Australian Football

Match Report

While Sydney went into this Thursday night match against Geelong at SCG as slight favourites, nobody - not even the Swans' most one-eyed, diehard fans - could have predicted the utter decimation that the home team would inflict on the Cats. The Swans opened up with a strong first quarter, holding Geelong goalless while kicking four of their own and then just kept going, and going, and going. When it was all over, Sydney had recorded a win that had everybody scrambling for the record books, victorious by an amazing 110 points.

While the Cats had not kicked a goal in the first term, they had also done so against Fremantle two games earlier and fought back to record an honourable defeat. There would be no such honour on this night. The Swans followed up their four-goal-to-none first term with another four goals in the second, with Geelong's only major of the entire first half coming at the 15-minute mark via an unlikely source in ruckman Dawson Simpson, who kicked a miracle goal from the boundary line after being awarded a free kick.

Trailing by 48 points at the long break, conventional wisdom said that the Cats would not produce another half as bad as the first. But in fact, they offered up one that was even worse. Whether that was due to Sydney's brilliance or Geelong's poor play or a combination of the two is a matter for debate, but the Cats managed only one goal in the third term , with that one coming late in the quarter to Tom Hawkins, while Sydney added six more. When the three-quarter time siren sounded, the Swans were 79 points in front.

While Geelong at least managed to score three majors in the last quarter, they were unable to stop an avalanche of them at the other end of the ground, as the Swans added eight more to complete the biggest demolition job on the Cats since Hawthorn beat them by 115 points in round one, 1990.

Sydney had winners all over the ground, with Craig Bird (33 disposals, seven marks) and Nic Malceski (37 possessions, eight marks) particularly outstanding, while Jimmy Bartel (27 disposals) and Matthew Stokes (30 possessions and three tackles) at least provided some spark for the Cats.

The final losing margin of 110 points was the seventh-highest in Geelong's history, and it saw the Cats' percentage plummet from 117 to 101 and the club drop from second to sixth on the ladder. For the Swans, it was their 12th-biggest win as South Melbourne or Sydney, and took them from fifth to third on the table.

The Swans will try and make it seven wins in a row when they take on Gold Coast at Carrara next Sunday, while Geelong will look to rebound with a win over Carlton at Kardinia Park on Friday night.

GOALS
Sydney: Tippett 5; Franklin 4; Goodes 3; Jack, Derickx, Hannebery 2; Bird, Lloyd, McGlynn, Jetta
Geelong: Hawkins 3; Simpson, Johnson

BEST - AFL.COM.AU
Sydney: Bird, Tippett, Malceski, Shaw, Goodes, Franklin, McGlynn, Richards
Geelong: Bartel, Horlin-Smith, Stokes, Johnson

BEST - SPORTAL.COM.AU
Sydney: Bird, Kennedy, Malceski, Richards, Tippett, Franklin, Parker
Geelong: Bartel, Stokes, Selwood, Blicavs

COACHES' COMMENTS
John Longmire (Syd): We've been playing some good footy over the last five weeks and we wanted to come into the game and keep the momentum going, keep putting pressure on the opposition. We had 10 more tackles than the opposition even though we had a lot of the ball, so that continues to be the foundation of what we need to do, keep putting pressure on the opposition. It was a really good performance; it was fantastic.

Chris Scott (Geel): We're disappointed. We played poorly. The opposition were good. Our focus shifts really quickly to doing what we need to do to rectify it. We need to move on relatively quickly, and the players do, but it's a loser's mentality to say, "it was one of those days, she'll be right". We've got to focus on the things that went wrong that are the most important and fix them as quickly as possible.

INJURIES
Sydney: Rampe (knee)
Geelong: Mackie (back)

SUBSTITUTES
Sydney: Harry Cunningham replaced Dane Rampe in the third quarter.
Geelong: Jackson Sheringham replaced Andrew Mackie at three-quarter time.

UMPIRES: Fisher, Nicholls, Ryan

TELEVISION BROADCAST: Seven Network

COMMENTATORS: Brian Taylor, Luke Darcy, Matthew Richardson, Cameron Ling