2025 - Round 28 : 2nd v 3rd

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The bookmakers have the Cats defeating the Lions by about two goals, which is equivalent to about 60 to 65% favourites.

There have been four Grand Finals since 2000 where 2nd on the ladder faced 3rd, and the teams from 3rd have won three of those contests but not the most recent, which occurred in 2018 and saw West Coast defeat Collingwood.

More generally, teams from 2nd on the ladder have seen themselves playing in the Grand Final in 13 of the 25 previous seasons, winning 7 and losing 6, with five of those seven victories coming in games against the minor premier.

Teams from 3rd have participated 12 times, winning seven and losing five with four of them to minor premiers.

MOSHBODS RATINGS

A team’s final ladder position is not always a good guide to its underlying ability (as the Western Bulldogs can attest this season), so let’s look at the relationship between recent Grand Final success, and offensive and defensive Ratings.

By eye, it looks as though more Premiers were superior offensively (ie higher) than they were defensively (ie more rightwards), and the table below confirms this.

What the table also shows, is that offensive superiority has been more important than defensive superiority since about 2007 and that this is the only period of history where this has been the case. That would be good news for Cats fans.

There’s also, however, a hint that we might be returning to a more normal phase where defensive superioritiy is more important. That would be better news for Lions fans.

TIPS AND PREDICTIONS

There are no contrarian tips for the Grand Final. As such, we can declare MoSHPlay_Marg the winner amongst the Head-to-Head Tipsters.

There’s also little variability in margin forecasts, which span only 5 points from MoSSBODS_Marg’s 10 points to MoSHBODS_Marg’s 15 points.

Given this small range, we can also confidently congratulate ENS_Linear for being best Margin Predictor.

Finally, amongst the Head-to-Head Probability Predictors the probability forecasts span only 7% points with MoSSBODS_Prob lowest on 60%, and MoSHBODS_Prob highest on 67%

Here too then, the differences are so small that the results are unlikely to alter the current Leaderboard.

As such, we congratulate Bookie_LPSO for being this year’s best Head-to-Head Probability Predictor.





WAGERS

Investors have just a line wager this week.

(Please click on the image at right to access a larger version.)

The possible outcomes are:

GEELONG v BRISBANE LIONS

  • Geelong wins: 0.3% x 0.91 x 65% = +0.2%

  • Geelong loses: -0.3% x 65% = -0.2%

To finish, here are MoSSBODS’ and MoSHBODS’ opinions about likely team scoring.

Commentary about these forecasts will come in the week's Overs/Unders blog and MoSHPlay’s various forecasts will be posted after the relevant team line-ups are made public.