Carlton gets Power surge to make 2024 finals in Mark Knight toon

The AFL finals are upon us. After 24 bruising rounds of football between 18 teams, the final eight has been decided.

While the Sydney Swans finished on top and were there for most of the year, it was perhaps the most competitive year in the league’s history, with the teams that make up the eight only being decided in the last round – and in fact in the last game.

Carlton, one of the big Victorian clubs, was trying to make the finals for the second year in a row after years of missing out. Its season was going well up until it had a spate* of injuries to players and started losing games, causing the club to drop down the ladder.

By round 24, the mighty Navy Blues* were in strife*.

If they won their last game against an in-form St Kilda, they would play finals, but unfortunately they still had a host* of star players out.

The match ensued* with the Blues putting up a good fight, and in the last quarter, urged on by their supporters in the stands, they hit the front with only a couple of minutes to go. Carlton players, sensing victory and a finals berth*, just needed to hang on and wind the clock down, but unfortunately happy endings are only in Hollywood movies.

St Kilda got the ball, play went down field in front of their goal. A minute to go and Carlton had all its players in defence trying to stop the Saints kicking that winning goal.

It was desperate hand-to-hand, combat-in-the-trenches stuff. With 12 seconds left, St Kilda small forward Jack Higgins threw the ball onto his boot and it sailed through the goals, winning the game for St Kilda.

Carlton’s finals hopes were gone! Or were they?

The last game of the season was about to start in Perth: Port Adelaide Power up against Fremantle. If Freo won, they would leapfrog Carlton on the ladder into eighth spot and play finals. So tearful Carlton supporters and their team turned their attention to Western Australia, hoping that the Power would beat the Freo Dockers and get the Blues into the finals. It was their last chance.

In a tight game, Power did just that, getting home over the Dockers and Carlton had made it into the final eight. Not the most convincing way to make it into the finals but they had just fallen over the finish line.

I wanted to draw a cartoon that summed up this inauspicious* entry by Carlton into the finals. When the Blues lost to the Saints, their supporters thought their season was dead, and I had sketched the club mascot, Captain Carlton, lying prone* on the footy field. I waited to see if their slim finals hopes could be resurrected* by Port Adelaide winning. Luckily they were and Carlton was brought back to life.

It was perfect for my cartoon idea that Port Adelaide Power’s mascot was “Tommy Thunda Power”, a lightning bolt character. Carlton finished the season without a heartbeat and were in dire need of cardiac defibrillation*, so I drew the Port Power mascot applying his electrode* paddles to an unconscious Captain Carlton and zapping the Blues’ finals campaign back to life.

Having restored Carlton’s heartbeat, it remains to be seen just how much heart the poor old Navy Blues will have in this year’s AFL finals.

POLL

GLOSSARY

• spate: series, succession, a run of something happening
• Navy Blues: colloquial or informal nickname for Carlton
• strife: trouble, conflict, bother, difficulty
• host: a range, a large number of people or things
• ensued: followed, developed, arose
• berth: a seat, spot, a specific place in, on or as part of something
• inauspicious: unpromising, unfavourable, adverse
• prone: lying down stretched out flat
• resurrected: revived, brought back to life, restored, revitalised
• cardiac defibrillation: when a defibrillator device is used to apply an electric charge or current to the heart to restore a normal heartbeat
• electrode: electrical conductor used to make electrical contact with a nonmetallic part of a circuit

EXTRA READING

Pies stuck teetering on the edge

‘King of the jungle’ goes bananas

Tough call on hard knocks in AFL

QUICK QUIZ

1. Which team won their 24th round game against Carlton?
2. How many AFL teams were vying for a place in the finals?
3. Who kicked the winning goal in the dying seconds of that game?
4. Which team did Port Adelaide Power beat to revive Carlton’s hopes?
5. What is the name given to the Port Adelaide team mascot?

LISTEN TO THIS STORY

CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES
1. What’s going on?
What’s going on in this Mark Knight cartoon? Outline the following:

Issue –

Why is it newsworthy?

What’s the humour?

Which side of the issue are they representing?

What do you see that makes you say that?

–

–

–

Time: allow 15 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Personal and Social, Critical and Creative Thinking

2. Extension
If you could turn this cartoon into a joke to tell a friend, how would you phrase it? Is it funny? Could they guess the answer?

Time: allow 10 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Personal and social, Critical and Creative Thinking

VCOP ACTIVITY
What happens next?
Imagine this story is part of an animated series made up of three cartoons. The three cartoons tell the complete story and this article is only Part 1. Think about what the rest of the story could be and draw the next two cartoons that tell the story.

Time: allow 30 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Visual Arts, Visual Communication Design, Critical and Creative Thinking