Sydney's sons rise for Swans

KIEREN Jack wishes the Swans Academy was in existence when he was a teenager trying to break through as an Aussie Rules player.

Kieren Jack

KIEREN Jack wishes the Swans Academy was in existence when he was a teenager trying to break through as an Aussie Rules player.

Jack, who tomorrow will play his 100th senior game for the Swans, is one of a handful of players to have grown up in Sydney and made it in the AFL. He admits learning the game in the harbour city was a disadvantage in his football development.

"It's been a tough journey," Jack said.

"I think I missed a lot of the fundamentals of the game of AFL as a young kid growing up. I was a little bit disadvantaged from the Victorian and South Australian kids. I just wasn't taught the knowledge of the game as much as they were, which I found out when I got here just how little I knew about the game."

At the age of 15, Jack decided to abandon his promising rugby league career and concentrate on making it in the AFL. It was a decision made even tougher by the fact his father Garry played league with great distinction for Balmain, NSW and Australia.

Kieren Jacks's choice proved to be a good one and tomorrow night's match against Essendon will confirm it again when he plays his 100th game in the red and white. Jack has been an inspiration to local teenagers for the past six years with his charges through the Swans midfield - and this week he has a dual celebration with the announcement that 14 members of the NSW under-16 team have been drawn from Sydney and the Illawarra.

The massive representation is a far cry from the time Jack was a junior, when the squad was dominated by boys from the Riverina.

It is also a huge feather in the cap for the Swans Academy, which was established only last year and is having a dramatic effect under head coach Paul Roos.

"It's fantastic," Roos told The Daily Telegraph. "It's a credit to all the part-time coaches we have, the system we put in place and and it's a credit to the boys."

It's the feedback from football people outside the organisation which has thrilled the Swans' premiership coach.

"When people say your game style is fantastic and your boys are fantastic it's a great boost," Roos said.

"It's a bit like watching your own kids when they grow up and people notice but you haven't."

Jack struggled to convince AFL officials he had the size and skills and was overlooked in the draft but his self-belief and determination won the Swans over eventually.

"There was a lot of knockers for Kieren and there was probably a few at this club as well, that had question marks on whether he could play," Sydney coach John Longmire said yesterday. "Initially there were plenty of people who thought he was too small and (wondered) whether he had the skills to play AFL footy.

"There was a lot of doubts on that, but he's the one that didn't have any doubt.

"The exciting thing for me and the club's point of view is that we know he's going to keep getting better because of the type of kid he is.

"And he is still only fairly young."

Jack has put an injury-interrupted 2011 season behind him and is getting back to his best after recording 83 touches and seven goals across Sydney's past three games.

The league convert named former Swan Jared Crouch as a mentor and said he was also inspired by another scion of NSW, former Swans captain Paul Kelly.

However, he still has some way to go to catch his famous father in the games stakes. "He played 244 (games), so until I get there, he'll still think he's got something over me," the younger Jack said.

Despite following his son's burgeoning career closely, Jack senior still has to come to grips with the intricacies of AFL. "He still tries to get me to chip over the top of players," he joked.

The Swans have brought in Andrejs Everitt and Nick Malceski for tomorrow night's vital match against essendon at Etihad Stadium.

The pair replace Luke Parker who is out with a broken collarbone and Ben McGlynn who is suspended for a week.

Malceski comes straight back into the side after being dropped last week and Everitt makes his return after spending three weeks in the reserves.

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