Collingwood v North Melbourne
Saturday April 19, 1.40pmMCG Fox Footy 1.30pm Weather: Min 11 Max 17 Chance of rain 60%: < 1mm Wind: SW 17kph Betting: Collingwood 1.84 North Melbourne 2.00 |
On consecutive Friday nights came performances that demanded scepticism and courted far worse.
For the savage external reaction, the scope of the failures had the capacity to undermine the best-laid internal plans.
The Magpies displayed no increased willingness to work defensively and came apart when subjected to authentic pressure.
The Kangaroos played as if tricked and had neither the nous nor the leadership to alter a wretched circumstance.
Active on exposed fault lines both teams could have been defined by such malfunctions.
Credit to Nathan Buckley and Brad Scott those have been retrieved, usurped as reference points and made to look aberrations.
While the coaches share common attributes their teams appear destined for a similar quadrant of the ladder and on a trajectory to challenge in the couple of years beyond.
Saturday’s meeting at the MCG is more than a check-up to establish comparative levels; it might well be a forerunner to critical engagements in the not too distant future.
There’s a sureness about Collingwood that belies the conversation anchored too much in the past.
Part of that direction owes to a late-season defeat at the hands of the Kangaroos in 2012.
It was a night on which the Magpies were run off their legs. More exposing was the lack of defensive running that became a theme of the subsequent 12 months.
Buckley has long since faced the realities and enacted his plan. He has made his choices and assembled his team. The pillars of the next Magpie team to make a run at success have been enlisted and committed in the steady stream of recently signed contracts.
Much of the proven core at Collingwood is relatively young. On field it is Scott Pendlebury’s to shape and drive. Dayne Beams and Steele Sidebottom will be his cohorts.
The key posts in Nathan Brown, Lachie Keeffe, Ben Reid and Travis Cloke are present and correct.
Purpose recruiting has netted Clinton Young and a long-term lock in Taylor Adams.
But above all Collingwood has trusted the draft, amassing five top-20 picks across two years.
Brodie Grundy has already declared himself the ruckman of the future. Ben Kennedy has given a glimpse. Tim Broomhead, Matt Scharenberg and Nathan Freeman are the untried yearlings in the paddock.
Buckley is in the period of cultivation that requires care, persistence and patience.
But he isn’t one to manage expectations. The outside perceptions — as either demand or limitation — have no place in his mantra.
While he might have his team pegged as top six rather than top four, he’s unapologetic in his demand that they strive for the ultimate now.
Be it resolute or stubborn, on this measure he has an equal in Brad Scott. The North Melbourne coach is unerring in the course he charted at the commencement of his tenure.
In the early days Collingwood handed his Kangaroos some fearful hidings to emphasise how arduous the climb would be. Scott was 0-3 against the Magpies. Now the scoreline is 2-4.
The advancement, widely predicted and insisted, is now verified. That dire Round 1 loss to Essendon on the back of a lacklustre pre-season must have been unnerving.
But in three weeks North has won against type and then beaten vaunted rivals at their own games. Storming home over Port Adelaide was meritorious. Out-muscling Sydney was momentous.
Much of North’s fate rests with the ability of the mid-range players to step forward. Ben Cunnington has become the poster boy for the cause, but he isn’t alone.
These days will have been a potent source of reassurance within the Arden St walls.
Given the age of Brent Harvey and Drew Petrie and the addition of Nick Dal Santo there’s an urgency to the rise that might run ahead of plotting.
For the stage and the foe this is just the sort of afternoon to further its claim.
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