Former West Coast Eagle Will Schofield reveals what Fremantle must do to beat Brisbane, Luke Hodge goal 2015

It’s the image that still haunts me to this day.

I’m on my backside on the turf looking up and I see Luke Hodge, just seconds after he pushed me to the ground, snapping the most ridiculous banana goal you’ll see in a Grand Final.

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The MCG roared to life. The Hawks now led by 25 points at the start of the second term. It was the sixth goal in a run of nine consecutive Hawthorn majors. Game officially over.

But, honestly, the game was probably done well before that moment for the Eagles.

We’d played in a prelim in 2011, but this was our first Grand Final as a group and the club’s first decider since 2006. So pretty much everyone playing in the game – outside of Sharrod Wellingham, Xavier Ellis and Sam Butler – hadn’t experienced the week as a player before.

Looking back, I think we thought at the time the dream was to play in the Grand Final. Collectively, we were very happy to just be in it. Therefore, everything that went with Grand Final week was an amazing thing.

I remember the last main training session at Subiaco Oval with 20,000 people there. Then there was the Grand Final parade, the flood of media coverage, every person in your phone book congratulating you and wishing you good luck – and asking for tickets – and organising tickets and flights and accommodation for family – none of us really knew how to handle that. A lot of us did that work ourselves and spent a lot of the week caught up in those things.

You forgot you’re going to play a game of football.

I remember standing on the ground on the day before the game, watching the heats of the Grand Final sprint then watching some entertainment being set up. Then suddenly it clicked: “Oh, sh*t. I’ve gotta f***ing get strapped to play.”

I’ll never forget warming up for the granny and feeling like I had lead boots on. It was like I’d just run a marathon then had weights tied to my legs before the game.

And none of that was physical. It was all mental.

I didn’t prepare well enough. I didn’t get my head inside what it would take to win a Grand Final. I didn’t know my opposition well enough. I thought: “We just beat Hawthorn two weeks prior, we can do it again.”

Ultimately, we rocked up and got it handed to us.

It’s a true regret of my career, the way we played in that Grand Final. But I learnt everything from that week and was able to use it in 2018.

SAME STAGE, DIFFERENT APPROACH THREE YEARS LATER

I approached the Grand Final against Collingwood so differently.

I turned my phone off on the Wednesday. Like, fully off. I didn’t look at it once.

My wife handled all the tickets and accommodation. If anyone wanted a ticket or reached out to wish me good luck, they needed to go through her. She was an amazing support for me.

As a team, there were no sunglasses in the parade. Yes, we embraced the week, but we weren’t there to ‘enjoy it’, per se. After the Grand Final parade, it was a case of: ‘Present yourselves well, hold the cup up, stand there, get it done, get off, get back to preparing properly.’ Everything was about winning the game in 2018.

But, ultimately, the biggest thing I did was prepare properly. I’ve never been more prepared for a game in my life than I was for Collingwood in 2018, specifically for the role I played on the day. It just meant that when I ran out on Grand Final day, I was so clear, so focused and able to get in the zone immediately. A lot of us were like that.

Now on paper it didn’t go very well initially as we gave up the first five goals of the game. But there wouldn’t be too many teams who would’ve given their opposition such a head start then been able to pull off a comeback in a Grand Final like we did. That’s because we were so clear on our role and we had this belief we could get back into the game.

The bottom line is the dream is not just to reach an AFL Grand Final. It’s to prepare and then win a Grand Final. Any player who’s both lost and won a decider gets the difference. They understand both what the real dream is, the regret you have in the Grand Finals you’ve lost and the pure joy in the ones you’ve won.

EAGLES 2015 v FREO 2026

In terms of September experience, there are a few parallels between the Eagles of 2015 and the Dockers 2026.

Like us 11 years ago, Fremantle will go into Saturday’s match with three premiership players: Shai Bolton, Mason Cox and Luke Jackson.

But they’re not necessarily ‘better prepared’ than we were. A lot of our players learnt so much from losing in 2015, so we did a lot of things differently.

Freo, unfortunately, don’t have that experience. There’s a real danger they get carried away with it all if they don’t get their mindset right.

The difference is that Justin Longmuir’s Dockers, both on paper and in the way they’ve performed in 2026, are so much better than we could’ve ever been.

Freo has so many match-winners. You could argue the Dockers have up to 10 players who can rip a game apart by themselves. They don’t have as many role players as a lot of previous premiership sides.

Grand Finals come down to a mix of both player types. Yes, you need your top-band players – think Jackson, Bolton, Hayden Young, Murphy Reid and Josh Treacy – to stand up and win the game. But you also need your role players – think Judd McVee, Corey Wagner and Matty Johnson, to an extent – to do their job.

Those less-heralded Dockers need to have the games of their lives to keep up with the Lions, who’ve done it before. And Brisbane is going to be so much more prepared than Freo ever were or could be.

‘BRUTAL’ DOCKERS SELECTION CALL LOOMS

I think Fremantle is considering at least one change, if not more, for the Grand Final.

So far the Dockers have won just three of 12 quarters in this year’s finals series. No typo. Three quarters in three games. Clearly they’re not playing at the level they’d hoped to be at.

That’s where selection becomes so important. In a Grand Final, you can’t afford passengers – particularly against a Brisbane side that knows what it takes to win this game.

And the way a few Fremantle players performed in the first three quarters against Sydney, I reckon there’s a few spots up for grabs, with Mason Cox one of the players under pressure

I believe Cox was one mark away from being dropped. If he didn’t take that mark and kick that goal late against the Swans, he would’ve been vulnerable, because he’d had a negative impact on the game prior to that.

But I was at Optus Stadium on Sunday to see Peel Thunder’s WAFL grand final triumph and watched Sean Darcy play – and Darcy isn’t at the level to be selected for an AFL Grand Final. He wasn’t clean enough and just didn’t look fit enough, to be honest.

Brandon Walker, though, is a really interesting call. He played exceptionally well in the WAFL granny on Sunday. His defensive actions stood out: His spoiling, smothering, one-on-one work, defensive craft, bodywork, closing speed – he was brilliant.

So if the Dockers are considering a change and going in with a smaller backline, Walker will be straight in, because he did absolutely everything he could have for Peel.

The big one, though, is Brennan Cox. Freo held him out of the WAFL decider and he hasn’t played footy in five weeks. They’re definitely considering playing all three key defenders to take on Eric Hipwood, Oscar Allen and Logan Morris, or making a change with Oscar McDonald for the Grand Final.

Dropping McDonald would be absolutely brutal – and it would also be a big risk, given Cox’s body. But they’re definitely looking at it, because Cox trained really strongly on Saturday.

My call? I think they should play tall and bring in Cox. I just don’t know who you drop

McVee and Wagner are guys that are usually last into the team and first out if they do make a change.

But I thought McVee’s game against Sydney was probably his best of the year. When the chips were down and Freo was really struggling, McVee wasn’t. He was clean, tough and hard. I don’t think you could drop him off that prelim performance.

And Wagner gives the Dockers something different with his flexibility.

Maybe it’s Cox for McDonald? I don’t know. It’s going to be an interesting and tough call for Longmuir, who hasn’t been afraid to pull the trigger at selection throughout the year.

ONE WIN FROM ‘FLAGMANTLE’

A Freo flag would be truly amazing. For the fan base, for Longmuir, for the team, for the extended squad and for the club.

There’s a lot of people that have invested a lot of blood, sweat, tears and time into this footy club.

The signs of a Fremantle flag push were there in 2022 when the club made the jump into the top eight for the first time since 2015. We started running with ‘Flagmantle’ in 2022, even though it was too early in their journey to genuinely challenge.

But as we wrote in July, 2026 ‘Flagmantle’ is no pisstake.

I’m picking Freo to win on Saturday.

To be honest, it’s probably more hopeful than factual. Because if you look at facts, form and experience, Brisbane will win this game.

But I still believe the Dockers’ best footy is better than Brisbane’s. Brisbane has a brilliant list, but I think Freo has a better list of match-winners.

Plus the Lions’ gamestyle will suit Freo. Hawthorn and Sydney both play high-pressure footy, but that’s not Brisbane’s trademark asset – at least not this year. It means we could see a bit of a shootout – and if it is an open shootout, like we saw in the Hawks-Lions prelim, Freo win it.

The Dockers deserve a premiership. But you don’t deserve anything in life. So whether they win one or not will come down to preparation, just like it did 11 years ago.

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