“No rebuild,” Chris Scott promised the Geelong players and supporters half a decade ago. “No acquiescence to equalisation.” In the AFL, the theory goes, the house always wins. The house beat Alastair Clarkson’s Hawthorn. It beat Damien Hardwick’s Richmond. You take your turn at the bottom. That’s the deal. That’s the price of being good.
After all, you can defy the handicapper all you like but you can’t fight father time. Many of Scott’s best players turned up to the 2022 premiership celebrations wearing wigs and wielding walking sticks. The flag, a decade in the making and the end of the Joel Selwood era, seemed like a full stop. In 2023 the older players were legless, the backline was decimated, and youngsters didn’t seem ready.
