Essendon v Kangaroos (2001 AFL season)
The Round 16, 2001, match played between and the Kangaroos was an Australian rules football home-and-away match played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 22 July 2001. The match saw the greatest successful comeback in the history of the Australian Football League, with Essendon winning by twelve points after trailing by 69 points midway through the second quarter. Many people have called it the best game of football ever played. Background. Essendon went into the match placed first on the ladder with a record of 13–2, while the Kangaroos were placed ninth  with a record of 8–7. The match was crucial to the Kangaroos' chances of reaching the finals in 2001. Essendon and the Kangaroos had been two of the best teams of the era, winning three of the previous five premierships between them (the Kangaroos in 1996 and 1999, and Essendon in 2000), and both clubs had finished in the top four for the previous two seasons. The 2001 season was seeing a decline for the Kangaroos, whilst Essendon was on target to win a third consecutive minor premiership. Essendon had comfortably won the previous two encounters between the clubs, by  125 points in the previous year's qualifying final, and by 85 points in Round 1. This form and their respective positions on the ladder meant that Essendon was a warm favourite to win. Match summary. The Kangaroos kicked twelve goals to two in the first quarter, to lead by 58 points at quarter time, 12.1 (73) to 2.3 (15). After kicking three of the first four goals of the second quarter, the Kangaroos extended the lead to 69 points, leading 15.1 (91) to Essendon's 3.4 (22). Essendon then kicked 9 unanswered goals to reduce the margin to only  15 points, before the Kangaroos kicked a goal after the half-time siren to make the margin 21 points at half-time: 12.4 (76) to the Kangaroos' 16.1 (97). An even third quarter saw Essendon kick seven goals to the Kangaroos' six. The Kangaroos led 22.4 (136) to Essendon 19.8 (122) by 14 points at three-quarter time. Essendon kicked eight goals to the Kangaroos' three in the final quarter to complete the greatest comeback in AFL history, winning the match by twelve points: 27.9 (171) to the Kangaroos' 25.9 (159). The win ensured Essendon remained on top of the  ladder and kept the Kangaroos outside the top eight. Essendon full-forward Matthew Lloyd kicked nine goals; Jason Johnson earned 3/3 Brownlow Medal votes for his 31-disposal performance, which included four goals. Corey McKernan kicked five goals for the Kangaroos. Aftermath. Essendon's win set a new record for the greatest comeback in AFL history, breaking the record of , who had come back from a 63-point deficit to beat by 13 points in Round 12, 1999. It also equaled the record of most goals in a match, with 52, set in Round 6, 1978, between and . The Kangaroos ' losing score of 159 trailed only the 163 scored by in an 8-point loss to in Round 6, 1989. The match was also the highest aggregate scoring match since 1993, with the teams scoring 52.18 (330) between them; the Kangaroos had taken part on the previous occasion as well, defeating 35.19 (229) to 16.9 (105) in Round 6, 1993. It remains the highest scoring match since quarters were shortened to 20 minutes in length in 1994. Both clubs finished the season indifferently after this match. Of Essendon's last six matches in the regular season, it won just three , enough to secure the minor premiership (first place after the regular season). They lost the Grand Final to the , which marked the end of an era, as they dropped out of the top four the next season. The Kangaroos, by contrast, won just one more match for the season and slid to 13th on the ladder. Significantly, after this game, the Kangaroos won their next six matches against Essendon; it was not until Round 1, 2008, that Essendon defeated the Kangaroos (who by then had reverted to its old name "North Melbourne") again. Additionally, Essendon coach Kevin Sheedy never had  a win against the Kangaroos as a coach again; as the coach of the Greater Western Sydney Giants in 2012 and 2013, the club lost three times to North Melbourne during this period. Writing for the "Herald Sun", Mark Robinson declared: “Amid the euphoria of victory and emptiness of defeat, there’s only one question to be asked: was this the greatest game of all time? The answer is almost certainly yes. If it was a Grand Final there would be no doubt." McKernan said it was equal with a match against the Western Bulldogs in 1998, while the other  six placed it on a pedestal above all others. Lloyd loved it so much he got the radio commentary sent to him to relive it. Per the "Herald Sun": "Later that year, Garry Lyon won a media award for his expert calling in the 3AW box. In the video package when he accepted his prize, they played the audio of him predicting Essendon would come back and win early in the second term when the margin exceeded 10 goals."