip the ball from the centre time and again. Our efforts are often kamikaze, our delivery to the forward line haphazard, but our intensity, our will, can't be faulted. And there are enough moments of brilliance - Josh Bruce's superb 50 metre goal on the run from the boundary, the Bont's brilliant snap - for us to be in the match up to our eyeballs. We've lost our wonderful forward, the Astro-Naut, but maybe in these conditions, it's not as big a loss as it might normally be, much though I mourn the loss of his exhilarating leaps in his retro long-sleeved guernsey

The Cats, however, are always in touch. Of course they are. Their goals somehow seem easier, more methodical, more calmly crafted and less energy-sapping than ours.

But early in the last quarter I murmur the words: 'I think we can do this.' Libba Sister Two nods in silent agreement. We miss some sitters,  but our efforts, our desperation, our focus, are magnificent. They will - surely - be rewarded.

Maybe they would have been rewarded, if it was any other team, any other venue.

Toby McLean puts us in front. The Tragician had earlier been proclaiming his inclusion as a mistake. But as we jump to our feet, I swiftly change my tune; I always knew it would be another selection masterstroke from Bevo Our Saviour!

But... there are three minutes to go. Will we bottle up the play, clog the backline with every Bulldogs player? or will we keep pushing forward, trying to manufacture another goal, strike a final killer blow against these seasoned pros... who've been in this position, and escaped, so many times before?

We have no way of knowing which option to take. Instead, as fans, we enter what I call the fever dream. Only footy fans can understand it: a fugue state, those last few minutes of a match when you're in front and trying to hold on. Reality is both heightened and blurry. Time slows down and accelerates, warps, has no meaning. Mesmerised, hypnotised, barely able to breathe: the actions of those out there on the field are momentarily the very most important on the planet.

In the fever dream, we become inarticulate, unable to even barrack coherently. There's  just snatches of agitated, racing thoughts, made worse by having no full perspective of the ground or the match context: 'Not there..oh...don't kick it...good boy...what...they can't ... they can't, can they??'

And somehow time for anticipatory grief, for all that's at stake.

Gary Rohan has the ball in his hands. He will kick for goal after the siren. In so many homes across Melbourne's west like ours, the last quarter din has fallen silent.

I try and imagine him duffing the kick and it slewing out of bounds on the full. I know it won't happen.

It doesn't happen.

The Libba Sisters scramble for the remote, but not in time to avoid the nauseating celebrations of the Solarium-faced One, not so morose now, rubbing further salt into the wounds of every Bulldogs fan.

We slowly, painfully, emerge from the fever dream.

There are the 'if onlies', of course. Surely a fit Astro-Naut would have clunked a crazy-brave mark in those last dying minutes as we struggled to fend off the insurgents. Our injured players, especially the Bromance Buddies, would have been so vital with their extra run in that last quarter. There were those costly misses; the fact that the Cats still had so much space in their forward line with seconds to go; the decisions players made under white-hot pressure. I can't criticise any one of them, for I can see how much our team tried, how much this loss - an after the siren kick is the absolutely worst way to lose - will sting.

And there's the sinking knowledge of what lies ahead; a trip to Perth, with another hungry, fresh challenger hoping to bring us down. A week in strict quarantine will strain Our Boys' physical and mental wellbeing. And now, 'Big Boys Month', as Damien Hardwick calls the gruelling month of July, is now just around the corner

I leave Libba Sister Two and drive  home. There is roadwork everywhere, and I twice become lost. I swerve to avoid a fox, running stealthily across the grim shadows beneath the Westgate Bridge. In the semi-deserted streets, I pass knots of Bulldogs' fans clustered outside pubs, still dissecting the loss, emerging from their own fever dreams to lament the 'if-onlies'.

Finally at home, I try to understand what went wrong and what it will mean for our 2021 campaign. I see the footage of Joel Selwood, clawing at the face of Dailey Bailey (an 'ear massage' chortle the commentators, who love to maintain the myth of his courage) and in a separate incident, drawing blood as he steps back "accidentally" onto the calf of Taylor Duryea ('and he pokes him in the eye and then stands on his foot,' they titter) acts for which he will only be fined. There's one pithy statement on Twitter that captures my anger, defiance and heartbreak for our club. 'We'll kill these pricks in September.'

​Agh, Geelong. How you do annoy me. Let me count the ways.

Their home ground is so formidable, at one stage we had a 27-year losing streak against them.

They've feasted on us in finals; who among us isn't thankful that Sydney thrashed them in the 2016 preliminary final, and we didn't have to face the sight of those blue-and-white hoops, and endure Billy Brownless 'King of Geelong' flashbacks.

The Cats have always had the knack of dismantling our pretensions. In mid-2008 we headed to Geelong for an eagerly awaited 'top-of-the-table' showdown. The mood was maudlin on the train back to Footscray after a 10-goal drubbing, while Geelong fans around us artlessly discussed how many of their players had shockers, and expressed disappointment: they should have won by more.

'Taxpayer-funded stadium', as I call the Cats' home these days, does have at least one fond memory for me though. It was where a Geelong wit christened myself and my sister 'The Libba Sisters' because of our petite size; a nickname which has now endured and developed a life of its own.

​One day when my children were young, we were visiting friends. Embarrassingly, as we were eating, ants began to march across their dinner table. While we diplomatically ignored it, my youngest son exclaimed: 'Look there's some ants!'

Into the awkward silence he added, with the artlessness of a three-year-old: 'Mummy calls them by their first name. Bloody ants!'

He's travelling through Europe at present, but as I contemplated, with some degree of gloom, our prospects against the Cats this week I realised some things hadn't changed. I definitely call Selwood and Dangerfield by the first name of 'bloody' whenever I think - make that fume - about their irritating skills, their cocksure talents, their endless capacity to run rampant against a team wearing red, white and blue, whatever the venue, whatever the occasion.

As for 'bloody Geelong': they've thrashed us when we were ordinary. They've thrashed us when we were under the illusion - until we came up against the men from Kardinia Park - that we were pretty good.

By some miserable quirk of fate we've played more finals against the Cats - ten -  than any other team. In one year alone, 1992, they demoralised us with two ten-goal finals drubbings. Yes, with the way finals were then set up, we played them twice in the same finals series, losing on each occasion (you've got to admire our consistency) by 60 plus points.

I don't like paying squillions to sit in their taxpayer-funded stadium. I irrationally resent that once they broke their premiership hoodoo, they - unlike us -  went on to create a dynasty. And there's the fact, which surely can't be overlooked, that their coach is a Scott brother.

I don't like bloody Geelong very much at all.

There are no signs that Friday night's game will depart from the hackneyed 'Geelong-handing-out-a hiding' script. We're fielding, yet again, an extremely young team. Our injury woes show no sign of clearing. The Cats are top four contenders, fresh from the bye. Their midfield still glitters with stars. 

It's unclear how Our Boys will respond to last week's loss. Our season is down the drain. I'm worried that the last gasp errors, and Bevo's uncharacteristic fire and brimstone reaction, may have demoralised them, eroding the confidence of a group that are unsettled, have not yet had a chance to gell and work together.

The match falls on my birthday. Many would say there must surely be better things to do on your birthday than sit and watch Our Boys, who've now lost five on the trot, get mauled again by our bogey team. Some would point out that it's likely we will yet again endure a ten-goal loss, that to venture out on the coldest day so far this year, only to see the smug countenances of Bloody Selwood and co, and the 'We are Geelong' music blaring out, is a form of self-inflicted torture.

Such people actually make a lot of sense. Yet still, I know I have to be there.
.
Because - you never know - it's possible, theoretically possible, is all I'm saying - Our Boys might be so inspired,  if news filters through about my attendance - that they could feel so motivated by my commitment, my tenacity, my sheer selfless heroism - that they could play out of their skins and WIN.

(I'm not saying it's likely, by any means. It's just a random thought, to throw out there into the universe).

Our team takes the field, running past some lit torches. I'm not sure if these are an oblique tribute for my birthday or just a way to keep us all warm.

I anxiously scan the Cats' lineup, looking for confirmation that Mackie, Scarlett and Enright have definitely retired; I wouldn't rule out them returning for a one-match frolic against us. I don't see them, but in the backline there is a Harry, and a dazzling newcomer called Narkle. And initially, I think there's even a Kardashian; disappointingly, it turns out it's Kolodjashnij. And Gary 'Voldemort' Ablett - a footballer I've never warmed to - is out there too, part of their so-called Holy Trinity. Their midfield cupboard is overflowing; ours, wrecked by injury, is threadbare.

Lin Jong is a late change into the team...so late that he had to borrow Shane Biggs' jumper, though I guess it could be part of a cunning strategy to bamboozle the opposition. The game hasn't been going long before he is dumped in a brutal tackle. We see almost immediately that Lin's shoulder - the one that probably cost him the chance to be a premiership Bulldog - has been injured. Our team's appalling bad luck continues. But for Lin himself - well, it is devastation beyond imagining.

Our Boys make a terrific start. I can't believe the transformation that's come on over the past couple of weeks. We're playing free-flowing footy, but we're just as good in locking down the contest. We've finally rid ourselves of the slow ball movement, the plodding entries into a stagnant forward line. We even kick straight. At last the painfully inexperienced group are developing a chemistry; it's reassuring to glance into the backline and see the sizeable figure of Marcus Adams in our defence, alongside the ever-reliable Dale Morris. Geelong still seem able to score more easily. But at least, if we lose this match, it won't be from the lack of effort.

At half time, we are one goal up, and my questions about whether the team will be scarred, or motivated, by last week's loss, have been answered. Our Boys form a close huddle in the middle before they leave the arena. Addressing them in animated style is the guy whose mistake in last week's loss has been endlessly analysed, the guy some say will not be at our club next year. His team-mates seem to be hanging on Mitch Wallis's every word. (I can't be sure, of course, but it's quite possible there was some mention of my birthday, just to provide the troops with that extra sense of urgency).

The team trots off, a united, determined group with a galaxy of stories. Three teenagers; ten others including our captain Bont who aren't yet 23. A bloke who couldn't get a game for Carlton. Rookies who've toiled away, wondering if they'd ever get this chance; highly rated draft picks who've been criticised and derided for not immediately delivering on inflated expectations. A heroic veteran, the only 'survivor' from the last time we beat the Cats, way back in 2009.

And inside the rooms is a luckless footballer who can't return to the field, who's broken his collarbone for the second time, who lost all of season 2017 after he ruptured his ACL, who's only been able to patch together 58 games in the seven years he's been at our club. Who's now facing more time on the sidelines, and an uncertain future after that.

The motley group have absorbed whatever Wally exhorted them to do; they come out breathing fire in the third quarter. There's a storm of goals, even some electrifying 2016-style footy where the ball gets swept down the ground, players overlapping, men sprinting hard to make an option for their team-mate. It's hard to believe Geelong will be able to withstand our intensity. But, of course, being Geelong, they do. In fact, it's depressing, how it is so easy for them to strike back. The treetrunk legs of Patrick Dangerfield aren't troubled by the prospect of a kick outside 50, after the three-quarter time siren. He inevitably converts. The Cats, older, stronger, more experienced than the Saltwater Lads, are two points ahead with one quarter to play. Maybe we've fired our best shot.

The Cats are fresh from the bye; we'd given everything, and then some, in our match against North. We have been down a rotation since early in the match. A valiant loss tonight will still draw praise, still bring optimism at the future ahead. But that's too far away for Our Boys' thinking; in fact, they aren't thinking that at all.

The way the goals come in the last quarter is in itself a portrait of the new energy centres in our team. There are two exquisite, opportunistic goals from Little Red. There is a 'Jake Who?' scissor kick goal from the guy who polarised our fans earlier in the year like no other since Nathan Eagleton: that Carlton reject, Billy Gowers. He's rewarding the coaches' faith. He's earning our respect, even our love, converting us  with his bristling energy, his enthusiasm, his care for his team-mates, his increasing footy smarts.

We have a ten-point lead, but in the stands, our nerves are jangling. It's impossible not to have flashbacks to last week's disaster. The boys look more composed in their approach, but still as the clock runs down under two minutes, so much - and not just the sight of a scowling and petulant Scott twin in the coaching box - is identical to what transpired against North.

The tension could have blasted off the Etihad roof.

'They'd need to score two goals within 48 seconds,' the Other Libba Sister says. She means it to be consoling, but almost instantly, the light glints off 'Voldemort's' bald pate as he speeds through from absolutely nowhere for a goal.

The arena seems to ripple with our simultaneous emotions, as the ball is bounced with 30 seconds to go and us clinging to our lead.

Get it out of the centre boys. PLEASE just get it out of the centre boys!

There's a free - you knew there would be - to Selwood. There's a scrambled kick into their forward line. Everything unfolds in slow motion. Despite half our team being in the backline Harry Taylor cleanly marks the ball.

The words that spill from my mouth are not: 'Bloody hell.'

Years of Tragician agony mean I am in no doubt that he will go back and steer the ball nonchalantly through the big sticks, and heartbreak will be ours for the second week in a row. I was there - of course I was -  for the hideous moment in a 1994 final when Billy Brownless kicked a goal after the siren to snatch a win; I've long been haunted by Sandy Roberts' famous shriek: 'Billy you are KING of Geelong!!!'

It's like a punch in the stomach, knowing that ignominious scenario is about to be repeated. There's despair, the worst kind of despair, as the siren sounds and we know Harry's kick will decide the match. My niece is crying. We are all, instantly, bereft, grieving in anticipation, knowing the embarrassment, the recriminations, the agonising post-mortem to come. 

But a wall of Bulldogs has materialised behind the mark where Roarke Smith, in just his seventh game, is standing. They begin jumping around like marionettes. Thirty-five-year-old Dale Morris, 19-year-old lifelong Bulldogs fan Patrick Lipinski, our captain Bont, first-gamer Bradley Lynch. Tom Boyd, who has carried the ruck on his giant shoulders and played a massive game, isn't too tired or too cool to wave his arms around like a maniac. Someone is surely yelling: 'Chewy on your boot!' They're creating, with their enormous energy, their big hearts, a mysterious barrier that Harry T can't breach. The ball wobbles, veers lamely to the left. It's as though Bob Murphy is standing in the crowd operating a remote control device to steer it out of harm.

Can you believe it? Harry Taylor fails to make the distance!!

Our celebrations, in the stands, mirror our team's. We leap around, we hug, we are joyful, alongside them in their delight as we suffered with them last week in their dejection. We see Lin Jong come out, in his tracksuit, his broken wing tucked inside, a determined smile on his face; Brad Lynch, hearing what his latest injury is, plants a kiss on his cheek. Our Boys look as though they are just as dazzled, as surprised, as us...that we have vanquished Geelong at last.

We stay, everyone of us, until they go into the rooms. Then we wait.

We want to watch them sing our song.

Dale Morris, smiling like a kid, is interviewed. His desperate efforts on the last line had saved a goal, for the zillionth time in his career, during the frenetic last minutes. He says he doesn't have 'the ticker' for this sort of stuff any more. I never would have picked Dale Morris for a bare-faced liar.

As we file out, exhausted, elated, hoarse, and proud, our mood could not be more different than last week's devastation. To many, the blame for that loss lay squarely with one man, Mitch Wallis, who had kicked out on the full amid the chaos of that final minute.

Some argued that there were hundreds of other mistakes throughout the course of a match, and why should Mitch's error alone be singled out?

Others made a counter argument: that not all actions are the same throughout a game; an error in the first quarter can't be seen as equal to one in the most high-stakes moments of the match. A mistake, in the final moments, is so much worse, that line of thinking goes: because it reveals a crack under pressure, an inability to make the right decision when everything is on the line.

When Harry Taylor marked the ball, many hundreds of actions had already taken place over the previous 120 minutes and during four bruising quarters. Countless decisions were made; to centre a ball, to kick long, to handpass instead of kick, to shepherd, to take an opponent on. To punch or try to out-mark; to leave an opponent and run at one racing towards goal; to lead out in the forward line or wait for it to be crumbed. To run, even if you feel you cannot.

Coaches scanned the list, worked their whiteboards, made rotations, evaluated how the tide of play was flowing, decided who to clamp down on, who to back in for a centre square bounce or kick out. 

The umpires blew their whistles, or called play on; video technicians made examinations, scrutinising the tiniest of millimetres to adjudicate a score.

The medical staff decided that Matt Suckling wasn't right to play, and pulled out a number 24 jumper for Lin Jong; he could have been watching the match safely from the grandstand, instead of his shoulder hitting the deck at the most vulnerable point when he was tackled.

Little Red's kick in the final quarter was a point until it mysteriously (the Bob Murphy theory's gaining traction) did a U-turn and became a goal.

So many actions, decisions, deflections, and yet this much was still true: Harry Taylor's kick was the only one that would really count, the only one that would determine whether we knew the pleasure or felt the pain.

I think about all these things as I make a cup of cocoa at home, finishing off my birthday in quite a genteel fashion for one who'd been screeching like a banshee for three hours solid.

Footy, I think. You've got to admit, it really is bloody fantastic.

You know the drill.

The Libba Sisters were, of course, on the couch. In the Rising Sun apartments, across the road from the Whitten oval. Just as we were for the loss to West Coast. And the loss to the despised Acronyms.

Those lucky spots on the couch – it's fair to say they're not proving all that lucky in 2017.

We were feeling nervous and apprehensive, even though the Tragician had boldly declared after the premiership victory, that the battle between hope and dread, optimism and fear - the hallmark of Bulldogs supporting experience -  had been decisively, conclusively, won.

That Tragician. She sure can speak a lot of drivel.

All week I’d cringed at every mention of Ye Olde Kardinia Park Hoodoo. Grimaced at the parade of gloomy statistics about just how long it’s been since we beat our bogey team. Broken out in clammy sweats with each new article highlighting Geelong’s dismal tackling, the fact that they'd never lost more than three games in a row since 2006, the spotlight that was being shone upon Joel Selwood and Patrick Dangerfield.

I was nervous and apprehensive that in a year where we’ve struggled to get our best players out on the field, we’d made so many changes.

Nervous and apprehensive that ten of our premiership players are missing – and most worryingly, some of them were omitted for reasons of form, not forced on us by injury.

Nervous and apprehensive that the media, by harping constantly on Geelong’s so-called lack of fire and physicality, were providing motivation and ammunition for a team that have never exactly needed it against us.

Mainly ... I was just nervous and apprehensive.

I was succumbing to that old style, defeatist, loser mentality, not befitting of the 2016 premiers.

That's why I double-checked the Geelong team-sheet, just to reassure myself that those tormentors of so many matches past: Corey Enright, Jimmy Bartel, Billy Brownless, Gary Ablett (Senior, let alone Junior) – even Peter Riccardi (I once saw him winking, I repeat winking, to some mates in the crowd as he and his fellow Cats were demolishing us with ridiculous ease. And I still bear a grudge) – were not surprise selections.

Once that was established, our match-day experience went something like this:

Quarter time

Libba One: Our Boys are switched on. That's the best start we've had in ages. We've even kicked straight.

We’ve really locked down well on Corey Enright too. He’s been completely unsighted! 

Libba Two: The Cats have thrown a whole lot of things at us, but we’ve withstood the challenge.

Sure, Joel Selwood and Patrick Dangerfield have been getting it a bit. They’ll probably get tired for the rest of the match.

Half time

Libba One: That was unbelievable. Unbelievably bad.

We didn’t even touch the footy. There’s no way we can come back from this.

Didn’t Geelong thrash us by 10 goals around this time last year? I can feel it in my bones – we’re in for a repeat.

Libba Two: Pass the chocolate.

Three quarter time

Libba One: I knew we'd come back! What a team! What self-belief! You can never write these boys off! We're the premiers, remember!

Libba Two: (massive eye-roll).

Final siren

Libba one: I’m really REALLY sick of being beaten by Geelong. Bloody Selwood.

Libba two: I’m really REALLY sick of being beaten by Geelong. Bloody Dangerfield.

There were questionable umpiring decisions of course, but I’ve never been one to harbor grudges for years and years, or go childishly on, and on, and on, about them. That sort of person might point out that Bob Murphy’s “holding the ball” when he actually KICKED the thing, was just exactly like a spectacularly awful decision in the ’09 preliminary, against Ryan Hargrave, if I recall rightly. (Nobody is fooled - I recall it with crystal clarity). But hypothetically, IF I were one to harp about the umpiring and never let go of these horrendous injustices, even after we've won a flag, that’s the sort of thing I’d be banging on about.

Friday night was the first time I’ve seen Bevo (Our Saviour) looking genuinely dejected after a loss. And there was something in Our Boys’ reaction that made me uneasy. Bewilderment, annoyance at what’s going wrong. A weariness, that week after week, hungry challengers are fired up to the max, ready to knock us off our pedestal; and even when one is despatched, another lurks in the wings.

I don't think we're complacent. But there's a little edge that's been lost. The hunger isn't as acute. It's not sustained over entire matches, by all players, in every quarter, every week.

The last two years have been a journey, an exploration of how good we can be. Losses just pointed to where we needed to improve. Now there's frustration, even boredom, at having to absorb – again! - the painful lesson, that footy is hard, that success is precious but oh so rare. That to win another premiership, the mountain has to be climbed all over again; you don’t get to start half way up.This rather obvious fact hadn’t somehow percolated into my consciousness. I’m not quite sure why. I guess I haven't had much experience in this whole Post Premiership mindset.

But my thoughts, spinning around in the wake of the dispiriting loss, make me unaccountably tired.

I think about The Bont, brutally crunched several times during the match, getting up just a little more slowly and gingerly each time. It was a rarity, a game where our star had little impact. Next week and the week after, he will have to do it all over again. His name is the one circled on each opponents’ whiteboard. His body is the one that each opposition player hopes to slam into the turf at every opportunity. His influence is the one that every other team is most desperate to curb.

I think about Murph, the oldest man on the field, trying to create a last-minute spark by setting off on a dash into the forward line, hearing the thundering footsteps of Tom Hawkins behind him, feeling the indignity of the Cats' fans triumphant roar. Moments like that -  they weren't quite what motivated him as he embarked on the grind of rehabilitation, the slow journey back to fitness and confidence.

I think about Libba (the Second) and Toby McLean and Fletcher Roberts and Shane Biggs and Zaine Cordy, trundling around at Footscray in front of a couple of thousand people for a pedestrian VFL encounter, wondering where the magic has gone. Wondering if they still have the fire. Remembering what it took. Unsure, right at the moment, whether they can pay that price again.

I think about ‘Matthew’ Keith Boyd. His preparation has been limited, his form not reaching the heights of last year’s All-Australian performances. The internet has begun to buzz as armchair critics circle, agreeing that he’s played one year too long. He’s ‘slowed up’. He’s making errors. Our valiant former skipper, the man whose tiny toe-poke to JJ in the preliminary final was just as vital, just as magnificent, as the chain of play to which it led, is already being ruthlessly written off, by our own fans no less. It’s a heartbreak to me whenever this speculation begins, accompanied by those inevitable words: ‘He’s been a great servant of the club. But...’

I think about those words, too. Of all the meanings and implications. It's a strange concept. 'A servant’ of a club.

I think about Mitch Wallis. The boy destined to succeed, with his distinguished footy pedigree, his leadership qualities, the boy who requested, demanded, the famous number three jumper, who was an important part of our 2015-16 rise. The boy who broke his leg horrendously last August, who had to sit in the MCG grandstand watching his team-mates living out his dream. 

Mitch was our best player in his comeback match on Friday night. He was at the bottom of packs. He didn’t shy away from the bruises, the physicality, the slippery turf, the parochial crowd, the never-ending relentless of getting to one contest...and then the next.

For his team-mates, the road ahead over the next three months probably feels right now as though it's strewn with boulders. It might be hard to remember the scent of warm summer grass, the thrill of finals footy; the obstacles might be looming larger than the destination. Mitch won't be seeing those hindrances; the rewards, after what he's been through, must seem close enough to touch.