JEREMY Cameron's hamstring injury looks to have sealed the Coleman Medal for Charlie Curnow, but if history has taught us anything, it's that Carlton's comeback kid is far from over the line.
Curnow (62 goals) has been one of the feelgood stories of 2022 after barely playing the previous two-and-a-half seasons, and leads Cameron (59), Tom Lynch (55) and Tom Hawkins (55) in the race to be the AFL's leading goalkicker.
With Cameron now out of the equation, Curnow holds a commanding seven-goal lead from the two Toms.
The athletic Carlton forward will try and add to his tally in Sunday's blockbuster against Collingwood at the MCG, while Hawkins has the chance to feast against West Coast at GMHBA Stadium. Lynch - fresh off eight goals against Hawthorn - comes up against Essendon, which has had a week on and off the field it'd rather forget.
Remarkably, if Curnow holds onto his lead, it will be the first time since 1900/1901 that two different players from the same club will take home the leading goalkicker award.
But the possibilities for the chasing forwards are endless.
BROWNLOW PREDICTOR Who's leading the race?
Could Lynch bag another eight – or more – and really put some pressure on Curnow, or could Hawkins be placed in the goalsquare against a battling Eagles team with nothing aside from pride to play for.
It wouldn't be the first time a big bag of goals in the final round has snatched the Coleman.
We only have to go back three years where it was Cameron who ran riot to snatch the award from North Melbourne's Ben Brown.
After Brown kicked two goals earlier on the Saturday afternoon to move him six goals clear of Cameron, the then Greater Western Sydney forward dined out at Metricon Stadium, kicking nine goals to roar home.
Once teammates got a sniff he was 'on', they fed Cameron and he didn't let them down.
Two years earlier it was the greatest showman of this century, Lance Franklin, who stole the limelight and the Coleman.
Brown had put himself into pole position earlier that day with a bag of seven against Brisbane, leaving him four clear of Buddy – but that was nowhere near enough.
Facing a battling Carlton outfit, Franklin hit double figures for just the second time in his career, kicking 10 against the Blues to win his fourth Coleman.
There are other examples of big final-round hauls since the turn of the century to top the goalkicking award, with Jonathan Brown kicking seven in 2007 and Matthew Lloyd (2001), Jack Riewoldt (2012) and Buddy (2014) all kicking six.
Although it would take a miraculous effort from either Lynch or Hawkins to take the gong away from Curnow, it's not completely out of the realms of possibility.
