Scott Pendlebury describes what playing in an AFL Grand Final is like

WHAT is it like to play in the Grand Final? Scott Pendlebury takes us behind the scenes.

Pendlbury

ADRENALIN is surging through your veins.

Such is the feeling of invincibility that if someone said to you, ‘Try and run through a brick wall’ you would say, ‘I can do that’.

This is what it feels like to run on to the MCG before a Grand Final.

It is an incredible feeling that comes at the end of an extraordinary week; a week that includes the Brownlow Medal, the parade and a massive load of Grand Final hysteria that needs to be carefully negotiated.

Thompson could still coach

But you wouldn’t want to be doing anything else. As the Hawthorn and Fremantle boys lap up the countdown, I think back to our appearance at the big dance against St Kilda in 2010 and the week prior.

When you hear the final siren sound in a preliminary final, relief washes over you. The Hawks and Dockers would have been no different.

You think, ‘Wow, I’m going to play in a Grand Final’, but then you do a scan of your whole body to make sure you’re all sweet for next week. It’s just a little moment of selfishness because you’ve worked so very hard, you started training in November and you have talked about this game for so long.

You get back into the rooms and belt out the song and you see your family and friends and they’re ecstatic for you.

In 2010 we beat Geelong in the prelim and it was a similar game to Fremantle-Sydney in that it was done at half-time, basically. I remember Mick Malthouse saying afterwards something like: “Well done, you’re in a Grand Final, but we still haven’t achieved our ultimate goal.” It was that simple.

Pendlebury

Then he said we would be in the hands of director of sports science David Buttifant for the next 48 hours to get our bodies as fresh as possible.

You get in your car to drive home and turn your phone back on and a stream of messages come through congratulating you. Some are from people you haven’t heard from in ages. It’s great.

We reported back to the club on Sunday morning for a day dedicated to recovery. All the boys were talking about the Grand Final, how cool it was going to be, and the parade. You speak to players who had played in one, such as Tarkyn Lockyer, Alan Didak and Ben Johnson, and they say: “The parade will blow your mind.”

We were told to embrace the week. Hawthorn has been through it all before so I think that gives it an early advantage, whereas Fremantle’s players don’t know what to expect and there’s no one to turn to. Maybe assistant coach Brett Kirk is a good one for them, while Ross Lyon has also been there and knows how to handle it and clearly they worship Ross as a coach.

One thing I wasn’t prepared for was training. We were used to running around with 30-40 people watching, but in Grand Final week, with school holidays and no other teams playing, they come from everywhere.

At our first training session, on the Monday, there were about 5000 people. I was just so pumped and energised to train that I remember thinking to myself, ‘I’ve got to pull it back here or I’ll end up playing the game in my head and I’ll expend all my energy during the week’.

That year Dane Swan was the favourite for that night’s Brownlow Medal. He was something like $1.60 and pretty much everyone thought he was going to win because he had an amazing season.

But to be honest the Brownlow is not something you want to do if you’re playing in a Grand Final. It’s a long night. That Monday we were saying, ‘Gee, it would be good if they let the two Grand Final teams off and you didn’t have to go to the count’.

So we got to Crown as late as we could and we left as soon as they said: “And the winner of the Brownlow Medal is Chris Judd.” Everyone had their sip and we were straight out the door. As we walked out the St Kilda boys were right behind us. We gave each other a bit of a nod and said something like, ‘Don’t fall down the stairs’.

After a bit of a swim and an open media day on Tuesday, we had our main training session on the Wednesday. It was madness.

We trained at Gosch’s Paddock and there were barricades snaking about 200m away from the ground and people were high-fiving you, taking photos and it was just a great buzz. Speaking of buzzing, there were helicopters circling overhead and such was the excitement it felt like you’d recovered almost instantly from the preliminary final only a few days earlier.

Thursday was our day off, which was great to take stock and chill out, but it didn’t mean you were guaranteed to escape the hype.

Even going down the street and grabbing a coffee it was all ‘Good luck’ and ‘How do you think you’ll go?’ I was living in Williamstown and every shop window had posters, streamers and balloons.

A 15-minute coffee turned into an hour coffee because people wanted to talk about the game. You quickly learned to stay inside a bit more.

Friday was probably the weirdest day. Normally we would train, have a team meeting, then a divisional meeting and finish with a massage and go out for lunch.

But on Grand Final eve it was training, meeting and then we all jumped on a bus for the parade. We sat inside this room off St Kilda Rd for about an hour, just chatting and staring into our phones. Then the team manager piped up about 10 minutes before we went out: “Righto, Pendlebury, Thomas, truck one, Jolly and Ball truck two...”

It’s mind-blowing how many people turn out to watch the parade. You’re getting interviewed and chased by media the whole way around.

But then you get out of the ute, you’re standing there in front of a sea of people and you see the captains hold the cup aloft. That’s when you get this tingly feeling and you almost wish there was a footy field nearby so you could just go at it right there.

From the time the parade finished to the game happened really quickly for me. I hit the sack about 10.30pm and slept well, but as soon as I woke up about 7am I was wide awake. It was eyes open and bang. I took the dog for a walk and went to the beach for a swim and tried to kill a bit of time.

I can remember Mick saying to leave early to get to the game because there would be traffic. On my way to the MCG there was an accident on the West Gate Bridge and I was getting a bit nervous. It probably took me 45 minutes to get to the ground, but I was still early.

Scott Pendlebury

The other difference on Grand Final day is you can’t go out onto the ground for a walk. Some guys who have routines like going out for a kick can’t do it. We were lucky we had been through Anzac Day games, which have a similar routine entertainment-wise. But because guys can’t get out, all this energy builds up within the room and this is where Fremantle — and to a lesser extent Hawthorn — will rely on their coaches and fitness staff. Mick was really good for us, he knew what to do and he kept us level. ‘Relax boys, it’s going to come,’ he said.

It was probably a sign of nerves, but looking back we talked more than normal that day. Perhaps we were trying to act like we weren’t nervous, but we were.

When Mick gave his final message he was just trying to get us to actually listen because he knew we were so ready to go we may not be taking it in.

That talk was part motivation and part technical. ‘Don’t forget if we’re in this situation this has got to happen’.

You can fall into the trap of just playing on emotion in a Grand Final, like just going for the big hits. But you can lose your head. You have to play smart and you always hear the first team that settles is the first team that makes the right decisions and scores first.

The first five minutes is the most intense football you’ve ever lived. Nobody takes a short step, everyone does that extra thing and everyone lays it on the line. That’s why it’s so important to be the first side that settles. If you take a mark, go back and have a look and hit an option. Don’t just say, ‘I’ve got the ball’ and boot it.

But the intensity simply doesn’t drop for the whole game. It’s frantic. What Fremantle did for the first 2½ quarters last week, they’ll do for four quarters on Saturday. Hawthorn is going to feel so good about itself going in on the back of that last quarter against Geelong.

It’s going to a cracker of a game. Hawthorn v Fremantle. Offence v defence.