In the land of the AFL rebuild Geelong are serial renovators – finally they have it right

On the supposedly level playing fields of AFL football, the rebuild is a fate that should come to all clubs at some time or another. Some embrace the necessary evil and the long-term benefits a list refresh can bring. Others have it thrust upon them. Others still would sooner sell their souls.

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Geelong fit firmly in the latter camp. For a decade now the Cats have had chances galore to do the honourable thing and start anew, but at every turn they have declined the sinister overtures of the narrowing premiership window. Each year since their most recent flag in 2011, the third in a period of excellence spanning five seasons, Geelong have positioned themselves at season’s start with sincere belief they can go again.

Each year, however, they have failed. Though always on the premises – under Chris Scott, only in 2015 have the finals taken place without Geelong – their repeated efforts to defy equalisation and win another premiership have fallen flat. If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, then Geelong are certifiably bonkers.

But while outsiders might snigger at Geelong’s almost petulant endeavours to keep the party going, in 2021 there looks to be method to their madness. Or, more precisely, they finally appear to have got it right.

Not that they are doing things much differently to seasons past. If anything, Geelong have doubled down on their modus operandi of using free agency and trade to bolster their ranks. With the departure over time of Geelong’s golden generation – from Gary Ablett to Jimmy Bartel to Paul Chapman and a galaxy of stars in between, almost all of whom came via the national draft and occasionally via the father-son rule – in their place has arrived established senior players from rival clubs.

For years now the Cats have been little more than onlookers on draft night but rabid in their commitment to identify and secure the best available talent in the marketplace. Though the likes of Patrick Dangerfield and Tim Kelly have helped keep Geelong relevant, the puzzle has still been a piece or two short of completion. The Cats might have made it all the way through to the 2020 grand final, but the glass-half-empty conclusion from their loss to Richmond was they have a way to go to again be considered genuine premiership contenders.

Although starting 2021 with an off-colour loss to the Crows in Adelaide, Geelong now have the shape a team building towards something. After 13 rounds the Cats are primed for a top-four finish and are unbeaten since losing to Sydney in round seven. A snapshot of their growth was revealed on Thursday night in their victory over Port Adelaide, an outfit they lost to in a 2020 qualifying final at the same ground and one roundly expected to go close this campaign.

In that final Geelong suffered for a lack of options up front, a concern that had become recurring with an over-reliance on Tom Hawkins. Enter Jeremy Cameron, who made his way from the Giants to Kardinia Park as a free agent. The key forward missed the first five rounds with a hamstring complaint but is now making up for lost time, booting five goals against the Power and having a hand in others. With the attacking instincts of Luke Dahlhaus, Shaun Higgins and Isaac Smith added to the mix, plus the career-best form of former Sydney Swan Gary Rohan, it is hard to think of a more potent forward line in the AFL.

“Our forwards looked really dangerous and that’s something we’ve been working on for a long time,” Scott said in Adelaide. Though he happily concedes he “tends to pick the defenders” when lavishing praise, the Geelong coach cannot hide his delight at the blossoming partnership between Hawkins and Cameron.

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“It’s coming along quite nicely,” he said. “If you’d asked me two or three years ago I wouldn’t have been able to forecast that our key forward at a forward-50 stoppage would hit it to our other key forward and kick a goal. But Jeremy is capable of doing some pretty special things. I thought [he] did some things very few players in the competition could do tonight.” In Cameron, the biggest vacancy in Geelong’s incomplete puzzle looks to be filled.

With triumphs already over Brisbane, West Coast, Richmond and Port – and now crucially a healthy list from which to choose – Geelong will be confident their best is as good as anyone’s. Melbourne supporters might beg to differ, and we will doubtless learn more when the Cats host Western Bulldogs on Friday night.

In their present incarnation, Geelong are all in. Dangerfield, Joel Selwood, Hawkins, Smith, Higgins, Zach Tuohy, Mark Blicavs: these are men on the wrong side of 30 and nearer the end than the start. It is tempting to say it is boom or bust for the Cats, that it will be curtains if this group fails to deliver a premiership, but by now we should know better than that.