Gerard Whateley

They're a 50-50 team, even Steven.

Four wins and a draw from nine with a percentage of 99.9.

734 points for, 735 points against.

Average, bog average.

I've had a tendency to over-index the magpies, despite numerous warnings from Simmo.

I'm on the brink of having to concede that I'm wrong here.

They certainly don't belong with the contenders.

Saturday night was a pretty graphic illustration of that.

But are they in the second tier?

Or are they just scrapping for the newfangled wildcard places?

There's a pattern in the deficiencies of their clearance game.

There's an event in the breakdown of their defensive structure, so they have both pattern and event.

They thought they'd resolved the forward connection piece, but that reared again on Saturday night, and it leaves Craig McRae with an awful lot to work on.

They were broadly expected to be the slider, given the age profile and the lack of young talent.

I suspect that might have been true on their internal forecasting as well, but it looks like the most accurate of economic forecasting.

They are absolutely doing the right thing with Scott Pendlebury, holding him back from an MCG record breaker, but inevitably that is going to create awkwardness this week.

Shane Crawford cast this as a tribute year at Collingwood when we were together for the Holy Thursday game in Brisbane.

It's starting to feel like such a canny observation.

They're even, Stephen.

They're 50-50.