Most of my family are Saints fans, so I know how much 09 still stings, however after 08 there was no way known the Cats were going to let that one slip.
As a neutral I’d argue their capitulation in the 05 prelim would be their worst. That team was primed for a flag and had a stacked list, coming off one of their all-time best wins against Adelaide in the QF, but completely gave up in a home final to the Paul Roos Swans.
That’s a very very good call out
I’d think the draw would have hurt more than anything else. The Milne bounce. I guess technically that isn’t a loss even though they were smashed in the replay.
We may well see a few green shoots this year, but they’ll come to not very much with this dull, unimaginative plodder of a coach.
On a dry day they win 2009 by a comfy 6 goals imo, yes as @rossoneri pointed out Geelong were also great that season but that was St Kilda’s time. If i was to do St Kilda’s top 3 im going:
09 GF
10 GFR
Our streak breaker, if they beat us they genuinely could have gone undefeated
You mean that type we have every second week or so…?
And those are just his strong points.
Add in the prelim losses of 04 and 05 and that would round out their top five.
| St Kilda | 5.1.31 | 7.2.44 | 14.4.88 | 17.6.108 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Essendon | 2.3.15 | 5.5.35 | 6.7.43 | 8.7.55 |
Essendon had finals on the line late in the season and were coming off a poor home loss to Adelaide by 2 pts the previous week.
St Kilda came into the game sitting in the bottom 4 with their season practically over.
St Kilda won the uncontested possessions 274-217.
Click here to go to worst loss #30.
Forgot that this game spawned one of the greatest Herbatron vids of all time.
I reckon 2009 Anzac Day would definitely feature for Collingwood.
I reckon you’re wrong about the 2022 PF. All the Pies fans I know saw that one as the ultimate “honourable loss”. They were outclassed and behind all day but never gave up and gave Sydney an almighty scare. That team was dead ordinary (and their fans knew it) and enjoyed a magic carpet ride of ridiculous wins. I think at one point they won about 10 in a row and nine of them were by less than 10 points or something like that. Plus the fans all knew they would never have beaten Geelong in the granny. The only frustration they have is Sydney crapping themselves on the big stage. They’re under no illusion they would have won but they reckon they would have done much better than that.
Throw in that you can argue it led to 2023 and all the Pies fans I’ve seen have absolutely no bitterness about that game.
Given how ordinary we were for the Knights era, we had a lot of good wins over very good teams in that era. Maybe not top 5 (the games were never that important), but there’d be quite a few “how did we lose to those guys” type games from that era.
2004 was the one where they opened up on fire and were all over Port in the first 10 minutes until Gehrig kicked his ton and the resulting ground invasion gave Port a free “time out” to get their composure. Grant Thomas is still bitter about that.
True, they surrendered a five goal lead that game, and it will go down as one of Gavin Wanganeen’s finest performances, but playing the top side away from home in a prelim was always going to be an uphill battle.
2005 was the year that should have been theirs. They’d had the necessary finals experience by that point, they were established as a true contender, yet playing at home in a prelim they gave up seven goals in the final quarter to a team routinely criticised for playing too defensively.
| Essendon | 5.0.30 | 5.2.32 | 7.7.49 | 9.11.65 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| St Kilda | 1.6.12 | 4.8.32 | 8.11.59 | 11.15.81 |
18 pts up at QT. Refused to get out of 1st gear despite only being ahead due to accuracy.
St Kilda led by as much as 29 pts in the 4th QTR.
St Kilda eventually finished 18th while Essendon finished 7th (on the ladder).
Nick Riewoldt, Leigh Montagna and Lenny Hayes, all of whom were 30+ years of age, shared the Brownlow votes.
Click here to go to worst loss #29.
All I remember from this game is that Reiwoldt absolutely dominated Hurley.
This game killed the momentum we had built in early 2014. The first few weeks we had played some scintillating football, and it came to a screeching halt with that dire performance vs the Saints. A microcosm of that season.
Don’t know about top 5, but for the Saints, I’d nominate two losses to Freo:
“Sirengate” where Steven Baker kicked a point after the siren to tie the game when the umpires didn’t hear the siren and some of the Freo players stopped playing. This was then reversed to a St Kilda loss during the week, which I don’t think has ever happened before.
The “Whispers in the sky” game in 2005. St Kilda lost after the siren, thanks in no small part to Freo kicking about 5 goals directly from free kicks (pretty much all of them dubious). There was an AFL investigation into this one after Tony Jones said he heard a couple of umpires joking / bragging about ****ing over the Saints on the flight home (hence “whispers in the sky”) as retaliation for Grant Thomas publicly bagging the umpires during the week.
Another one would be the 2005 loss to Brisbane where Riewoldt broke his collarbone and then got bumped by a couple of Brisbane players as he was trying to get off the ground.
| Adelaide | 7.2.44 | 10.3.63 | 17.6.108 | 24.7.151 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Essendon | 2.1.13 | 7.4.46 | 7.5.47 | 9.9.63 |
Luke Jericho kicked 4 of his 33 career goals for Adelaide.
Fun fact: One of three 4-goal hauls for Ken McGregor against Essendon.
Essendon’s Paul Thomas had 0 disposals in his 75% of time on ground. He did however manage 5 tackles and 2 one-percenters.
Click here to go to worst loss #28.
