Warning: Football Can Make You Drowsy (Round Thirteen – Ling For The Brownlow!)

The Saints would have loved to have one of these guys out there last night. The other one…hmmm, not so much.

Well, that was three hours of your life that you will never get back! And you know that a Friday night game is as boring as all get-out when sub-editors try to get away with writing dumb-ass headlines, purely for their own amusement. The guys at The Age went with “St Kilda killing off Fremantle’s finals hopes”…um, Freo have won two games all year. TWO GAMES! Gee, I wonder if Sydney will kill off Melbourne’s finals hopes tomorrow…

Even the people at the Herald Sun must have dozed off during the night after confusing St Kilda veteran Robert Harvey with Dockers coach Mark Harvey, which you can see in the image below. Well, Robert must be at least 15 years older than Mark so you can’t really blame them…easy mistake to make!

At least the Saints showed a fair bit of spirit after a string of lifeless efforts and Nick Riewoldt’s fine game kept the St Kilda faithful entertained while a burst of three goals in the second quarter from Matthew Pavlich was a rare highlight for Fremantle. After that…zzzzzzzzzzzz…

Typically, the Dockers went in as favourites after a win and totally stunk out the joint – they may as well just call themselves the Freo Pavlich from now on. No wonder Robert Mark Harvey is frustrated!

Won’t stand next to his opponent, won’t sit next to anyone in the stands! Even when he’s not playing, Nick Dal Santo is still unaccountable…

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Hopefully, last night’s match was so damn boring that the umpires did not feel compelled to award Brownlow votes…assisting our push for a shock medal winner during Ling For The Brownlow round! Let’s see which other players need to be stopped today in order to get the Geelong Gingernut over the line…

SATURDAY AFTERNOON

Luke Hodge: GUILTY of attempting to strike…during a VFL appearance for Box Hill a few years ago. Look at that flying fist! That cannot go unpunished…REPRIMAND – OUT OF BROWNLOW CONTENTION.

MCG, Melbourne - 2:10pm (local): Hawthorn v North Melbourne (TEN)

• We can expect a fiery clash because these two teams don’t seem to like each other very much…and it has been that way for a long time!
• Josh Gibson has the unenviable task of trying to stop Buddy Franklin from doing whatever the hell he wants…and Michael Firrito is so happy he could cry!
• We find it interesting that Buddy and Sam Mitchell are seen as earning respect for giving up a shot at the Brownlow by accepting reprimands for their reports. They wouldn’t have got off anyway so why risk a suspension?
• David Hale has faith in his Kangaroos…well, they better have faith in him because he has a lot more ruck work to do now!
• Injury plagued forward Nathan Thompson is a certain starter for the Roos…but we can’t promise that he will be a certain finisher…

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Matthew Richardson: GUILTY of breaching AFL merchandising trademarks by wearing unlicensed football products from Dimmeys. REPRIMAND – OUT OF BROWNLOW CONTENTION.

AAMI Stadium, Adelaide - 2:40pm (local): Port Adelaide v Richmond (FOX)

• Port Adelaide have failed to recapture the form that took them to last year’s grand final and their biggest supporter and local journo doesn’t seem to be taking it too well…
• So what the heck has gone wrong? Apparently, it’s all mental. Gee, a Mark Williams coached team with mental problems…what are the odds?
• How to stop Richo…that’s the problem facing the Power this week. But will two players be enough?
• Terry Wallace is still banging on about the crappy draw…even his former team mate and rival coach reckons he should quit whining!
• The rebuilding phase at Tigerland finally appears to be moving forward…though how many times has that been said since the early 80’s?

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SATURDAY NIGHT

Gary Ablett: GUILTY of charging David Wirrpanda…sure, it’s from an incident two seasons ago (when he had hair) but better late than never! REPRIMAND – OUT OF BROWNLOW CONTENTION.

Subiaco, Perth – 5:40pm (local): West Coast v Geelong (TEN)

• Apparently Western Australia is almost out of gas…could we see a repeat of the Essendon-St Kilda match in 1996 when the lights went out?
• John Worsfold tried to fool everybody into thinking that his missing premiership players would be automatic selections but what do you know…they are all straight back in!
• Which surely means that they are not tanking, right? Well, let’s see if all their best players are able to play when they face a weaker opponent…
• The Eagles seem to believe they have plenty of options to stop Gary Ablett…but the big question is – are any of them legal?
• Speaking of Ablett, the two Garys will probably become the greatest father-son pairing in the history of the game by the time little Gary gives it away.

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Jonathan Brown: GUILTY of striking…well, he was thinking about it after this incident…and we feel that intent is an admission of guilt! REPRIMAND – OUT OF BROWNLOW CONTENTION.

GABBA, Brisbane – 7:10pm (local): Brisbane v Adelaide (FOX)

• The Lions have performed well at home so far this season but not all is well with the Gabba surface. Perhaps they need to recruit Andrew Symonds to start in the centre…
• Jono Brown escapes a fine for his pre-match review comments on the Buddy Franklin report…but he was never in any danger of being fined anyway. So thanks for running with the non-story for three whole days. It was fascinating.
• Nigel Lappin knows what he wants for his 32nd birthday…but seeming as though it is unlikely he will be the meat in a Scarlett Johansson-Penelope Cruz sandwich, he might have to settle for a Lions win.
• Adelaide have set their sights on scoring big at the Gabba tonight…which should work a treat provided they can stop Jono Brown from scoring bigger!
• And that responsibility will fall to Nathan Bock, who is looking forward to taking on another big name. Well, that’s what he is telling us…