Opinion Hardest Year of Support?

[Heeney2Franklin]

Never thought we were a genuine flag chance this season so I was largely watching to see improvement. Reid and Tippett really started to show things. Rampe and Grundy. Kennedy played as well as he could have. Some of the young ups were great.

We still have an excellent midfield but shaw will be really hard to replace. Tonight showed what happens when you can't get any run from behind the ball - you end up trying to hit leads all night. So we actually need someone who can really go.

Yep the losses to Hawthorn and the Eagles put it beyond doubt for me, i actually thought the downhill slide started with the Richmond game.

Happy to get development into our next generation.

 

[The King!]

Yep the losses to Hawthorn and the Eagles put it beyond doubt for me, i actually thought the downhill slide started with the Richmond game.

Happy to get development into our next generation.

Losing that dogs game was shit

But yeah half time v tigers seems like a different year now

 

[brad cooper]

Not even close. 1993 we won one game, I'd trade that year for this any day.

 

[GoTheSwannies]

Yep the losses to Hawthorn and the Eagles put it beyond doubt for me, i actually thought the downhill slide started with the Richmond game.

Funny. The Richmond game summed up our season and represented it within the game. First half was great. We showed our class. Then the second half we just got overran and looked a shell of our former selves

 

[Ticky009]

Funny. The Richmond game summed up our season and represented it within the game. First half was great. We showed our class. Then the second half we just got overran and looked a shell of our former selves

The best & worst of us in one game

 

[cinderella man]

Never thought we were a genuine flag chance this season so I was largely watching to see improvement. Reid and Tippett really started to show things. Rampe and Grundy. Kennedy played as well as he could have. Some of the young ups were great.

We still have an excellent midfield but shaw will be really hard to replace. Tonight showed what happens when you can't get any run from behind the ball - you end up trying to hit leads all night. So we actually need someone who can really go.

Never thought I would say this but if he was not so badly needed down back I think he could actually play a real role in the midfield. Looked strong and used the ball well when in there late in the 3rd and last quarters. Spot on about the Shaw role and run from behind. The defensive structures teams are using now will just gobble up sides that are going back having to kick over the man on the mark. Run from behind and 2-3 player overlap is the backbone of the best offensive sides and the proof will be in the pudding when either WC or Hawthorn salute on the first Saturday in October.

 

[Jack2Jack]

Not the hardest year as we did finish top 4 and saw some good signs from players individually...but a frustrating year no doubt, especially on the back of last years GF, never played to the level that the talent on our list suggested we should be able to. Hell we only missed top spot by one game, and despite the late injury issues that's just a couple less crap performances and we could've been one of the teams sitting there waiting in prelim weekend.

Getting Franklin has sort of upped the ante in the pressure to achieving something and f'ing up 2014 could hurt for a very long time..for whatever reason it was certainly harder to enjoy footy this year then it should've been for a team that won 16 games. There's certainly been darker years but I can't remember a time where I've enjoyed footy less, but that's a combination of things probably (and a lot that probably has nothing to do with the swans).

 

[momentbymoment]

It's been a challenge since 2013 and I'm sure that has affected the club and the players.

We were targeted and cut down after the 2012 granny. It was a campaign designed to destroy our competitiveness led by Eddie and his AFL cronies. The fans and the media jumped on like wolves to a slaughter.

The club has no choice now but to re-group and focus on our own culture and our unique strengths. That is what has worked in the past and it will work in the future.

 

[momentbymoment]

Never thought I would say this but if he was not so badly needed down back I think he could actually play a real role in the midfield. Looked strong and used the ball well when in there late in the 3rd and last quarters. Spot on about the Shaw role and run from behind. The defensive structures teams are using now will just gobble up sides that are going back having to kick over the man on the mark. Run from behind and 2-3 player overlap is the backbone of the best offensive sides and the proof will be in the pudding when either WC or Hawthorn salute on the first Saturday in October.

Would love to see Rampe in the midfield.

The trend is towards bigger, stronger bodies and Rampe is in that bracket - he literally knocks players off him and has a penetrating kick.

I think he can be a true champion in the role.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

Not the hardest year as we did finish top 4 and saw some good signs from players individually...but a frustrating year no doubt, especially on the back of last years GF, never played to the level that the talent on our list suggested we should be able to. Hell we only missed top spot by one game, and despite the late injury issues that's just a couple less crap performances and we could've been one of the teams sitting there waiting in prelim weekend.

Getting Franklin has sort of upped the ante in the pressure to achieving something and f'ing up 2014 could hurt for a very long time..for whatever reason it was certainly harder to enjoy footy this year then it should've been for a team that won 16 games. There's certainly been darker years but I can't remember a time where I've enjoyed footy less, but that's a combination of things probably (and a lot that probably has nothing to do with the swans).

You read my mind. Totally my take on things.

 

[basilcampbell]

1. I've seen the future of the Swans and his name is Isaac Heeney

2. Adam Goodes you have been a champion as a player and a man - good luck in whatever you do

3. Thanks Rhyce - you brought everything you had to this club. We are grateful.

4. We need a new game plan fwd of centre. Kind of disappointing that after 2 yrs with Buddy & as well as he and lately Tippet have played we still look disfunctional in fwd 50.

5. Ive been supporting for 27 years and while nowhere near worst year onfield, the off-field issues have been horrendous and just sapped my enthusiasm for the game at time. I still feel privileged to follow this club.

6. See you all next season




Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Back One Out]

What are other people's thoughts?

Hopefully, you don't mind some outsider input and a long post.

We've had to deal with:

- The Trade Ban - a hot topic during the off-season, but your defence held up pretty well for the most part. The worry was whether you could get through another year with Richards and Grundy in the key posts, but they hardly missed a game and did okay. Not superstars, but they get the job done. Dane Rampe had his best year. Shaw and Laidler played well. Smith wasn't as good as previous years, but he wasn't a weak link.

The Swans were supposedly into Joel Patfull (or possibly Patrick Ryder) when Mike Fitzpatrick stepped in with the trade ban. Patfull didn't even crack the top 20 of the Giants best and fairest. He missed a month of footy with broken ribs and a punctured lung back in June, but he was bog ordinary in the games he played. He wouldn't have made much difference at Sydney in 2015.

Ryder would've been an upgrade on Pyke, but as good as Paddy can be (when he is on), he is equally inconsistent. I'm not even sure Sydney were in picture to sign him. Perhaps Ryder was always bound for Port. You came up against the best ruckman last night, but Goldstein was not the difference for North. If anything, he was down on his normal output.

- Our onfield performance - If someone had said you'll finish somewhere in the top four with 16 wins, would you have taken it? The Swans have bettered that just once in their entire history: 17 wins in 2014. Maybe you went into the season with unreasonably high expectations, expecting just to dominate again and win the flag. I notice people talk on this board about Hawk fans with a sense of "entitlement", but maybe you're guilty of the same. Footballers aren't machines. You had a super year in 2014 (with that unfortunate let-down at the end.)

If only it was that easy every year. They say it takes a heap of luck (and good planning) to reach the Grand Final. All you can really ask is for your boys to keep knocking on the door with top four finishes and hopefully, the breaks go your way a few times when it matters (and for your close rivals to get the shitty bad luck.) That's how every premiership is won. It's always been that way. It's a game of attrition.

- Our gameplan - same as above. The gameplan was good enough to get your team back to another top 4 finish with 16 wins (just 1 win away from top spot.) Despite all the problems you experienced with injuries and good players down on form, your game-plan enabled you to contend for another flag. I wouldn't go overboard blaming the coach. John Longmire's results speak for themselves. Four successive top four finishes and a yearly expectation of reaching the Grand Final. Name another Sydney coach who has managed to achieve that.

- Buddy's troubles - I still can't quite process the recent news about Buddy's mental illness. It's unbelievable that he and the club pulled the pin on his season. Obviously, there is more to the story. It's his personal business and perhaps he'll tell us about it when he's good and ready. The Buddy I knew was always such a resilient competitor. The pressure never fazed him. He THRIVED on it. The other side of the coin is that he was struggling anyway with a crook back and wasn't even producing 50% of his capability. Maybe this was the source of the problems which followed. It would be tremendously difficult for a superstar like Buddy to have the weight of expectations on him, being paid a million bucks and be unable to bend down and pick up a ball cleanly from off his bootstraps. His agility is what sets him apart from every other key forward.

- The injuries heading into the finals - this would be the number 1 fan frustration in a football sense. It doesn't matter who you follow. Injuries are a f**ker. They're an unfortunate part of the game. I just roll my eyes whenever people dismiss the impact of injury on a player or club's performance. Of course, it matters! Look at every team who finishes on the bottom: 95% of the time, they were decimated by injuries. Every time a star player has a shocker and barely touches the ball, you can bet he was carrying some sort of injury. I hate hearing people say they weren't trying. I'd be willing to bet $1000 that Trent Cotchin was carrying some complaint into that week one final v North. But he's a stand-up guy so you won't hear him bleating or making excuses. No point. Unfortunately, it doesn't stop everyone else from ripping him to shreds.

The Swans had shit luck with Buddy, Parker and Jack all going down at the same time. That's a tough break.

It's the off-field stuff that's just had me mentally fried as it seems like everyone outside of the club is trying to bring us down. The Goodesy stuff has made me bitter towards opposition supporters and the media and has made me lose some of my enjoyment of the game.

- The Media - this would be the number 1 fan frustration from an off-field sense. You only have to read these boards to realise the negative impact of our shitful football media. It doesn't matter who you follow. 95% of our complaints get back to those arsehats who work in the media and sensationalise everything. Whether it be the commentators on game day who talk copious amounts of shit about Cyril Rioli, Paddy Dangerfield, Nick Naitanui, Buddy Franklin and various other stars. Or whether it's the ambulance chasers who are looking for a easy headline and beating up some tabloid bullshit about our clubs.

Even when there's truth to the story, it never warrants the coverage it receives. It's all so overblown. The problem is we love our footy. We can't get enough of it. Especially when it's some nonsense or "controversy" happening at another club. We want to read more more more. So now we have an army of Craig Hutchison/Eddie McGuire clones all looking for an angle and trying to make a name for themselves.

All people really want is to be informed and read & hear interesting, complimentary things about their own club, but the positivity is in short supply. You should try being a Hawk fan and watch your team win B2B flags and receive nothing but negativity from all and sundry!!

The simplest solution is to stop paying attention to the media. Keep it pure. Just stick to watching the games and maybe read only your club's website. Easy to say, but hard to do!

- The Adam Goodes events - this was a definite sour note on the 2015 season, not just for Swans fans, but for all football fans. You feel bitter about it. So do I… And I'll put my hand up as someone who "hates" Goodes. Not a booer. I just hate him the same way you probably "hate" Hodge and Mitchell. It was unfortunate that Goodes became the subject of moronic copycat weekly booing. I blame the media for overreacting (trying to outdo each other with their moralising) and blowing it up into a race row.

I know I probably disagree with many of you Swannies fans about this, but I don't believe 50% of football fans are racist. I think the booers are sheep and Goodesy-haters are passionate about their team and love to hate the opposition stars. Keep calling them racist and tell them not to boo and they will get their backs up. (Up yours AFL, et cetera…) It probably would've died down, but the AFL media fanned the flames.

The only winners from all of that were the media - it gave them great content, clicks and ratings for months on end. I wish everyone would've realised the cynical reality of the situation while we were all busy punching on with each other on the main board.

 

[bedford]

Note: Not a sympathy thread, just interested in people's opinions.

Has this been one of the hardest and/or most frustrating season's to be a Sydney Swans supporter on and off the field?

What we've had to deal with:
- The Trade Ban
- Our onfield performance
- Our gameplan
- The Adam Goodes events
- Buddy's troubles
- The injuries heading into the finals
- The Media

Not sure if I'm missing anything.

I love my Sydney Swans and I was hoping we could've had a sneaky chance of making the Grand Final but to be honest I'm abit relieved that the season is over.

I was just learning to walk back in the dark days of the early 90's so I can't comment on that but this year has to me been the hardest to support the club. Not so much because of the onfield stuff because every club has their troubles throughout the season. It's more the off-field stuff that's just had me mentally fried as it seems like everyone outside of the club is trying to bring us down. The Goodesy stuff has made me bitter towards opposition supporters and the media and has made me lose some of my enjoyment of the game.



What are other people's thoughts?

Want to come back to the Lake days, gee wiz, people have been spoilt

 

[The King!]

Want to come back to the Lake days, gee wiz, people have been spoilt

Would of thought 1946 to 1982 would of had a few dark days, i wasnt alive but the trophy case from those days is a little on the empty side

 

[kickthething]

Never hard, but this year was undeniably frustrating....perhaps nothing more so than the media playing to the lowest ebbs of the fan base. Listening to dh's like Andy Maher who would is nothing more than a rumor mongerer and gossip columnist, Eddie and co telling deliberate ans strategic lies knowing the bottom feeders will follow them hook line and sinker...its a sad state of affairs when Eddie has given up trying to improve his club and focuses instead on bringing other clubs down.

The best thing about this season, besides its over, is the abolition of the sub rule.....in all its time we never once got it right.

FRUSTRATING....

 

[PVF]

Want to come back to the Lake days, gee wiz, people have been spoilt

I'm only posting from my experience. Probably haven't worded the OP out as well as I would've liked. I'm certainly no wordsmith.

I'm 23 and really started watching every Swans game since I was 10 so I was fortunate enough to miss the bad old days.

 

[kickthething]

Funny. The Richmond game summed up our season and represented it within the game. First half was great. We showed our class. Then the second half we just got overran and looked a shell of our former selves

then you could say our season basically swung on Buddy's decision to bump, that game totally changed momentum after that incident, and the big fella could not get back into the groove for the rest of the game....

 

[RW]

Certainly not the hardest given what this club has gone through in the past (much of which was before I was born so cannot really comment), but the brand of football played was frustrating to watch at times. In some ways this year was reminiscent of 2007 when we also failed to win a final, despite high expectations that the team would make amends for defeat in the previous year's grand final.

 

[GotTheGoodes]

Certainly not the hardest given what this club has gone through in the past (much of which was before I was born so cannot really comment), but the brand of football played was frustrating to watch at times. In some ways this year was reminiscent of 2007 when we also failed to win a final, despite high expectations that the team would make amends for defeat in the previous year's grand final.

Then we had 2008, 2009, 2010 & 2011 to deal with as we rolled the list (& coaches) over in preparation of 2012....

 

[BarneyBent]

The fact this is even a question able to be posed seriously shows how far we've come as a club, and particularly how spoiled we've been.

2002 was the year I started following the Swans in earnest. We were a shambles, slowly imploding under Eade, and while the tail end of our season under caretaker Roos was promising, few predicted a happy 2003 season. Well, we know how that ended, but the point remains, 2002 was pretty bad. 2009, after a period of extended success and finals campaign after finals campaign, we finish 12th and again, we are written off.

That's without mentioning the truly dark years which were before my time, but that others have mentioned.

Ultimately, we finished 4th in the H&A season, 5th overall (after losing a QF we probably should have won). There have been frustrating games where we didn't play as well as we could have, and the Goodes situation was terrible, but was also at times uplifting as people stood up and said "this is not OK". The media narrative ended well and truly on our/Goodes' side, and I'm pretty damn confident people will look back on it as another watershed moment in Australian race relations in sport. We can be proud of the role Goodes played in that.

In the meantime, we've seen Tippett play arguably the best footy of his career. We've seen Heeney debut and impress. We've seen Mitchell build, Jones emerge, Hanners and Kennedy take their games to a new level, Cunningham bounce back from a form dip (always a good sign when a player can dig themselves out of a hole), Rampe collect 30+ disposals running through midfield/wing one game, while beating the eventual Coleman medallist at FB in another (and also digging himself out of a form slump early in the year).

While things haven't always gone our way this year, the teeth-gnashing on this board has been absurd at times. What do you think Essendon fans would think of this thread? Carlton? Dees? Saints? Pies, even?

We've had a bloody good year. Yes, it could have been better, but this was not a tough year to be a Swans supporter. Not by a long shot.

 

[bedford]

It was tough, the Goodes saga, Jetta's pathetic performance again, a terrible negative game plan and still we finished 5th. What a waste !

 

[miggs]

lol obviously werent around in the early to mid 90's. Was a tough year but not the toughest. We got to see our team win most of our games. I always look back to the early days of my supporting and think how lucky we are to be in the position we are now.

 

[Vin Rogue]

Never thought we were a genuine flag chance this season so I was largely watching to see improvement. Reid and Tippett really started to show things. Rampe and Grundy. Kennedy played as well as he could have. Some of the young ups were great.

We still have an excellent midfield but shaw will be really hard to replace. Tonight showed what happens when you can't get any run from behind the ball - you end up trying to hit leads all night. So we actually need someone who can really go.

Never thought we were a genuine flag chance this season so I was largely watching to see improvement. Reid and Tippett really started to show things. Rampe and Grundy. Kennedy played as well as he could have. Some of the young ups were great.

We still have an excellent midfield but shaw will be really hard to replace. Tonight showed what happens when you can't get any run from behind the ball - you end up trying to hit leads all night. So we actually need someone who can really go.

Yes, the year was a disappointment. The team...the players...they seemed to be stifled, inhibited...as if they were not enjoying the game...as if they didn't have the swagger or self belief to take the game on. I reckon Rampe has the swagger and self belief. Rohan has the pace to break the lines coming out of defence....but he doesn't have the confidence to do it repeatedly.
As for our midfield. They are both our strength and our achilles heel. Their footskills of ball delivery into the forward line are poor. Their two way running is mostly elite. Dare I say it ....with Jetta's imminent defection,we probably have too many at the coal face and too few outside players. Let's hope that the footy nouse of Heeney and Mills compensates for their lack of elite leg speed, otherwise we shall continue to see our midfield be praised one week and damned the next.
The real winner for us was the confirmation that Reid will become a real asset and that his promised potential will eventuate. The other was Tippett's power, his skill set and his commitment to the team. It has taken some time, but he has delivered. And Heeney will become a talisman for the club. These are great signs. In a disappointing year, there are signs of good things that await.

 

[Vin Rogue]

Hopefully, you don't mind some outsider input and a long post.



- The Trade Ban - a hot topic during the off-season, but your defence held up pretty well for the most part. The worry was whether you could get through another year with Richards and Grundy in the key posts, but they hardly missed a game and did okay. Not superstars, but they get the job done. Dane Rampe had his best year. Shaw and Laidler played well. Smith wasn't as good as previous years, but he wasn't a weak link.

The Swans were supposedly into Joel Patfull (or possibly Patrick Ryder) when Mike Fitzpatrick stepped in with the trade ban. Patfull didn't even crack the top 20 of the Giants best and fairest. He missed a month of footy with broken ribs and a punctured lung back in June, but he was bog ordinary in the games he played. He wouldn't have made much difference at Sydney in 2015.

Ryder would've been an upgrade on Pyke, but as good as Paddy can be (when he is on), he is equally inconsistent. I'm not even sure Sydney were in picture to sign him. Perhaps Ryder was always bound for Port. You came up against the best ruckman last night, but Goldstein was not the difference for North. If anything, he was down on his normal output.

- Our onfield performance - If someone had said you'll finish somewhere in the top four with 16 wins, would you have taken it? The Swans have bettered that just once in their entire history: 17 wins in 2014. Maybe you went into the season with unreasonably high expectations, expecting just to dominate again and win the flag. I notice people talk on this board about Hawk fans with a sense of "entitlement", but maybe you're guilty of the same. Footballers aren't machines. You had a super year in 2014 (with that unfortunate let-down at the end.)

If only it was that easy every year. They say it takes a heap of luck (and good planning) to reach the Grand Final. All you can really ask is for your boys to keep knocking on the door with top four finishes and hopefully, the breaks go your way a few times when it matters (and for your close rivals to get the shitty bad luck.) That's how every premiership is won. It's always been that way. It's a game of attrition.

- Our gameplan - same as above. The gameplan was good enough to get your team back to another top 4 finish with 16 wins (just 1 win away from top spot.) Despite all the problems you experienced with injuries and good players down on form, your game-plan enabled you to contend for another flag. I wouldn't go overboard blaming the coach. John Longmire's results speak for themselves. Four successive top four finishes and a yearly expectation of reaching the Grand Final. Name another Sydney coach who has managed to achieve that.

- Buddy's troubles - I still can't quite process the recent news about Buddy's mental illness. It's unbelievable that he and the club pulled the pin on his season. Obviously, there is more to the story. It's his personal business and perhaps he'll tell us about it when he's good and ready. The Buddy I knew was always such a resilient competitor. The pressure never fazed him. He THRIVED on it. The other side of the coin is that he was struggling anyway with a crook back and wasn't even producing 50% of his capability. Maybe this was the source of the problems which followed. It would be tremendously difficult for a superstar like Buddy to have the weight of expectations on him, being paid a million bucks and be unable to bend down and pick up a ball cleanly from off his bootstraps. His agility is what sets him apart from every other key forward.

- The injuries heading into the finals - this would be the number 1 fan frustration in a football sense. It doesn't matter who you follow. Injuries are a f**ker. They're an unfortunate part of the game. I just roll my eyes whenever people dismiss the impact of injury on a player or club's performance. Of course, it matters! Look at every team who finishes on the bottom: 95% of the time, they were decimated by injuries. Every time a star player has a shocker and barely touches the ball, you can bet he was carrying some sort of injury. I hate hearing people say they weren't trying. I'd be willing to bet $1000 that Trent Cotchin was carrying some complaint into that week one final v North. But he's a stand-up guy so you won't hear him bleating or making excuses. No point. Unfortunately, it doesn't stop everyone else from ripping him to shreds.

The Swans had shit luck with Buddy, Parker and Jack all going down at the same time. That's a tough break.




- The Media - this would be the number 1 fan frustration from an off-field sense. You only have to read these boards to realise the negative impact of our shitful football media. It doesn't matter who you follow. 95% of our complaints get back to those arsehats who work in the media and sensationalise everything. Whether it be the commentators on game day who talk copious amounts of shit about Cyril Rioli, Paddy Dangerfield, Nick Naitanui, Buddy Franklin and various other stars. Or whether it's the ambulance chasers who are looking for a easy headline and beating up some tabloid bullshit about our clubs.

Even when there's truth to the story, it never warrants the coverage it receives. It's all so overblown. The problem is we love our footy. We can't get enough of it. Especially when it's some nonsense or "controversy" happening at another club. We want to read more more more. So now we have an army of Craig Hutchison/Eddie McGuire clones all looking for an angle and trying to make a name for themselves.

All people really want is to be informed and read & hear interesting, complimentary things about their own club, but the positivity is in short supply. You should try being a Hawk fan and watch your team win B2B flags and receive nothing but negativity from all and sundry!!

The simplest solution is to stop paying attention to the media. Keep it pure. Just stick to watching the games and maybe read only your club's website. Easy to say, but hard to do!

- The Adam Goodes events - this was a definite sour note on the 2015 season, not just for Swans fans, but for all football fans. You feel bitter about it. So do I… And I'll put my hand up as someone who "hates" Goodes. Not a booer. I just hate him the same way you probably "hate" Hodge and Mitchell. It was unfortunate that Goodes became the subject of moronic copycat weekly booing. I blame the media for overreacting (trying to outdo each other with their moralising) and blowing it up into a race row.

I know I probably disagree with many of you Swannies fans about this, but I don't believe 50% of football fans are racist. I think the booers are sheep and Goodesy-haters are passionate about their team and love to hate the opposition stars. Keep calling them racist and tell them not to boo and they will get their backs up. (Up yours AFL, et cetera…) It probably would've died down, but the AFL media fanned the flames.

The only winners from all of that were the media - it gave them great content, clicks and ratings for months on end. I wish everyone would've realised the cynical reality of the situation while we were all busy punching on with each other on the main board.

Your observations are bang on the money. I enjoyed reading your post - good to get an outsider's view. The Ada, Goodes comments are probably correct. The boof heads are probably more sheep like than racist. The really hard pill to swallow though, is getting the message through that you cannot bleat or boo, be told its the sound of racism, and then argue that it's not racism. The pain of racism is felt by the victim and its not up to the perpetrator to argue that cos they don't feel that pain and that it's not intended to be taken that way, that its still okay for them to continue. I take your point - but the boos will continue to expose Australians as racists. What happened to Goodesie was ugly and shameful. Full stop. End story.

 

[Banyo Bloods]

Hopefully, you don't mind some outsider input and a long post.



- The Trade Ban - a hot topic during the off-season, but your defence held up pretty well for the most part. The worry was whether you could get through another year with Richards and Grundy in the key posts, but they hardly missed a game and did okay. Not superstars, but they get the job done. Dane Rampe had his best year. Shaw and Laidler played well. Smith wasn't as good as previous years, but he wasn't a weak link.

The Swans were supposedly into Joel Patfull (or possibly Patrick Ryder) when Mike Fitzpatrick stepped in with the trade ban. Patfull didn't even crack the top 20 of the Giants best and fairest. He missed a month of footy with broken ribs and a punctured lung back in June, but he was bog ordinary in the games he played. He wouldn't have made much difference at Sydney in 2015.

Ryder would've been an upgrade on Pyke, but as good as Paddy can be (when he is on), he is equally inconsistent. I'm not even sure Sydney were in picture to sign him. Perhaps Ryder was always bound for Port. You came up against the best ruckman last night, but Goldstein was not the difference for North. If anything, he was down on his normal output.

- Our onfield performance - If someone had said you'll finish somewhere in the top four with 16 wins, would you have taken it? The Swans have bettered that just once in their entire history: 17 wins in 2014. Maybe you went into the season with unreasonably high expectations, expecting just to dominate again and win the flag. I notice people talk on this board about Hawk fans with a sense of "entitlement", but maybe you're guilty of the same. Footballers aren't machines. You had a super year in 2014 (with that unfortunate let-down at the end.)

If only it was that easy every year. They say it takes a heap of luck (and good planning) to reach the Grand Final. All you can really ask is for your boys to keep knocking on the door with top four finishes and hopefully, the breaks go your way a few times when it matters (and for your close rivals to get the shitty bad luck.) That's how every premiership is won. It's always been that way. It's a game of attrition.

- Our gameplan - same as above. The gameplan was good enough to get your team back to another top 4 finish with 16 wins (just 1 win away from top spot.) Despite all the problems you experienced with injuries and good players down on form, your game-plan enabled you to contend for another flag. I wouldn't go overboard blaming the coach. John Longmire's results speak for themselves. Four successive top four finishes and a yearly expectation of reaching the Grand Final. Name another Sydney coach who has managed to achieve that.

- Buddy's troubles - I still can't quite process the recent news about Buddy's mental illness. It's unbelievable that he and the club pulled the pin on his season. Obviously, there is more to the story. It's his personal business and perhaps he'll tell us about it when he's good and ready. The Buddy I knew was always such a resilient competitor. The pressure never fazed him. He THRIVED on it. The other side of the coin is that he was struggling anyway with a crook back and wasn't even producing 50% of his capability. Maybe this was the source of the problems which followed. It would be tremendously difficult for a superstar like Buddy to have the weight of expectations on him, being paid a million bucks and be unable to bend down and pick up a ball cleanly from off his bootstraps. His agility is what sets him apart from every other key forward.

- The injuries heading into the finals - this would be the number 1 fan frustration in a football sense. It doesn't matter who you follow. Injuries are a f**ker. They're an unfortunate part of the game. I just roll my eyes whenever people dismiss the impact of injury on a player or club's performance. Of course, it matters! Look at every team who finishes on the bottom: 95% of the time, they were decimated by injuries. Every time a star player has a shocker and barely touches the ball, you can bet he was carrying some sort of injury. I hate hearing people say they weren't trying. I'd be willing to bet $1000 that Trent Cotchin was carrying some complaint into that week one final v North. But he's a stand-up guy so you won't hear him bleating or making excuses. No point. Unfortunately, it doesn't stop everyone else from ripping him to shreds.

The Swans had shit luck with Buddy, Parker and Jack all going down at the same time. That's a tough break.




- The Media - this would be the number 1 fan frustration from an off-field sense. You only have to read these boards to realise the negative impact of our shitful football media. It doesn't matter who you follow. 95% of our complaints get back to those arsehats who work in the media and sensationalise everything. Whether it be the commentators on game day who talk copious amounts of shit about Cyril Rioli, Paddy Dangerfield, Nick Naitanui, Buddy Franklin and various other stars. Or whether it's the ambulance chasers who are looking for a easy headline and beating up some tabloid bullshit about our clubs.

Even when there's truth to the story, it never warrants the coverage it receives. It's all so overblown. The problem is we love our footy. We can't get enough of it. Especially when it's some nonsense or "controversy" happening at another club. We want to read more more more. So now we have an army of Craig Hutchison/Eddie McGuire clones all looking for an angle and trying to make a name for themselves.

All people really want is to be informed and read & hear interesting, complimentary things about their own club, but the positivity is in short supply. You should try being a Hawk fan and watch your team win B2B flags and receive nothing but negativity from all and sundry!!

The simplest solution is to stop paying attention to the media. Keep it pure. Just stick to watching the games and maybe read only your club's website. Easy to say, but hard to do!

- The Adam Goodes events - this was a definite sour note on the 2015 season, not just for Swans fans, but for all football fans. You feel bitter about it. So do I… And I'll put my hand up as someone who "hates" Goodes. Not a booer. I just hate him the same way you probably "hate" Hodge and Mitchell. It was unfortunate that Goodes became the subject of moronic copycat weekly booing. I blame the media for overreacting (trying to outdo each other with their moralising) and blowing it up into a race row.

I know I probably disagree with many of you Swannies fans about this, but I don't believe 50% of football fans are racist. I think the booers are sheep and Goodesy-haters are passionate about their team and love to hate the opposition stars. Keep calling them racist and tell them not to boo and they will get their backs up. (Up yours AFL, et cetera…) It probably would've died down, but the AFL media fanned the flames.

The only winners from all of that were the media - it gave them great content, clicks and ratings for months on end. I wish everyone would've realised the cynical reality of the situation while we were all busy punching on with each other on the main board.

That sure is a long winded post to give yourself the opportunity to say you hate Adam Goodes. Just no need for it, but thanks for the "insight". Putting your hand up......what a hero.