Easter is a time for miracles. Like the way they are able to get smarties inside an enclosed Easter egg or that whole Jesus rising from the dead stuff. Fremantle arrived at Etihad Stadium knowing that they would have to follow in Red Tulips' footsteps (and to a lesser extent Jesus) and perform a miracle of their own if they were to finally beat Essendon at the Dome.
They started the day out on a good note. After watching what he thought was a documentary about travel, narrated by John Candy and Steve Martin, Mark Harvey decided to let the players make their own way to the ground rather than all catching the ever reliable team bus. It was either going to work or the results would be hilarious. Either way he couldn't't lose. An array of transport arrived at the hotel, Pavlich went by limo, McPharlin rode his bike, Hayden Ballantyne had somehow organised a hot air balloon and a top hat, but most went by taxi. Miracle number one for Fremantle was that they all arrived on time - and those who went by taxi arrived at the right ground.
Miracle number two came shortly after the siren sounded. It's one of the great Aussie Rules traditions that the game starts in what has become an iconic fashion - a free kick to one of the ruckmen. The miracle being that this week it went to Fremantle's ruckman, a retiring young fellow by the name of Sandilands. Sandilands went long to Fremantle's deadly forward line but the umpire soon realised he'd pointed the wrong way and found a square up.
The Bombers brought the ball back down the ground where Zaharakis soccered through a goal so lucky that it could have been kicked out of James Hird arse, circa 2003.
Fremantle fought back and peppered their goals but were lacking a bit of poise after the long trip south east. Lacking, that is, until Garick Ibbotson returned to the winners circle, grabbing the ball out of the ruck, spinning out of trouble then snapping the ball for Freo's first.
With the Dockers clearly on for the day, Matthew Knights panicked earlier than usual. So he did what all ordinary coaches of ordinary sides do - he blocked up the play and turned it into a scrap and out of the scrap, Monfries and his friend with the whistle organised a goal.
But what Matthew Knights didn't know (well, one of the things he didn't know) was that the new look Fremantle love a scrap.
Hayden Ballantyne was on track to get belted by Dustin Fletcher of all people, Paul Hasleby was somehow covered in mud despite the complete absence of mud at the ground, Roger Hayden was weaving in and out of traffic like a bogan who was running late for a Bon Jovi concert, Aaron Sandilands had been sent a bill for turf re-sodding - turf re-sodding in the exact shape of Heath Hocking's head; and Michael Barlow went VFL on them, racking up stats at will and driving the ball forward.
Once Fremantle caught on not to kick the ball to Adam McPhee, they hit their stride, Aaron Sandilands took a screamer inside fifty, dished out the handpass to Hayden Ballantyne and watched the show as the little bloke ran amok before kicking the goal.
The big fella backed up pretty quickly, swatting the footy out of the ruck to the waiting arms of Matthew Pavlich who put it down the throat of Michael Johnson who drilled a goal to give the Dockers a handy lead.
One reason Freo have struggled to win in Melbourne, however, is the complete thievery of the umpires (umpires robbing Fremantle of kicks and handing them out to the opposition not people sneaking onto the ground and stealing the umpires. The black market for umpires just isn't lucrative enough). The string of free kicks saw the Bombers get the ball into the hands of Scott Gumbleton, who suddenly learned how to kick and gave the Bombers a two point lead going into quarter time.
Despite their lead, the Bombers looked worried. You could see it in Matthew Knights eyes - there was more fear than usual. Mark Harvey knew it too, he strode out to the centre like he was the fourth Bee Gee. Fremantle were running rings around the Bombers all over the ground, their mix of youth and experience was too much for Essendon's mix of inexperience and age in defence, Aaron Sandilands was making a mockery of the dual 'rucks' that Essendon had thrown up against him and Adam McPhee was being played so deep in the pocket that he was barely able to bugger things up. All they needed was the simmering forward line to bubble over and the game was theirs.
Yet, even with Fremantle teetering on the edge of complete dominance, the second quarter carried on much the same as the first. Essendon bottled things up, taking advantage of Fremantle's lack of experience playing on an ice rink; the umpires refused to acknowledge the existence of two teams, nor the rules; and, judging by the booing of Adam McPhee, there was a huge Fremantle crowd in attendance who were struggling to make their influence felt.
Zaharakis was gifted one early before Mark Harvey pulled a master coaching move and sent Chris Tarrant forward to use his superior marking and laser guided kicking skills to settle the score.
Timmy Watson's kid was rewarded for diving and has never been one to knock back something he didn't really deserve. Which fired up Des Headland, who went on a mini rampaging, jailing two goals, largely thanks to some spectacular kicking from Stephen Hill and Hayden Ballantyne's cheek.
A late goal, against the flow of play, gave Essendon the lead at half time but the FREO Speedwagon has always taken it's time building momentum, so no one in purple was concerned.
Traditionally there are a lot of warning signs, when Fremantle are on the road, indicating they are seconds away from a flogging. None of the boxes were getting ticked off this week. They weren't getting caught between kicks, they weren't constantly falling over, tackles weren't slipping free and no one had contracted hypothermia. The only box left to worry about was the playing four quarters box and the four points would be theirs for the taking.
With all the flooding and huddling and floodling that the Bombers had been doing to desperately stop the Dockers from playing football, Fremantle expected a short breather and a drink of cordial to rejuvenate the Essendon players and see them come out twice as hard and twice as determined to bugger up the sport in the second half.
Fremantle get a lot of things wrong.
Instead of a fired up Essendon, the locals were treated to a fired up Fremantle. They'd had three shots on goals in the opening minute but a few too many blokes McPheed it. In the second minute though, they managed to take back the lead when the Mayor of Mandurah graced the locals with a run from the wing, seven bounces, and a casual drop punt from 40 metres out. Young Micky Barlow followed up with a strong mark and a beautiful kick for goal, trying to show his coach that he could hold down a spot in the forward line if this midfield lark didn't pan out for him.
Angus Monfries assisted the umpire in kicking another one to get the Bombers within a kick but Essendon were just scared little children playing against .. well, unscared little children, Paul Hasleby, Matthew Pavlich and Aaron Sandilands.
When Adam McPhee managed to get the ball, get the ball to land on his boot and get the ball to go from his boot the chest of an actual Fremantle player, in the goal square, there were a lot of Fremantle supporters sitting back after a big Easter lunch thinking "we've got this one". There were also a lot of Eagles players sitting back thinking "bugger, we're going to be spending most of this week at the Children's hospital".
Matthew Pavlich unleashed some of his awesomeness to bring up Fremantle's tenth and put them 15 points clear before Essendon finally dug deep for some pride and scored a goal, either side of Paul Hasleby's - who's a very good mark for his size.
The three quarter time siren sounded with the Dockers 9 points up and the Bombers heads down. The Docker were given a standing ovation as they headed to their huddle (although the Fremantle supporter could have just been getting up to go to the dunnies) while Essendon were nearly booed out of the stadium.
Mark Harvey was pumped up. Sure he'd never won a game in Melbourne; sure he had a contract with just six months left on it; and sure he promised the other two Lloyd boys he'd make their Easter Sunday family dinner bearable; but Essendon had been good to him over the years and he knew it was up to him to win so he could show the Essendon board of directors just how big a goose their coach was so they could save the Bombers from becoming the next Richmond.
What he was about to do he was doing for the good of the Essendon Football Club.
After four quarters of letting the Bombers play their defensive rubbish that kept scoring low and made football the loser, Mark Harvey decided it was time to set his own terms. Bloody exciting terms.
He stacked the midfield with skill, pace, brilliance and a bloke as big as a house. Sandilands swatted the ball to the ground, the midfielders pounced on it and sent it down forward. A couple of blokes McPheed it but once Ballantyne was off the leash, he hunted down any Bomber who even thought about picking up the footy, jumped on anything loose and eventually decided he'd have a crack from outside fifty - dobbing the goal and getting so excited he could no longer bend his elbows.
Back from the toilet, the Fremantle supporter was pretty excited himself, having never been to a win. His head nearly exploded when David Mundy got hold of the ball on the half back line. Mundy bounced, ran a bit, bounced again, ran a bit more, sold a dummy, had another bounce, stopped for a breather, had another bounce, sold another dummy, ran a bit more, had a bounce and then mustered up enough energy to have a kick. To everyone's surprise, most of all his, he connected and the ball sailed over the goal umpires head for six points. The only thing missing was a bike leg, a swim leg and a pair of Tony Abott style speedos.
To their credit, that goal wasn't quite enough to break the Bombers. It wasn't until SCOS Silvangi, the second cousin of their arch nemesis, ran down from the back line, had his head taken off in another brutal assault on a Freo kid, and repaid the favour by kicking the goal that they were finally broken.
The Freeeee-ooooooo chant rang out (although somewhat less impressive when it's one bloke doing it) and the Dockers cruised around making Essendon look stupid, kicking another couple of goals to win by 44 points and send a warning to Geelong that they'd need to cheat even more than usual if they wanted to sneak over the line this year.