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2005 on the field
12:43:42 PM Mon 19 December, 2005
Paul Gough
It was the most memorable moment of the 2005 AFL season, a moment to rank with the best in the history of the game and one that is certain to be talked about and replayed endlessly on television for decades to come.
The moment of course was Leo Barry's incredible pack mark in the last second of the 2005 grand final to clinch Sydney's first premiership for 72 years and cap off not only another stellar AFL season but provide a fitting end to the most exciting grand final since the famous North Melbourne-Collingwood draw in 1977.
It also produced one of the greatest outpourings of emotion ever seen at the MCG and united Australia's two biggest cities - Sydney and Melbourne - in a way never seen before from two cities that in sporting terms are usually poles apart.
The Swans' four point win in this year's grand final was one of the most memorable in the history of the competition and was the ultimate triumph for Sydney coach Paul Roos, who stuck to his principles even when his team's style of play was being criticised by anyone with even a passing interest in Australian Rules Football early in the season.
Sydney's game-plan of continually trying to force stoppages and playing tight, contested football at all costs was so successful that not only did the club win its first premiership since its South Melbourne days of 1933 but by year's end the AFL had announced a series of rule changes for 2006 - designed to speed the game up and create a more open, flowing style of game although the league strenuously denied these changes had anything to do with Sydney's style of play or its success in 2005.
After the Swans won just two of their first six matches, even AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou was critical of their style of play - which saw them average just nine goals per match between rounds two and six.
"And probably there would be a brand of football being played on the other side of the border (New South Wales) which is not particularly attractive," Demetriou said at the time.
"And unless the Swans change that style of play, they won't win many football matches."
Little did Demetriou and the Swans' many other critics at the time realise that just five months later Sydney would win the grand final by kicking just eight goals on a perfect day for football.
However the final scores in the grand final - Sydney 8.10.58 to West Coast 7.12 (54) - do not reflect the amazing intensity with which the match was played throughout and the incredible commitment of all 44 players.
In the end it came down to the result of one last kick deep into the forward line by Eagles' ruckman Dean Cox.
The ball landed just 25 metres from the Eagles goal and a huge pack - comprising a total of four Swans and three Eagles - flew for the ball.
But just as Eagles' youngster Mark Seaby looked in perfect position to take the mark - which would have resulted in a kick after the siren to decide the premiership - the courageous Barry flew into the pack from side-on to take one of the most famous marks in the history of the game as the final siren sounded immediately afterwards.
Barry was then mobbed by jubilant teammates as Sydney ended the longest premiership drought in league history despite just a fortnight earlier being within seconds of bowing out of the finals in straight sets.
After an unlucky four-point loss to West Coast in the qualifying final in Perth, Sydney trailed Geelong by four goals at the last change in its semi-final at the SCG and having kicked just three goals for the entire game to that point looked gone.
Enter Nick Davis, who kicked four goals in the final term as Geelong was held goalless, with the winning goal coming with just three seconds remaining.
While the Cats could again consider themselves unlucky not to have progressed further in the finals, West Coast Eagles' fans must be scratching their heads wondering just what more their club could have done in 2005 to win a premiership.
Including the pre-season competition, the Eagles won 22 of 29 games for the season, produced their second successive Brownlow medalist in skipper Ben Cousins, the Brownlow Medal runner-up in Daniel Kerr while last year's Brownlow medalist Chris Judd won the Norm Smith Medal for best afield in the grand final.
Yet John Worsfold's team ended the season empty-handed, losing not only the grand final in such heartbreaking fashion to Sydney but even the Wizard Home Loans Cup grand final to a Carlton side which would eventually end the season as wooden-spooners.
The Eagles' midfield of Judd, Cousins, Cox, Fletcher and Kerr was magnificent all season but it was their lack of strikepower in attack which came back to haunt them - best highlighted by the fact their two leading goalkickers in 2005 in Phil Matera and Quinten Lynch were overlooked for the grand final due to injury and form problems.
While Carlton's fall to the bottom of the ladder after winning the Wizard Cup was one of the surprises of the season, so too was Adelaide's effort to end the season as minor premiers.
The Crows had been tipped to finish low down in Neil Craig's first full year as coach but Craig soon stamped himself as one of the league's best coaches as Adelaide won 18 games for the season thanks mainly to its fantastic defence - which yielded an average of just 69 points per game as Ben Rutten established himself as the AFL's best full-back - while skipper Mark Ricciuto was inspirational all season on his way to being named captain of the All-Australian side for the second successive season.
However the Crows' premiership hopes disappeared in the first week of the finals when they went down at home in the qualifying final to a Robert Harvey-inspired St Kilda.
While the Crows had the joy of ending fierce local rival Port's hopes of winning back-to-back flags by thrashing the Power in the first ever all South Australian final the following week, they were unable to beat West Coast in the preliminary final in Perth despite having done just that in round 22.
Adelaide however could be well satisfied with a preliminary final appearance but the same could not be said for this year's other losing preliminary finalist St Kilda, which fell in the penultimate week for the second year running.
The Saints were cursed by injuries all season and badly missed injured pair Justin Koschitzke and Aaron Hamill in their shock preliminary final loss at the MCG to Sydney.
And while the Saints have arguably been the league's most exciting team over the past two years, the theory they may have already blown their best chance of a first premiership since 1966 only increased at the end of 2005 when they lost two of their best defenders in Aussie Jones and Luke Penny to shock early retirements.
While the Saints were so near yet so far away again in 2005, the fall of last year's grand finalists Port Adelaide and Brisbane was a major surprise.
Port at least recovered to make the finals by winning three of its last four games but the Lions missed the finals for the first time since 1998 after winning just two of their first seven matches and even losing their aura of invincibility at the Gabba, losing five home games in succession in the first half of the season.
With the Lions shock absentees from the September action, it opened the way for the Kangaroos to return to the finals for the first time since 2002 and for the first time since Dean Laidley became coach but like Melbourne they bowed out of the September action with barely a whimper.
The Roos, after pulling off some amazing come-from-behind wins during the season, appeared spent by the finals and went down to Port by 87 points in front of just 25,173 fans at Telstra Dome - the lowest finals crowd in Melbourne since 1942.
Melbourne, after sitting in second place at round 12 with nine wins, then lost seven in a row but fell into the finals by winning their last three matches - including at Geelong and against the fast-finishing Bulldogs, who threatened to take their place in the finals.
But the Demons had nothing left for the first week of the finals and surrendered meekly to the Cats by 49 points - the second successive year Neale Daniher's side had bowed out in the first week of the finals.
Of the eight "also-rans" for 2005, it was the Bulldogs - under new coach Rodney Eade - who were the most impressive.
After just eight wins in the past two seasons under Peter Rohde, the Dogs won 11 games in 2005 to finish ninth despite losing skipper Luke Darcy to a season-ending knee injury in round six.
By season's end the Dogs were playing as well as any team in the competition - highlighted by their 43-point demolition of the Eagles at the MCG in round 19 - and if not for a late slip-up against Melbourne in round 21 would have made the finals.
The 2005 season also saw last year's wooden-spooners Richmond make great improvement under new coach Terry Wallace as the Tigers - who won just four games the year before after losing their last 14 - won 10 games.
The Tigers also produced this year's NAB Rising Star winner in Brett Deledio, who more than lived up to his rating as last year's number one draft pick.
The other new coach in 2005 was Hawthorn's Alastair Clarkson, who also had a promising debut season even though the Hawks won just five games.
But they avoided the wooden spoon that nearly everyone had predicted would come their way at the start of the season and Clarkson unearthed some future stars in Lance Franklin, Jarryd Roughead and Jordan Lewis and with more quality draftees on their way next season - headed by number three draft pick Xavier Ellis - Clarkson appears to be building a promising future for the Hawks.
The other four clubs in Fremantle, Essendon, Collingwood and Carlton were all disappointing in 2005.
Despite the sheer brilliance of Matthew Pavlich, the Dockers yet again found a way to miss the finals and with highly-rated Essendon assistant coach Mark Harvey having moved to Fremantle for 2006. Dockers' coach Chris Connolly will start next season under more pressure than any coach in the competition.
Essendon missed the finals for the first time since 1997 to herald the end of an era, which saw Matthew Lloyd replace James Hird as captain for 2006 while former Victorian powerhouses Collingwood and Carlton finished 15th and 16th.
It was the second straight season the 2002 and 2003 beaten grand finalists had finished in the bottom four but the Pies were decimated by injury with Nathan Buckley playing just 11 games, Alan Didak 12, Josh Fraser five and Anthony Rocca just four.
However, with coach Mick Malthouse's future beyond next season still the subject of much speculation, the Pies face a critical year in 2006 and their army of fans will expect big improvement.
And Blues fans, after enduring the worst four years in the club's history, finally have reason for optimism next year with the recent addition of number one draft pick Marc Murphy and highly-rated key position player Josh Kennedy.
However much of the Blues' hopes of improvement still depend on unpredictable duo Lance Whitnall and Brendan Fevola, who were the architects of the Wizard Cup win before failing to recapture that form during the season even though Whitnall did run third in the best and fairest after spending much of the season in defence.
12:43:42 PM Mon 19 December, 2005
Paul Gough
It was the most memorable moment of the 2005 AFL season, a moment to rank with the best in the history of the game and one that is certain to be talked about and replayed endlessly on television for decades to come.
The moment of course was Leo Barry's incredible pack mark in the last second of the 2005 grand final to clinch Sydney's first premiership for 72 years and cap off not only another stellar AFL season but provide a fitting end to the most exciting grand final since the famous North Melbourne-Collingwood draw in 1977.
It also produced one of the greatest outpourings of emotion ever seen at the MCG and united Australia's two biggest cities - Sydney and Melbourne - in a way never seen before from two cities that in sporting terms are usually poles apart.
The Swans' four point win in this year's grand final was one of the most memorable in the history of the competition and was the ultimate triumph for Sydney coach Paul Roos, who stuck to his principles even when his team's style of play was being criticised by anyone with even a passing interest in Australian Rules Football early in the season.
Sydney's game-plan of continually trying to force stoppages and playing tight, contested football at all costs was so successful that not only did the club win its first premiership since its South Melbourne days of 1933 but by year's end the AFL had announced a series of rule changes for 2006 - designed to speed the game up and create a more open, flowing style of game although the league strenuously denied these changes had anything to do with Sydney's style of play or its success in 2005.
After the Swans won just two of their first six matches, even AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou was critical of their style of play - which saw them average just nine goals per match between rounds two and six.
"And probably there would be a brand of football being played on the other side of the border (New South Wales) which is not particularly attractive," Demetriou said at the time.
"And unless the Swans change that style of play, they won't win many football matches."
Little did Demetriou and the Swans' many other critics at the time realise that just five months later Sydney would win the grand final by kicking just eight goals on a perfect day for football.
However the final scores in the grand final - Sydney 8.10.58 to West Coast 7.12 (54) - do not reflect the amazing intensity with which the match was played throughout and the incredible commitment of all 44 players.
In the end it came down to the result of one last kick deep into the forward line by Eagles' ruckman Dean Cox.
The ball landed just 25 metres from the Eagles goal and a huge pack - comprising a total of four Swans and three Eagles - flew for the ball.
But just as Eagles' youngster Mark Seaby looked in perfect position to take the mark - which would have resulted in a kick after the siren to decide the premiership - the courageous Barry flew into the pack from side-on to take one of the most famous marks in the history of the game as the final siren sounded immediately afterwards.
Barry was then mobbed by jubilant teammates as Sydney ended the longest premiership drought in league history despite just a fortnight earlier being within seconds of bowing out of the finals in straight sets.
After an unlucky four-point loss to West Coast in the qualifying final in Perth, Sydney trailed Geelong by four goals at the last change in its semi-final at the SCG and having kicked just three goals for the entire game to that point looked gone.
Enter Nick Davis, who kicked four goals in the final term as Geelong was held goalless, with the winning goal coming with just three seconds remaining.
While the Cats could again consider themselves unlucky not to have progressed further in the finals, West Coast Eagles' fans must be scratching their heads wondering just what more their club could have done in 2005 to win a premiership.
Including the pre-season competition, the Eagles won 22 of 29 games for the season, produced their second successive Brownlow medalist in skipper Ben Cousins, the Brownlow Medal runner-up in Daniel Kerr while last year's Brownlow medalist Chris Judd won the Norm Smith Medal for best afield in the grand final.
Yet John Worsfold's team ended the season empty-handed, losing not only the grand final in such heartbreaking fashion to Sydney but even the Wizard Home Loans Cup grand final to a Carlton side which would eventually end the season as wooden-spooners.
The Eagles' midfield of Judd, Cousins, Cox, Fletcher and Kerr was magnificent all season but it was their lack of strikepower in attack which came back to haunt them - best highlighted by the fact their two leading goalkickers in 2005 in Phil Matera and Quinten Lynch were overlooked for the grand final due to injury and form problems.
While Carlton's fall to the bottom of the ladder after winning the Wizard Cup was one of the surprises of the season, so too was Adelaide's effort to end the season as minor premiers.
The Crows had been tipped to finish low down in Neil Craig's first full year as coach but Craig soon stamped himself as one of the league's best coaches as Adelaide won 18 games for the season thanks mainly to its fantastic defence - which yielded an average of just 69 points per game as Ben Rutten established himself as the AFL's best full-back - while skipper Mark Ricciuto was inspirational all season on his way to being named captain of the All-Australian side for the second successive season.
However the Crows' premiership hopes disappeared in the first week of the finals when they went down at home in the qualifying final to a Robert Harvey-inspired St Kilda.
While the Crows had the joy of ending fierce local rival Port's hopes of winning back-to-back flags by thrashing the Power in the first ever all South Australian final the following week, they were unable to beat West Coast in the preliminary final in Perth despite having done just that in round 22.
Adelaide however could be well satisfied with a preliminary final appearance but the same could not be said for this year's other losing preliminary finalist St Kilda, which fell in the penultimate week for the second year running.
The Saints were cursed by injuries all season and badly missed injured pair Justin Koschitzke and Aaron Hamill in their shock preliminary final loss at the MCG to Sydney.
And while the Saints have arguably been the league's most exciting team over the past two years, the theory they may have already blown their best chance of a first premiership since 1966 only increased at the end of 2005 when they lost two of their best defenders in Aussie Jones and Luke Penny to shock early retirements.
While the Saints were so near yet so far away again in 2005, the fall of last year's grand finalists Port Adelaide and Brisbane was a major surprise.
Port at least recovered to make the finals by winning three of its last four games but the Lions missed the finals for the first time since 1998 after winning just two of their first seven matches and even losing their aura of invincibility at the Gabba, losing five home games in succession in the first half of the season.
With the Lions shock absentees from the September action, it opened the way for the Kangaroos to return to the finals for the first time since 2002 and for the first time since Dean Laidley became coach but like Melbourne they bowed out of the September action with barely a whimper.
The Roos, after pulling off some amazing come-from-behind wins during the season, appeared spent by the finals and went down to Port by 87 points in front of just 25,173 fans at Telstra Dome - the lowest finals crowd in Melbourne since 1942.
Melbourne, after sitting in second place at round 12 with nine wins, then lost seven in a row but fell into the finals by winning their last three matches - including at Geelong and against the fast-finishing Bulldogs, who threatened to take their place in the finals.
But the Demons had nothing left for the first week of the finals and surrendered meekly to the Cats by 49 points - the second successive year Neale Daniher's side had bowed out in the first week of the finals.
Of the eight "also-rans" for 2005, it was the Bulldogs - under new coach Rodney Eade - who were the most impressive.
After just eight wins in the past two seasons under Peter Rohde, the Dogs won 11 games in 2005 to finish ninth despite losing skipper Luke Darcy to a season-ending knee injury in round six.
By season's end the Dogs were playing as well as any team in the competition - highlighted by their 43-point demolition of the Eagles at the MCG in round 19 - and if not for a late slip-up against Melbourne in round 21 would have made the finals.
The 2005 season also saw last year's wooden-spooners Richmond make great improvement under new coach Terry Wallace as the Tigers - who won just four games the year before after losing their last 14 - won 10 games.
The Tigers also produced this year's NAB Rising Star winner in Brett Deledio, who more than lived up to his rating as last year's number one draft pick.
The other new coach in 2005 was Hawthorn's Alastair Clarkson, who also had a promising debut season even though the Hawks won just five games.
But they avoided the wooden spoon that nearly everyone had predicted would come their way at the start of the season and Clarkson unearthed some future stars in Lance Franklin, Jarryd Roughead and Jordan Lewis and with more quality draftees on their way next season - headed by number three draft pick Xavier Ellis - Clarkson appears to be building a promising future for the Hawks.
The other four clubs in Fremantle, Essendon, Collingwood and Carlton were all disappointing in 2005.
Despite the sheer brilliance of Matthew Pavlich, the Dockers yet again found a way to miss the finals and with highly-rated Essendon assistant coach Mark Harvey having moved to Fremantle for 2006. Dockers' coach Chris Connolly will start next season under more pressure than any coach in the competition.
Essendon missed the finals for the first time since 1997 to herald the end of an era, which saw Matthew Lloyd replace James Hird as captain for 2006 while former Victorian powerhouses Collingwood and Carlton finished 15th and 16th.
It was the second straight season the 2002 and 2003 beaten grand finalists had finished in the bottom four but the Pies were decimated by injury with Nathan Buckley playing just 11 games, Alan Didak 12, Josh Fraser five and Anthony Rocca just four.
However, with coach Mick Malthouse's future beyond next season still the subject of much speculation, the Pies face a critical year in 2006 and their army of fans will expect big improvement.
And Blues fans, after enduring the worst four years in the club's history, finally have reason for optimism next year with the recent addition of number one draft pick Marc Murphy and highly-rated key position player Josh Kennedy.
However much of the Blues' hopes of improvement still depend on unpredictable duo Lance Whitnall and Brendan Fevola, who were the architects of the Wizard Cup win before failing to recapture that form during the season even though Whitnall did run third in the best and fairest after spending much of the season in defence.
