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Buckley held one of the most heavily-scrutinised jobs in football as head coach of the Collingwood Football Club until he sensationally resigned midway through last season instead of being pushed.

But as of the cast members on Channel 10’s new series of I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here!, the 49-year-old has revealed he hasn’t felt the stare of the public spotlight quite as much as he has since his split with his ex-wife Tania.

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Buckley confirmed he had split with Tania in December 2020 despite reported they had broken up before the 2020 AFL season returned from a mid-season suspension and the Magpies spent most of the season on the road.

And a month later, Buckley had started a relationship with cosmetic nurse Alex Pike.

The pair have been targets for paparazzi and gossip columns as pictures of the pair out and about made the news.

Although no stranger to the limelight as a wildly successful footballer, Buckley opened up on the difficulty of being hound for his photo.

Speaking about the invasion of privacy from paparazzi on an episode of I’m A Celeb to air on Tuesday night, former NRL star Beau Ryan turned to ex-Collingwood coach and asked him about his experience.

“I’m going through a separation, so I’ve been out of home for 18 months, a bit over 18 months, nearly two years,” he said. “The paps are following my ex-wife and sometimes with my boys. And they’re also looking for photos for me with my current partner.”

The rest of the cast said “that’s awful”, while Buckley elaborated.

“I’ve never understood it until now,” he added before he was asked if it was the first time he’d been in the press.

The 280-game AFL legend who won the 2003 Brownlow Medal, seven all-Australians, was captain of the Magpies for eight years and followed up by coaching Collingwood for the past decade said: “Not in the press but in the bloody Daily Mail”.

In a to-camera piece, Ryan said: “I feel in this world, paps are always going to be around but it’s all good until your family is involved. It’s like everything really. Nathan’s going through it now which is not a good feeling.”

Ryan said it was much different when it was happening to you, saying that in Sydney they moved your bins to block your driveway so that when you got out to move them, the photographer could take the picture.

News of Buckley’s marriage breakdown came as a huge shock to the AFL world, with him and Minnici establishing themselves as one of footy’s golden couples during his playing days with Collingwood.

“It has been a tough and challenging year for every family and for ours included,” the couple’s joint statement said late last year.

“It is with the utmost love and respect for each other and a true commitment to our sons, that we have made a decision to separate in January.

“We remain dedicated parents and in the interests of our boys, we ask for our family to be given the privacy that is needed.

“We thank everyone in advance for understanding our request and for the unconditional love and support we have received throughout our marriage.”

Buckley will stay on screens, moving from the coach’s box to the commentary box on Fox Sports.

Buckley says the deal means he will not be involved in coaching in 2022, but his plans beyond that remain unknown.

“I determined really early that I would take some time to consider my next step in footy so returning to clubland in 2022 was off the table really quickly after leaving Collingwood,” Buckley said.

I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here! continues Tuesday night from 7.30pm AEDT on Channel 10

Shane Martin passed away in New Zealand on Friday at the age of 54.

The news was confirmed in a statement from Martin’s Richmond football club on Saturday morning.

The Herald Sun reports the club learned of Martin’s death on Friday.

“The Richmond Football Club is mourning the passing of Shane Martin,” the club said.

“The club extends its heartfelt sympathy to Dustin, his brothers Bronson and Tyson, and the entire Martin family in this extremely difficult time.”

New Zealand Police confirmed they attended a property on Friday on the street which Martin lived where a man was located deceased.

There do not appear to be any suspicious circumstances, police said.

The cause of death is not yet known

Shane Martin was deported from Australia in 2016 on the grounds of bad character.

Martin was a top-ranking member of Australia’s Rebels motorcycle gang and had lived in New South Wales since he was 20, after moving from Huntly, New Zealand, in 1989.

Martin previously told The New Zealand Herald he had a history of depression and mental illness.

In 2019 he said his depression had cleared somewhat, but he still desperately missed his three grown sons and two young stepdaughters living in Australia.

“I was depressed and angry for a while and took it out on my wife a bit,” he said.

“It wasn’t her fault but she stood strong. Now we’re living together. We’d just got married, two weeks after that I got deported, separated for nearly three years.”

Martin said he was even thinking of settling in New Zealand, and had come to “love” the country of his birth, but still yearned for the ability to return to Australia to see his kids and watch Dustin play footy.

Martin had his visa cancelled under section 501 of the Australian Immigration Act, which states people can be deported if they have a “substantial” criminal record.

He was also denied entry into Australia last year when he flew into Sydney before being forced to return to Auckland.

The three-time Norm Smith medallist has previously spoken publicly to request permission for his father to be allowed to return to Australia to watch him play during the Tigers’ recent grand final victories.

The 30-year-old footballer told Fox Footy earlier this year it is his dream to win another grand final with his dad watching in the grandstand.

“I love my dad and he’s made me the man I am today,” he said.

“I’ve got full belief he’ll back here to watch us win another flag.

“That’s my dream to be able to have the old man up there (in the grandstand) with the rest of my family and watch the Tiges win another flag.”

Martin in 2017 spoke with emotion about his dad not being there in person to watch the team defeat the Adelaide Crows in the AFL grand final.

“It’s been incredibly hard the last 12 to 18 months not having him here,” Martin said in an interview with Channel 9’s Footy Show.

”He’d love to be here and hopefully he is back here soon.

“It’s been a pretty emotional week seeing him (in New Zealand) he was pretty broken.”

He described his dad as his biggest fan.

Shane Martin also told the iconic football program in 2017: “It’s pretty emotional to see your son developing into something special.

“He is a very humble, shy kid, but the Richmond Football Club has been magnificent for him.”

The football club posted on its official website: “The club extends its heartfelt sympathy to Dustin, his brothers Bronson and Tyson and the entire Martin family.

“We ask the media to respect Dustin and the Martin family‘s privacy in this extremely difficult time.”

The Brownlow medallist was in April granted permission to visit his father in New Zealand in the middle of the AFL season.

Shane Martin had lived in Australia for more than 25 years before his visa was cancelled in 2016.

The family of Shane Martin all live in Australia, including his wife Adriana.

As reported by The Advertiser, CitrusAd was sold to French multinational advertising and public relations firm Publicis Groupe earlier this year for a whopping nine-figure sum — which was approximately 100 times more than what Moran made in his football career.

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Launched in December 2017 by Moran and Adelaide-based business partner Nick Paech, CitrusAd enables retailers to charge brands a premium for the best product placements on their online stores.

The technology essentially serves as a back-end auction where brands can bid to have their products show up in online banner ads.

The online advertising search engine has secured the services of Woolworths, Coles and Dan Murphy’s in Australia, along with Tesco in the UK and Target in the US.

“What we learned after talking to the grocers for a long time was that they used to make a lot of their money from the eye-line shelf space,” Moran said, as reported by The Advertiser.

“And so we basically decided to build the digital version of that — a system where the retailer could allow their suppliers like Unilever and Coke and Pepsi to bid like they would on Google for the top spots on Google, but for the top spots on woolworths.com or coles.com.

“There was a lot more focus on online towards the back half of last year and there was a lot of focus around how do we make online profitable.

“Naturally they started to look for monetising solutions and things that could bring them advertising revenue to offset the cost of the growing the online presence.”

CitrusAd faced an uncertain future when the Covid-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on the Australian business landscape, but investor MA Financial followed through with funding throughout 2020 to help increase the company’s revenue by more than 10 times over an 18-month period.

Moran played 21 AFL games for North Melbourne and Adelaide before injury forced a premature retirement in 2011, aged 24.

But the ex-footballer described his shock retirement as a “sliding doors” moment in his business career.

“Would I have liked to play another 10 years, maybe, but I look back now and probably think it’s the best thing that’s happened,” he said.

“I heavily lent on the club to help springboard me into business. Rob Chapman was the very first person I went to about my first business idea and he helped set me on the train to meet various others individuals across town.

“The footy club had a really influential and pivotal moment in the journey of my business career.”

One deal was done yesterday that saw a player move clubs, with Collingwood trading pick 41 to Geelong in return for pick 55 and 22-year-old Nathan Kreuger, who has played two AFL games for the Cats.

It was a good day for the Magpies, who announced captain Scott Pendlebury had signed a two-year contract extension that will keep him at Collingwood until the end of 2023.

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Port Adelaide ruckman meets with two clubs

Hawthorn and Sydney have met with Port Adelaide ruckman Peter Ladhams as both clubs look to bolster their big-man depth.

According to afl.com.au, the Hawks and the Swans both had discussions with the 23-year-old over Zoom last week after he was told to explore opportunities elsewhere during the Trade Period.

Ladhams is Port Adelaide’s backup ruckman behind Scott Lycett and has one year remaining on his contract.

Hawthorn is looking for a long-term replacement to veteran ruck duo Ben McEvoy and Jonathan Ceglar, while Sydney is hoping to recruit another ruckman to support Tom Hickey, who enjoyed a successful first season with the Swans in 2021.

Ladhams has a back-ended contract and the Power is likely to ask for significant compensation for the 202cm ruckman, which could prove a stumbling block in negotiations with Sydney and Hawthorn.

“Peter Ladhams was one we inquired about last year when we were looking for a ruckman, (but) we were able to secure Tom Hickey who has come in and been excellent, he’s had a fantastic year,” Swans general manager of football Charlie Gardiner told SEN.

“His management has reached out … I don’t think it’s progressed much further, but that’s something we’ll consider.”

There has been regular criticism the commentary box can be a bit of a boys club as former AFL players taking up most of the seats. That was until this year when Pearce became the first woman to make special comments on Channel 7’s broadcast of the Grand Final.

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Earlier this month she was awarded the Best Opinion/Analysis Award at the 2021 Australian Football Media Association awards and she shined on Grand Final day as the Melbourne Demons ended a 57-year Premiership drought with an emphatic 21.14 (140) to 10.6 (66) win over the Western Bulldogs.

Pearce, who plays for the Melbourne Demons in the AFLW, has quickly become one of the stars of footy commentary in Australia and said it best late in the call.

“It is not my club, it is Neale Daniher’s and Garry Lyon’s club. I am so proud, to take this club, with 57 years of hope and expectation, and turn it around. They deserve this,” she said.

The 33-year-old was widely praised for how she handled the biggest moment of her commentary career.

Steve Taylor tweeted: “Daisy Pearce absolutely saving this call.”

The Illawarra Mercury’s Tim Barrow added: “Is there a press red for Daisy Pearce option? She has lengths on the rest of the TV commentary.”

Sports broadcaster Chris Coleman was all for more Pearce, writing: “I’m sure there are plenty of misogynists around, but I’m looking forward to the day Daisy Pearce gets a bigger role in an #AFLGF commentary team.”

Author Adam Spencer hashtagged her the “best off ground”.

“Not for the first time this season, more informed, well-spoken observations from @DaisyPearce6 than pretty much the rest of the Channel 7 commentary team combined to half-time in the GF,” he tweeted.

Journalist Alex Fair said: “Thank God for Daisy Pearce.”

Even BlueBet Australia was behind Pearce, writing: “Top three first quarter performances: 3: Clayton Oliver 2: Christian Petracca 1: Daisy Pearce commentary.”

Pearce was kicking goals even before the game during her chat with Demons coach Simon Goodwin.

“Fantastic question to Goodwin, Daisy Pearce. She’s all class,” Sports reporter Daniel Garb tweeted.

If there was a Norm Smith Medal for the best performer in Seven’s commentary box, Pearce would be a clear winner.

It’s a world far removed from today’s sports media landscape where Daisy Pearce, AFLW star and AFL commentator, will make history tonight when she provides special comments on Channel 7’s broadcast of the Grand Final, becoming the first woman to do so on the game’s biggest day.

But before there was Daisy there was Dixie.

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Dixie Marshall, a WA native, was the first woman to feature in a football telecast when she was a boundary rider for Channel 7 in the late 80s.

Aged 24 when she moved to Melbourne to report from the sidelines each Saturday, it was a baptism of fire for Marshall who, by simply doing her job, angered crowds, fans, viewers and even a league coach or two.

Marshall this week reflected on her stint in Melbourne, recounting VB cans thrown at her head from over the fence, being spat on and signs in the crowd that read “Dixie, show us your t**s”.

There were furious letters to the editor, a jammed talkback line at radio 3AW, death threats and even a bomb threat at Seven’s South Melbourne studios.

“It caused a lot of controversy, I quickly learned it was something out of the ordinary, it was pretty heavy going the first six months,” Marshall said.

“For me, on TV, I believed that I was there because Channel 7 had just won the football back from the ABC and they wanted a different flavour which was ahead of its time, let’s be frank.

“But it was very much positive discrimination for me and I was very lucky to ride the wave.

“But now I don’t think it is positive discrimination, these women have earned their place and they are just as highly skilled as any man, if not more so, certainly in Daisy Pearce’s case. She’s amazing.

“We needed the tokenism in the early days to get underway, but now those days are gone.”

Marshall arrived in Melbourne in 1987 and covered football from the following season until 1991.

Christopher Skase was network boss at the time and his footy commentators were rock stars. A black stretch limousine would collect them from the studio and take them to the game at Victoria Park, Western Oval or Moorabbin each Saturday.

Marshall could name the colour of the carpet in every club’s changeroom because she was used to staring down at it while reporting from a small room of, sometimes, naked men.

“At halftime and the end of the game you’d go into the changerooms to get some information from the coaches and that just caused so much controversy. It’s different now the rooms are bigger and have private areas but back in those days it was one room,’’ she recalls.

“Many of those players found it hilarious to drop their dacks or run past while I was live to air.

“Many people thought it was inappropriate, a woman reporting live from a man’s changeroom. I just needed the opportunity to do my job in the same way that my male colleagues did.”

Marshall’s on-air colleagues like Bruce McAvaney, Peter Landy, Sandy Roberts, Drew Morphett and Peter Donegan never played league football but didn’t attract the same criticism.

“It was difficult, this notion that I hadn’t played the game so how could I possibly report on it. My colleagues never played the game but it didn’t seem to be an issue,’’ Marshall said.

“For me, it was, ‘What would she know about football?’ That was very much front and centre, what would a chick know about sport that would be of any use to an audience?

“Of course, a health reporter doesn’t have to be a doctor, a court reporter doesn’t have to be a lawyer, a war correspondent doesn’t need to know how to fire a gun but I was expected to have played.

“The feedback was audiences were very cranky.”

Marshall was well supported by her television teammates, especially some greats of the game.

“It was really the old guys (past champions) Bob Davis, Ron Barassi, Peter McKenna, Don Scott, Bernie Quinlan — the guys you might have thought would be very difficult were very supportive,’’ she explains.

“That gave me the cred that, ‘If those guys think she’s OK, then maybe we’ll give her a chance’.

“By the time I left it wasn’t an issue and now look at it!”

After her stint in Melbourne, Marshall moved on to the newsroom in Adelaide before a decade anchoring the nightly news back in Perth.

She would depart the desk to serve as director of strategic communications for the WA government and today is managing director of advertising agency Marketforce.

She maintains her passion for the sport as a WA footy commissioner.

Decades on, Marshall delights in seeing women working in all facets of football from playing at the highest level, administrating and reporting on it and helming clubs. Grand Finalists Melbourne and the Western Bulldogs both have female presidents.

“There are women everywhere and in very, senior leadership positions, at football clubs themselves,” she said.

“It’s been a terrific shift.”

A brand new Brownlow medallist will be crowned at the ceremony on Sunday evening.

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The prestigious medal is awarded to the player judged the best and fairest by the AFL umpires.

After each game in every round, the match officials award three votes, two votes and one vote to the three players they believe were the most impressive on the field.

Last year’s Brownlow medallist Lachie Neale and 2019 winner Nat Fyfe both had injury-interrupted seasons, ruling them out of contention for this year’s award.

Unlike the past few seasons, there is no clear-cut favourite with a winner likely to come from a trio of standout midfielders.

This year’s is count is expected to be one of the closest in recent memory and could well go down to the wire.

Here’s everything you need to know about this year’s Brownlow Medal.

When is it on?

This year’s Brownlow Medal will be held on Sunday 19 September with the vote count due to get underway at 7.30pm (AEST).

The Brownlow usually takes place on the Monday of grand final week but the AFL has parted with tradition in the last two years, holding the ceremony on the Sunday instead.

How can I watch the Brownlow?

The Brownlow will be broadcast on Channel 7, with coverage of the red carpet kicking off at 7pm (AEST) before the vote count gets underway at 7.30pm (AEST).

Where is it being held?

The past two Covid-affected seasons have forced the Brownlow to be held at state-based locations instead of the usual glamorous ceremony at Melbourne’s Crown Casino.

Perth is hosting all the major events in the lead up to the grand final, with Optus Stadium to host the main part of this year’s ceremony.

Players from Western Australia and South Australia will be there in Perth, along with some of the favourites for the Brownlow from the two grand finalists — Melbourne and the Western Bulldogs.

Queensland-based players will be at the Gabba, while players from Victoria and NSW will have to tune in remotely from home due to the Covid-19 lockdowns in those states.

AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan will be reading out the votes at the venue at Optus Stadium, where this year’s winner will likely be crowned.

Who are the favourites to win?

The 2021 Brownlow count is expected to be one of the closest in recent years.

There isn’t a runaway favourite this year but most experts believe one of Port Adelaide’s Ollie Wines, Melbourne’s Clayton Oliver or the Western Bulldogs’ Marcus Bontempelli will win.

Pundits have Wines as the narrow favourite to take home “Charlie”, with Oliver to be disadvantaged by his teammates Christian Petracca and Max Gawn taking votes off him.

Bontempelli could also miss out on valuable votes awarded to his teammate Jack Macrae instead.

A rare tie is certainly not out of the realm of possibility and it would be the first time there have been joint winners since 2003 when Nathan Buckley, Adam Goodes and Mark Ricciuto all finished on 23 votes.

St Kilda’s Jack Steele is a smokey for the Brownlow and is expected to poll very well in the second half of the season and challenge the favourites.

Carlton’s young gun Sam Walsh and Essendon’s Darcy Parish are likely to finish high on the leaderboard and be rewarded for breakout seasons.

What are the betting odds?

Wines is the favourite to win the Brownlow according to Sportsbet, only just ahead of Oliver and Bontempelli.

Ollie Wines ($3.25)

Clayton Oliver ($3.75)

Marcus Bontempelli ($4)

Jack Steele ($6.50)

Christian Petracca ($15)

Sam Walsh ($26)

Darcy Parish ($31)

Jack Macrae ($34)

Tom Mitchell (51)

Melbourne will play in its first grand final in 21 years after demolishing Geelong by 83 points in their preliminary final on Friday night.

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The dominant 19.11 (125) to 6.6 (42) win means the Demons are one step closer to winning their first premiership since 1964 and ending the longest drought in the AFL.

Melbourne couldn’t have made a better start to the preliminary final, piling on six goals in the first quarter to open up a 26-point lead.

The Dees destroyed Geelong around the ball and were in control of the game from the opening minutes and were never headed.

Melbourne continued its sensational start in the second term, with a stunning goal to captain Max Gawn the highlight.

The big ruckman played on after being awarded a free kick and athletically snapped the ball across his body from 40 metres out, defying his lanky physique.

Goals to Charlie Spargo, Kysaiah Pickett and Tom Sparrow helped the Demons consolidate their lead.

Melbourne pulled away in the third term, piling on eight unanswered goals to extend its lead out to a mammoth 78 points at three-quarter time.

And the star of the show was undoubtedly Gawn, who kicked four goals in the third quarter alone to take his tally for the game to five.

It’s the biggest haul of his career and breaks the record for the most goals kicked by a Melbourne captain in an AFL final.

Making the feat all the more impressive was the spectacular nature of each of Gawn’s goals.

Early in the third quarter, he received a handpass from Christian Petracca in the centre square and kicked a 55-metre bomb on the run.

He wasn’t finished there. Shortly afterwards, Gawn plucked the ball out of the ruck and snapped a miraculous goal from a tight angle as he was falling off balance.

The All-Australian captain also took some strong contested marks, which led to his other two majors in the third quarter.

Fans and viewers were stunned by Gawn’s goalkicking skills and athletic prowess.

“He’s kicked the two best goals for his career in a preliminary final!” Hawthorn and Melbourne great Jordan Lewis said on AFL Nation.

“I haven’t done that before,” Gawn said of his goalkicking exploits on Channel 7 after the game.

“I’m not normally a goal kicker and got on the end of some of them.

“Like that stoppage goal, I probably won’t be able to do every again in my life.”

While pleased with the victory, Gawn emphasised his side’s ultimate goal is to be lifting the premiership cup after a grand final win.

“We want to be able to win the grand final. That’s what the target is,” he said.

“Obviously this is nice. We’ve got 50,000 Melbourne people here and this really nice but we haven’t broken the drought until we do so in two weeks and that’s what we’re really looking forward to.”

The Demons didn’t allow Geelong to play its natural kick-mark game style.

In a symbol of just how much the Cats struggled, Jeremy Cameron’s goal in the last quarter was the only six-pointer Geelong scored in the second half.

Melbourne will play the winner of Saturday’s preliminary final between Port Adelaide and the Western Bulldogs in the grand final, which will take place in Perth in two weeks.

Injury concern to star Demons defender

Melbourne’s red-hot performance was soured by an injury to key defender Steven May, who appeared to strain his hamstring in a marking contest with Geelong’s Tom Hawkins.

May went straight down to the rooms to have the injury assessed and emerged with his leg heavily strapped.

He spent most of the quarter on the bench getting his leg massaged but played the second and third quarters in some discomfort.

Everything was going right for Melbourne, who had the luxury of taking star defender Steven May out of the game, replacing him with medical substitute James Jordon.

It will allow May the best hope possible of recovering from a hamstring injury he sustained early in the game.

He will be racing the clock to recover in time for the grand final, but the bye before the season finale will give him an extra week to prove his fitness.

The Lions have now gone out of the finals in straight sets for the second time in three years as tempers boiled over with police restraining one supporter who was abusing the match officials as they left the ground with the free kick count of 28-19 against Brisbane.

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While the umpires had far too much say in the contest with howlers against both teams, when the match was in the balance, a brilliant left-foot goal to Bulldogs star Bailey Smith from 40 metres out broke the deadlock with two minutes left in the match.

A running Zac Bailey goal levelled the scores with 78 seconds remaining before Vandermeer rushed a behind with a toe poke to put the visitors in front to break the hearts of Brisbane.

Bulldogs captain Marcus Bontempelli left the field late with a knee issue and the club will sweat on his availability ahead of the preliminary final date with Port Adelaide in Adelaide.

Jack Macrae (38 disposals and a goal) and Hugh McCluggage (28 disposals) were the best for their respective sides as momentum swung wildly throughout the contest.

The Dogs came out with all guns blazing in the final term with goals to Macrae, Josh Schache and Smith handing them an eight-point lead before Lions forward Tom Fullarton bobbed up with a major.

The Lions were reduced to a three-man interchange bench when Jarrod Berry was ruled out with concussion at halftime and medical replacement Ryan Lester – who came on for Jack Payne – was one of three goalkickers in the third term when Brisbane raced to a 18-point lead thanks to a noticeable lift in their pressure.

The Bulldogs lost Cody Weightman to a head knock late in the second quarter and his medical sub – Jason Johannisen – kicked a goal late in the third term to reduce Brisbane’s advantage to 10 points at the last change.

With Macrae racking up 24 touches by the main break, the Bulldogs led by the solitary point at halftime after they kicked the first three goals of the second term through Aaron Naughton, Mitch Hannan and Weightman.

Brisbane suffered a blow when fill-in forward Payne left the field with blood gushing from his head after clashing with the knee of teammate Linc McCarthy in a marking contest.

Brisbane led by 11 points at quarter-time after a sluggish start but scorching finish to the opening term.

The Bulldogs were on top early with Tom Liberatore hitting the scoreboard twice as the visitors dominated the contest on the ground and moved the ball out of defence with ease.

But Brisbane emphatically seized the momentum with three rapid-fire goals with Cameron, Linc McCarthy and Joe Daniher all booting goals on the back of Brisbane dominating centre clearances with ruckman Oscar McInerney getting his hand to the Sherrin first.

Cameron’s third goal for the term was a gem as he collected the bouncing ball at full pace and kicked across his body from 40 metres out to send the Gabba faithful wild.

Essendon supporters were irate at a number of umpiring howlers in the sudden-death final against the Bulldogs in Launceston last week. The Gabba faithful were revolting on Saturday when the Dogs received 10 free kicks to Brisbane’s four in the second term. Some were there – despite the passionate protests of some Brisbane supporters – but a few were very soft calls against the Lions. In short, they had a shocker. None of the officials at the Gabba should figure in the preliminary finals.

Concussion concerns

It was carnage at halftime with both sides losing players to head knocks. The Bulldogs were forced to activate medical sub Jason Johannisen after Cody Weightman suffered a head knock when he ran into the substantial figure of Marcus Adams in the second term. Brisbane had to play the second half with one man short on the interchange bench after Jarrod Berry was ruled out of the match with concussion after hitting his head on the ground making a tackle.

Forward line nightmare

Lions senior coach Chris Fagan is always happy to talk about Dan McStay’s vital role in Brisbane’s forward structure. With McStay in the grandstands after getting knocked senseless last week, his influence was missed. After losing Eric Hipwood earlier in the season, the absence of McStay was critical as the Lions struggled for a period to capitalise on their inside 50 entry superiority. Losing McStay’s replacement, Jack Payne, in the second quarter saw defender Ryan Lester thrust into a forward role.

Week three fixture confirmed

The Bulldogs’ win confirmed the fixture for the third week of this year’s finals series. Melbourne is set to face the Cats at Perth’s Optus Stadium on Friday, September 10. The Bulldogs will meet Port Adelaide the following evening at Adelaide Oval. The winner of each clash advances to the grand final on September 25 which, for the first time in AFL/VFL history, will be hosted in Perth.

Caleb kicks off

There is a good reason why there is a Twitter account devoted to the “elite” kicking skills of diminutive Bulldogs defender Caleb Daniel. Time and again, Daniel was able to clear congestion with raking pinpoint kicks to teammates coming out of defence to thrust the Bulldogs into counter-attack. Brisbane allowed Daniel to sprint 15 to 20 metres out of the goalsquare before he pumped the Sherrin to the centre of the field.

Score:

LIONS: 5.3/6.5/9.9/11.12 (78)

BULLDOGS: 3.4/6.6/7.11/11.13 (79)

Goals:

LIONS: Cameron 3, Bailey 2, McCarthy, Daniher, Robinson, McCluggage, Lester, Fullarton

BULLDOGS: Smith 3, Liberatore 2, Naughton, Hannan, Weightman, Johannisen, Macrae, Schache,

Greg Davis’ best:

LIONS: McCluggage, Zorko, Robinson, Cameron, Lyons, Coleman, McInerney

BULLDOGS: Macrae, Daniel, Bontempelli, B.Smith, Dale, Hunter, Dunkley

Injuries:

LIONS: Jack Payne (head cut), Jarrod Berry (concussion)

BULLDOGS: Cody Weightman (head knock), Bontempelli (knee)

Crowd:

36,470

The Cats were scrappy early but pulled away in the second half to claim a 15.13 (103) to 10.8 (68) victory at Optus Stadium in Perth.

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After a very poor showing against Port Adelaide last week, Geelong bounced back and rediscovered some good form against the Giants.

It was a low-scoring start to the game, with the Cats kicking only two goals in the first quarter while GWS didn’t record a goal in their worst start to a game all season.

Geelong had a 15-point lead at quarter time and were never headed, despite GWS mounting mini-comebacks in the second and fourth quarters.

Gun key forward Tom Hawkins kicked five goals for the Cats, including three in the final term as his side ran away with the game.

The only sour note for Geelong came when midfielder Brandan Parfitt was substituted out of the match with a hamstring injury.

The result was a fitting way to celebrate captain Joel Selwood becoming Geelong’s all-time games record-holder with 333 games.

There was a touching moment after the game when he was chaired off the field by Hawkins and the man whose record he broke — former teammate and current Geelong assistant coach Corey Enright.

Selwood also notched up his 35th appearance in finals matches, drawing level with Port Adelaide and Hawthorn great Shaun Burgoyne at second on the all-time list.

Only seven-time premiership Hawk Michael Tuck has played more finals games in VFL/AFL history.

Geelong’s form in finals was questioned during the week, but Chris Scott’s men proved the doubters wrong to book their place in an incredible fifth preliminary final in six years.

They will face premiership favourites Melbourne next week for a place in the grand final.

However, the clash with the Giants failed to live up to the intensity expected of finals football and AFL pundits believe the Cats will struggle to challenge the Demons.

“I don’t think Melbourne are quaking in their boots right now based on what they’ve seen,” St Kilda great Nick Riewoldt told Fox Footy.

“I know it can change from week to week but nothing there would be scaring them.”

Earlier in the game, fans were convinced the Cats were getting the rub of the green from the umpires in the first half.

They were up in arms when Tom Hawkins kicked a goal after it appeared he pushed Giants defender Sam Taylor in the back before taking the mark.

“This is one of the blights on the game at the moment,” former Brownlow medallist Gerard Healy said on AFL Nation, referring to free kicks not being paid for a push in the back.

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