IF THE events at Spotless Stadium on Saturday evening proved anything, it is that one great era might be just about done and that another might be just on the horizon.

Hawthorn's 75-point loss to Greater Western Sydney inspires little confidence that a fourth successive premiership is in the offing. By the same token, evidence is mounting that a premiership, possibly a few, are part of the future for the Giants.

But in the interregnum there is this year's premiership up for grabs and this is where North Melbourne could be to the AFL in 2016 what Lleyton Hewitt was to tennis in 2001 and 2002.

Those were the bridging years where the 'other' pride of South Australia was the No.1 ranked player in the world thanks to wins at the US Open and then Wimbledon. It came after the years when Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi were waxing grand slam titles and before Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal would do the same.

North Melbourne is set up beautifully to win the flag this year. There are six or seven teams that can win the flag, but with six straight wins to start the season, an ability to win games both in a shootout or through a grind, with their veterans in peak form and condition, and a wafer-thin injury list, the Kangaroos are making all the running. Add to the mix the disappointment of – and lessons learned from – a pair of preliminary final defeats the last two seasons.

So much of North's sound start to the season is due to the excellent form of their over-30s. Brent Harvey, Drew Petrie, Nick Dal Santo, Jarrad Waite, Michael Firrito and Daniel Wells have been among the club's best contributors so far this year.

In particular, Waite, with four of North's nine goals in Friday night's tight scrap against the Western Bulldogs, has found form, maturity and consistency he rarely displayed in 12 seasons with Carlton.

At some stage the over-30s at North will "fall off the cliff" as they like to say in list manager-ese. It might happen as soon as next season and the premiership window will forcefully close.

But there is a golden opportunity ahead for the Kangaroos in 2016 when the giant of the game (Hawthorn) might be ready to relinquish its crown and the Giants of the game (GWS) are looming large, but are probably still 12 months away.

Lleyton Hewitt was good enough to seize his moment. Can the Kangaroos do the same?

The Cat who got away

The North Melbourne evergreens aren't starring in isolation this year. If there were any questions about the wisdom of GWS recruiting Steve Johnson this year, they were put to bed with his five-goal haul in the mauling of his old enemy, the Hawks.

It was a rollback back to the Kennett Curse years for Johnson and he got the goals for the Giants when they mattered, in the first half when the game was up for grabs.

That's 16 goals for the season but most importantly, nine in the past fortnight. Johnson was brought to the club to provide some polish and some big-game experience and on that count, he is delivering.

And then there's Nick Riewoldt, who put his stamp on Saturday's win over Melbourne with 16 touches, 10 marks and three goals in the first half alone.

With Paddy McCartin being 'managed', Riewoldt played closer to goal rather than up the ground, which has been his role for the year. And he played as well as ever, prompting Saints coach Alan Richardson to declare that the 33-year-old has already shown enough this year to earn himself another one-year deal in 2017.

Cats cruising, Giants dwarf the Suns 

What are we to make of Geelong?

Almost by stealth, the Cats are 5-1, second on the ladder, with a more than healthy percentage of 174.1. Maintain something close to that and later in the season, that will be worth a position or two on the ladder.

It is a great platform from which to launch into the meat of the season.

But how good are the Cats? They've had a reasonably good run of it on the fixture front, with the best of their wins in the season-opener against a weakened Hawks line-up. The Giants beat them in round two and the Giants, as noted, are getting better by the week.

Since then, they've beaten the Brisbane Lions, Essendon, Port Adelaide and Gold Coast, teams that even in an even season such as this, are hardly the cream of the competition.

What the Cats do have is a great draw. They have a second crack at the Bombers this year and their only meetings with fellow top-four aspirants West Coast and the Sydney Swans are at Simonds Stadium where, a bit like during the glory times a few years back, the locals turn up for a virtuoso performance rather than a contest.

Without doubt, the Cats were in great touch on Saturday night, but it helped them enormously that Gold Coast looked very much like the 2011 expansion team than the 2016 model that was supposed to have learned how to deal with a bit adversity under the wily Rodney Eade, who had every right to be horrified at what he saw.

The comparisons seem almost unfair, but the Suns and the Giants are miles apart.

2016 most enigmatic award

The joint clubhouse leaders for the most enigmatic teams for 2016 would be St Kilda and Melbourne. Coming off back-to-back wins for the first time since 2011, the Demons appeared good things to get over the Saints at Etihad on Saturday. Alas not. They haven’t beaten the Saints since 2007 and the wait continues after a disappointing 39-point loss.

At first call it would appear that the Demons got ahead of themselves after once again enjoying some prosperity, but Paul Roos said it was structure, rather than intent that got them this time around.

As for the Saints, they're in that development phase where performance can fluctuate so wildly from week to week – very good (and a bit unlucky) against Hawthorn a fortnight ago, flat and listless against GWS last week and excellent again on Sunday. Former Swan Tim Membrey (remember him?) was great with five goals, Blake Acres excellent and Riewoldt, as mentioned above, an ageless star.

If the good Saints turn up on Sunday then the clash with the Kangas should be a beauty. If the 'bad' Saints turn up, then an extended afternoon tea with your mother might be the better option.

Other observations

1. The scoreboard might have shown a three-point loss to the Sydney Swans, but it was the sort of performance by the Brisbane Lions that they can hang their hat on and think about better times ahead. The difference in the end was Luke Parker's mark and goal after a gut-busting run from defence – the swooning girl on the AFL Live Pass TV commercial would have been particularly pleased – but the Swans were made to dig deep. It was interesting to note that a member of the Lions media department tweeted afterwards that the loss was the best match played by the club in the 50 matches Justin Leppitsch has been in charge. As for 'Stretcher-gate' being the difference in the end, I'm not buying it. The most likely outcome from that passage of play was the ball ending up out of bounds. Still, some clarification from the AFL would be helpful because in the West Coast-Collingwood game, the umpires waited for a stoppage in play before calling time-off for a stretcher.

2. Even at its best, Hawthorn was never a great contested ball and clearance-winning team, but the figures have trended badly for the Hawks this year and against the Giants, they lost the stoppage clearances 30-11 and the contested possessions 153-114. That's the first order of business for Alastair Clarkson to deal with. The Hawks have a good draw from here and should be 9-3 heading into a clash with North Melbourne. Jarryd Roughead should be back from then, but there is much to be fixed in the meantime and the hope is that the soft draw doesn't continue to mask the ever-growing cracks.

3. No style points were won at the MCG on Sunday but if you are a Carlton person, who cares? That's two wins on the trot for the Blues, and while the spectacle was largely awful, it came alive in the last quarter when, as per the AFL's desire, fatigue set in and the game opened up. Brendon Bolton is re-building the Blues from the backline and for the most part it held up. Next week they play Collingwood and they're every chance to make it three on the trot. Dale Thomas also picked a good week to play his best game for the Blues.

4. Damien Hardwick might have thrown his players under the bus with his "dumb football" comments and comparing some of their efforts to those of park footballers, but you know something? He was spot-on and right to do so. Saturday night at the MCG saw another lamentable performance from the Tigers, who had their season on the line. All sorts of questions will be asked of Richmond this week and every aspect of the football operation will be placed under the microscope and deservedly so. Ordinarily they might fancy their chances against Hawthorn but with Alex Rance and, now, Trent Cotchin missing, they'll be up against it. Port Adelaide always looks slick in victory and Saturday night was no exception. With the Lions and Carlton to come, the Power can continue to regain momentum and set themselves up for a finals push later in the year.

5. Given the final 62-point margin in the loss to West Coast, the goal conceded by Collingwood early in the final quarter after Adam Oxley and Josh Smith slipped over the turned the ball over, really didn't make much difference. But if they were found to be wearing the wrong boots, then that is the sort of shoddy professionalism that will make Nathan Buckley's blood boil. The Pies were never really going to win in Perth coming off a short week, but will be disappointed to have fallen away late. West Coast did as West Coast does at home, but they need to win a big game away from Domain Stadium. Collingwood-Carlton at the MCG next Saturday will draw the usual headlines, but the Cats-Eagles clash at Simonds Stadium is the match of the round next weekend, and by a considerable margin.