ANZ Stadium, Friday 9 May 2014
Long on injuries – short on salary cap
In the end it was exactly what we always feared; Buddy was the difference. Not that he was the most outstanding player on the ground, or that he was even dominant, but he kicked 2.7.19, which, as it happens, is exactly what Sydney won by.
It was a similar story in his Hawthorn years - we would often win by more or less the score he kicked, so it was fitting, if depressingly predictable that he would reverse that when playing against us. Even at three quarter time when he had no goals and seven behinds to his name, most Hawthorn fans knew what was coming and sure enough, his two final quarter goals gave the Swans the advantage we couldn’t overcome.
With Tippet kicking four goals, this was a victory for Sydney’s bloated salary cap and the different rule sunder which they operate.
I took in the match with Chan-Tha, Alex and Jason at the Duke of Wellington Hotel the city. The Duke may charge a fortune for drinks, but they do cater for sporting enthusiasts with plenty of screens each clearly labelled as to the sport that will be shown. So you don’t waste your time securing a prime spot with a good view and a convenient ledge or table only to discover that you’re watching the Melbourne Rebels or the Wellington Nobodies falling about in some approximation of a game, and having to decamp to another screen. Weirdly, they turn off the music for the commentary, which in a crowded pub with lots of chatter, is inaudible anyway.
The other thing about the Duke - they serve the best pub chips in Melbourne. So Hawthorn and hot chips - can’t beat that.
With Sam Mitchell and Brian Lake already missing, along with Brad Sewell, the banner along the foot of the screen announcing that Luke Hodge as a late withdrawal gave me a sick feeling in the stomach, and that was before I’d had a bag of chips and several pints of Kosciusko Pale Ale.
In fact I’d given up on the match at this point. Regardless of the Buddy factor, I didn’t see how we could match Sydney with so many of our key players missing. And so it seemed early on as Sydney did all the attacking and had 3.3 on the board before we’d even strayed forward. Josh Kennedy, Daniel Hanneberry and co ran amok with no Hawthorn strong bodies to compete against them in the middle.
Sydney’s lead got out to more than four goals half way through the second before Jonathan Simpkin, Luke Breust and David Hale added the last three goals of the half to get the Hawks back in the match. At this stage, however, Buddy was doing as much as anyone in the brown and gold to keep the Hawks in the match. His six first half behinds could have settled the match already, so it was good to see signs that the guilt was kicking in, just as his kicking was going astray. Perhaps the universe was telling him something.
The Twang and the Tongue
You couldn’t hear it over the chatter but Cyril Rioli’s hamstring twanged in the first minute of the third quarter. Cyril snaps his hamstring with more or less the same frequency that Keith Richards breaks guitar strings. So no Mitchell, Hodge, Lake and now Rioli off - if the universe was telling Buddy something, it was beating Hawks fans sadistically about the face and head with an unwelcome message.
Then Roughead collected Sydney’s Ben McGlynn with a bump and it looked like we’d have virtually an All-Australian line-up on the sidelines for our next match.
Riloi’s exit brought new boy Billy ‘The Tongue’ Hartung into the fray and The Tongue continued with the fine form he showed on debut the week before. The Hawks even began to get on top, or were at least breaking even, largely due to Burgoyne and Gibson, and when Suckling, Breust and even Taylor Duryea banged through goals Hawks fans were able to momentarily believe, or at least get in another pint of Kosciusko.
A new crew joined us in our corner, including some Hawks fans. One of them, Scott, impressed me immediately with his willingness to shout abuse at the television and his utter lack of compunction when it came to shouting the C-bomb loudly in public. It made mine and Chan-Tha’s behaviour seem measured and reasonable by comparison. It also egged us on to get more involved, despite being several hundred kilometres from the action. And we had to get involved because from early in the final quarter it was obvious the Hawks boys were exhausted and hurt, and the Swans were getting back on top.
Teams often finish matches the way they begin, regardless of what has transpired in the intervening quarters, so it wasn’t a surprise when the Swans kicked away. Nor was it a surprise that Buddy’s two goals were instrumental in Sydney winning.
The final margin was 19 points, but the real margin was the million or so dollars difference between Sydney’s annual salary cap and that which is afforded the rest of the competition.
Final scores: Sydney 15 17 107 d Hawthorn 13 10 88
Attendance:
Ladder position – 2nd
What we learned: the complexities of the Match Review Panel have now been clarified. Last week Melbourne’s Jack Viney was originally suspended and then ultimately cleared after he bumped Adelaide’s Tom Lynch who sustained a broken jaw.
This week Jarryd Roughead was suspended for one match for bumping Sydney’s Ben McGlynn, who barely felt it and continued playing. Had Roughy broken McGlynn’s jaw he could have escaped sanction. The lesson from the tribunal is simple: Roughy didn’t hit him hard enough.
What we already knew: You can’t take Hodge, Mitchell, Sewell, Lake, Rioli and Shiels from the team and not expect some backwash. Take out Roughead for the next match against Port and watching the Hawks over the next few week will be a little like seeing one of those bands that reunites without the singer or lead guitarist from the original line-up, like the Rolling Stones with just Ronnie Wood from the current line-up.
What we knew but didn't realise the extent of: That the beard is back is nothing new, you only have to look at the players from Sydney, but tuning into Eurovision on the weekend made me realise just how far this trend has reached when I saw a bearded lady take the trophy and belt out the winning tune. 'Conchita' would fit nicely into the Swans line-up with that beard, and she could replace that old guy who leads the singing of their club song after victories. Plus, I suspect, take Oxford Street by storm.
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