In the greatest and cruellest of grand finals, only the Lions believed

Where do you start? How do you confront the challenge of making sense of the 2026 AFL grand final?

Perhaps one's reaction to this game, this nonsensical overdose of a game, can stand as some sort of Rorschach test.

When you look at these pictures, do you see the Brisbane Lions and their titanic force of will, the outrageous talent and nerve, an accomplishment to match any seen in the modern AFL era?

Or do you see Fremantle, inconsolable and bewildered, an unfathomably cruel loss, among the most heartbreaking inflicted upon a single club in the game's history?

Which of these narratives are you most drawn to? What emotion is drawn out of you most acutely? Because you definitely felt something. Nobody who witnessed this grand final, no matter their allegiances or knowledge of the sport, could claim to have felt nothing.

Crucially you can not have one without the other. The overwhelming weight of Brisbane's accomplishment needs to fall somewhere, and it just so happened to drop squarely on the soul of the Fremantle Dockers.

We can speak safely about the Dockers here, because you can be sure not one of their long-suffering fans will take the step of entering into this or any other media about this grand final for as long as they live.

There have been close grand finals before, heartbreaking defeats, joy snatched away just it was poised to erupt. But nothing like this.

As Patrick Voss set off in celebration of his goal, as the bells tolled to signify what must surely be the last ever Wharfie Time and as tears erupted at last from the tortured purple throngs, nobody could possibly have been so heartless as to deny them now.

The next five minutes will go down in football folklore, dissected to the millisecond, but in the immediate aftermath feel like a blur of sound and colour. Charlie Cameron teed up Country Roads, Zac Bailey squeezed one out of nowhere, Logan Morris took the biggest mark and kicked the biggest goal of his life.

In amongst it all was Will Ashcroft, again and again and again. With a ferocity perhaps even he didn't know he was capable of, but with the grace nobody has ever doubted. He willed that team off the canvas, Ashcroft.

He didn't win the medal this time, but make no mistake. This was Will Ashcroft's finest hour.

There wasn't time for Fremantle to process what was happening to them. Suddenly, and without warning, they were bystanders in what was meant to be their own story.

It was gone. It was there, it was theirs'. Then it was gone.

Justin Longmuir wept in the coaches' box before the final siren had even sounded. By now, he was as helpless as the many hundreds of thousands of Dockers around the country who wept with him.

They were probably the better team on the day, the Dockers. They obliterated the Lions in the clearances, owned the airways and the territory. The in-house review of the game will be made more galling by the fact the Dockers did so much right.

To the great relief of Fremantle fans and neutrals alike, it was clear within 15 minutes of the first bounce that the grand final lights weren't likely to blind the Dockers.

Fremantle leant on its barometers early. The colossal figures of Josh Treacy and Voss, the unique talents of Luke Jackson, the relentless ferreting energy of Caleb Serong and Andrew Brayshaw.

The Dockers, on an unfamiliar stage, belonged. And with that minor business out of the way, a truly great grand final was allowed to unfurl.

Played in a shoebox, compressed at times within an inch of its life, the brief moments of game-breaking skill elevated the contest. Morris's invisible but very real handball to Kai Lohmann, Murphy Reid making up for an error with the cleanest hands imaginable, Conor McKenna seeing an angle few others could.

The first little sign of concern for Freo came in the third quarter, after a period of dominance that produced more behinds than goals. Windows of opportunity are rare in grand finals such as this, and when Charlie Cameron kicked the Lions in front it felt like the Dockers had missed a big one.

But even then, Fremantle had an answer. Hayden Young, outstanding on the day, kicked two sensational goals to turn the tide again. The Lions were throwing punches, the Dockers were wearing them and sending them back.

The Dockers were winning the arm wrestle in the last. Treacy's miss from the goalsquare was set right by Voss's true set shot minutes later. For all intents and purposes, they had at last put the Lions away.

Was Wharfie Time a mistake? Another of the great unknowns about this game. It's cursed forever now, those bells now more likely to trigger an untimely bout of PTSD than to inspire the Freo faithful.

What is also certain is that the Lions fed off it, saw it as a sign the Dockers had an eye on celebrations when five decisive minutes remained on the clock.

These Lions, of course, need no invitation. The self-belief and composure and character required to win this premiership — a journey which extended well beyond those final five minutes or this grand final even the start of the season — is the envy of the entire AFL.

One problem with dynastic greatness in sport is you can sometimes run out of things to talk about. Once you've ascended to the peak and set up camp, the story of how you got there can lose its lustre.

They'll tell this story forever. The day the Lions won the unwinnable, the day the world collapsed upon the Dockers, among the greatest and most horrible days footy has ever seen.