Those who love footy, and the games within the games, were waiting patiently, or not so patiently in my case, for the Crows and Dogs to clash in Round 18.
Not that there weren’t other games that tickled the fancy of the football world, but the pending clash between two of the game’s best young forwards was something even supporters of other teams, like me, were looking forward to.
I genuinely don’t think the league is good at promoting itself, anymore. Here, you had the name on the tip of everyone’s tongue, Sam Darcy, at one end. And at the other, the man who has made a huge leap in 2025 to become the focal point of the Adelaide offence.
The Dogs had beaten nobody and needed a scalp, dispute Luke Beveridge making the point that they were not Navajo Indians. The Crows needed to entrench themselves in the top four.
In a contest that meant so much to either club, this was treated like just another game by the broadcasters, but it felt like so much more.
And so much more should have been made of it.
This was Round One of Darcy versus Thilthorpe, as much as it was the Dogs versus the Crows, and it didn’t fail to deliver.
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