Geelong were the first team to be knocked out of the 2018 AFL finals series after the Demons comprehensively won the first elimination final by 29 points at the MCG on Friday.
There was much hope for the Cats at the beginning of the season due to prodigal son Gary Ablett Jnr returning to the club where he won two premierships.
Along with Ablett, Stewart Crameri, Tim Kelly, Charlie Constable, Gryan Miers and Lachie Fogarty joined forces at the Cattery to provide the club with some silky skills and much-needed composure.
Considering their movements in the off-season, it's easy to say that Geelong's season was a bust.
MORE: Melbourne v Geelong: Cats left behind as Dees burst out the blocks
Coach Chris Scott lamented his side's poor start to the match where the Demons, who were playing their first finals game since 2006, jumped out of the blocks.
"I think the final margin was 29 points and they got out to 30-plus or whatever it was. So on the scoreboard, the game was relatively even post that start,” Scott said post-match.
“We blew some chances that were inexplicable in our mind early and gave them some opportunities that were a bit uncharacteristic of us.
“So they were clearly dominant for the clearances and around the ball, which is their strength, we knew that. But it wasn’t as if early on we were just blown away, they just chipped away and made the most of their chances early. They had some chances obviously late that they could have taken but I think that was a bit the same with both teams.
“But you get killed in the clearances, killed in the contested ball, killed in the ground balls inside forward 50. They tackled better than we did, they certainly smothered better than we did – we might have given them some opportunities to smother. But I almost can’t think of a facet of the game that we outplayed them in.”
One of the biggest talking points of the encounter came from an incident involving Geelong skipper Joel Selwood, who brought a stop to the Cats' momentum after Melbourne's hot start.
Tom Hawkins had a chance to bring the margin to 14 points with a very gettable set shot in the third quarter, but the ball was taken out of his hands by umpires due to Selwood's indiscretion which occurred off the ball, 100 metres away.
Replays showed Selwood wrestling with Melbourne's Jake Melksham before throwing him to the ground and resuming hostilities with James Harmes.
Joel Selwood cost his side a shot at goal after giving away a free kick for a scuffle on the wing. #AFLFinals pic.twitter.com/7HQ1cTFWuc
— AFL.com.au (@AFLcomau) September 7, 2018
Scott wasn't happy with Selwood post-match.
“I think Joel’s smart enough to know that that was the wrong thing to do in the situation,” he said.
“But I must admit, I’m an advocate for umpires paying free kicks for high contact or holding way off the ball – in my view it doesn’t happen often enough.
“So we had a pretty good view of it – it was right in front of the bench, it was a free kick.
“You see that stuff going on behind the play regularly, Joel was either not smart enough or unlucky enough to do it right in front of the emergency umpire. I’m surprised it doesn’t happen more often.
“But when you’ve got a gettable shot to take you 15 points in a game where not much was going right for us, that was up there with the bad bits.”
