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Swans to trade up for midfielder
By Jenny McAsey
September 22, 2003
SYDNEY are in the market for a top quality midfielder after their dismal final term against Brisbane exposed a soft centre to their bid to be genuine premiership contenders.
Coach Paul Roos gave the team full marks for determination and spirit this year but said the 44-point loss highlighted weaknesses.
"The next day you realise they are probably not as talented as the other teams, but to get to where we have is a fantastic effort. They have given absolutely everything they could," Roos said.
He said the playing list was in good shape with a number of emerging stars such as Adam Goodes, Jude Bolton and Tadhg Kennelly.
However, the priority in the trading period would be to "hit a home run" and try to recruit one of the competition's elite midfielders.
That could put Sydney in the already crowded race for the services of out-of-contract Port Adelaide midfielder Nick Stevens.
While Roos and his players were bitterly disappointed yesterday, they will eventually take consolation from a top-four finish in a season when they were tipped to win the wooden spoon.
The Swans went to the three-quarter time huddle on Saturday night confident of upsetting Brisbane, according to defender Jared Crouch.
"Maybe we were a bit too pumped. We were told to settle down a little bit and think about the basics," Crouch said.
Sydney were only three points down at that stage, but in the last quarter Brisbane's class came to the fore. Their midfield dominated the centre clearances and the result was a return of 6.6 to a solitary behind for Sydney.
"For them to have 12 scoring shots to our one, it was almost our worst quarter for the season," Roos said. "It can only be put down to almost like hitting the wall in the marathon, and 18 blokes all hit it together.
"(But) the club should be proud of the players after we went into the year with financial troubles.
"It is always dangerous to have too many down years in Sydney and the players can take a lot of credit for lifting the club and lifting the profile of the game with two attendances over 70,000.
"They really did play up to their potential across the board, no-one had a poor year."
With that in mind, Roos doesn't want to make radical changes to the playing list.
"If we can get a really top player that is the priority, but if we can't, at least we have bought ourselves a bit of time," he said. "A midfielder is the preference. Obviously we need a big key defender, key forward type, but we showed we can at least cover that. The midfield is an area where you always need to be spot on so that would be a priority.
"My philosophy in the trading period is if we can hit a home run, let's go for it, but if we can't, let's just give the majority of the guys another chance."
Roos said if they couldn't recruit a top-end player he would prefer to nurture the club's current crop of young players.
The finals experience gained this year by the likes of youngsters Adam Schneider, Lewis Roberts-Thomson and Luke Ablett will be invaluable.
"We got a lot of young guys exposed over the last month to some big crowds and some big footy. It's very hard to quantify, but I think it's going to do them a world of good going into next year," Roos said.
Captain Stuart Maxfield was desolate in the rooms on Saturday night, but nonetheless proud of the players.
"It's not a waste because we've learned a lot and we've got a lot of self-belief from this year, but it takes a lot of hard work to get back to that position, so it is a wasted opportunity," Maxfield said.
"The boys have shown a great deal of character and a great deal of heart all year. It has been fantastic to be part of it.
"Once again we showed (that) to fight back into a winning position, but every one of us let ourselves down in the last quarter."
Tough-nut forward Barry Hall was Sydney's best player, continually presenting himself, contesting and creating scoring opportunities amid a flood of Brisbane defenders. He said it was sad that one bad quarter had undermined their season.
"It was disappointing to go down like we did," Hall said. "We'll look at it on paper and say it was a good year. We've learnt a hell of a lot and to play finals is a big stepping stone for the club."
The Australian
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