Welcome to Balls of Steel’s AFL Beat!

Let’s see what happened this week.

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AFL 2021 Season Week 16 Recaps

Gold Coast Suns 77 – 67 RIchmond Tigers

If no one saw last week’s loss to St. Kilda coming, then absolutely no one to the infinite power saw the Suns handing the Tigers their second loss in a row.

Here are the highlights:

Geelong Cats 98 – 57 Essendon Bombers

The Bombers started well but the Cats took over in the second quarter and never looked back. It was a good bounce back from last week’s loss.

Here are the highlights:

Melbourne Demons 55 – 64 GWS Giants

The Giants came up HUGE when they needed to and have now taken away RIchmond’s spot in the Eight. They need to keep it up if they are to make anything of this season.

Here are the highlights:

Adelaide Crows 59 – 111 Brisbane Lions

The Lions are on a roll and look to be aiming to take a Top Two spot away from either Melbourne or Western. Meanwhile, the Crows are back to not being very good.

Here are the highlights:

Fremantle Dockers 64 – 80 Carlton Blues

The Dockers AGAIN blew a golden opportunity to get into the Eight. This time they lost to a Carlton team they had no business losing to.

Here are the highlights:

Hawthorn Hawks 53 – 87 Port Adelaide Power

The Power handled their business like they should and are still in the middle of the battle for the Top Four spots. They have a HUGE game next week against the Demons.

Here are the highlights:

Sydney Swans 118 – 26 West Coast Eagles

This was both a destruction and a thing of beauty to watch. Sydney played the Cats’ home ground to perfection and the Eagles have now lost two games in Geelong by over 90 points this season.

Here are the highlights:

Collingwood Magpies 61 – 70 St. Kilda Saints

The change of coach hasn’t helped the Pies any while Litre’s Saints are rallied as Litre predicted and are now in 11th place, only 1 place away from where Litre predicted.

Here are the highlights:

Western Bulldogs 108 – 79 North Melbourne Kangaroos

I honestly thought the margin would have been a lot bigger but I guess the Roos played pretty well. The Doggies are now the league leaders!

Here are the highlights:

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2021 Ladder

Here is how the teams stand after Round 16:

P	TEAM	W	L	T	PTS	%
1	Western Bulldogs	12	3	0	48	147.6
2	Melbourne Demons	12	3	0	48	128.5
3	Brisbane Lions	11	4	0	44	134.7
4	Port Adelaide Power	11	4	0	44	124.4
5	Geelong Cats	11	4	0	44	123.4
6	Sydney Swans	9	6	0	36	114.5
7	West Coast Eagles	8	7	0	32	95.3
8	GWS Giants	7	7	1	30	97.1
9	Richmond Tigers	7	8	0	28	100.6
10	Fremantle Dockers	7	8	0	28	92.2
11	St. Kilda Saints	7	8	0	28	83.7
12	Essendon Bombers	6	9	0	24	98.7
13	Carlton Blues	6	9	0	24	93.0
14	Gold Coast Suns	5	10	0	20	88.0
15	Adelaide Crows	5	10	0	20	84.2
16	Collingwood Magpies	4	11	0	16	89.5
17	Hawthorn Hawks	4	11	0	16	80.7
18	North Melbourne Kangaroos	2	12	1	10	64.3

Here is the Balls Graph (TM) as of Week 16:

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Footy Tipping Contest

Here is where we stand after Round 16:

P	TIPPER	Round Tips	Round Margin	Total Tips	Total Margin
1	Litre_cola	6	36	93	467
2	SonOfSpam	7	30	91	416
3	Doktor Zymm	4	35	91	467
4	Mr. Ayo	6	10	89	402
5	BFC	5	36	89	517
6	BALLS	6	36	88	465
7	Dolph Ucker	6	33	87	445
8		5	10	86	420
9	BC Dick	5	35	86	462
10	WhyEaglesWhy	6	33	83	429
11	Game Time Decision	6	24	82	413
12	bk109	5	10	74	406
13	Reverend Mayhem	5	10	63	414
14	Maestro	5	10	60	444
15	Yeah Right	5	10	60	456

Litre has pulled away to take sole possession of first place while Dok has dropped all the way to third behind Spammy! There was a LOT of movement all over the table as the jostling for positions is getting intense.

Good job to SonOfSpam for getting top score this week!

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Balls Sechs

• Australian media is all over the Richmond Tigers saying that their reign is over. I think that’s premature. They will most likely make the Eight and may yet make some noise in Finals.
• COVID restrictions strike again as the venues for two games this week are still unknown. Also, the West Coast-North Melbourne game was moved to Monday as restrictions are scheduled to be eased there on Monday morning and that would allow a full capacity crowd. Greed is universal, kids.
• The three-way battle for the final two places is still super tight with only percentages separating the three teams.
• It seems no one wants the eight spot. Everyone has had a chance to take it away from Richmond and only this week did someone step up and take it. I have a feeling the battle for the eighth spot will come down to the final week.
• While everyone is also counting out the West Coast Eagles, let’s remember they play the Roos at home this week. They’re not out of the Eight quite yet.
• The Match of The Round next week is probably the Port Adelaide-Melbourne game although I think the more interesting game will be Western-Sydney. If the Swans could pull off the upset, that would shake everything up and make them legitimate contenders.

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Round Seventeen Schedule

Here is the Round 17 schedule (all times Pacific):

Thursday, July 8, 2021

2:40 AM – Port Adelaide Power v Melbourne Demons at Adelaide Oval

Friday, July 9, 2021

2:50 AM – Essendon Bombers v Adelaide Crows at Marvel Stadium

8:45 PM – Hawthorn Hawks v Fremantle Dockers at University of Tasmania Stadium

11:35 PM – Carlton Blues v Geelong Cats at the MCG

Saturday, July 10, 2021

2:25 AM – Brisbane Lions v St. Kilda Saints at TBD

8:10 PM – GWS Giants v Gold Coast Suns at Mars Stadium

10:20 PM – Western Bulldogs v Sydney Swans at Marvel Stadium

11:10 PM – Richmond Tigers v Collingwood Magpies at the MCG

Monday, July 12, 2021

2:40 AM – West Coast Eagles v North Melbourne Kangaroos at Optus Stadium

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That’s all for this week. See you next week!