By Seven Hours Behind

People are creatures of habit and custom and as everyone from Esperance to Katherine is all too aware, these are unprecedented times for one of WA's teams.  The publicans of the state's many alehouses have heard one long composite conversation over the last fifteen years about poor draft choices, ill-considered trades, games that should have been won and the begrudging acceptance of Fremantle's place with mediocrity.  Since 1995, flashes of brilliance have been tempered with moderate quality. These however are not times for such fruitless reflection.  It is worth instead to recall where the exceptions have been and what lessons exist for the 2010 vintage.    

While the top-four finish of 2006 was certainly grand and exciting, it was unexpected and the result of a nine match winning streak late in the season which must have surprised even the players.  Certainly few of us saw it coming.  I recall sitting in a sunny but windswept AAMI Stadium for the Qualifying Final against Adelaide with several hundred Dockers supporters, all with dramatic air, rail or even road travel stories.  We had big ambition but were simply excited the story wasn't done for another year.  A scoreless final quarter and a defeat to a Crows team that never really hit their stride was evidence we weren't even sure if we belonged at the business end ourselves.  This was followed by an enthralling but expected first finals win against Melbourne which confirmed we would not suffer straight sets ignominy. Pleasing, but again we had drawn competition by no means superior to us.  

Then there was our own Olympic Stadium moment: Pavlich and Bell leading the boys out one of those long dark tunnels to surely one of the largest and eeriest stadiums in world sport (especially when it's half-empty).  I sat high up in the stands and sang my heart out, but the 40 minute train ride back to central Sydney was a long and lonely one.  Once again, we didn't play our best but our opposition knew how to do enough on such a stage and were too hungry to go back to the big dance. But for a great Ryan O'Keefe performance and a free kick or mark in the third quarter not awarded and it could been so different.  So it goes.  

But the worst was still to come.  Anyone will tell you preliminary finals are fools gold and rarely (in the current finals system at least) suggest a Grand Final appearance the following season.  For every close loss or tough day at the office the year after, the players must surely think back to the third week in September and wonder what might have been. That in a nutshell, was 2007. The famous 'top-up', the 'premiership window' and the experience-heavy list which turned out to be just one year older.  While a better coach than I could ever try to be and someone who was always nice in person, the writing was on the wall for 'CC' when things went backwards so quickly.  

Yet amidst the analyses and debate, one modest voice with a considered opinion - Dennis Cometti - issued the warning for anyone willing to hear: the list was inflexible.  What made his view so credible was not that he knew the WA teams so well, but that he sees so many of the rest up close with his television commitments and knows what the ever-changing benchmark always is.  Where was a positional surprise or rotation going to come from? Who played a handful of roles? What happened when Pavlich, Farmer, McPharlin or Longmuir didn't kick the score we needed?  

I had a private theory for the majority of the 2000's that Fremantle didn't play well without Heath Black.  While never a standout player, his direction from half-back and his ability to kick short, hook his raking kick to either wing or go over the midfield 'squeeze' and straight to a leading forward 60m from goal meant our attack was unpredictable when rebounding from half-back.  A good plan, but that was our one shred of variety.  Remember, these were days when Hayden, Michael Johnson and Mundy had their places in defence; they had neither the 'swingman' ability to go to a forward pocket nor the Darren Milburn/Tom Harley/Matthew Scarlett telepathy that comes with playing together for over 100+ games and knowing how to use space, provide cover and force your opponents to make difficult decisions like following you up the ground out of position or letting you run free and collect possessions.  The seasoned campaigners saw the flaws in the list but we persevered to that group's ultimate demise. 

How quickly things can change: delist a few experienced players; have a handful of tough retirement conversations with valued 'club-men'; send the ones you're unsure about back to the WAFL to prove themselves; and bring in new faces hungry for their one shot, as Eminem would say.  And with change has come that very flexibility we lacked.  It is hard to match an opponent up when you've seen little of him.  Someone in the Thursday match committee for opposing teams might have talked up Broughton or Suban from their 2009 showings. So be it, their head coach would say. Hill was a given, but they would argue his engine wasn't developed and he could be bodied off the ball with taggers.  Increasingly they are being proven wrong.  Within a summer, that conversation suddenly had to include Barlow, Morabito, Fyfe, Silvagni, Roberton and a host of other names. Even we needed to check the AFL records on game day for correct spelling. 

Unlike 2006, I submit this (potential) top four finish is something to get genuinely excited about; it has been a sustained season of effort beating teams easily our equal on days when not everything went our way. Sydney (away). Carlton (away). Brisbane (away).  These were locks for the opposition in past seasons; games you thought twice about putting yourself through.  Make no mistake, this is a flexible team.  Taking journeymen in their early twenties from the VFL and WAFL ensures players have seen most game situations before, and played in different positions to see them.   

Chickens of course cannot be counted and some tough fixtures await - not least the Western Bulldogs in Melbourne and Hawthorn in Launceston - but the average age bracket and the potential for the group to come through together make this a different core, one that would be well served by one home and one away final experience, regardless of their order or result.   A showing of two finals is all I think a supporter can reasonably ask for at this time. After all, lists with far greater expectations at their stage of development - think Carlton, Hawthorn - would happily take that as it stands.  Also, the Western Bulldogs might come through the home stretch hard. 

The question of how such a young group will handle finals pressure against teams of greater pedigree is a worthwhile question for a contribution closer to September, but what are the lessons from previous campaigns regarding now to Round 22? Certainly the team must avoid a "Round 19: Collingwood" episode, circa 2004. This was the much-hyped Friday night game at Subiaco where a promising 11-7 season ground to a halt because a hungrier and more enterprising Magpies team demanded the points.  One game sucked the confidence out of the group, starting a chain reaction for a bitterly disappointing 11-11 finish and no finals appearance. Did Richmond accomplish this on the weekend?  I doubt it very much.  But there is nothing to say dangerous fixtures don't lie ahead. 

The other danger - of which I have seen Harvey give no indication of to now - is for the players to accept that exceeding expectations is enough.  If ever a Dockers supporter is guilty of misplaced love, it is patting the players on the back when they've achieved more than we thought they would.  There is no more glaring example of this than the standing ovation after the 2003 elimination final loss to Essendon.  Like many, I stood and applauded, happy we'd finally played a final and still excited from the hype of the all-night ticket queues at Challenge Stadium during the week or the feeling that better results were around the corner.  They weren't.  With a longer lens we should remember success is all that matters - at least that's how it works for the other 15 clubs in the competition.  Then we cheered but now we cringe at our unwitting acceptance of the very mediocrity that perhaps held the team back.  Harvey wants to win a premiership and - with an injury on 1993 Grand Final Day that meant he shouldn't have played - knows what it takes.  A little after the halfway point is a dangerous time to get too excited: I hope the players listen to their coach in the run home and not the supporter who stops them in the street.