Will the Swans sink or swim after their 2014 grand final humiliation?

I maintain that the GF had diddly squat to do with talent. Our list is just as good as Hawthorns and we're just as capable of playing the same brilliant football as Hawthorn. Sydney were simply daunted. Not by Hawthorn, since we've taken it up to them plenty of times, but most likely by the occasion. You could see it as plain as day. The moment for me came mid-way through the second quarter. Lewis Jetta was around the wing/half back flank literally looking around like a fish out of water, for whatever reason. There was a sense of uncomfortability about the way they played. And I can't credit it fully to the Hawks because a lot of it was just uncontested scrap. Simple kicks that missed the target. Usually-smooth disposals were sloppy and fumbly. Fresh speed and pace looked heavy and tired. After all, Hawthorn only laid 63 tackles, just six more than the Swans. It shows how ineffective and half-assed our pressure and effort was. There was just no intensity. I would hope it doesn't haunt the Swans too much. It was literally just an uncharacteristically bad game - which every great team that's ever played has had before - but unfortunately it just took place on the most important day. Anyone who genuinely thinks it was because Hawthorn are so superior is bonkers. I'd be willing to concede the Hawks are maybe a 10-15 point better team, but 60+ points better? You're reaching. I also think it's hilarious that all of a sudden our backline is meager. Because we lost Malceski, who actually spent most of his time outside of the defensive 50 last year? The GF was won and lost in the middle. As far as I'm concerned, BOTH back-lines failed in the GF, since a forward should never be able to kick four or five goals against the best or second-best team. I don't know if it was the fact we'd played three consecutive games in Sydney so we didn't adapt our midfield to the spacious MCG, or if we tried too hard to stop Hawthorn that we forgot to focus on our own game and our strengths, or if the rare pressure of being overwhelming favorites made the boys uneasy. Whatever it was, it was their fault. They had their fate in their own hands and they didn't push for it (props to Kieren Jack, Buddy and Malceski for being the only blokes that went hard ALL day, not just in one minute stages). It could ruin them or it could motivate them beyond belief. If it doesn't ruin them, I'd almost call them favorites, because they ARE as good as Hawthorn. But if I were to use a sport analogy, I'd compare this current Swans team to Serena Williams in tennis. Phenominal and utterly dominant when switched on, yet virtually non-existent when not (see first four rounds of last year). I'm proud to say Sydney can out-play any team in the competition, but I'm also not ashamed to say there are at least half a dozen mentally-tougher teams in the competition (see Hawks, Freo, Port, Pies). If Sydney were to win the flag this year, which at this point is an extremely distant dream, credit it to their mental toughness, not their talent. Anyone who respects the game should see the talent, but they're about to face the toughest mental test they'll probably ever face. I'm not looking for a flag this year, but as a die-hard fan who paid thousands to see them give their all in the GF, I am looking for consistent effort simply to atone for their last game.

5 days late on this reply. Didn't see it until now, I'm afraid. Sometimes teams beat other teams by a lot. Not every result reflects the true gap between teams. But as you say, maybe they were outcoached. Or maybe I'm mistaken, and the Hawks truly are that much better than the Swans.

I'm old but not that old so I didn't witness the 30s glory days. Although I have always wondered about a club that harks back to such a "golden age"? The swans celebrating the 1930s is a bit like Geelong celebrating their run of losing grand final performances in the late 1980s. Geelong doesn't celebrate that, but the swans go on, and on about the 30s, a "golden age" that involves taking a lot of "silver medals" - very odd. if you're willing to mythologise the distant past, it seems much more sense to celebrate the period 40 years earlier when the Swans really were golden.

OK, I thought you were just referring to their time in Sydney. There were a lot of crazy deals in the 1970s (Teasdale, Foschini) but the last real big recruiting drive of the Swans was in the 1930s. The glory days lasted for about six seasons, but then flopped after that for many years (aside from a brief resurgence in 1945). After 1977 when they made the finals in the final minutes of Round 22 (defeated North Melbourne by 10 points), they had a few average seasons (I recall they were pushing for the finals in 1980), but the biggest problem was they had a poor recruiting zone, and poor management didn't help.

I have a fairly good knowledge of swans history, I have the advantage of being old. The two BIG$$$ recruiting events that almost led to extinction were Edelstoned's idiocy of the Mid 80's as you recalled but also Tuddy's folly in '78. Fields was only the tip of the iceberg, Max James was on big money as was the utterly mercenary the mercenary John Murphy. These inclusions damaged cohesion, the sale of the Danihers and the squeeze out of Norm Goss pushed the '77 finalist back down the ladder, into bankruptcy and finally to Sydney.

No...the Tippett recruiting just shows how empty headed and shallow is the Swans recruiting department. Sylvia may yet prove to be better for Freo than Tippett for Sydney. It's either that or just poor coaching. Is the Roos legacy starting to fade? (i actually don't believe that.) Tippett, however was a big recruit. Just a failed one. Franklin got done by Silvagni yesterday. Has he gone too?

My position is less that the bloods culture is dead and more that it was never as strong as people thought. For much of last year the media couldn't stop talking up the bloods culture, but at the same time I felt Hawthorn had a superior club culture (the best in the comp, for that matter) which the media didn't give us credit for until after the GF. After all, a "no d!ckheads" policy is hardly a lavish new idea- my wife and I have one in our marriage. Any perceived denigration of the bloods culture at present is less a defamation of their status and more a case of putting their status where it should always have been.

Ok, let's just leave it at that. Everytime the Swans suffer a bad defeat, I guess we'll see this type of 'told-you-so' inane conversation about the end of the Bloods culture, which is what we saw when Franklin crashed his car, Hannebury was supposedly out all night boozing, the loss to GWS, and then the bad loss to North Melbourne. Players are not robots, and every team has a bad performance - admittedly, a grand final loss like the Swans suffered has a lot more weight than any other match - but it does happen. Noone talked about the end of the Bloods culture when they were 'smashed' by Melbourne by 73 points in 2010 – it was similar performance, albeit difference circumstances. Or when the were 'smashed' by Richmond in 2011 and 2012 at the MCG. Have a look at the replay of the 2014 Grand Final. Everything the Swans touched turned to rubbish, everything Hawthorn touched turned to gold. Sure, that's the pressure of the situation too, but I don't believe the gap between the two teams is that great, especially when you consider the same teams, with similar players, played off in the 2012 Grand Final, which the Swans won. The Swans perhaps thought they had won the game before it started. It happens in sport ocassionally - I just wish the 'end of the Bloods' discussion had a bit more depth to it, rather than the knee-jerk reaction based on the last held thought.

Two players don't make a team. Sure, Franklin was a big recruit, Tippett not so - it was big media hype at the time, and I think his performance since 2013 would suggest that he's not the so-called big recruit that everyone is claiming.

EddyJ- I think the "end-of-bloods-culture" discussions have occurred because Sydney's culture was based all around the fact that they never got smashed, even if their opponent was one as good as Hawthorn were on GF day last year. Yes, us Hawks played absolutely awesome football that day. The way we played, we should've smashed anyone. Except the Bloods. North Melbourne used to have a similar culture- you knew that win, lose or draw against them, it would always be a tough game and they'd never give in. Until Laidley took over as coach and finals thrashings became the norm. It's taken another change of coach for North to fight back from that.

The recruiting of Franklin and Tippett was not "big" recruiting?... OK.... Just as big as has ever been. It has redefined, "big".

I think your history might be a bit wrong there. A big recruiting drive in 1985 that did not lead to sustained success (finals only in 1986 and 1987), and the brink of extinction in 1994, but what are the other three other examples that you refer to? The success of 1996 was based on recruiting two name players (Lockett and Roos). The only other name player since this time was Barry Hall in 2002, which culminated in the 2005 premiership. Recruiting Franklin in 2014 and Tippett in 2013 is not 'big' recruiting, they are just two players out of 22 in the team. As I previously mentioned, if the so-called big recruiting results in at least a grand final appearance, I would say that that's a good result. Sure, it's not the premiership, but it's still worthwhile. I just wish this mindless 'end-of-the-Bloods-culture' would cease, because it's not based on anything substantial, just opinion and hearsay. A grand final appearance after the supposed end of the Bloods shows that the Swans are not doing too badly.

It's a much lamented truism that "Those that fail to learn from history, are doomed to repeat it." Our comments will no doubt have evaporated from the internet long before either of us is proven correct. But this is the 4th time I've seen the swans go BIG$$$$ recruiting and not a single 1 of the 3 previous occasions did it lead to a flag, and on 2 of those occasions it led us to the brink of extinction. What makes this occasion any different? Blithe optimism? Regardless of ones opinion, the precedents aren't good.

Didn't we sort out all this rubbish about the Blood's culture being destroyed? The culture was destroyed so much that their backline ceded only 1488 points, Lance Franklin was runner up in the Brownlow, and won the Coleman Medal, they had their most successful home and away season in 118 AFL seasons, and made the AFL Grand Final? Look out if the Swans ever manage to sort themselves out and reclaim the Blood's culture – they'll win 10 premierships in a row. The Swans had a bad day on Grand Final day, and were defeated by a very good Hawthorn team. It sometimes happen.

If it wasn't psychological and wasn't due to a big quality difference to the 2 sides, then what does that leave us with TomC, aside from food poisoning or the flu? It looked like they were out coached. Unsure who was meant to be playing on Hill for much of the match, and Teddy Richards dummy spits at his team mates looked like there was confusion on the back line. Craig Bird on the bench while Jetta flailed around suggested Longmire was all at sea too. Can't see the Swans dropping out of the 8, but they've had a reality check and so has the Sydney media.

". . . it would be remiss to expect a team built on the ‘Bloods’ culture to lie down so easily. Almost as remiss as them losing a grand final by 63 points." Says it all realy, the Swans team was built on the "Bloods' culture" but the club began to turn it's back on that culture when it recruited DirtyKurt. Buddy was another step on the path away from that culture, the ten year duration of that contract will make it difficult to reverse this trend. Decline in certain. The club was reinvigorated by bloods culture, that culture is now being white-anted.

Richards currently injured with a hammy.

Half the teams were crap too. A few teams dominated the comp.

Interesting that you've had to go back over 20 years to find the slightest evidence that a 40+ point GF loser can rebound the following year. Football was a different sport in the 80's- it was only a 12-team competition for most of the decade and half the clubs were broke, meaning it was much easier to rebound the following year than it is now. Also, football was less of a mental game in the 80's- it wasn't a 24/7 profession and there were more physical attributes that were tolerated by umpires.

Out of West Coast's 10 or so quality midfielders, 5 of whom are now back from injury, which of them do you think are slow? The Brownlow Medalist and...?