Screaming believers,
Anyone who has even casually followed the Swans this season could believe that they got away with being thumped 0-5 goals in the Championship Quarter and still won the game.
There must have been a moment approaching three quarter time when all the Swans people at the ground found themselves self-flagellating with their merch at the prospect of a perfectly acceptable season being undone in a whimper in the team's third goaless Championship Quarter this year.
Beyond belief, really.
Only when Our Boy From Burma sacked the hapless Double Blue in the goal square minutes from time and the Bamford had no option but to rule the tacklee was in infringement of the rules and blew his whistle for "ball", did anyone take the result of the game as the gospel truth.
Thank the Good Lord Joisus the scoreboard doesn't lie when they press the button marked "final siren".
The irony is that someone should tell Coach'n'Horses that six goals in the opening stanza might be all well and good, but a quarter of football does not a match make.
Surprised myself on becoming a quivering mass of nerve-endings in the last quarter, but shouldn't have been, after screaming at a ridiculously huge flat screen crystal bucket for a full third quarter as the Swans were totally distracted from their usual game, completely sucked in by Carlton into a brand of football that looked for all the world like an under-7's "swarm", where there's a scrimmage and a ball up every half a minute.
Completely lost the plot.
SC Roos would have been furious.
Looked it.
Swans build their game on handball to the loose man and a good kick to the uncontested mark, patiently staking out territory, before getting in front of goal.
So, it's ugly, but it works.
It was plain for all to see that Plan B wasn't a happening thing, and why fix something if it isn't broke, in any case?
Coach Longmire still has a lot to learn.
Little wonder Carlton were dead set filthy at losing.
Sydney should have enough in the kit bag to out play the Dogs, again, in week two.
It won' take much niggling from The Goodes Train to make BBB Hall's brain implode like some kind of Black Hole, given the bad man's performance last week, and narrow escape at the tribunal.
Not at all convinced about the wisdom of playing Daniel "Ol' Crock" Bradshaw in a semi-final, for gawd's sake, when he's been in the rehab ward and out of the game for so long.
You would have thought the first and last requirement for players going around in finals is match fitness, and he certainly aint got that.
Same goes for the injury-fragile "In Like" McGlynn.
In any case, who do you drop out of the current 22 to make way for that stepping-on-eggshells pair?
Can't think of anyone off the top of my head who deserves to be omitted for someone wrapped in cotton wool after a five game winning streak late season purple patch.
Surely they can't be thinking along the lines of a 'last in, first out' policy, as Dennis-Lane and the Jetta Kiddie are having the time of their lives.
The yoof .v. experience conundrum comes into play, yet again.
That'd be up to brighter minds than me on the match committee to decide, and good luck to them
SC Roos and Cap'n'Kirk live to fight another day, which can't be a bad thing for ol' times sake.
If the antics they got up to together after the game are any indication, who knows what they'll do to each other if they win this week, and find themselves one game out of the Grand Final?
SYDNEY: 6.6, 11.8, 11.11, 14.15 (99). Goals: Dennis-Lane 4, Bevan 3, Shaw 2, Jack, White, Goodes, Jetta, O'Keefe.
CARLTON: 4.3, 7.8, 12.12, 13.16 (94). Goals: Walker 3, Waite 3, Warnock 2, Garlett 2, Henderson, Murphy.
At Olympic Stadium, Homebush.
Crowd: 41,596.
Ducked my head into the Front Bar at The Local mid-week and just said one word "Mighty Tiges", only to be greeted with a general shaking of heads in dismay that Balmain had limply given up second place on the ladder when the guaranteed double chance was there for the taking.
Beyond belief, really.
With so much on the line, the local drinkers found it hard to fathom why they played so badly in the first half; all the dropped ball and other silly mistakes and plain spastic penalties given away, and that's not to mention the softest two tries scored against anyone all season very early on in proceedings, the first 11 minutes in fact, to find themselves well and truly behind the eight ball, only to cop a gigantic tusk up the runter in the form of a field goal to make it 13-0 down before the half-time hooter!
The students of the game were still finding that a difficult one to work out, while the old fashioned drunks were just dumbfounded, as usual.
After getting a Saturn rocket up them at half time from SC Sheens, Tigers came out in the second half with quite a bit more steel to the backbone to score two good tries off the bell, to be just a point behind, yet never looked like winning.
Talk of the lunatic 77th minute penalty goal aroused yet more shaking of heads among the imbibers, and then some gnashing of teeth, soothed only, days after the event, by a deep draft of the schooner that's to hand.
The Philosopher was blunt on the matter:
"well, that's typical Titans for you, isn't it? You cannot afford to let them continue to have the lead with 20 minutes to go, no matter how small the margin, as you will always find it dreadfully difficult to get it back".
Otherwise, it appeared or all intents and purposes to be situation normal, with the forwards getting on with it and the backs doing the job.
Go figure.
Current form is impossible to read across the top eight, given that it's all over the shop like a mad dog's breakfast.
On paper, Balmain should do Eastern Suburbs like a hot dinner.
Should have more strike power in the light artillery to out-point 'em, while the forwards should have little difficulty wrapping up the Roosters pack.
Should being the operative word.
Wade "I can't spit six metres, Your Honour" McKinnon back at full-back will add a measure of safety and security in the last line of defence, while Fulton's return will no doubt add the other half of the starch to the second row, and he's a perfect foil for That Pom Ellis.
The selection of the SFS at the finals home ground is a curious, but ultimately sensible one.
Leichhardt Oval would have to have been the obvious first pick, but with 20,000 capacity at best, the Club Secretary, flanked by a phalanx of bean counters and nut crackers in the back office, would have made it very clear to the board that a 45,500 full house potential at SFS is a much better deal on the turnstiles.
To add the curioisty, SFS is also the Roosters home ground, so both teams are playing at home, if that makes any sense.
With Balmain hosting the home final and having first dibs on the ground, they have locked the Roosters out of the SFS [even though Easts administrative offices are actually in the ground], and put in security guards to deal with the problem of football spies.
Easts have labelled the move as "paranoid".
Whatever.
If you can't get 2nd, 3rd on the premiership table isn't a bad option; in theory anway under the strange Hare-Clark-McIntyre-Duckworth-Lewis finals system, the Tiges can't be knocked out in the first week, and a win and the unlikely event of a Penrith loss would see them sail straight through to week three under a wet sail, one win out of the Grand Final.
At least SC Sheens doesn't have to carry through with the threat he made the day he extended his contract to the end of next season on the back of a paper napkin in some cafe in Chiswick earlier in the year that he would retire at the end of this season if the team he had didn't make the top eight.
The side he's got on the park is good enough to win the thing, but only, it seems, on "their day".
While SC Sheens is busy working on the game plan, Messrs Folkes and Simmons would have been reaching into the back of their complex football brains to coach some more of those beautiful set plays on the training paddock this week.
They know, better than anyone in the caper, that strength, speed, and surprise is the secret to finals football.
GOLD COAST TITANS 21. Tries: Harrison, Zillman, Gordon. Goals: Prince (4). Field Goals: Rogers (1).
WESTS TIGERS 18. Tries: Heighington, Ellis, Tuqiri. Goals: Marshall (3).
At Gold Coast Stadium.
Crowd: 26,103.
