Live blog: Time for the big one

Rohan Connolly There were echoes of Geelong's massive preliminary final fright against Collingwood five years ago in Hawthorn's near disaster against a gallant Adelaide at the same stage of the season on Saturday...

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Rohan Connolly

The scare Hawks had to have

Rohan Connolly Hawthorn has the fundamentals in place to win the flag.

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Don't sell this heavyweight short

Rohan Connolly When Sydney steps on to the grand final stage on Saturday, it still won't be seen as anything like an AFL heavyweight. But perhaps now it should.

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Football

Time to collide

Rohan Connolly While it won't be a blowout, Hawthorn's superior skills and potent attack should deliver the flag.

Hawks find salvation in deadly duo

Rohan Connolly Deja vu can never have felt as chilling for any Hawthorn supporter than during the final quarter last night. It was happening again.

Rohan Connolly

Can Crows defy odds?

Rohan Connolly Whatever happens in today's Hawthorn-Adelaide preliminary final, it's a game that has already created history of sorts.

Live blog: Preliminary discussions

Rohan Connolly Two weekends ago, some long-standing finals football maxims looked set to be seriously challenged. They weren't.

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Sorry Jack, but three aces trumped you

Rohan Connolly It goes without saying that you can't please everyone when picking an All-Australian team, but generally you'll find reasonable consensus about at least 75 per cent of those selected.

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It's club rivalry that really matters

Rohan Connolly Two preliminary finals pitting a Victorian team against a side from over the border. Even a few years ago, that might have had the locals manning the barricades.

Rohan Connolly

Rest key to Sydney's hopes

Rohan Connolly The Swans could be buoyed by preliminary finals history.

Rohan Connolly

Hawks are Adelaide's last hurrah

Rohan Connolly They've had a good year, but the Crows don't have enough in their arsenal to beat Hawthorn.

Magpies get their reward

Rohan Connolly Collingwood can, and has, played a lot better quality football than it did last night, and will certainly need to if it is to have any chance of winning the premiership.

Rohan Connolly

Lyon-sized Dockers show finals quality

Rohan Connolly There's a parallel between Ross Lyon as coach of St Kilda and his efforts at Fremantle.

Live blog: Are you jumping off the bandwagon?

Rohan Connolly It is pretty easy to jump off the bandwagon of a qualifying final loser. Easy and almost always wrong. It is worth repeating the figures ....

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Pies and Crows look vulnerable

Rohan Connolly It is pretty easy to jump off the bandwagon of a qualifying final loser. Easy and almost always wrong.

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Dockers live by Lyon's lore

Rohan Connolly For Ross Lyon, it's about a job. And for him and his side, it's a job only partially done.

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Dockers rewrite the script

Rohan Connolly The scoreline at quarter-time looked as expected. But the teams were the wrong way round.

Crows by a nose on Swans

Rohan Connolly The visiting Swans will push the Crows early, but Adelaide has the better form.

Aussie Rules

Third time lucky for Magpies

Rohan Connolly COLLINGWOOD assistant coach Robert Harvey said yesterday the Magpies had taken plenty of confidence out of last week's return to some sort of form against Essendon.

AFL

Hawks clearly the best: Harvey

Rohan Connolly Magpies assistant coach Robert Harvey says team took confidence out of last week's win.