It was the 56th annual Grand Final of the Victorian Football League, staged to determine the premiers for the 1953 VFL season.

Collingwood's full-back Jack Hamilton and Geelong's dual premiership player Russell Middlemiss missed the game through injury.

The game opened with the large crowd spilling out onto the oval and forming a human boundary line; these people got to see a Collingwood side that were more determined to get to the ball first and run their Geelong opponents off their feet.

[citation needed] It was a tight first term in which the Magpies didn't allow the Cats to play their usual dominant game.

The second quarter was a microcosm of the game: Geelong were wasteful in front of goal, whereas the Collingwood team, with Batchelor and Rose, were accurate.