Once at the MCG, it was a case of if Lillee don’t get you, Thommo must. Fifty years later, the modern version is if Curnow don’t get you, McKay must. That is, if Nick Daicos don’t trump them all, which he did, of course. It won’t soothe Carlton hearts at all to dwell on the idea that Daicos this night was young Chris Judd reincarnated.

“What a player, what a player. Geez,” wheezed Collingwood coach Craig McRae. “That late in the game, to be running with that intensity, and then the finish … ” Carlton’s Michael Voss used what was once the highest form of Australian praise, understatement: “Daicos was all right.” You had to see the eye roll.

Nick Daicos kicked the winning goal in the Magpies’ win against the Blues. Credit: Getty Images

At one level, this was a glorious exhibition of football between two old rivals for the delectation of another massive crowd. The Peter Mac cause was again well served. At another, it was an exposition of what might deliver a premiership to either of these two contending teams and what may thwart them still.

When they met late last year, Charlie Curnow kicked six. This time, Harry McKay had three by quarter time and looked on track for six, and Curnow had two of his own soon after the break, and the Blues led by more than three goals then. “They’re big and serious weapons up front,” said McRae, glad........

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