THE day Geelong beat the Roos by 106 points earlier this finals series, I rang my travel agent in London and booked a plane ticket. When I told English friends why, most were gobsmacked that I would fly around the world for a football match. But my neighbour, a mad Arsenal fan who has never seen an Aussie rules game in his life, simply said: "You have to."

I had to. With my father and brother, I have gone to Geelong games for nearly 40 years. We have seen them soar towards the sun, then plummet to earth. Time and again we have sat in the stand, sick at heart, as the enemy roared home to steal a match that was not for stealing. And we have wondered: What would it be like to barrack for Hawthorn or Essendon? What would it be like to win?

I came home because I was two when Geelong last won a flag. If they won this year, I figured, it might be another 44 years before they won again, and I might not be here. Would I say on my deathbed: "Thank God I saved 2½ thousand bucks on that plane ticket"?

But though I flew home, did I believe in my heart they would win? On Saturday morning, I was nearly sure they would not. I could not get past Port Adelaide having 10 premiership players and beating us in round 21. Tredrea and the Burgoyne and Cornes brothers walked like giants in my head. I could not imagine how, and through which players, Geelong would seize hold of the game. So, instead of savouring the football ahead, I tried, Zen-like, to prepare myself to cope with defeat.

Was I faithless? Perhaps, but I am a Geelong supporter. I relived the catatonic game they played in the 1995 grand final. I feared the weight of expectation would crush them.

For years, too, I had wondered whether the Cats had missed their chance to win a flag. The national league, I thought, had grown too big, too rich and too savvy for a country town, and deep down the players, club and the whole of Geelong knew it. At the crunch moment, the players lacked the magic self-belief to lead them to victory.

I was not alone. Why was the line of Geelong's season: Keep a lid on it? It says: Don't hope too much — we have been here before. It testifies to a shared psychological condition.

But in my time away I had missed what this team of Cats had become.

They have no superstitious beliefs, just belief. They don't care about the past; they know that the future is unwritten.

Maybe only the players and the coach can fully explain the alchemy that exists among them and that has turned them into a champion team.

The rest of us can see it in the astonishing chains of often blind handballs they do from the back line — what coach "Bomber" Thompson calls their Kamikaze handball. Such exuberant recklessness only works if a player has absolute trust that his team-mate will be there.

What changed, then, from the miserable year of 2006? They got a lot fitter, obviously, but they also turned their heads around. A bunch of good but often ill-disciplined players realised they could be so much better if they worked together and told each other the truth.

This must have huge resonance for the fans. Following Geelong has always felt like a personality failing. Who has not looked at the years of unfulfilled promise and thought: That's me. That's my life? From there it was only a small step to thinking that Geelong's failure was somehow our fault.

Perhaps that helps to explain the extraordinary scenes after the game.

The players did not want to leave the field. As they walked along the boundary line — some even jumping into the crowd — they and the supporters seemed to merge. "Thank you for your patience," Thompson told the crowd. A great club needs great fans.

Outside gate one, each wave of blue and white leaving the ground was greeted with a roar by fans already outside. People hugged and hung Cats scarves around the statue of Bill Ponsford. At the club dinner, 80-year-old men danced with 25-year-old women to Born to Be Alive. The cup was passed around and kissed like a newborn baby. As several speakers said, there was a lot of love in the room.

I was happiest for my father, who has followed the team through thick and thin for half a century and more, and who thought, like many older supporters, that he might not live to see a flag. His joy was dimmed a little by problems with his eyes. The players are blurs to him. The game is better for him on TV.

He has already bought his commemorative DVD. He will watch it obsessively, reliving Ablett's stolen goal, Chapman's mark and the moment lumbering Brad Ottens ran down a faster Port player and lifted the roof off the Ponsford stand.

Yesterday morning, I pored over each photo of elated players: Stephen King and Corey Enright are staring bug-eyed and open-mouthed at each other, knees up, as if they're about to do the watusi. But what can I complain about now, my dad asks over breakfast. That is the problem.

No more laments about the curse of the Cats, no more waiting for life to begin. How will we cope? And will other fans grow to hate us now?

If that means more premierships, a Cat Empire, bring it on.

The wheel of destiny is broken. The hobbits have flung the ring of power into the fires of Mount Doom. The Lid is Off. Tonight we dance on the shores of Corio Bay as a round object with a handle on top spins towards the stars.

James Button is Europe correspondent.