Fremantle win arm wrestle

A four-goal haul from Michael Walters helped Fremantle hold off Collingwood by seven points in a sensational contest at Domain Stadium tonight, bringing up their 11th win of the season.

The Dockers and the Pies were two points apart or level at every break before the visitors looked to have taken the advantage with two quick goals in the last term.

But goals from set shots to Michael Barlow and Walters, who had twice before bobbed up when it counted in the close encounter, gave the Dockers the edge they needed to record the 12.8 (80) to 11.7 (73) win, keeping them one win clear atop the ladder.

Walters was the difference up forward, but defender Garrick Ibbotson (nine marks), Nat Fyfe (32 possessions, two goals) and Stephen Hill (24, two goals) held up their end of the bargain.

Young Magpie Jack Crisp (seven tackles) did some tremendous work across the ground, while Travis Varcoe’s performance on Hayden Ballantyne was arguably his best in black and white.

It didn’t start that way for the Geelong premiership player, however, with his defensive error in the early stages giving Walters the opening goal of the game.

But it didn’t take longs for things to turn, with the Pies beginning a dominant period which saw them control the stoppages, take plenty of marks in their forward half and quickly move into a two-goal lead.

Crisp sat on Fyfe in the midfield and won the battle early, but when the Brownlow Medal favourite started to lift, it’s no surprise his team joined him.

The Dockers weren’t as clean as the opposition with their ball movement, but their scrappy forays forward delivered late goals to Hill and Fyfe to bring the margin back to two points at the first change.

The second term was essentially a carbon copy of the first, with Collingwood getting off the chain early, then Fremantle pushing back as time ticked towards the long break.

WA forward Alex Fasolo proved the danger man for the visitors with two goals for the term, while Scott Pendlebury continued to have an influence despite spending the first eight minutes of the quarter on the bench.

The Dockers struggled to take a mark inside 50 — besides one spectacular effort from Fyfe — courtesy of some strong Magpie defence.

But in the absence of set shots, they discovered other avenues to goal, including a tremendous snap out of congestion from Walters that kept the margin at two points again at the half.

The game descended into an arm wrestle in the third, with both sides unable to convert from their share of possession.

It was Crisp who broke the stalemate, getting on the receiving end of some clever work from the Pies’ forwards and running into an open goal.

The ball bounced from end to end, with pressure at its peak, and Collingwood looked to have an advantage ahead of three-quarter time.

But again it was Walters who bobbed up in the final 10 seconds of the quarter, this time bringing scores level with one term to play.

His set-shot at the 20-minute mark of the final term finally gave Freo the buffer they needed to run out with the win.

SCOREBOARD

FREMANTLE 3.2 7.4 9.612.8 (80)

COLLINGWOOD 3.4 7.6 9.611.7 (73)

GOALS – FREMANTLE: Walters 4; Fyfe, Hill 2; C Pearce, Ballantyne, Neale, Barlow.COLLINGWOOD: Fasolo, Elliott 2; Pendlebury, Broomhead, Adams, Crisp, Blair, de Goey, Seedsman.

BEST – FREMANTLE: Hill, Walters, Fyfe, Ibbotson, Neale, Mundy.COLLINGWOOD: Varcoe, Adams, Crisp, Swan, Langdon, de Goey.

UMPIRES: J Dalgleish, M Stevic, S McInerney

CROWD: 37,145 at Domain Stadium