Stats observations

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Most consecutive finals losses after winning a premiership

Consecutive lossesTeamPremiership yearSubsequent losses
7Collingwood19031904 semi-final, 1905 semi-final, 1905 grand final, 1906 semi-final, 1907 semi-final, 1908 semi-final, 1909 semi-final
4Carlton19821983 elimination, 1984 qualifying, 1984 1st semi, 1985 elimination
4Hawthorn19911992 1st elimination, 1993 1st elimination, 1994 2nd qualifying, 1996 4th qualifying
4Hawthorn20152016 2nd qualifying, 2016 2nd semi, 2018 1st qualifying, 2018 1st semi
4Melbourne20212022 2nd qualifying, 2022 2nd semi, 2023 1st qualifying, 2023 1st semi
3Geelong19371938 2nd semi, 1938 preliminary, 1940 1st semi
3Carlton19381941 2nd semi, 1941 preliminary, 1943 1st semi
3Melbourne19601961 2nd semi, 1961 preliminary, 1962 1st semi
3Carlton19951996 1st qualifying, 1996 2nd semi, 1999 2nd qualifying
3West Coast20062007 2nd qualifying, 2007 2nd semi, 2011 1st qualifying
 
Most consecutive finals losses after winning a premiership

Consecutive lossesTeamPremiership yearSubsequent losses
7Collingwood19031904 semi-final, 1905 semi-final, 1905 grand final, 1906 semi-final, 1907 semi-final, 1908 semi-final, 1909 semi-final
4Carlton19821983 elimination, 1984 qualifying, 1984 1st semi, 1985 elimination
4Hawthorn19911992 1st elimination, 1993 1st elimination, 1994 2nd qualifying, 1996 4th qualifying
4Hawthorn20152016 2nd qualifying, 2016 2nd semi, 2018 1st qualifying, 2018 1st semi
4Melbourne20212022 2nd qualifying, 2022 2nd semi, 2023 1st qualifying, 2023 1st semi
3Geelong19371938 2nd semi, 1938 preliminary, 1940 1st semi
3Carlton19381941 2nd semi, 1941 preliminary, 1943 1st semi
3Melbourne19601961 2nd semi, 1961 preliminary, 1962 1st semi
3Carlton19951996 1st qualifying, 1996 2nd semi, 1999 2nd qualifying
3West Coast20062007 2nd qualifying, 2007 2nd semi, 2011 1st qualifying

Somewhat ironically, the Demons record in finals matches following their 1964 premiership and their next Grand Final appearance was pretty good. Wins by 118 points over North Melbourne in an Elimination Final, 76 points over the Sydney Swans in a First Semi Final, a 2 point preliminary final loss, followed the next year by wins in the Elimination, First Semi and Preliminary Finals before falling in the Grand Final to Hawthorn by 96-points.

Unfortunately for Melbourne, an astonishing 23 years had passed after they won the 1964 premiership and before they would again play in September save for the odd last round that was played early in the month. South Melbourne had become the Sydney Swans, and there were these strange new teams called the West Coast Eagles and Brisbane Bears in the league. In this time, coach Norm Smith had died, captain Rob Barassi had coached Carlton, North Melbourne and then Melbourne again, and Carlton had won 6 premierships (and would win again in 1987) and Hawthorn and Richmond 5 each.

Imagine if the day after Melbourne won the 1964 flag the Dees premiership team were invited to go into a time machine and to the day of Melbourne's next finals match. One would think the team would assume they were going forward a year to September 1965 and could hear the Beatles' newest hits and see Elvis Presley's latest movies in advance, and would experience a massive culture shock when they stepped out of the time machine and into the strange new futuristic world of the late 1980s....
 
Somewhat ironically, the Demons record in finals matches following their 1964 premiership and their next Grand Final appearance was pretty good. Wins by 118 points over North Melbourne in an Elimination Final, 76 points over the Sydney Swans in a First Semi Final, a 2 point preliminary final loss, followed the next year by wins in the Elimination, First Semi and Preliminary Finals before falling in the Grand Final to Hawthorn by 96-points.

Unfortunately for Melbourne, an astonishing 23 years had passed after they won the 1964 premiership and before they would again play in September save for the odd last round that was played early in the month. South Melbourne had become the Sydney Swans, and there were these strange new teams called the West Coast Eagles and Brisbane Bears in the league. In this time, coach Norm Smith had died, captain Rob Barassi had coached Carlton, North Melbourne and then Melbourne again, and Carlton had won 6 premierships (and would win again in 1987) and Hawthorn and Richmond 5 each.

Imagine if the day after Melbourne won the 1964 flag the Dees premiership team were invited to go into a time machine and to the day of Melbourne's next finals match. One would think the team would assume they were going forward a year to September 1965 and could hear the Beatles' newest hits and see Elvis Presley's latest movies in advance, and would experience a massive culture shock when they stepped out of the time machine and into the strange new futuristic world of the late 1980s....

Taking a time machine to the late 1980s...sounds like an excellent adventure.
 

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With 23 home and away rounds having been played this year and with GWS and Carlton now out of the finals, no player any longer has the chance to equal John Cassin's 1977 record of playing 27 games in one season.


No fu*%^ng way.

I was about the post the same stat.
 
The WAFL, VFL and Talent League Grand Finals that will be played today all have new combinations of teams that have never met in a Grand Final before.

The WAFL Grand Final will be played between the East Fremantle Sharks and Peel Thunder, while interestingly the Reserves Grand Final will be between Swan Districts and West Perth and the Colts between Claremont and Perth; with these combinations never having come up in a WAFL league grand final.

Werribee Tigers and the Gold Coast Suns will play the VFL Grand Final, while the curtain raiser Talent League Grand Final will be played between the Sandringham Dragons and the Eastern Ranges. The Dragons and Ranges both have impressive records of making and winning Grand Finals, but until now have never crossed paths in a premiership decider.

Todays SANFL Grand Final will be played between the Glenelg Tigers and the Sturt Double Blues, but while these teams have played against each other in Grand Finals before, these teams haven't met on Grand Final day since 1974.
 
Neither North Melbourne nor Carlton have made a Grand Final since playing off in the 1999 decider.

This is the longest drought of this type ever recorded and, following Saturday's result, will now extend into a 25th year.

The previous record was 23 years for Fitzroy and Richmond in 1944. Richmond did not play another Grand Final until 1967 while Fitzroy never made a Grand Final again.

Apart from the North Melbourne/Carlton drought, there are only two other 'live' Grand Final droughts - and both are much shorter.

Neither Melbourne nor Western Bulldogs have played in a Grand Final since 2021 (2 years) and neither Geelong nor Sydney have played in a Grand Final since 2022 (1 year).
 
The Specky Magee Round: A round where all five of the teams that Specky Magee supports (Brisbane, Collingwood, Essendon, Sydney and West Coast) wins their games:
  1. Round 13, 2002
  2. Round 10, 2004
  3. Round 4, 2012
  4. Round 8, 2012
  5. Round 14, 2012
  6. Round 15, 2013
  7. Round 9, 2019
  8. Round 2, 2023
 

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Neither North Melbourne nor Carlton have made a Grand Final since playing off in the 1999 decider.

This is the longest drought of this type ever recorded and, following Saturday's result, will now extend into a 25th year.

The previous record was 23 years for Fitzroy and Richmond in 1944. Richmond did not play another Grand Final until 1967 while Fitzroy never made a Grand Final again.

Apart from the North Melbourne/Carlton drought, there are only two other 'live' Grand Final droughts - and both are much shorter.

Neither Melbourne nor Western Bulldogs have played in a Grand Final since 2021 (2 years) and neither Geelong nor Sydney have played in a Grand Final since 2022 (1 year).

There's an interesting similar case in the WAFL. In 1978, East Perth and Perth met in the WAFL Grand Final. This wasn't unusual at the time, East Perth and Perth had played in the 1966, 1967, 1968 and 1976 Grand Finals, the Perth Demons winning all of these, but the East Perth Royals won a thriller over Perth in teeming rain in 1978.

East Perth would have been confident of winning some more premierships in coming years, while Perth having won the WAFL in 1976 and 1977 would have been aiming to make it three flags in four years by taking out the 1979 WAFL Premiership.

However, it would take 18 long years before either of these teams would make a Grand Final again, East Perth losing the 1996 decider to Claremont, before the Royals would break their 22-year premiership drought in 2000 and would win the 2001 and 2002 flags too. Perth have not made a Grand Final in 45 years since then, have finished at or near the bottom of the ladder on many occasions, and their finals appearances have been few and far between, in 1986, 1991, 1997 and the COVID affected 2020 season.

I couldn't find any instances of this in the SANFL or VFL/VFA - in most Grand Finals where a less successful team has made it there has always been a powerhouse like Port Adelaide, Norwood or Glenelg in SA; or a Port Melbourne, Williamstown or Sandringham in Victoria.

In the Talent League the Northern Knights played the NSW-ACT Rams in the 1996 Grand Final. The Knights were going for - and won - their fourth premiership in a row, while the Rams did well to make the GF from 7th spot in their first season and were far from disgraced. Twenty seven years later, the Northern Knights have not made another Grand Final, while the Rams mainly struggled throughout the rest of their tenure as a full-time Under 18's team in the late 1990s and early 2000s, before they withdrew from full-time competition at the end of 2002 and from there on played 4 games a season on an invitational basis.
 
If Collingwood win today's Grand Final, Isaac Quaynor will become the first premiership player whose surname started with Q since Carlton's Brian Quirk in 1968.

If Brisbane win today's Grand Final, Dayne Zorko will become the first premiership player whose surname started with Z since Richmond's Eric Zshesh in 1934 (also a member of the Tiger's 1932 premiership) and to date the only Z-name premiership player.
 
If Collingwood win today's Grand Final, Isaac Quaynor will become the first premiership player whose surname started with Q since Carlton's Brian Quirk in 1968.

If Brisbane win today's Grand Final, Dayne Zorko will become the first premiership player whose surname started with Z since Richmond's Eric Zshesh in 1934 (also a member of the Tiger's 1932 premiership) and to date the only Z-name premiership player.

This has now occurred, as has something else for the first time since 1968. Collingwood are the second premiership team to have kicked fewer goals than their opponent (12 to 13). Carlton kicked 7 to Essendon's 8 in 1968.
 
There are 3060 possible combinations of 4 AFL teams (of the current 18). Something I set out to find was the longest ongoing streak where a group of four teams haven't won in the same round.

For example: Collingwood, Hawthorn, St Kilda and West Coast haven't won in the same round since Round 21, 2019.

Since 2020, there are 472 combinations of 4 who haven't won in the same round. Let's see how small that number gets:

4-team combos that haven't won in the same round since the start of:
2020: 472
2019: 278
2018: 182
2017: 115
2016: 59
2015: 34
2014: 21
2013: 18
2012: 16

Last occurred before 2015:
Essendon-Fremantle-Hawthorn-North Melbourne: Round 22, 2014
Essendon-Fremantle-North Melbourne-Richmond: Round 22, 2014
Adelaide-Carlton-Essendon-North Melbourne: Round 16, 2014
Carlton-Essendon-Fremantle-North Melbourne: Round 16, 2014
Carlton-Essendon-Gold Coast-North Melbourne: Round 16, 2014
Carlton-Fremantle-North Melbourne-Richmond: Round 16, 2014
Carlton-Gold Coast-Geelong-North Melbourne: Round 16, 2014
Adelaide-Brisbane-Carlton-North Melbourne: Round 6, 2014
Adelaide-Brisbane-Gold Coast-North Melbourne: Round 6, 2014
Brisbane-Carlton-Gold Coast-North Melbourne: Round 6, 2014
Brisbane-Collingwood-Gold Coast-North Melbourne: Round 6, 2014
Carlton-Collingwood-Gold Coast-North Melbourne: Round 6, 2014
Collingwood-Gold Coast-North Melbourne-Port Adelaide: Round 6, 2014
Gold Coast-Hawthorn-North Melbourne-Richmond: Round 23, 2013
North Melbourne-Richmond-St Kilda-Western Bulldogs: Round 23, 2013
Carlton-Collingwood-Gold Coast-West Coast: Round 8, 2013
Collingwood-North Melbourne-St Kilda-Western Bulldogs: Round 5, 2012
Essendon-Hawthorn-North Melbourne-St Kilda: Round 3, 2012
[the longest streak]

Has not happened:
Adelaide-Brisbane-Gold Coast-GWS
Adelaide-Carlton-GWS-Hawthorn
Brisbane-Carlton-GWS-North Melbourne
Brisbane-Collingwood-Essendon-Gold Coast
Brisbane-Fremantle-Gold Coast-North Melbourne
Brisbane-Gold Coast-North Melbourne-Richmond
Brisbane-Gold Coast-North Melbourne-Western Bulldogs
Carlton-Essendon-Gold Coast-GWS
Carlton-Essendon-Gold Coast-St Kilda
Carlton-Essendon-Gold Coast-West Coast
Carlton-Essendon-Gold Coast-Western Bulldogs
Carlton-Geelong-Gold Coast-West Coast
Carlton-Gold Coast-GWS-North Melbourne
Carlton-Gold Coast-Melbourne-North Melbourne
Essendon-Gold Coast-St Kilda-Western Bulldogs

Ultimately, I was able to find one group of four teams that not only didn't have Gold Coast or GWS, but hadn't won in the same round since before Gold Coast entered the league: Adelaide-Carlton-Melbourne-Richmond, and their streak stretches waaaaay back.

In fact, Round 2, 2005 was the last round where Adelaide, Carlton, Melbourne and Richmond all won. It's very likely that we're going to go 19 straight years without seeing this happen.
 
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The 125th Grand Final played (1898-1923, 1925-2023) and the 78th won by the team that finished higher on the Ladder.

The 60th Grand Final played between teams that finished 1st and 2nd on the Ladder and the 35th won by the team that finished 1st on the Ladder.

The first Grand Final between 1st and 2nd on the Ladder that was won by the team placed 1st since Geelong defeated Port Adelaide in 2007.

Only the 2nd Grand Final won by a team that only won the 1st Quarter. Previous: Hawthorn vs Geelong in 1989.

One of only 6 Grand Finals won by a team that had a margin of no more that 10 pts. at the end of each quarter. Previous: 2002: (Brisbane defeated Collingwood -6, +8, +4, +9.)

The 17th Grand Final won by less than 1 goal and the 2nd won by Collingwood. Previous: Collingwood 4.7-31 vs Fitzroy 3.11-29 in 1903. (Collingwood previous has lost Grand Finals by less than one goal in 1918 (5 pts.), 1964 (4 pts.), 1966 (1 pt.), 1979 (5 pts.), 2018 (5 pts.).

The lowest winning margin in a Grand Final by a team with 9 more scoring shots. Previous: Essendon 5.17-47 vs Sth Melbourne 4.9-33 in 1912. (Highest: Essendon 20.13-133 vs Carlton 13.11-89).

Only the 2nd Grand Final won by a team with fewer goals. Previous: 1968: Carlton 7.14-56 vs Essendon 8.5-53.
 
If Collingwood win today's Grand Final, Isaac Quaynor will become the first premiership player whose surname started with Q since Carlton's Brian Quirk in 1968.

If Brisbane win today's Grand Final, Dayne Zorko will become the first premiership player whose surname started with Z since Richmond's Eric Zshesh in 1934 (also a member of the Tiger's 1932 premiership) and to date the only Z-name premiership player.

The 55-year drought of Q surname players winning premierships is over, with Isaac Quaynor part of Collingwood's premiership team yesterday. Hopefully the Brisbane Lions can reverse the result of today's grand final next year and win the 2024 premiership, with Dayne Zorko becoming the first Z-name premiership player in 90 years.

Premierships continue to be elusive for I name players, with North Melbourne's Steven Icke way back in 1977 the last example.

U and X players are still yet to get off the mark. There have been players whose surnames started with U who have played in losing Grand Finals - Max Urquhart for Collingwood in the 1960s one example - and players who played for a premiership team during the season but not in the team that won the Grand Final, such as Troy Ugle for the West Coast Eagles in 1992, but never in a premiership team.

The only realistic way for an X-name player to be the first to win a premiership or even appear in a losing grand final team is for North Melbourne to trade Tristan Xerri (the first and only X name AFL player in history) to a team that is currently in a position to win a premiership or a team on the rise which will be a challenger in two or three years.
 
  • March 4
  • April 6
  • April 26
  • September 23
  • October 6
  • November 16
  • December 18
No premiership player has either of these seven birthdays. The other 359, including February 29 (Brent Macaffer) have premiership winners.

The most recent five birthday debutants were:
  • February 12: Dayne Beams (2010)
  • February 29: Brent Macaffer (2010)
  • April 14: Jarryd Blair (2010)
  • October 17: Trent West (2011)
  • July 25: Matt Suckling (2014)
If Brisbane had won this year's Grand Final, we would have had TWO debutants:
  • March 4: Joe Daniher
  • September 23: Zac Bailey
There are also currently no AFL players born on November 16.
 
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Have we seen the last of Brett Ratten as a senior coach? If so, he leaves with an extraordinary record of his first 9 games as coach (with Carlton) as well as his final 9 games (with North Melbourne) all resulting in losses.
 

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