Luke Jackson and Sean Darcy prove why Fremantle has staunchly defended them

If there was ever a perfect advertisement for playing two genuine ruckmen, it was how Sean Darcy and Luke Jackson inspired Fremantle’s final quarter chase down of St Kilda.

If there was ever a perfect advertisement for playing two genuine ruckmen, it was how Sean Darcy and Luke Jackson inspired Fremantle’s 12-point win over St Kilda in the final quarter.

“That’s a double ruck special,” tweeted Melbourne captain Max Gawn, one of the greatest ruckmen of the modern era.

And it’s hard to disagree.

That’s a double ruck special in the last.

— Max Gawn (@maxygawn11) June 29, 2025

There was Jackson hitting Darcy on the chest streaming out of the midfield and the latter converting Fremantle’s first goal of the final term.

Jackson kicked the next one, reducing the margin to two points.

With 48 seconds on the clock and six points the margin, Darcy held his ground and palmed the ball down the throat of Caleb Serong who fed it to Shai Bolton who found Jye Amiss on the lead.

Amiss sent the ball long and deep inside 50 to Jackson who took a strong contested mark and extended the margin after the full-time siren.

Jackson was directly involved in three of Fremantle’s five goals in the final quarter.

Darcy had five score involvements, three clearances, 12 hitouts, two marks and six disposals.

“I thought Sean dominated the ruck in the last quarter,” Fremantle coach Justin Longmuir said post-match. “I thought those two talls, in particular, were important in the last.”

Sean Darcy and Luke Jackson delivered the sort of game the Dockers have been dreaming of since Jackson returned home. Picture: Janelle St Pierre/AFL Photos via Getty Images.

Fremantle coach Justin Longmuir has staunchly defended his twin towers for the past few seasons. But as 2025 has worn on, the cracks have started to show.

They started when Darcy was forced to undergo pre-season ankle surgery. They got deeper when rumours started swirling that Jackson could consider a move back to Victoria and specifically, Melbourne.

Then after a strong run of form, Longmuir conceded that Jackson might be better suited to the role as Fremantle’s No. 1 ruckman. Then Darcy was left out of the Dockers’ team to play Essendon.

When Longmuir says he’ll take a “horses for courses” approach to his two big men, he means that circumstances will dictate who plays in the ruck and when – not that one will get repurposed or left out entirely.

“My opinion was that Sean was having more impact in the last for us (in the ruck),” Longmuir said.

“He’s getting stronger in the ruck. I thought his aerial contest was very strong. He’s taken steps forward.”

Jackson started in the ruck against St Kilda but it became clear post-match that he’d endured a tough week and maybe wasn’t up to the task of wrestling Rowan Marshall for four quarters.

“At halftime, it was a real battle to get him going,” teammate Jordan Clark told Fox Footy. “He was a bit flat … his second half was phenomenal.”

Enter Darcy.

The benefit of having two A-grade ruckmen is that Marshall didn’t get any respite.

Luke Jackson and Sean Darcy kept Rowan Marshall busy. Picture: Janelle St Pierre/AFL Photos via Getty Images.

“They give a different look, the two of them in the ruck,” Bailey Banfield told this masthead. “They throw up different challenges.

“Rowan is a really quality AFL ruck. They got on top of us around stoppage for most of the day but wearing him down was a factor and having two blokes come at him for the whole day would’ve been pretty tough.

“Jacko fought through some adversity today when the game potentially wasn’t looking the way he wanted it to. But then he stood up when the game was on the line.

“Their best footy together is pretty high level and no one else in the comp has two rucks that can go with them.”

The Dockers have now won six games in a row and Longmuir has silenced a lot of his critics.

But given the opportunity to prove just how much he’d learnt from Fremantle’s round eight loss to St Kilda, widely regarded as the turning point of the club’s season, Longmuir was one quarter away from failure.

Back in early May, the Dockers were outdone by a hungry, ferocious and stingy Saints side.

Fremantle was smashed in contested possessions by 48, clearances by 28 and the inside 50s by 27. St Kilda had 95 more disposals in the forward half as well.

For three quarters, it looked like Fremantle was about to be beaten by what it knows.

But good teams find ways to show us they’re the product of past capitulations.

And despite a final clearance count of 46-31, the Dockers proved they don’t need to be dominant in the middle to win games of footy.

“You never know when you’re going to get on top of a team,” Banfield said. “We feel like we’re a different team to the last time we played them and I think the past six or seven weeks have shown that.

“The game from a stoppage point of view potentially looked pretty similar to that game but we were able to stand up in the contest behind the ball and make the most of our opportunities going forward.”

That was largely thanks to Jackson and Darcy.

Originally published as Luke Jackson and Sean Darcy prove why Fremantle has staunchly defended them