WHO’S FLYING

Each week throughout the 2023 season we will present Who’s Flying, a series of stories which will encapsulate everything that is good about our great game. It could be a star player, a coach who has inspired his men or a team that is – pardon the pun –flying. BRENDAN RHODES asks if Magpie Isaac Quaynor is on track for an All-Australian blazer.

For most of the season all the publicity about Collingwood’s surge to the top of the AFL ladder has been credited to the likes of Nick and Josh Daicos, Scott Pendlebury and Darcy Moore.

There have also been plenty of headlines for Mason Cox, Jordan De Goey, Bobby Hill and even Brody Mihocek.

But there’s another layer to Craig McRae’s powerhouse premiership favourites that could end up being the difference between the ultimate success or otherwise in September.

Working alongside Moore has been a previously unheralded backline that is now starting to appear on the radar – for those who aren’t aware, it is the bottom 10 players of a team who win premierships more than the top six.

At the head of that group is Isaac Quaynor, who is making his way into some pundits’ All-Australian calculations for his intercepting and rebounding efforts.

Quaynor, 23, who matched the younger Daicos’ nine AFL coaches votes after winning 27 disposals at 88.9 per cent efficiency to go with 13 marks, six rebound-50s and 10 intercept possessions in Collingwood’s win over Western Bulldogs last Friday, is quietly putting together his best year of a career that has snuck up to 75 matches.

The past two weeks have been his best, with 24 possessions in the big round 16 win over Gold Coast helping him to 2023 averages of 16.6 disposals, 5.9 marks and 4.1 rebounds – the latter two being career-bests and the other second only to his 18.1 disposals in 2021.

Only once – a loss to Geelong in round 11, 2021, when he had 28 touches – has Quaynor enjoyed more of the football than last week, and if he keeps using it that well, the calls for higher recognition will only grow stronger.

Footy Fun Facts

Canada has its own AFL competition. Teams such as the Toronto Dingos, Calgary Kookaburras and Edmonton Wombats and Emus compete for a variety of different cups and flags.

Recoveries don’t come any bigger than the Western Bulldogs’ barnstorming finish to the 2016 season.

It was a classic case of daring to dream as the Bulldogs came from the clouds to claim just their second AFL/VFL premiership.

After suffering a crippling injury toll in the middle to latter stages of 2016, the Bulldogs eventually scrambled into seventh position at the end of the home and away season.

Only one team had won a flag from outside the top four and that was Adelaide, which had come from fifth in 1998.

No team had even made a Grand Final from seventh position, let alone won a premiership.

However, the Bulldogs conjured victories in four consecutive finals, each of them as underdogs in cut-throat clashes; and twice triumphed interstate – a first for a Victorian club – to become unlikely premiers.

They hammered the previous year’s Grand Finalists – West Coast and Hawthorn, when the Hawks were aiming for a record-equalling fourth flag in a row – conquered emerging power GWS in the preliminary final and a star-studded Sydney in the decider.

After a pulsating 22-point win over the Swans, coach Luke Beveridge told the euphoric Bulldog faithful at the MCG: “We know how long you have waited for success ... to you, the fans, our supporters ... you’ve boosted our spirits. We have ridden on your wings.”

In a bruising, fluctuating contest before a crowd of 99,981, the Bulldogs led by eight points at the last change, but the gap twice narrowed to just one point before