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After the Adelaide Crows last night coughed up a 29-point capitulation to the West Coast Eagles on their home turf, the Sydney Swans must surely be the clear favourites by a wide margin to take out the 2016 premiership.
Less than a month ago the AFL coaches said that the Swans should be premiership favourites – well, more than half of them did anyway, according to an AFL survey.
I thought it was a bit of surprise at the time. The Swans were good, sure, but the clear favourites? With only 11.8 per cent tipping Adelaide, and absolutley no one backing Geelong? In what seemed like such an even year, it felt bizarre that one side would be so heavily backed.
But they were ahead of their time, it seems. Or ahead of me at least. Because right now the magic eight-ball is saying that all signs point to a Sydney premiership.
Before that – an enormous amount of credit is due to the West Coast Eagles for their win last night. They’ve had an incredible turnaround in the past few weeks, made all the more impressive by their ability to cope with the loss of Nic Naitanui.
After being criticised all year for failing to compete away from home, and failing to compete against the best sides, they’ve won three consecutive matches against top eight competition, two of them on the road.
In fact, their three-week stretch of form has been arguably the most impressive three weeks we’ve seen any club put together all year. And they are certainly doing it at the right time of the season.
The Crows, in contrast, must be feeling absolutely crushed. They could potentially have claimed the minor premiership with a win last night and would at least have made a top two spot virtually certain.
Instead, now, they’re clinging to the hope that one of Geelong, Hawthorn or GWS will cop a loss this week. If those three sides all win – and they’re all favourites going into their matches – the Crows will miss the top four entirely.
Twenty-four hours ago my expectation was that Sydney and Adelaide would finish top two on the ladder this season and then eventually play off in the grand final – Sydney probably going in as favourites, but not by much.
However that’s now off the cards and Adelaide will have to fight their way to the final day of September with at least two and maybe three finals wins required interstate if they’re going to lift the premiership cup.
The Swans just seem to be on the right side of all the percentages now. So long as they beat Richmond today – and that seems extremely likely given the Tigers’ youth focus – they will have the minor premiership locked up and can ride successive home qualifying and preliminary finals all the way to a grand final berth.
Whoever they face will be at the disadvantage. Sure, for Geelong and Hawthorn it’d be a home ground advantage, technically, but the Swans have beaten both those sides on the road this year, and I’d back them in to do it again.
Geelong have the Dangerwood factor but Sydney have the Kennedy-Parker-Hannebery-Mitchell quartet. Hawthorn’s ailing forward line is no match for Sydney’s stalwart defense. Adelaide, who I saw as their strongest rivals, will probably be just too tired from taking the hard road to the final – if they make it there at all.
Can West Coast or GWS threaten? They don’t even have top four spots locked in at the moment though and like Adelaide they’re just going to have to put so much more work in to make the final that surely the Swans would make short work of them on the big day. And the Western Bulldogs and North Melbourne would need a miracle to be anything better than making up the numbers in September.
It’s been a season of surprises, and I won’t dare write off another one. Anything could still happen. But if everything goes as it most probably will, the Swans will be cheer, cheering the red and the white come curtains on grand final day. If they play their cards right, the flag is theirs to lose.