unheard of in the modern era

Miracle workers,

Didn't see a frame of the Swans match, not even the highlights reel, so in no position to offer much comment.
Found myself at a surprise 50th birthday party at the Duke of Wellington Hotel in New Lambton in the company of a mob who don't mind a drink, and hardly need any excuse to have a few.
Newcastle, being the friendly town it is, saw the publican refusing point blank to put the Rules game on a spare screen that no one was watching with a stern "nah, mate" - not even a "sorry".
But did have two spies in Surfers Paradise.
Soon after the Swans kicked five goals in nine minutes shortly before three-quarter time, two almost simultaneous telegraph messages came through, both saying words to the effect of "Swans have taken to mid-way through The Champo to get going, but the floodgates have now opened."
The usual suspects turned up the "best" lists in the Monday morning fishwraps...Jack, Kennedy, O'Keefe, Roberts-Thomson, Bolton, McVeigh et al
The mid-field brains 'em week to week to week.
Thanks to some excellent work from Geelong at Kardinia Park to do a job on Adelaide, Sydney are now a game clear on top, with five regular season games to play.
Simply unheard of in the modern era.
The Stats Guru also pointed out the unusal fact that the Swans are the first team since the Sainters back in 2000 to win a game in every state in the same season.
Another example of the supreme advantage of winning away.
Seems Sam Reid will be out three weeks, after doing himself a mischief.
No great loss, at this stage, for mine, with the kiddie being a model of inconsistency all season.
It was reported that the coach chastised him mid-season for just that, reminding him that there is a clause in his contract that requires him to "kick goals" week in week out.
It's no use kicking six one week, then SFA the next.
Mr Ed is becoming more and more taciturn as the season wears on - as all good coaches should be - when quizzed on interview after the game re the eight game winning streak, he said only "there's no satisfaction just at this point".
Sydney should be able to account for Carlton fairly comfortably away this weekend - but it's not a game where they can allow any kind of complacency to sneak in.
Then it's the Pies blockbuster at the Bush for the chance to do the extremely rare double purple patch - ten in a row.
But best not to get ahead of ourselves here.
What more is there to say?

GOLD COAST: 2.1, 5.2, 7.4, 8.6 (54). Goals: Matera 3, Smith 2, Brown, Ablett, Lynch.
SYDNEY: 6.3, 8.7, 16.9, 19.12 (126). Goals: Roberts-Thomson 4, Goodes 3, Bolton 3, Jack 2, Dennis-Lane 2, Bird, Hannebery, Kennedy, McVeigh, Jetta.
At Gold Coast Stadium.
Crowd: 11,169.


Pains me as it does to say, but Balmain are shot birds.
Taking a full 65 minutes score their only try to narrowly avoid being beat to zip, says it all.
Weakness in defence down the middle of the ruck with missed tackles galore was there for all to see.
They stood around and looked at each other in attack, as if waiting for someone else to do something.
The two marquee players, Best Leb in the Game and The Great Benji, by their own admissions, had poor games.
The ranks are now so thin, the two young kids who were brought up from reserve grade [or maybe they were picked up at random at a bus stop on the Balmain Road mid-week], who were charged with guarding the left and right edges, found themselves out of their depth and were done like dinners by a Souths attack that's playing at its best in at least four years.
The child who played on one wing is a chappie called Marika Koroibete.
Who?
The hell is he exactly?
Things are not helped by blokes like poor old Matty Utai and That Bloody Adam Blair playing career-worst football.
Confidence, if there was any scrap of it left, has now gone right out the back door.
SC Sheens had that "what do you expect me to do?" look on his face as he sat in the sideline truck seat during the second half, and didn't hold back on interview after the game, describing the Tigers as "brain dead" at half time and "looking like a suburban park footy team".
He could have left it at that, but went on to add "you only have to look at other teams in our position; they have that desperation -- that 'we've got to win, we've got to win' mentality. We haven't. But that's where we need to be right now."
After being confomortably ensconced in the top four seemingly only yesterday, Balmain has made an ignominious exit from the top eight, slipping to 10th on the ladder, and being in the negative percentage area.
The Club Secretary would be apoplectic.
Despite the very, very good crowd [it is, after all, a traditional grudge match that goes back to the dawn of time], the Rabbitohs would have taken the lion's share of the gate receipts and the Secretary's got a stack of medical bills to pay for all those first graders who are malingering in Sick Bay waiting for miracle cures while not earning their keep, as he watches the wheels fall off the wagon and the prospect of making the finals receding out of view over the horizon.
At present, the team is probably beyond help down at The Room Full of Mirrors, so there's not much point going there.
They could do worse than start thinking outside the square again, to get themselevs out of this one.
They're going to need a few good ones.

SOUTH SYDNEY RABBITOHS 32. Tries: Peats (2), Merritt, Farrell, Clark. Goals: Reynolds (6).
WESTS TIGERS 6. Tries: Marshall. Goals: Marshall (1).
At Olympic Stadium, Homebush.
Crowd: 29,863.

trashed in Townsville

Salvation Janers,

Woke up on Sunday morning and wandered into the front yard to get the fishwrap that'd been lobbed in there, only to regret rubbing the sleep out of my eyes.
Opened up the sports section to reveal a very confronting and deeply disturbing image.
It was a large photograph spead across two pages of Lewis "The Ugliest Man in Football" Roberts-Thomson sitting in front of his locker in the Swans change room along with his mother, three sisters, and fiance.
Dear oh dear oh dear.
It was enough to frighten the hell out of small children.
Certainly gave me a start.
Good thing that he's a champion footballer, and played a key role in this one after Mummy did himself a mischief and was subbed out of the game at half time, by helping out Pykey in the ruck.
The Stats Guru says the late season purple patch is now turning into something else again with seven wins on the trot and a visit to sunny Surfers Paradise on the intinerary for this weekend - and who can argue?
That sort of thing and Sydney going top three weeks running hasn't been seen in living memory.
Lets hope the Swans don't fall back into that old-time routine of winning ugly in the run home, doing just enough for victory.
The idea has its merits, but it really aint no preparation for September, as things tend to get scrappy [13 behinds to half time? What the?], evinced by the fact that flambouyant playmakers like The Goodes Train and the Jetta Kiddie both had quiet games, with Goodesy still playing on one leg.
It was, needless to say, a close run thing throughout, but four goals in four mintues in the denoument flattered the Swans scoreline.
Deep into the final quarter my spy at the ground pushed through a telegraph message: "The fittest team won".
Quite right.
This mob are match hard after 17 rounds; tough as teak.
And the coach knows if you haven't got that, you are no chance in the finals.
These blokes are trained to within an inch of their lives.
After a couple of slow weeks, JP Kennedy was back to his best and probably garnered the three Brownlow votes, and remains a genuine smokey to pick up the Chas, for mine [the bloke, playing for the leading side, is at 25/1 down at the books to win the top gong, so load up].
The Guru also noted that the Sainters haven't played at the SCG since 2009, when they won by a bloody point, and the crowd that night was 27,805...so surmised that this time around 971 people must have had something better to do.
Maybe they were put off by the sight of HQ looking like a bomb has hit it, with the Bradman and MA Noble Stands in ruins, with bloody big diggers sitting on top of the huge pile of rubble.
Guessing that by the time the cricket season comes around they will have cleared that away, and all that will be there for the New Year test match will be a huge gaping hole, as it will take them the best part a year to put together the new structures, to complete the final stadiumisation of the ground that began 21 years ago, when they covered The Hill in concrete and plastic seats.
The good old days have gone away.
You only have to look at the hideous monstrocity they are creating at the once venerable Adelaide Oval with the sole purpose of turning it into a soulless AFL stadium, given that the purpose built 38-year-old footy stadium, Football Park, looks set to go the way of Waverley and be demolished and covered in flats.
They are no longer cricket grounds that host the occasional game of football, rather the other way round, football stadiums that stage the occasional game of cricket.
CB Fry cited watching the game from a wicker chair with a gin and tonic in hand in the now shamefully demolished 1882 George Giffen Stand, with the cathedral towering above the magnificenr scoreboard to the left and the Adelaide hills as the backdrop, as perhaps the finest sight in world cricket.
No more.
Repeat, the good old days have gone away.
Oops, a bit off topic there, but that's my rant for the week, what's yours?
My spy also commented that the latest look for the "it" girls at the footy is a maple leaf flag beanie.
Right colours, and a nod to Mike Pyke, who is, apparantly, a well-known pants man.
Coach Longmire was his usual taciturn self on interview after the game.
Mr Ed refuses to get carried away with anything, knowing more than anyone, that winning the last game of the year is all that matters.

SYDNEY: 1.6, 5.13, 9.13, 15.15 (105). Goals: Goodes 2, Bolton 2, Jack 2, McGlynn, Bird, Grundy, Kennedy, McVeigh, Jetta, Roberts-Thomson, O'Keefe, Reid
ST KILDA: 5.1, 5.4, 7.9, 10.16 (76). Goals: Milne 5, Saad, Koschitzke, Dal Santo, Dunell, Gilbert.
At Sydney Cricket Ground.
Crowd: 26,834.


If yet another season cruelled by injury needed an exclamation mark, this was it!
Fancy Timmy Moltzen doing a hammy in the warm-up - the warm-up, for chrissake - and failing to take the field.
Then poor Sirro Jnr manages to dislocate a shoulder mid-way through the first half, which is likely to be a season ender as a shoulder reconstruction looms.
Young Curtis apparently has a history of being somewhat fragile, so could it be another sad case of a hugely promising career being shot early by chronic injury?
Then the Try Scoring Freak was carted off late in the opening stanza with a calf, never to return.
To hold the home team to 16-16 at half time was a brave effort under the circumstances.
Late in the piece Murdoch-Masila was taken off with some kind of mischief, and the Tigers were down to no men on the bench, no reserves left, not a one; a bench that was entirely empty, deserted, nobody sitting on it.
[It's also been reported that Matty Groat busted a thumb in the reserve grade game. Joisus. Even lads you'd call on in a crisis are going down].
As a result, That Pom Ellis - coming back for his first game in 13 weeks from a serious foot injury - was forced to play the full 80 minutes in the second row - something that was never planned and is all but impossible to do even when fully fit.
Superhuman effort.
From there the result was a fait accompli, and yet Balmain managed to stay in it right to the finish, with only a field goal and a fruit-on-the-sideboard try to the Cowboys in the last five minutes putting the game beyond doubt.
Never mind that the play was end-to-end with both sides error riddled as no one really managed to hang onto the ball, let alone do much useful with it.
As the commentator on the ramshackle MMM radio call was moved to say near the end of the first first half "boy, oh boy, this is one crazy game of football".
Townsville is a long way to go for a Monday night to see the troops decimated, trashed on the front line.
SC Sheens put it succinctly on interview after the game: "Right now all I'm worried about is the guys in hospital. I'm not thinking about what I'm going to do with the lineup next week".
And then it goes from bad to worse to cataclysmic as news filters through on the bush telegraph that The Great Benji was seen gingerly hobbling about at Tuesday morning training on a bad toe, and he's also got a thumb niggle and isn't expected to train all week.
Lawd, save us!
That could be just about season over.
Or maybe not?
By some miracle, Balmain still manages to cling on to 8th spot, but the result certainly has plenty of ladder implications, as the Tigers lost a golden opportunity to take a two win break on the rest of the field; the loss opens the door for four other teams to challenge for a finals berth.
But, as everyone knows, how many teams have won the premiership from 6th-8th since the introduction of the top eight system?
Zip.
And with half the first pick team in Sick Bay, even getting to September in a hopeless situation is doubtful.

NORTH QUEENSLAND COWBOYS 29: Tries: Cooper, Fai Fai Loa, Hall, Mitchell, Tate. Goals: Thurston (1). Field Goals: Bowen (1).
WESTS TIGERS 16: Tries: Farah, Fulton, Iosefa. Goals: Marshall (2).
At Townsville Sports Stadium.
Crowd: 12,357.

through the roof and over the moon

Anticipationists,

Little wonder the crowd at a full-to-the-gunwhales Subiaco Oval, who were jammed in like sardines, was so quiet and so glum.
They'd forgotten what it's like to lose at home.
Weagels fans had enjoyed no less than 18 straight wins on their side of the island....jeez, it must be good to be a member there with a guaranteed win...all the time...until they come the inevitable cropper.
Their last loss at Sooby was in Round 3 last year, against, you guessed it, the Swans.
It could be turning into some kind of hoo-doo.
The Bamfords might as well have given the whole midfield the Best on Ground award as a group.
They most certainy would've shared all the Brownlow votes between them.
Rhino Keefe, Ric Shaw, the Haneberry Kiddie, Son of Gary, The Little Birdie all had excellent games.
Not to mention blokes like In Like McGlynn and the New Train Jetta, who has the radar well & truly going on ridiculously long shots at goal, and bags 'em almost every time.
Teddy Richards took four marks in a row at full back in the Champo to thwart any Weagles threat in front of goal being just one example of the heroics on display.
Once they had won the Champo, in spades, it was never in doubt.
My spy at the ground telegraphed through "LRT should have never taken off the head gear" after he was carted off for the umpteenth time this season with yet another head knock [and remember he's also copped a busted cheekbone].
The Ugliest Man in Football is a walking, talking advertisment for head gear - he could make good money by endorsing a popular brand of strap-on helmet - not only do they go some way to protecting the bonce, they also tend to help hide your extreme ugliness = winner!
That said, the stability of the Swans core playing unit only goes to show how far you can you can get by not having a season cruelled by injury.
Sure The Train was out for a few weeks and has been slow in getting himself competely right, and Mummy was sidelined for a while, but apart from that, by and large, Mr Ed has been able to field pretty much an unchanged line up throughout, and there is certainly some depth on the bench, when required.
It's novel to field more than one ruckman at the same time - no other team does it - but it works, and it must be hard to coach against the relentless scrapping and tackling the Swans deploy in defence, denying the opposition any chance of getting proper structure and go forward together.
And then there's the wily old heads combining with the blokes with young legs in attack.
You've got a recipe for success with that, as the scoreboard suggests.
And the scoreboard never lies.
The most pleasing thing about it was that on the now faint background of the rivalry created by '05 and '06, they didn't just beat 'em, they gave 'em a right touch up; a bloody good towelling.
While the Swans went about scoring one of their most important and perhaps finest wins since the Miracle Year in front of that huge crowd at Subiaco - where they truly love their footy - a miserable 7,669 punters were streaming out of the Sydney Showground after witnessing the Crows give the Pygmies a 27 goal football lesson.
Under normal circumstances, in any other town, the Swans win would, of course, be front page news.
But a casual check of the fishwraps in the newsagent on Monday morning revealed that that's not the case in the Emerald City.
Even the back page editors had no idea the Swans had already gone top the week before.
Wouldn't know a good sports story if it fell on them.
The run home gets fascinating now.
It must be rather rare for all top eight teams to play each other on the same weekend, as they will do this weekend, which should just about start to sort the men from the boys.
Coach Horse on interview after the game refused to be drawn into the futures market saying "everybody talkin' 'bout September. I aint talkin' 'bout September, 'cos it's only July".
Well said.

WEST COAST: 4.3, 7.7, 8.8, 10.9 (69). Goals: Masten 3; Darling 2; Selwood, Sheppard, Cox, Newman, Naitanui.
SYDNEY: 5.1, 10.4, 13.8, 18.13 (121). Goals: Jetta 4, Reid 3, Bolton 3, Bird, McVeigh, Goodes, McGlynn, Pyke, Roberts-Thomson, Everitt, Kennedy.
At Subiaco Oval.
Crowd: 39,152.

Another very flaky win.
Very flaky.
Did just enough to pull off victory against a team placed 15th on the ladder, just one short of stone motherless last.
And let's face it, If you can't win against the Chocolate Soldiers, you might as well pick up your ball and go home and call the whole thing off.
No less than six lead changes in a rugby league match is enough to get the blood pressure boiling through the roof and over the moon.
The forwards took it up well enough all night, the backs looked a little disjointed in attack but due to the good coaching had plenty of set plays in the repetoir to score enough tries, the goal kickers cancelled each other out, and superior match fitness was always going to be a factor in the finish.
See which ones of the big units tire first.
The two marquee players, Farah and Marshall aren't playing very well at the moment; the Best Leb in The Game is still cut up about his mum and Benji has trouble convincing his mother to polish his kicking boots week in week out.
Sirro Jnr, after a stellar debut, is now finding the first grade going a lot tougher than first thought now that he has to play it every weekend.
The leap up from the Under 20's to the seniors is like jumping a yawning chasm in terms of the pace, skills, and toughness involved.
To heap more trouble and woe and gnashing of teeth on a season already cruelled by injury, appears the Bludnut Keefy Galloway will be in the casualty ward for 3 to 4 weeks with a ruptured thing-a-me-jig; never a good idea to rupture anything, lets alone a what's-its-name.
Whoever they replace him with will no doubt be big and boofy, but won't have the same grunt.
If someone like Benji gets hurt, gawd forbid, then it's season over there and then.
The Tigers are really not much more than a week-to-week proposition at present, which is not a great place to be with the pointy end of the season looming.
If fact, it's a bad place to be.
The win was enough to push Balmain back into the top eight, but The Stats Guru has pointed out that on any calculation, only ten teams can realistically make the top eight, and ten into eight won't go.
Even the most mathematically illiterate among us, like myself, can understand that.
Two will miss out.
Nothing surer.
SC Sheens on interview after the game refused to be drawn into the futures market saying "obviously the two premiership points are very valuable, the way the competition is going, but that said, there's no point getting ahead of ourselves."
Well said.
Somebody must've had a word in the shell-likes of the Bamfords, because, much to their credit, they have pulled their heads in in recent weeks.
It's taken them this long?
Perhaps they have finally been told that the whole point of refereeing in the rugby league is to let the game flow and allow the players sort it out for themselves; minor infringements can be let go by and large as they will always cancel themselves out in the end, and the whistle should only be used sparingly, for obvious, blatant infractions of the rules.
You know it makes sense.

WESTS TIGERS 26. Tries: Farah, Fulton, Heighington, Lawrence, Murdoch-Masila. Goals: Marshall (3).
PENRITH PANTHERS 18. Tries: Kingston, Mansour, Walsh. Goals: Walsh (3).
At Campbelltown Sports Ground.
Crowd: 12,384.

Where is Grimsby?

Bored spectators,

What to make of the ill-fated, meaningless, 50-over tour of soggy ol' Engerland?
The 0-4 result certainly had the whole country all a twitter, and captured the imagination of the general public.
No idea why they played it at all, really.
MJ Clarke did not appear to be happy about any of it, claiming Australia had been "bewitched", "bullied" "blindsided" "hoodwinked", or some such euphemism, by an England side made up almost entirely of foreigners.
He must have been humming to himself...."Where is Johannesburg? That's in England! Where is Cape Town? That's in England! Where is Peitermaritzburg? That's in England! Where is Dublin? That's in England! Where is Perth, Western Australia? That's in England! Where is Copenhagen? That's in England! Where is Grimsby? That's in Lincolnshire."
No great worry, and certainly something that doesn't warrant anything like a Royal Commission.
Best left forgotten, as it surely will be.
Pup's record as an unbeaten skipper in a test series remains intact.
And let's face it, nothing else matters outside the Ashes when it comes to taking on the Old Enemy, and they've got exactly 12 months to get ready for that, with the first Ashes test due to start on 10 July 2013.
Perhaps Australia is the first of what will eventually be every country who've just given up on one-day cricket as a creaking, out-moded format well beyond its use by date, and will pour all their resources into the development of two very different, and hopefully very good teams in the Twenty20 and Test Match arena's.
Maybe it's time to let the Packer legacy go after all these years.
You know it makes sense.

a basket case full of excuses

Diehards,

It had that air of inevitability about it.
What with Balmain having a basket case full of excuses.
SC Sheens was forced to field a scratch, makeshift, hastily cobbled together ensemble that he couldn't have trained as a unit all week.
They played brave and some how managed a 10-4 half time lead, but it was never, ever going to be enough against a Bulldogs outfit playing in their best form in years.
Things were not helped when Lote "What'd I do Guv?" Tuqiri went down inside the first ten minutes with a broken arm after a collision with a team-mate, in the shape of, you guessed it, Adam Bloody Blair [could rant about how Blair literally stops, comes to a complete halt at the advantage line! But won't].
Obviously, that's season over for Lote, and sadly, it could well be career over too.
He's not getting any younger, and if anything, is probably getting uglier with age, and for a bloke who's been plauged by injury in the past two years who's been struggling to renegotiate a contract with the Tigers [who aren't prepared to give him another two years] it could well be the finish of an illustrious career as a dual international.
Tragic way to go out if it is.
Plain awful to see live footage of the bloke with his arm in a sling in the first class medical facilities at the SFS being shown the x-ray print by the radiologist, which clearly showed a radical break in the bone.
At least Lote could develop a lucrative career in retirement as a consultant advising up and coming players on how to "Live The Lote Life", i.e. how to have a mighty fine time off the field without drawing any attention to yourself.
There'd be money in that.
Matty Utai was out at the last minute and Timmy Moltzen also failed to take the field without notice, forcing Beau Ryan to full back, where he's ill equppied to play, thus leaving both wings exposed after Tuqiri went off.
Joel Reddy, who was plucked from nowhere [probably the bar] to play, had a very good game despite thinking he had to cover for every position where they were well down on talent.
Add to that the long term mischief done to That Pom Ellis, who'd be lucky to get back before September, and it's looking eerily like yet another season cruelled by injury.
Haven't gone through the old team sheets, but SC Sheens would not have been able to field the same team from one week to next at any stage of the season.
The Club Secretary now has a problem.
From being touted as a Premiership favourite at the start of the year, and being ensconced in the top four a few weeks ago, they've now slipped clear out of the top eight into ninth at the two thirds mark.
He'd have the abacus working overtime and would have the boardroom divining rod out, trying to work out the probababilty of making the finals at all.
And the mathematics are reasonably stark.
The Tigers are eight wins and eight losses with eight games to play - four against teams above them on the current ladder, and four below.
The Stats Guru was quick to point out that winning four will not guarantee them a start in September, any less will be certain death, so they have to in effect win almost all of the last eight games to make it, and the lot to get back in the priceless top four.
Whatever margin of error they might have had is now G-O-R-N.
Gawd crikey, the boss would be thinking, the gate receipt projections will be shot, and if they don't make it deep into the finals the club balance sheet will be worse than Barclay's Bank.
So where will the money be to replace the casualties and lop off the dead wood?
Little wonder The Secrertary is prone to palpitations and night sweats.
Having lived in the heart of the Canterbury Bankstown district for 14 years, it's always very hard to swallow losing to the Bulldogs.
Never mind that they have nasty supporters and have the worst ethos of any club in the caper, it's just the sickening sight of Bulldogs merch on people down at the shops that upsets me.
Not feeling so good, so popped into the Front Bar at The Local on Monday morning for a medicinal snifter.
The Brown Bros were in a boisterous mood and well pleased with the recent form of their beloved NZ Warriors, or as they prefer to call them, the Auckland Worriers.
The Philosopher looked up from his perusal of the back pages of his fish wrap and spoke:
"As Socrates used to say 'looks like it's all buggered'", before refocussing his attention on his high ball of vodka & tonic with a twist of lemon.

WESTS TIGERS 20. Tries: Iosefa, Lawrence, Reddy, Ryan. Goals: Marshall (2).
CANTERBURY-BANKSTOWN BULLDOGS 32. Tries: Morris (2), Reynolds (2), Barba, Inu. Goals: Inu (4).
At Sydney Football Stadium.
Crowd: 19,034.

It had that air of inevitability about it.
A solid, reliable [except for the occasional inexplicable brain fade] well-coached football team up against a mob who consistently struggle against good sides.
Brained 'em cold in the Champo and went on to give 'em a seven goal football lesson.
And, however momentarily, go top, with a healthy boost to an already impressive percentage.
Go top, eh?
Who would have thought it possible at the start of the season?
Must be doing something right.
It's probably got to do with the theory that champion teams will always out-do teams full of champions.
Apart from The Train and the Jetta Kiddie, none of them get any mention in the fishwraps.
Craig Bolton used to say he liked the fact that he could walk down any street in Sydney at any time and not be recognised, let alone be asked for an autograph.
And there they are, undisputably, top.
And yet, even with the introduction of a two-team town this year, the marketing has been hopeless.
Swans are still relegated to the inside pages of the back pages, get no coverage to speak of in the Melbourne press, and they can't even attract 20,000 punters on any calculation to HQ on a fine, albeit brisk, Saturday evening.
They talked about them flying under the radar in the Monday morning editions with little understanding of how it happened.
SC Roos and Mr Ed have only been working on it for the past seven years, since the moment they won the last game of the season in the '05 Miracle Year.
It's taken that long to get the mix of yoof and experience exactly right.
Pleasing to the Young Sam Reid Kiddie find some touch in the goal square and boot six maximums.
Perhaps he will after all fufill his promise of becoming a proper full-forward, something the Swans have been sadly lacking since Big Bad Barry Hall went west.
Nice to see The Train back on song after a difficult fortnight on the field, while Odd Head McVeigh celebrated signing a new two year contract that will see him retire as a one-club man, with a very good game indeed.
The highlight of the game would have to be In Like McGlynn not happy about Black going on with a tackle and letting the big bastard know all about.
Ben wasn't having any of it, and was quite happy to take on a bloke twice his size in the jostling and air-slapping that substitutes for a stink in the AFL nowadays.
The Stats Guru has calculated that at eleven and three, even if the Swans lose all of their remaining seven games they will still make the top eight, they've got away that much.
If they win the games they are expected to, then it's home finals time, baby, and if they also beat West Coast away this weekend and Collingwood at The Bush in a few weeks time then they will give the Minor Premiership a very good nudge.
At the least, it's valuable to play good sides in the run home, so you can get out the yardstick and measure yourself by it.
While it's never a good idea to get ahead of yourself on account of the wheels could fall off the bandwagon at any moment, as they say in the classics, Sydney is "well placed".

SYDNEY: 4.2 10.7 15.12 16.14 (110). Goals: Reid 6, Goodes 3, McVeigh 2, McGlynn, Hannebery, Jetta, Pyke, O’Keefe.
BRISBANE: 3.4 7.4 8.7 9.9 (63). Goals: Rich 2, Brown 2, Karnezis 2, Raines, Crisp, Bewick.
At Sydney Cricket Ground.
Crowd: 19,419.

tremendous waste of time and money

Sceptics,

Me mate, Risky Business, was up from Melbourne for the week and found himself at a loose end on Saturday night and thought going to the footy might be a good way to pass the time.
He was Sadly Mistaken.
The Youngest, who'd also tagged along for the game, had a prescient experience to start.
Just as we got off the special event bus at Homebush she shouted "farking scored! free beanie!" as she picked up a well worn Swans beanie on the ground that had obviously fallen out of someone's bag.
She untied her hair and let it down and put the thing on her head, saying "whoever lost this is going to have a really shitty night out"
Never mind that it was the worst game of football witnessed in recent times and was a very very poor advertisment for the code in Sydney, the most notable feature of the match was the almost complete absence of Giants supporters in the quite simply pitiful crowd of 22,565 [the Stats Guru was quick to point out that it was the second worst AFL attendance at the ground in a decade].
There was very little evidence of anyone in orange coming through the gates, or in the dunnies, the bars and food outlets [which were by and large deserted - no queues at all], moving along the concourses, and certainly not on the bus that begins its journey at Maroubra Beach.
Sitting in the general admission area - the only part of the ground that was half way full - and you could, literally, count the number of Giants fans on the fingers of one hand.
If the fanciful claim that GWS really do boast 10,000 members is true, then it appeared that 9,850 of them didn't bother to turn up.
Even a cursory glance at the attendance figures at the brand spanking new Sydney Showground reveal atrociously disappointing crowds for Pygmies home games [in what is reportedly a very comfortable, well-built, and well thought out new stadium - as it should be, for the cost]; crowds at Swans home games have also been not at all flash this year [even in a ground that's half-closed for renovation] - and that for a team that is sitting second on the Premiership table and is in with a tip-top chance of making the priceless top four, and even taking out the minor premiership - for chrissake - if they continue to play well.
Now, everyone knows the AFL is clearly made for television these days, but on the evidence seen to date, far from the introduction of a two-team town in this city being a shot in the arm for the code on this side of the island, fearing Australian Rules Football is actually going backwards in the Emerald City.
And there was northern Tasmania crying out for a team, and as the Business commented "jeez - they'd even do better in Darwin".
Muddle headed thinking can be excused, but there's no justification for sheer stubborn stupidity on the part of the fools who purportedly run the caper, not to mention the tremendous waste of time and money involved, for mine.
As for the game itself, Son of Gary was the stand out best on ground in a side full of mediocre performers, and it was enough for him to win something called the Brett Kirk Medal.
What the?
Seems they'll give away gongs for anything these days.
At that point, the Good Lady Wife said it was time to go home [given that they haven't adjusted the bus timetable to account for the shift from the 7.10pm game start to 7.40pm, so the match ended at the plain silly time of 10.25pm and the last event bus left at 11.00pm, and it's a fair walk for a couple of old cripples from Gate H to the bus stop = ridiculous], a call that was long overdue.
The Pygmies do have a few very big units in the forward line, but the long and short of it was that it was Men v Boys, which in any other code would be declared an illegally unfair contest and banned, in case any of The Boys got seriously hurt or died.
Oh, and The Train took a speccy that will be on the Mark Of The Year showreel.
And the Jetta Kiddie kicked a couple of pearlers from a long, long way out, incuding one that defied the laws of physics.
Trying to convince myself that that was worth the price of admission alone, but really, apart from that, the match had nothing whatsoever to recommend it.
The crowd failed to be inspired at any stage and were mostly next to silent, faced with that kind of spectacle.
The place wasn't exactly dripping with atmosphere.
There was a bloke sitting across the aisle from me in a jacket the colour of a beige turd who didn't move an inch throughout and sat there showing no emotion or expression on his face, for all intents and purposes, motionless, as if he had done something really evil and had been turned into a Pillar of Salt.
At least he had the good sense to leave at three-quarter time.
Rather than being at the much trumpeted magnificent new era of the AFL, it was like being at a funeral.
Coach Horse only said on interview after the game "well, that was that, now we move on".
He mumbled something about percentage, which is now up to 144.2%, but the Weagles and the Bombers are not far behind on that score and are also on 40 Premiership points.
The top five have got away, with 2nd to 5th now 16 points clear of 9th.
In reality, the bottom ten teams [and three of them are hopeless jokes] are just scrabbling for the last place in the finals at best, which throws the current competition into stark relief.
All in all, a very tawdry affair; a scenario that's likely to be repeated for years to come when these two teams meet.
Or, it will all end in tears.

SYDNEY SWANS: 3.4, 8.6, 14.10, 19.18 (132). Goals: Jetta 3, Goodes 2, McGlynn 2, Kennedy 2, Jack 2, Roberts-Thomson 2, Reid 2, Everitt, Hannebery, Pyke, Mumford
GREATER WESTERN SYDNEY GIANTS: 1.2, 2.5, 4.7, 5.8 (38). Goals: Ward, Cameron, Giles, Palmer, Greene.
At Olympic Stadium, Homebush.
Crowd: 22,565.

No news is good news in the second bye week.
You can only hope that the Best Leb in The Game will power the engine room and lead New South Wales to glorious victory over Queensland in Good v Evil III, and come out the other end of the worm hole unscathed.

WESTS TIGERS: Bye.

The Debacle in Newcastle

Long sufferers,

Just plain silly, is probably as good a way to describe it as any.
To kick seven goals zip in the first quarter, and then 12 in total, and almost lose the unloseable game would have had Coach Horse at the end of his tether for the second game on the trot.
What the??
It certainly had me reaching for the jar of heart pills in the final quarter.
Lucky there's powerful pharamcueticals about the house.
Certain cardiac arrest averted.
The scorched earth policy in the first quarter; to come out with all guns blazing and the flamethrowers hard at work, is fine and dandy if you can then consolidate it into a solid following three quarters, all the time maintaining a match lead.
But they can't.
The vexed problem of the fade out, or as it's known 'round here, the Swans sleepy bye-byes time.
My spy at the ground, perched high up in The Gods, left early in the Championship Quarter, for the two and a half hour drive home [thankfully Country Members get a significant discount on their tickets for the time and trouble they have to go through], pushing through a message on the Bush Telegraph in the corner of the lounge room:
"Sick of the shitty football, the wind, and the cold".
Who could blame him.
The Train was not at all comfortable playing in the cotton wool suit he'd been provided with by the Football Dept.
It was clear he'd come back too early.
Just before the Cats miraculously got in front, poor ol' Goodesy was subbed off with Spida Jnr replacing him.
Who would have thought a nephew of Peter would be the most unlikely of saviours, kicking the Swans winning goal with seconds left on the clock?
Bizzare.
At full time, the Bush Telegraph spat out another message.
It was from the Youngest Daughter, who was looking at it on a telly at some pub somewhere:
"Could barely stand to watch the last ten minutes. Ridiculous."
Well said.
Still, as they say in the classics, a win is a win is a win, and you'll take any you can get.
And a good get it was too against Geelong.
Hoisted Sydney well clear of the mid-table log jam, and more or less consolidated them in the top four.
Bring on this weekend's game against the Pygmies at The Bush.
Loose the bears on the midgets, and let the gaming begin!

SYDNEY: 7.0, 8.2,10.6, 12.8 (80). Goals: McGlynn 2, Reid 2, Jack 2, Bolton, Armstrong, Jetta, Pyke, Kennedy, Everitt.
GEELONG: 1.1, 3.3, 6.6, 11.8 (74). Goals: Podsiadly 2, Chapman 2, Motlop, Selwood, West, T.Hunt, J.Hunt, Enright, Hawkins.
At Sydney Cricket Ground.
Crowd: 27,400.

You can't consider yourself a real fan unless you travel.
So found myself on Monday night deep inside enemy territory ambling up the ramp to the more or less brand new Joey Johns Stand at the Newcastle International Sports Centre, now known as Ausgrid Stadium.
It's an impressive structure, just the right scale for a provincial ground, with the seating bays, the people flow, the dunnies, the bars and food outlets arranged on the brilliant Olympic Stadium Homebush model, on a much smaller basis, of course.
Never mind that the stand is named after a bloke who spent his entire legendary career coked & iced to the eyeballs - Newcastle people don't worry about that when it comes to one of their own.
It's all changed an different now, and yet it somehow felt like old home week [after all, did live in Our Town for two and a half years] with thousands upon thousands of Tigers fans streaming into the ground to the point where they almost outnumbered the Knights home fans.
And they sported perhaps the most colourful and diverse array of costumes ever seen at an away game.
The boys from ZZ Top with their waist length beards were in, in their ancient Western Suburbs jerseys with the Masterton Homes sponsor's logo, and even saw a quite rare Wests Magpies top displaying the Victa Mowers brand.
You are going way back there.
There were plenty of old Balmain guernseys, and the odd lunatic here and there, including the very fat, short bloke who teamed his baggy shorts and socks and sandals with a white business shirt and a yellow and black striped tie, with an enormous top hat made out of blue fluffy felt with a Tigers scarf wrapped around it.
Things got even more loopy at half time, when a bloke was seen who was into some crossing dressing thing, wearing a Richmond Tigers jacket, while another had on a hand-knitted orange jumper with a Collingwood Magpies scarf around his neck.
But my favourite by far was the chap in the NE smoking lounge [which has a panoramic view over the entire trotting track] who had on an unbranded yellow jacket and a black t-shirt with white lettering on it which read KNIGHTS SUCK.
Overheard him saying to a Newcastle fan who was talking to him "Nah. I don't come to the football very much".
Little wonder, in that get up.
In stark contrast, the all pink and black uniform the Balmain players were wearing in honour of some nonsense known as the Women in League Round didn't suit them.
They did not look pretty in pink
Everything appeared to be lovely-jubblies at 14-0 after the first ten minutes, with That Trying Scoring Freak going in for a well worked try through the centres, and Lote "What'd I do, Guv?" Tuqiri scoring a trademark regulation wingers try, taking out the corner post in the process, and The Great Benji bagging a penalty goal - but then suddenly, it all went to shit.
Started to go down the S-bend when Balmain were in a first class field position and Ray Bloody Cashmere decides to put a stink on in the scrum.
Punches flying everywhere, but nothing landing, so Ray just gave away the penalty for starting it and got a talking to from the Bamford.
That seemed to really fire up the Knights, and the biggest, meanest, blackest, bastard back in the Newcastle side, Timana Tahu, then proceeded to smash open the Balmain right edge, not once, not twice, but three times.
leaving Matty Utai flailing in his wake each time as he was overwhelmed and over-run.
Gawd crikey.
The Ute hung his head very low as he trudged off the ground at half time, and rightly so.
Was rather vocal in the barracking duel with a few Knights fans around me, [startled them by breaking into song when Lote scored, with the ditty "Lott-ee, Lott-ee, Lott-ee! We're livin' the Lott-ee life!], so did cop a "go back to Balmain, where you belong" on the way up to the bar at the break.
Fair call.
So just put on a broad smile and threw my hands in the air.
To compound the woefulness, the Tigers were robbed blind in the second stanza, with the Bamfords very happy to freely award home crowd penalties, and then came the coup de grâce, with Be My Beau Ryan sent off for ten minutes to the sin bin mid-way though the last half for allegedly going on with a try saving tackle after the tacklee had been called held.
Joisus!
It looked perfectly legit to me, but the refs obviously called it a [border line at best, for mine] professional foul, so off you go, son.
Utterly outrageous.
Any chance of winning was gorn, then and there.
Poor ol' Robbie Farah still looked cut up after his mother's funeral mid-week, and failed to make much of an impact, most of the forwards played poorly, and Marshall just could not get the mojo working off a platform that wasn't there.
SC Sheens was not a happy camper after the game; not so much bothered with the send off or the appalling Bamfording, just cranky about the slipshod defence for the second week in a row that allowed two games to get away that the Club Secretary had been banking on winning easily.
Too scared to look at the ladder -- the top eight has got away from the bottom eight, but the Tigers must now be sitting in the bottom end of the top half after two unexpected losses.
The second bye week this weekend can't come soon enough.
No doubt the super coach would have booked in a long, hard session down at the Room Full Of Mirrors on the Balmain Rd to keep them occupied.
On the full time hooter did the cap abuse thing; tearing off the Tigers headgear and chucking it on the ground in a desultory fashion and stomping on it good and proper.
A nearby Knights fans called out "Oi! That's no way to treat a hat!".
Just beamed an idiot grin back at him and said "Don't worry about that, mate, it just adds character to the thing".
On wandering out of the ground, the 11 year old boy who was in our party commented out of the blue "That Benji Marshall knock-on. That was the game changer".
It seemed fairly insignificant at the time, but on reflection, the lad's observation was dead right.
The young fella obviously has more insight into the game than gibbering codgers like me.
Aftewards, there was nothing for it but to repair to my ol' mate Trev's gaff, and get plastered.
That sort of thing tends to happen when two old blokes who are long time Balmain supporters who don't mind a drink in a crisis get togther when they are tired & emotional.
On Tuesday morning, hobbled onto the platform at Broadmeadow station [the signs say "Home Station of The Newcastle Knights" - spare me] and spotted a grizzled Tigers fan, still in the kit from the night before, chain smoking while he read the Newcastle Herald, all the time shaking his head.
When the train to Fat City arrived, he got up, binned the paper, got on, and promptly fell asleep.
Obviously, had had a gutful.

NEWCASTLE KNIGHTS 38. Tries: Tahu (3), Houston, McManus, Uate. Goals: Roberts (7).
WESTS TIGERS 20. Tries: Lawrence, Tuqiri, Iosefa. Goals: Marshall (4).
At Hunter Stadium.
Crowd: 18,687.