It all started from the centre bounce. As both teams moved to setup, nothing appeared out of the ordinary.
However, as soon as the umpire bounced the ball, Essendon’s David Zaharakis took off, hitting the ruck contest at top speed.
The idea behind this play was apparent; Zaharakis backed his pace to win out over Andrew Swallow, and gambled that Patrick Ryder would be able to win the tap to advantage.
The Bombers’ ruckman did exactly that, but didn’t count on Nick Dal Santo, opposed by Heath Hocking, standing in exactly the right position to thwart the Bombers’ plans. A few inches either way and Zaharakis could have been off to the races and within scoring position.
After Dal Santo banged the Sherrin forward, the second critical moment came.
Courtenay Dempsey backed himself to intercept the opposition’s kick, but it was just out of reach. Meanwhile Daniel Wells had opted to stay down and was rewarded as Aaron Black dished a handball.
Once Wells received possession, Dempsey had recovered well enough to challenge. However the magic skills of the number eight came through again, with a silky smooth dummy effectively eliminating the Essendon defender from the play.
This move proved crucial just a few seconds later.
Wells handballed over the top of the oncoming Cale Hooker to the waiting Drew Petrie.
If it wasn’t for Wells’ dummy on Dempsey prior to the handball, the vice-captain wouldn’t have had the time straighten his body just enough to kick the checkside.
In his desperation to stop Wells, Dempsey had sprawled to the MCG turf and was frantically attempting to make his way back into the play from a few metres away.
It then allowed the North midfielder to lay a shepherd on Hooker, as shown in the picture below.
But there was one more piece of the puzzle to aid Petrie.
Ryan Bastinac had run on the outside of play to provide an option and was relatively close to Petrie when the key-forward gained possession.
If the number three had stopped running, his opponent in David Myers would have been able to effect the shot on goal. However, Bastinac kept striding towards goal and forced his opponent to keep chasing, allowing Petrie an extra second to have his shot.
In such a close, high-stakes game, it was the little things which proved crucial in the end.
