This seems right.

Finally, Geelong and the Brisbane Lions will meet in a grand final. It’s the game football fans have been waiting all year for – perhaps even longer.

They each have four premierships this century and are competing in their seventh grand final of the 2000s.

The Cats, with stars Patrick Dangerfield and Jeremy Cameron, and the Lions, with stars Will Ashcroft and Cam Rayner, will play off in the grand final on Saturday.Credit: Stephen Kiprillis

Back in 2004, I was playing for an emerging Cats line-up that came agonisingly close to toppling the formidable Lions in a preliminary final. We lost by nine points. Last year the Lions charged over the top of the Cats by 10 points in a preliminary final that was one of the games of the year and cruised to the premiership the next week. In between those matches, Geelong booked themselves grand final berths in 2020 and 2022 by beating Brisbane in prelims.

The point is, even though these clubs have never met in a VFL/AFL grand final, their recent rivalry is fierce. They were the two best teams of 2025 and have both constantly put themselves in a position to challenge for the premiership.

The admiration I have for Brisbane Lions coach Chris Fagan and the others who have helped him turn around their club is immense. After the glory days of the early 2000s, Brisbane lost their way for a few years there, but Fagan and Greg Swann – as CEO until he joined the AFL earlier this year – righted the ship. The alignment from that pair through to list management and their recruiting and medical teams has made them one of the AFL’s destination clubs.

Every time a challenge has confronted them this year, they have answered the call. Injuries, a tough loss, form issues, whatever it’s been, Fagan has navigated their premiership defence perfectly.

Geelong on the other hand, are methodical, metronomically putting themselves in contention deep in the season.

Their development program under former Lions great Nigel Lappin continues to identify and produce high-level AFL players from unlikely origins. Fourteen Cats in their preliminary final win over Hawthorn were selected with........

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