A Horse with no game? The big questions the Swans must tackle

To lose one grand final by 10 goals (or more) is bad enough. To lose two in three years? Unacceptable and deeply troubling.

A long, hard summer of introspection awaits for the Sydney Swans after their 60-point thrashing at the MCG on Saturday. These are the areas the football club must review as they pick over the carcass of another grand final embarrassment.

A dejected Dane Rampe speaks on stage after going down to the Lions.Credit: AFL Photos via Getty Images

Injury management and selection

No team reaches September without picking up a few bumps and bruises along the way. But just like in 2022, when the selection of an obviously injured Sam Reid backfired badly on the Swans in their 81-point loss to Geelong, another dice-roll on a hampered key forward resulted in snake eyes for Sydney.

Logan McDonald was the player overlooked for Reid in the grand final two years ago. This time, he came into the week with a sprained ankle, which he rolled against Port Adelaide in their preliminary final. He never looked right and was clearly limping from the first bounce. After one possession in two quarters of football, he was subbed off just after half-time. The Swans said he’d proven his fitness during the week, and post-match, John Longmire stood by the decision to select him but they didn’t learn from their mistakes.

Logan McDonald goes to the bench during Sydney’s preliminary final win.Credit: AFL Photos via Getty Images

It’s always hard to judge these things without all the information, which only the Swans’ coaching and medical staff will have, but someone has to be held accountable. They made the right call with Callum Mills (we presume) but the wrong one with McDonald. Why?

And then there’s Isaac Heeney, who revealed after the game that he had been playing through a stress fracture in his ankle for the whole finals series. It obviously didn’t bother him in their other finals, but when he took a hit to the ankle in a tackle towards the end of the first quarter on Saturday, it flared up, and he spent almost the entire final term on the bench.

That might be pure bad luck – maybe he would have seen out the game if that hit didn’t happen, maybe he would have gathered more than 14 possessions – but the reality is he has struggled in two grand finals now. Meanwhile, Brisbane star Lachie Neale was also carrying a heel problem, had needed pain-killing injections to play for the past month, and said he felt something “snap” late in the game. He finished second in the Norm Smith Medal voting.

The forward line

This was Sydney’s first season since the retirement of Lance Franklin, who obviously could not be replaced by a single player – and so the Swans went into 2024 with a three-pronged forward line. But there were always doubts over their quality, whether they had enough top-end talent in that part of the field, and whether they were too tall overall. McDonald, 22, Joel Amartey, 25, and Hayden McLean, 25, had their moments throughout the season, but failed to deliver when it mattered – and compared to their Lions counterparts, their lack of dynamism was obvious.

Tom Papley kicked one goal but did little else.Credit: Joe Armao

Sure, key forwards take a long time to develop, but the Swans needed more out of these players on grand final day – and sure, they didn’t get much service from a badly beaten midfield, but there were moments in which their teammates looked keen to take any option aside from kicking the ball to them.

As for Tom Papley, who was also well below his best, it felt like footy karma had caught up with him.

Coaching, strategy and mentality

As good as Longmire is and has been for this club, there is just no getting around the fact that the Swans have now lost four straight grand finals under him, and the past two by enormous margins. The playing group has changed; he is the common denominator. It’s not all his fault, of course – his players simply weren’t hard enough in the contest against Brisbane – but some of it might be, and the way they prepared mentally and approached the game tactically has to come under scrutiny.

John Longmire is contracted for only one more year.Credit: Getty Images

Again, it’s hard to talk in definitives, but we can safely say one of two things happened: either Longmire’s strategy to nullify Brisbane’s kick-mark game failed, or his strategy was correct, but his players failed to execute on the day. Either way, the responsibility falls on him. How could they turn up with the same lack of intensity and pressure as two years ago?

Longmire is contracted only through to the end of 2025, and AFL clubs typically try to avoid going into a season with a question mark over the tenure of their head coach. While chairman Andrew Pridham has said Longmire has the job for as long as he wants it, the 53-year-old is said to be wrestling with his future, unsure of what he wants to do beyond next year.

It might also be time for the Swans to wrestle with theirs, and ask themselves the hard question: is Longmire the man who can take them to the ultimate glory? The answer might very well be yes, but there surely needs to be some changes – perhaps some new assistant coaches, perhaps a new game plan, perhaps an external review to determine where the problems really lay.

The playing list

Exit meetings loom for Swans players this week, and there will be some interesting conversations to be had at the Royal Hall of Industries. The most pressing revolves around former co-captain Luke Parker, 31, who has done little to douse ongoing speculation that he could finish his career at North Melbourne. Parker’s stats sheet was enhanced by his three junk-time goals in the final quarter, but since breaking back into Sydney’s best 23 after his injury and suspension woes, he has more than proved his worth. It’d be a fair blow to lose such a heart and soul player.

Chad Warner is also entering the final year of his contract, which means Sydney’s next steps as a club will be clouded by the conversation over his future. The two WA clubs will be keen to lure him home.

With trade period coming up, will the Swans try to bring in more attacking quality? Another key defender, with Dane Rampe turning 35 next year? They remain a couple of important puzzle pieces away from being a premiership team. Do they have the salary cap room to move for them, particularly with Warner needing to be re-signed? Only they know.

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