This week,

Welcome to Balls of Steel’s AFL Beat!

Round 14 Recaps and Highlights

Finally, the byes are over! This is the last week of only having 6 games on the schedule.

The first game was, again, for some weird reason, held on Australian Thursday night, which means Thursday morning here in North America.

The Essendon Bombers traveled to Perth to take on the West Coast Eagles and pretty much everyone knew how this would turn out. The only question was what the final margin would be.

To be fair, the Bombers did start the game well and were slightly ahead a Quarter Time. Unfortunately, the Eagles woke up and dominated the rest of the game, as expected.

Here are the full game highlights:

The Australian Friday Night game (North American Friday morning) had the Sydney Swans hosting the Hawthorn Hawks at the SCG. The Hawks were playing on Australian Friday Night for the second straight week.

The venue was different, but the result was the same for the Hawks: A road loss. Sydney led throughout and are now poised to make a run at a finals position.

Here are the full-game highlights:

Later on proper Friday Night, the Melbourne Demons hosted the Fremantle Dockers at the MCG and turned in the surprise of the round. Despite the Dockers leading for most of the game, the Demons scored the last three goals of the game to take the four points.

Here are the full-game highlights:

Even later on Friday night, the St. Kilda Saints welcomed the Brisbane Lions to Melbourne by laying out the welcome mat and letting the Lions step all over it.

That’s not exactly fair. The game was close for about a quarter and a half and then the Lions went on a roll and turned a close game into a rout. This one was a huge percentage booster for the Lions and keeps them in the running for a finals spot.

Here are the highlights:

The Late Late Friday Night game had my Geelong Cats going to Adelaide to take on the Port Adelaide Power. Now, I had warned everyone in last week’s AFL Beat that the Cats are notoriously bad after byes.

No one listened to me, as I was the only one in the Footy Tipping Contest to pick the Power to win. Unfortunately, I was correct. It was a close and low-scoring contest, but the Power did prevail, as I foresaw. On the bright side, the Cats are still one game up on Collingwood at the top of the ladder.

Here are the full-game highlights:

The last game of the Round was on North American Saturday Night and had the Western Bulldogs hosting the Collingwood Magpies. The Pies did not exactly play their best and allowed the Doggies to hang with them for most of the game.

However, when push came to shove, the Pies showed what they were made of in dispatching the Doggies in the second half. Being able to win when not playing at your best is a very good quality for a team to have. The Pies will be dangerous come finals time.

Here are the full-game highlights:

Let’s take a look at the ladder, shall we?

P	TEAM	W	L	T	PTS	%
1	Geelong Cats	11	2	0	44	146.0
2	Collingwood Magpies	10	3	0	40	126.3
3	GWS Giants	9	4	0	36	132.9
4	West Coast Eagles	9	4	0	36	106.2
5	Adelaide Crows	8	5	0	32	115.1
6	Brisbane Lions	8	5	0	32	108.1
7	Port Adelaide Power	7	6	0	28	108.3
8	Fremantle Dockers	7	6	0	28	108.2
9	Richmond Tigers	7	6	0	28	92.0
10	Essendon Bombers	6	7	0	24	100.8
11	St. Kilda Saints	6	7	0	24	83.4
12	Hawthorn Hawks	5	8	0	20	97.3
13	North Melbourne Kangaroos	5	8	0	20	92.6
14	Sydney Swans	5	8	0	20	92.2
15	Western Bulldogs	5	8	0	20	89.9
16	Melbourne Demons	4	9	0	16	78.7
17	Gold Coast Suns	3	10	0	12	71.9
18	Carlton Blues	2	11	0	8	79.0

Here is the Balls Graph:

[gview file=”https://www.doorfliesopen.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/AFL-Ladder-2019R14.pdf”]

Thankfully, the byes are over, so we can start making some conclusions. The top four are clearly the class of the competition and should be fairly comfortable in making finals.

There is a big group of teams in the middle (spots 5 through 15) that are only three games apart and will be battling it out for those last four finals spots. I’m thinking that competition will go down to the last week.

On the bottom of the ladder, Carlton and Gold Coast will be fighting the rest of the season to avoid the Wooden Spoon.

***

Footy Tipping Contest

Here is where we are after Round Fourteen:

P	TIPPER	Round Tips	Round Margin	Total Tips	Total Margin
1	Litre_cola	4	23	79	373
2	Son Of Spam	5	17	78	403
3	BFC	4	15	76	443
4	BALLS	5	9	72	456
5	BC Dick	4	8	71	483
6	Dolph Ucker	2	6	67	387
7	Why Eagles Why	2	35	66	390
8	Yeah Right	3	8	66	541
9	Game Time Decision	4	2	65	434
10		2	35	60	515
11	Sharkbait	3	65	59	706
12	Blax	2	35	52	411

For the first time all season, the positions did not change from last week to this week. That, of course, does not mean that there wasn’t movement.

Litre continues to give up ground on the field and Spam is now within one game while BFC is only three behind. As the season winds down, anything can still happen!

DONT FORGET TO PUT THE FOOTY TIPS IN!

***

AFL Round 15

The byes are over! Here is the full schedule (all times Pacific):

Thursday, June 21, 2019

2:20 AM (Late Thursday Night!) – Essendon Bombers v GWS Giants at Marvel Stadium

The Bombers will be looking to spring the upset against one of the best teams in the competition. Meanwhile, the Giants should win against an inferior opponent.

Friday, June 28, 2019

2:50 AM – Geelong Cats v Adelaide Crows at GMHBA Stadium

The Cats lost IN Adelaide last week and could lose TO Adelaide at home this week if they are not careful. All of a sudden, that two game lead at the top is evaporating.

8:45 PM – Hawthorn Hawks v West Coast Eagles  at the MCG

The Eagles will use this opportunity to get used to the MCG surface. They expect to be back for the Grand Final, again.

11:35 PM – Sydney Swans v Gold Coast Suns at the SCG

The Swans are climbing up the ladder and get the falling Suns at home. Gold Coast must win this game to have any chance of saving their season.

Saturday, June 22, 2019

2:25 AM – Collingwood Magpies v North Melbourne Kangaroos at Marvel Stadium

This will be a good matchup as the Roos are on the rise and the Pies have not been playing well. An upset could happen.

2:40 AM – Port Adelaide Power v Western Bulldogs at Adelaide Oval

The Power get two in a row at home after three in a row on the road. The Doggies played tough against the Pies and could surprise.

8:10 PM – St. Kilda Saints v Richmond Tigers at Marvel Stadium

This now seems a much more even and intriguing game that it would have been a few weeks ago. The Saints have a shot here to give their finals hopes a boost.

10:20 PM – Brisbane Lions v Melbourne Demons at The Gabba

The Demons are coming off a nice home victory over the Dockers and look to get back on track. On the other end, the Lions have to win these types of games to show they are serious finals contenders.

Sunday, June 30, 2019

12:20 AM – Fremantle Dockers v Carlton Blues at Optus Stadium

The Blues have a very tough task ahead of them if they want to avoid the Wooden Spoon. Playing Fremantle in Perth does not help.

***

That’s all for this week! Now that the byes are over, we will be back with a full complement of games next weekend. We are at the two-thirds point in the season, so we are getting down to the most exciting part!

See you next week!

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