Last week, I opened by referencing Temptation Island and showed a random picture of a movie called Number 96.  I am, quite frankly, surprised that no one commented on the Fox show, which was, for the time, quite unusual and titillating (he he).  Little did I know that the Number 96 picture held some quite unusual and titillating secrets too!   That, the Round 7 highlights and scores, a new player to meet, and more on this week’s

Welcome to Balls of Steel’s AFL Beat!

So, about that Number 96…  thee Wee Baby Seamus asked in the comments last week for more information and I was curious as well.  I went deep into the first page of Google results and discovered that Number 96 was actually a revolutionary soap opera that ran on free television in Australia during the 70s. It was known for its groundbreaking sex scenes and nudity and for its comedy characters. The series was the first in the world to feature an openly gay regular character and the first to portray a gay relationship in a way that was considered the same as if it was a heterosexual relationship (i.e. as normal people fully accepted by and integrated into their community).  The series ran for over 1200 episodes and spawned a feature film as well as some paperback spin-offs:

The cover of the DVD of that movie was the image that I showed last week.

As for this week’s games, the Round started off on Australian Friday Night Footy (Friday morning for us in North America) with the clash of the Hawthorn Hawks and the Richmond Tigers.  The Hawks had gotten embarrassed by the Giants in Round 6 and Richmond has been struggling, so I expected a blowout.  Well, we did end up getting a blowout, but the game did not really break open until the end of the third quarter.  Until that point, the Tigers had actually played extremely well and held the lead a few times.  Something happened to wake the Hawks up, though, because they tore through the Richmond defence and ended up with a 46 point win.  I’m not sure if that’s any consolation for Tigers’ fans, but it’s something I suppose. Hawthorn’s Paul Puopolo continued his hot streak of playing well with this great mark:

As I mentioned, Richmond played well, but it wasn’t enough:

I love you, AFL social media team!  Really, who ISN’T aided by a handy?

Proper Friday night brought the expected Match of the Round with my Geelong Cats hosting the West Coast Eagles.  I was anticipating that this would be a tough test as the Eagles were last year’s Grand Final losers and were firmly in the top eight again this year.  The Cats, I am happy to report, passed with flying colors as they dominated throughout and rightfully earned a 44 point victory at home.

Here, the Cats’ Cameron Guthrie scores a great goal after some intense Geelong pressure in the Eagles’ defensive 50:

Later, Steven Motlop provides a fancy pass to Cam who dishes to Andrew Mackie for the score:

More on my favorite Cat (Cameron Guthrie) later…

Playing at roughly the same time were King Hippo’s Carlton Blues against the Collingwood Magpies of JJFozz and Moose.  How did the game end?  Well,

Yup, the Blues prevailed over the Pies though only by the slim margin of 15 points.  This is now the third victory in a row for the Blues and pushes them one game above the Pies in the standings.  Here, the Pies open up the scoreboard:

while here, Carlton’s Levi Casboult scores a nice goal to give the Blues some breathing room in the fourth:

Later on Friday night, Sydney took on Essendon in what was another expected blowout.  This one was closer to expectations as the Swans rolled through the Bombers from the second quarter on en route to a 81 point thrashing.  The Bombers tried valiantly for a bit:

but shortly after that goal, the Swans put their foot down and ran away with the game.

Remember how I said that I expected some surprises this week?  Well, my first one came with the Melbourne Demons-Gold Coast Suns matchup in the Gold Coast.  The Demons went into the Suns’ home and ripped them apart to the tune of a 73 point beating!  I really should stop recommending teams for you guys to follow.  Sorry, SonOfSpam!

I was honestly expecting a close game between two mid-ladder sides, but this game showed, to my chagrin, that the Demons have intentions to earn back some of the glory they haven’t had since before Number 96 was on the telly.

Here, Melbourne’s Jack Viney spreads the game open after halftime:

Things got so bad for the Suns at the end that the team’s star, Gary Ablett had to calm the fans down:

If that was Philadelphia, Gary would have been ducking D-cells. On the bright side, the Suns cut their loss margin by 33%, so that’s improvement!

The first of the late late night games featured the Western Bulldogs hosting the Adelaide Crows at the Etihad.  The game was close in the first with the Doggies taking a large lead at Quarter Time.  For the rest of the game, the Crows tried to cut the margin and at one point in the third and late in the fourth were close to tying it up, but the Doggies held on to win 123-108.  Last week’s featured AFL player, Taylor “Tex” Walker did a good midway through the fourth for the Crows to narrow the gap,

only for the Doggies’ Marcus Bontempelli to essentially seal the game with a late goal:

The Doggies would add one more to make the final score appear larger than the distance between the two clubs.

In the last game, the hapless Fremantle Dockers took on the GWS Giants at home.  The home-field advantage helped, but the Giants still won 95-77 to leave the Dockers as the STILL only winless team in the competition.  Again, I apologize profusely to Yeah Right for convincing him to adopt the Dockers as his team.  With the knee surgery and the Dockers’ woes, this has not been a good month.  In the long run, though, I think things will work out well both for the knee and his chosen team.

Here is proof that the Dockers actually can do some good things:

If you watched the video, you basically just saw a summary of the Dockers’ season.  It costs them SO MUCH effort to score a measly goal.  It seems they get some success despite their best efforts.  This highlight basically shows the same thing in the opposite direction:

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This

is my favorite Geelong Cat, Cameron Guthrie.  Every time I see him on the field, I think of this:

and I smile.  He is also one of the few players that elects to wear the long-sleeved guernseys when given the choice, which, in my opinion, look fantastic!

Cameron joined the team in 2011 and has solidified his position on the team as part of the Cats’ awesome midfield.  He started on defence and has now moved up the field.  His trademarks are full effort every time and that wonderful wonderful mane of hair.  He is the type of guy that has taken his mom to an awards dinner, has a side job serving ice cream, and appreciates the old traditions of trading jerseys with legends.  In short,

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North American Saturday night brought us only two games with the first being the battle of Etihad Stadium co-tenants North Melbourne Kangaroos and St. Kilda Saints.  You know what?  Just see this:

That was just…damn.  Why the hell do the Fighting Miss Fishers always have to suffer like this?!?  Good show for the Saints but they’ve gotta be disappointed.  As it is, North remains the only unbeaten in the competition.

The last game of the Round had the Brisbane Lions visiting the Port Adelaide Power in Adelaide.  It wasn’t a fun visit as the Power beat them by 77.  The Power are now right back in the thick of things in 10th place on the ladder.  Speaking of, let’s take a look at the ladder, shall we?

There are four teams tied on points for spots 7-10 and a few teams such as Carlton and Port Adelaide have rebounded after poor starts.  It will be interesting to see how bunched up things get in the middle of the pack.

Here is the Round 8 schedule (all times Pacific):

Friday May 13

Adelaide v Geelong at Adelaide Oval (2.50 AM)

Essendon v North Melbourne at Etihad Stadium (8.45pm)

Hawthorn v Fremantle at Aurora Stadium (9.10pm)

GWS Giants v Gold Coast Suns at Spotless Stadium (11.35pm)

Saturday May 14

Brisbane Lions v Collingwood at Gabba (2.25 AM)

Richmond v Sydney Swans at MCG (2.25 AM)

Carlton v Port Adelaide at Etihad Stadium (8.10pm)

Melbourne v Western Bulldogs at MCG (10.20pm) (PInk Lady Match!)

West Coast Eagles v St Kilda at Subiaco Oval (11.40pm)

The featured match of the Round, of course, will be the return of Geelong’s Patrick Dangerfield to face his old team, the Adelaide Crows, in Adelaide.  It will be quite interesting to see how that one turns out.  Shit, I guess I’m waking my ass up early on Friday!  See you next week!