Brave Lions fall by 51

THE BRISBANE Lions have finished the season in sixth place after losing their semi-final by 51 points to the Western Bulldogs at the MCG.

The final score was 16.11 (107) to 8.8 (56) after the Bulldogs led by 17 points at half time.

On a warm but windy Melbourne evening, the Dogs grabbed the first goal of the night through former Lion Jason Akermanis and were never headed.

By quarter time the Dogs had four goals on the board and kept the Lions goalless. Last week's hero Daniel Bradshaw booted two behinds of the Lions 0.6 while it was the smaller brigade of the Western Bulldogs who hit the scoreboard.

The quarter-time margin was 20 points and it proved to be a buffer they were able to protect for the rest of the night and stretch in the final half an hour.

The Lions couldn't string together consecutive goals or get on the sort of roll that got them across the line in the elimination final against Carlton at the Gabba last week.

They were behind by 37 points at the last change with all five goals they conceded in that third term the result of turnovers.

Coach Michael Voss urged one last effort in the final term but there was nothing left in the Lions' tank after a season where they took giant strides towards the top echelon of the competition.

For the Dogs, Daniel Giansiracusa, Brad Johnson, Jarrod Harbrow and Callan Ward had much better games than they did against the Cats in the qualifying final.

And Daniel Cross was back to his close-checking best, taking the points against Lions champion Simon Black in a duel which was pivotal in the victory.

For the Lions, captain Jonathan Brown was typically strong against the odds with three goals and 15 marks while retiring veteran Tim Notting was busy in his final game of AFL.

Bradshaw also ended up with 3.2 and had patches where he looked on top.

The two inclusions, Jed Adcock and Josh Drummond, had moderate impacts although Drummond's footskills were prominent at times.

Mitch Clark was again a standout in the ruck while Luke Power won plenty of the ball. His 31 possessions was the highest for the Lions with Jared Brennan and Notting the only other players to get more than 20 touches.

The Bulldogs will play St Kilda on Friday night at the MCG for a spot in the 2009 grand final.

Western Bulldogs   4.2   6.6   11.8   16.11 (107)
Brisbane Lions     0.6   3.7   5.7   8.8 (56)

GOALS
Western Bulldogs: Hahn 4, Eagleton 3, Minson 2, Higgins 2, Ward 2, Cooney, Griffen, Gilbee
Brisbane Lions: Brown 3, Bradshaw 3, McGrath, Redden

BEST
Western Bulldogs: Eagleton, Boyd, Cooney, Cross, Morris, Hargrave, Akermanis, Picken, Giansiracusa
Brisbane Lions: Brown, Power, Brennan, Clark, Black

INJURIES
Western Bulldogs: Griffen (corked calf)
Brisbane Lions: Nil

Reports: Nil

Umpires: Stevic, Meredith, Ryan

Official crowd: 47,030 at the MCG

The views in this story are those of the author and not necessarily those of the club.