2026 Pre-Season Analysis


I was flat out trying to work out how I can bequeath my meagre wealth to Collingwood (luckily they provided me with a step by step guide) because I’m pretty sure that in the current economic climate it would be of no use to any of my dear family, when I had the sudden realization that the season starts in less than two weeks!

I tried to enjoy the T20 World Cup, but it turns out the Australian Team have the skill of a sack of potatoes, and I found the Winter Olympics frustrating to watch.  Given the time of night it is on, I am consigned to watching the highlights.  I find it frustrating that Channel 9 doesn’t recognise that any other countries exist.  I can enjoy watching Australia, but when you get to see them crash out into last place and they don’t show you a world record setting run, I get annoyed.

A highlight though was the State of Origin.  It was a well received, well supported contest and we look forward to another installment next year.  A ticket gate issue meant that most of the crowd couldn’t get in the ground for most of the first quarter, but fortunately all they missed was watching Weitering lay on the ground for a while and then a stretcher.  Luckily, he is allegedly not so bad.  It would have helped if they had some in-ground pre-game entertainment to get the crowd in early.  Maybe they could have had some bands on or a curtain raiser with the state AFL Masters match…just an idea.

Match simulation gives a look at some young talent and the new rule updates which we seem to get every year.  What can we take from these matches?  Well, if you’re team won you can say they’re cherry ripe for the start of the season.  If they lost, you could say only suckers put in an effort in that match.

Currently there is no exciting news coming out of any clubs?  It seems like all coaches are safe at the moment, but we all know a loss in Opening Round is a perfect way to pile on Michael Voss.  In fact, if a butterfly flaps its wings in Argentina, this is also a good point to start piling on Voss.  Obviously, some players have moved clubs, and this always throws my statistics into a tail spin.  For example, I can have a level of accuracy in my predictions as I know exactly the probability that Carlton will win when Curnow is in the team, but I don’t know what the probability is that Carlton beat Sydney when Curnow is playing for Sydney.

Just like last season, I like to do a bit of pre-season ladder analysis to find out who did well from the fixturists and who got shafted.  The fixturing has a big sway in a teams fortunes, given its not a balanced system.  Consider the draw against how good the team actually is, and you have your winner.  Well…in theory anyway.

 


This year, Port Adelaide won the most favour, giving Josh Carr a leg up in the coaching stakes.  Port Adelaide also benefit from the best start to a season since Neolithic Man first planted crops at the end of Winter.  They play the bottom 4 teams from last year and 12th placed from last year.  Gold Coast, Essendon and North Melbourne also have good starts to the year.  Collingwood won the honour of the hardest start again facing four of last year’s top 6 in their first 5 matches.  These include the Premiers in a replay Preliminary Final grudge match, Minor Premiers in what is bound to be an Izak Rankine grudge match, GWS in a “we can’t seem to beat these guys” grudge match and Fremantle, which won’t necessarily be a grudge match although Mason Cox may hold a slight Grudge.  There are also tough starts for Fremantle, Adelaide and Footscray.

So, who’s going to win this year?  I’ll tell you in about 30 weeks’ time.  May your team go well this year and be free of on and off-field controversies and not appear in the Epstein files.  Most of all, despite what happens, enjoy it.

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