Bye, bye, bye: 2026 Mid-Season Report Card #2
Considering how GWS and Richmond are faring so far.
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We are now into the second week of an increasingly-prolonged sequence of byes. The bye is an opportunity for players to rest weary bodies and virtually the only chance for coaches to spend real time pondering how to iron out flaws in the game plan. As that happens, I want to consider how each club is travelling – not just relative to pre-season expectations, but also what’s the likely range of outcomes for the rest of the season. Thankfully, I won’t be doing it alone. I’ve asked supporters of each club – all friends of the newsletter – to share their thoughts about how their sides are going and how it’s changed their belief about what’s possible in 2026. I’ll then respond with my own thoughts.
In this second, smaller tranche, I’ll consider two sides travelling in opposite directions and with very different priorities for the remainder of the season: Richmond and Greater Western Sydney. The Tigers’ main objectives from here are to reduce the size of the injury list, see more of the next generation (the likes of Josh Smillie and Taj Hotton), and win another one or two games without endangering what looks certain to be another juicy draft pick. The Giants, meanwhile, have found form and have welcomed back some key players. They appear primed to make a run for finals. Let’s get into it.
Greater Western Sydney
Win-loss: 6-6
Ladder position: 10th
Next four games: St Kilda (A), Carlton (H), Hawthorn (A), Fremantle (H)
Dane Gade from SuperCoach Co-Captains podcast
The GWS Giants head into their bye round as the AFL’s ultimate mystery. Every week feels like opening a Kinder Surprise: sometimes you get something brilliant, sometimes you get a piece missing and no idea how it fits together. Despite a horror run with injuries, they’ve somehow kept themselves firmly in the finals conversation and continue to look capable of troubling the competition’s best when everything clicks.
The season looked destined for disaster when midfield star Tom Green went down for the year. Add smooth mover Josh Kelly and “the Kid with the Lid”, Darcy Jones to the long-term injury list, along with defensive superstar Sam Taylor, who sustained a nasty hamstring injury playing for Western Australia, and you can understand how the Giants got into this awkward position. Taylor only returned in Round 12, prompting supporters to check whether they’d accidentally skipped half the season. His return couldn’t have come soon enough for a defence that had been held together by duct tape, crossed fingers, and Adam Kingsley’s ability to keep a straight face during press conferences.
The injury curse hasn’t stopped there. Jesse Hogan has managed just seven games for the season, meaning the Giants have spent much of the year trying to replace one of the competition’s most dangerous key forwards. Fortunately for GWS, Max “Gru” Gruzewski has grabbed his opportunity with both hands. What began as a depth player filling a role has quickly become a genuine breakout season, with Gruzewski showing he belongs at AFL level. He’s provided a strong marking target, kicked important goals and given Giants fans plenty to get excited about for the future. At this point, the club should be locking him away on a new deal before rival recruiters can pounce. Missing Hogan for much of the season could have crippled the Giants, but Gruzewski’s emergence has softened the blow and possibly unearthed a key piece of the club’s future.
Remarkably, despite missing Green, Kelly, Jones, Taylor and large chunks of Hogan, the Giants have hung in there. To the Giants’ credit, they’ve somehow found reinforcements from the football equivalent of the clearance rack. Clayton Oliver arrived from Melbourne for a pack of durries and a half-full fuel card. Oliver has been outstanding, collecting possessions at a rate that would make a Dyson vacuum cleaner jealous [Mateo: he’s #1 in the AFL for contested possessions among all players with more than five games]. Jayden Laverde was picked up for next to nothing and has slotted seamlessly into the backline during the injury crisis. Somewhere at Essendon, fans are wondering why he suddenly looks like an AFL-calibre defender.
Meanwhile, Finn Callaghan has gone from emerging star to public enemy number one for opposition taggers. Rival coaches have realised letting him roam free was a terrible strategy, so Callaghan has had to learn the weekly challenge of dealing with a hard tag, something every elite midfielder eventually faces. The numbers haven’t always been as eye-catching, but the growth has been obvious. At the same time, Lachie Ash’s move into the midfield has been a mostly successful experiment. Initially appearing to get in Callaghan’s way, Ash has provided speed, run and dare through the middle, proving necessity really is the mother of invention. He will likely return to the half back flank, but the Giants now know they have an option to roll through the middle if needed.
Another huge positive has been the return of Brent Daniels. While most fans know him as one of the competition’s best small forwards, “Midfielder Daniels” has become one of Kingsley’s most important game-breaking weapons. The Giants are careful not to leave him in there for too long, generally only unleashing him around centre bounces in the second half of games. When they do, chaos follows. Daniels turns orderly stoppages into absolute carnage, bringing speed, pressure and unpredictability that few players in the league can match. In a midfield missing Green and Kelly, those bursts have often changed the momentum of games and given GWS a genuine point of difference. Can Daniels’ body hold up? Who knows! I’m just enjoying “Midfielder Daniels” while I can.
Up forward, one of the biggest positives has been the emergence of Phoenix Gothard. He looks more comfortable at AFL level by the week and it’s becoming increasingly obvious he’ll be a major part of the future. He brings energy, pressure and excitement whenever he’s near the ball, and Giants fans are already imagining what the forward line could look like in a few years with him playing a prominent role. In a season where injuries have forced younger players to step up, Gothard has grabbed his opportunity with both hands. In a forward line that can stack goals on or kick a record number of behinds to frustrate you, Gothard always provides an option, finding space and setting up others for that scoring opportunity.
But, nothing sums up the 2026 Giants better than a two-week stretch that should probably be studied by sports psychologists. One round, GWS managed to lose to lowly West Coast, leaving supporters questioning their life choices and wondering whether the club had accidentally boarded the wrong flight. Seven days later, they responded by producing one of the most ridiculous quarters of football in VFL/AFL history, kicking 14 goals in the third quarter and completely humiliating the reigning back-to-back premiers Brisbane. It was the football equivalent of failing your driving test on Monday and winning a Grand Prix on Sunday.
The performance against Brisbane was peak Orange Tsunami. Everything clicked. Yet the week before, the Giants had somehow found a way to lose (deservedly) to a wooden spoon contender. If GWS supporters ever need a definition of emotional whiplash, they can simply replay those two games back-to-back. Shout out to the baby-faced assassin Harvey Thomas as well, this man took on a new role along the wing and has been absolutely amazing and one of the quiet achievers for the Giants. What happens if/when Josh Kelly returns? I don’t know. But right now, he is doing everything right.
The one area that still has Giants supporters nervously reaching for the antacids is the ruck division. While the midfield has somewhat adapted and the defence has survived an injury apocalypse, the ruck stocks remain a genuine concern. Every week feels like an adventure, and not the fun kind. Against the competition’s stronger ruck combinations, GWS can still be exposed around stoppages, and if there’s one thing capable of derailing a September campaign, it’s getting monstered in the middle. Leek Aleer needs to keep getting a chance to roll through there when he is healthy. Watching him leap a foot over Max Gawn, to then see him only know how to tap in one direction and have the ball sharked by the opposition is frustrating, but if he can develop ruck craft, he could become a real wildcard.
Losing Tom Green, Josh Kelly, Darcy Jones, Sam Taylor, Jesse Hogan and Brent Daniels for big chunks of the season would have buried most clubs. But not these Giants. Their best football is arguably better than almost anyone’s. Their worst football can leave supporters staring blankly into the distance wondering what they’ve just witnessed. They could make a deep finals run, or they could finish 8-10th and lose a wildcard final by four points. Because at the end of the day, nothing is more predictable than the Giants being completely unpredictable.
Dane’s grade: C
My thoughts
Of the many adjectives one can use to describe Adam Kingsley’s side, doggedness isn’t usually one of them. This has been a side renowned for flashy footy: absorbing deep inside-50 entries before unfurling exhilarating counterattacks. That fundamental identity has remained. The wild oscillation between brilliance and banality has remained. But it has been supplemented by some steel. As Dane alluded to, the Giants have been whacked hard with the injury stick this season. Green, Taylor, Hogan, Daniels, Kelly and Jones are all arguably top 10 players for the Giants. All have missed most of the first half of the season. Given that, and a front-half fixture which has included games against Hawthorn, Sydney, the Bulldogs (before Sam Darcy did his knee), and Brisbane, and the Giants are doing OK to be 6-6 at the bye.
Smarter observers can tell me if I’m wrong – this applies generally to all my writing – but I have noticed a subtle shift to how the Giants are trying to play this season. As I wrote above, the fundamental identity is stable. They are currently second in the AFL for D50 to F50 success rate (they were seventh in this metric last season), fourth for defensive half scores (same as in 2025),13th for clearance differential (same), and 15th for forward half possession share (13th in 2025).
The Giants are comfortable playing a back-half game. What hasn’t been stable is player availability. But Adam Kingsley has largely succeeded in using that to his side’s advantage. Deprived of dominant aerial players like Taylor and Hogan, the Giants have switched to a ball movement scheme that prioritises moving the ball at ground level. Kingsley’s men took more than 10 contested marks per game last season. They had aerial security at both ends. This season, they’re taking 2.5 fewer. That’s been offset by a massively improved ability to win the ball after the initial contest. Last season, the Giants were ninth for post-clearance ground ball gets differential – the measure of how well they win the ground-level contest after the clearance. This season, they’re first by a mile, almost twice as much as the second-ranked side (Gold Coast). The adaptation has been possible because of the (surprising?) renaissance of Clayton Oliver, and the breakout form of Harvey Thomas (enjoying a change of role to a wing). Oliver has been a revelation. It will be interesting to see how Kingsley makes it work once Tom Green returns to the side (almost certainly in 2027).
The short-term question is what this Giants side looks like as those stars reintegrate into the side. The evidence of the last two games – Taylor returned for their most recent game, against Melbourne in Alice Springs – has been very positive. As enigmatic as the Giants are, and as anomalous as that game was, you can’t dismiss beating the back-to-back Premiers by 13 goals. The ceiling isn’t easy to find. But it remains scarily high. Over the next five games, the Giants play St Kilda, Carlton, Hawthorn, Fremantle, and Geelong. Literally no sequence of results over this stretch would surprise me. But they’ve given themselves a shot. It wouldn’t be the first time they’ve come home with a wet sail under Adam Kingsley.
My grade: B-
Richmond
Win-loss: 2-10
Ladder position: 17th
Next four games: Brisbane (H), North Melbourne (H), Collingwood (A), Carlton (H)
Toby, author of the (excellent) Jousting Sticks substack
For Richmond, it’s been a season of ‘yeah, but’. Everything that’s happened has been simultaneously despairing and understandable, with scarce moments of joy. It’s the dichotomy that defines the journey the club is on, where team and fans alike have accepted short-term pain, long-term gain. Yeah, it sucks to be 17th at 60.4%, but it makes sense and is certainly justifiable when you consider the wider context.
It’s frustrating, but you can’t talk about the Tigers season without mentioning injuries. They’ve been perilously close to needing top-up players. The significant aspect of the injury disaster has been its compounding impact on both veterans and youth. Richmond had a solid contingent of experience, capable of providing the team with a floor of stability that ‘protects’ the kids. Concurrently, Richmond has a brigade of highly touted youngsters. Both groups have been ravaged by injury. From the seven selections made pre-pick 30 in 2024, only Luke Trainor is healthy, whilst Toby Nankervis hasn’t played since Round 2, and injuries have hit Tom Lynch, Tim Taranto, Dion Prestia, and others. The floor has fallen out beneath them, while the kids haven’t had a chance to start building the ceiling yet. The injuries have been the ultimate ‘yeah, but’ of 2026. Yeah, they’re losing, but they’re putting a VFL side out there each week because Punt Road was apparently built on a cursed gravesite.
Adem Yze is coaching with both hands tied behind his back. If we briefly ignore the availability crisis, and the mega-washed status of some veterans, there are some interesting tactical evolutions happening. The prevailing criticism has been the lack of risk; long down-the-line, sideways kicks around defensive 50, all the usual hallmarks of ‘boring’ football is apparent at Richmond, acting as a safeguard. However, they’ve occasionally ventured into what we can consider the first iterations of Yzeball. It’s a similar style to most teams, utilising the forward handball to break stoppages and create overlap run. In moments of confidence, they switch the ball frequently to create width, before attempting to attack the seams through the middle with speed that their improved running capacity has created. It mostly falls apart because it’s a team full of kids, but if you squint, you really can see the bones of a cohesive style. It’s a modern game plan fitted for modern players. Yeah, it’s not yielding wins right now, but you can see it come to fruition if the players who the system is built for ever become available.
I’ve ‘joked’ about Richmond’s season beginning after the bye. We should be seeing the return of Taj Hotton and Sam Lalor in the coming weeks, and the club remains hopeful 196cm(!!) midfielder Josh Smillie will debut too. Add in the returning Nankervis and Lynch, the floor begins to take shape, the construction on the ceiling occurring simultaneously. The off-season looms with the Zak Butters shade over it, but regardless of how that turns out, Richmond will have another top 3 pick and the hope created by uninterrupted pre-seasons and houses being trained down. I’d prefer to limit the smashings and maybe scare a team hoping to play finals in the run-in, but really, I can’t imagine winning more than 1-2 more games. It’s really hard to talk about Richmond with detailed nuance because so much is up in the air, but what’s the point in being a fan if I can’t be optimistic about it?
Toby’s grade: D-
My thoughts
How do you begin to assess a season so cruelled by injuries? That’s the challenge Toby confronted and the one I now face. The best place to begin is with an acknowledgement that, subjectively, it’s felt like a lousy season for Tigers fans. I covered some of that ground in my recent piece about the progress of the rebuild. Lousy results are leavened by seeing kids weave a brighter future. They’re harder to stomach when some of the most exciting of those kids are stuck on the sidelines and you’re instead watching Oliver Hayes-Brown try and replicate Toby Nankervis.
The green shoots are there – if you squint hard. Seth Campbell has consolidated his rise. At the time of writing, he’s the 121st highest-rated player in the AFL this season and the fourth highest-rated Tiger over the last 20 games. He’s impish and skilful, and I’ve enjoyed Yze giving him some midfield reps. Sam Cumming has made a bright start to his AFL career (if only the poor boy didn’t always look so worried). Patrick Retschko, traded in for a token pick from Geelong, has looked at ease on a wing. Sam Lalor, meanwhile, showed enough in his seven games to vindicate Richmond’s choice to take him with the first pick in the 2024 draft. The problem is that, in a microcosm of Richmond’s frustrating year, he suffered a partial Achilles tear that will rule him out for most of the rest of the season. Lalor, Gibcus, Smillie, Hotton, Armstrong – these players will define the next decade at Punt Road. But you can’t get better if you don’t play.
On the field, it’s mostly been awful. It was never going to be any other way, even with a full complement of troops. But there have also been a couple of gritty wins against fellow cellar-dwellers, driven in large part by younger players. When the Tigers beat Essendon in the Dreamtime at the ‘G game, Campbell and Retschko were their two highest-rated players. When they beat the Eagles in Perth, Campbell, Jonty Faull, Tom Burton, Kane McAuliffe and Tom Brown all played well. These are the things you need to hold onto. And they’re data points about the future. With respect, the likes of Burton, McAuliffe and Burton are unlikely to become stars. But if they can take the opportunity that’s been extended to them by injury to become long-term contributors, that’s a win for everyone.
Beyond that, there have been flashes against decent sides. Richmond led Adelaide at half-time. They should probably have beaten Carlton in Round 1 (OK, Carlton was not “decent” at the time). The Tigers hung in for most of the day against Melbourne and St Kilda before young legs tired. Their next four games are not especially kind – but there are no easy games at this stage of the rebuild. Brisbane will be a damage limitation exercise. Instead, progress will be measured by the performances against North Melbourne – the first meeting between those sides was the on-field nadir of Richmond’s season – Collingwood and Carlton. If Richmond could jag a win, or run a couple of those sides close, their supporters should be pleased. Some of the kids will come back and get a glimpse of senior footy in the run home. And, come November, Punt Road will become the new home of a couple of the country’s most-talented 18 year-old footy players. It won’t be dawn for a while. But there’ll be some stars in the night sky.
My grade: D+
I’ll be back later this week with thoughts on how Collingwood, Carlton, Hawthorn and Fremantle are going so far.