A screamer, a banana and a monster torp: Breaking down the brilliant moments of Anzac Day draw

Jamie Elliott said his Anzac Day skyscraper was the best of many memorable marks in his mercurial career, so good that it didn’t matter whether or not he kicked the goal. He did, of course.

And he was still rubbing his eyes in wonder at Bobby Hill’s laser-guided sidewinder of a kick to him in the first quarter that laid his other goal on a platter.

As for Scott Pendlebury, he did Scott Pendlebury things. His 10,000-and-someteenth disposal in AFL footy was a running torpedo from the half-back line to lone ranger Brody Mihocek, who was what must have seemed kilometres away. In anyone else’s hands, it could have gone horribly wrong. In Pendlebury’s hands, it became a goal for Mihocek.

Collingwood’s Jamie Elliott takes a screamer in the Anzac Day clash.Credit: Channel Seven

An Anzac Day match that honoured its great tradition, right down to a replication of the drawn scoreline that set the ball rolling nearly 30 years ago, was studded with moments both sublime and ridiculous for both teams. These three moments spoke for all for the Magpies, but the Bombers will have their own selection, and it will be no less worthy.

The banana bender

For the first quarter of an hour, Collingwood couldn’t lay a glove on Essendon. They’d finally found a toehold in the game when Beau McCreery burst from the wing and Hill gathered the incoming kick deep at left half-forward.

Notionally, he should have kicked with his left foot, but that might not have been strong enough to find Elliott, who was streaming down the middle. So he laid it onto the outside of his right foot and it unfurled like an olden-days streamer onto the chest of Elliott in the goal square. He had to break neither stride nor into a sweat.

“I was running my patterns,” said Elliott. “And I was thinking, if he kicks it this way, then I’m here. But I couldn’t believe he kicked it like that. It’s sort of shaped to me. And then it went with me to the goal square, which is just phenomenal.

“That’s Bobby Hill. He does some freakish things out there. And it’s great seeing him being able to express himself.”

Ageing legs launch a torp for the ages

As the Magpies tried to consolidate their fightback in the second quarter, the ball fell to Pendlebury at centre half-back. In the way of modern footy, pretty much everyone was concertinaed into that half of the ground.

Pendlebury’s only outlet was the distant Mihocek. His 60-metre torpedo put Mihocek in the box seat, leaving Essendon full-back Ben McKay with no option but to give away a free kick for front-on contact. The second of Mihocek’s three goals ensued, off-set by three behinds and three out on the full. It was that sort of day for both clubs.

In the second half, the match settled into a surge and counter-surge pattern. In the maelstrom, Elliott wasn’t sure who had kicked the ball his way; he thought it might have been Brayden Maynard. Actually, it was Jordan de Goey. It set up McKay for Elliott as if he was a bag at practice.

“Normally, I get told to stay down and crumb, but one of my strengths is jumping at the ball,” he said. “Normally, I’ve got a defender on my back bodying me, checking me, so I don’t get a clean run at it.

“But with that one, I felt like I had prime position. There was no one behind me. I was the deepest and I had a good sit.”

“It was nice getting off (Jake) Kelly for a bit, so I didn’t have him sitting on my shoulder. It was just sitting there. It was nice to get a free run at the ball. I jumped at it and fortunately it stuck.”

This was not Elliott’s first rodeo, but it was his best ride. He was airborne long enough to have fleeting thoughts about what could go wrong. They have before. For all anyone knows, he’s still up there. Actually, he’s not. Here he was, straggling out of the medical room, almost incognito in a hoodie. But his mind was still aloft.

“That’s definitely my best,” he said. I was surprised I could still jump that high. I felt like I was up there and I was shitting myself. I was thinking, I’ve got the perfect sit, don’t drop it. I’m up there, watching the ball come into my hands. It felt like it I was in slow motion.”

Jamie Elliott flies high.Credit: AFL Photos

It was the sort of mark that teammates celebrate in the moment. Hell, it was the sort of mark that opponents even acknowledge grudgingly. It was the sort of mark that even Essendon fans could not help but applaud. Nobly, they did.

Then came the hard bit. “I felt like the mark was good enough that if I kicked the goal, it’s extra,” Elliott said. “It’s a tough spot to kick it out there. It was pretty breezy, the wind was pushing back at me from that end.

“We saw goals missed down that end all night. (Essendon’s Kyle Langford later would ruefully attest to that). I got onto it nicely and it was nice to finish.”

There would be no lid on this. Lids are not the way of footy now. Self-expression is.

“As a team we feed off energy and moments,” Elliott said. “We’ve got a lot of exciting players and I feel like at that time (the game) was a little bit static. It seesawed.” A game that was both static and see-sawing at the same time? Yes, it really was one of those days.

“So if we can draw a little bit of energy whether that’s me taking my mark Bobby kicking a goal, Beau doing a chasedown tackle, Bill Frampton doing a massive spoil, we feed off those moments,” Elloitt said. “It was nice to do that, and get the crowd involved and then the players got up .. hopefully we’ve got a little bit of momentum.”

In the end, neither team could carry momentum to the end. Call it a dynamic stalemate. Without those three goals, Collingwood would have lost. They didn’t. With them, they should have won, but didn’t, either. It was that sort of day. It was why at the end, everyone, all 93,000-plus were left feeling … whatever that feeling is.

Like his stellar mark, Elliott probably had the best grip on it. “I’m a bit flat. I dropped a chest mark (in the dying minutes),” he said. “But what a game of football! It was an incredible game of football on a really special day. As a spectator, a supporter, you can’t ask for much more.”

Though either side would have taken one more behind.

Keep up to date with the best AFL coverage in the country. Sign up for the Real Footy newsletter.