It was the opening round, but not the first round. Maybe football hasn’t started yet. For some teams, even those who played games in this nonsensically labelled “opening round”, it still hasn’t begun. For others, it was like last year never ended.

Melbourne and Brisbane played like they were angry with everyone, including themselves, but didn’t know what to do about it. GWS and Carlton played like last year never ended and carried the momentum and hunger with them into a new season.

Harry McKay and Charlie Curnow celebrate at the Gabba.Credit: Getty Images

Collingwood, meanwhile, had the self-satisfied torpor of the victor who had so much confidence driving them to victory last year they assumed self-belief was enough.

This is not to over-reach for conclusions from one round that was, in fact, less than half a round. They are pointers that come with the knowledge that round one notoriously throws up rogue results. These are not projections of what will be wrong for a whole season.

Collingwood were beaten everywhere, but most consequentially in defence, which has been their point of difference over the competition. The absence of Jeremy Howe and Nathan Murphy removed two players who intuitively cover for each other aerially and enable Darcy Moore to play with dare. Without them, the defence lacked cohesion and understanding against a forward line that is as rounded and complete as any in the competition. Indeed, that description could be applied to the entire GWS team.

The Collingwood forward line was also splutteringly poor. The kicking inside 50 metres was horrible, the marking inside 50 as bad and the kicking for goal was terrible. Mason Cox did more before the game in promoting it than he did during it. Running into Shane Mumford in the warm-up was fine if you are going to run through the Giants when the ball bounces, but Cox was unsighted.

Ash Johnson likewise. If he doesn’t mark the ball – which he didn’t – he struggles for impact. The delivery into the forward line was bad, but he needs to be more involved.

Scott Pendlebury had one of the best quarters of his career in the last term of the grand final. He had one of the poorest halves of his career (two touches) in the first half of this year’s first game. It was so uncharacteristic it was almost as if he had nursed a knee injury all last week with his leg in a brace and ice. Funny that (he did). He was better in the second half.