Can we bounce back?

[Alec]

Well...many similarities bewteen the Eagles and the Swans:
both are young sides with young coaches, both sides are at a crossroads in their seasons, both sides love to run the footy, both sides have flashy backlines and defenders that love to take a mark, and both sides are on the verge of wasting all the momentum achieved in successful 2003 campaigns.

One big difference, however.

WE HAVE A FORWARD LINE.

Go Swans. We'll piss it in, simply because we're not supposed to!

[Thunder Shaker]

Can we beat the Eagles this week? Yes - provided the weather is not too wet. Pray for a fine weekend.

We are one of the sides the Eagles have trouble beating. There are 6 clubs with a greater than 50% winning ratio against the Eagles, and we are one of them (54%). The other five are the Kangaroos (54%), Adelaide (55%), Carlton (56%), Port Adelaide (63%) and Essendon (66%). All those other clubs have good records, with all except Port winning two premierships each since the Eagles joined the comp, and Port have been a good side as well. We've been relatively mediocre. Yet we beat the Eagles with astonishing regularity.

We even beat them in 1992 - the year the Eagles won the premiership and we ... well we didn't do too well in 1992.

[NMWBloods]

Here are some other facts on our games against WCE.

In WA, we are 4 wins 9 losses, but we have won 3 of the last 4 enounters.

When we play them in WA in rd 9 or prior, we are 4-3, but after rd 9 we are 0-6.

BTW - our record at the SCG is 10-3.

[dendol]

well well.. all this points to a great win on saturday!

[bloodboy]

Originally posted by Thunder Shaker
We even beat them in 1992 - the year the Eagles won the premiership and we ... well we didn't do too well in 1992.

I like this quote right here from Thunder Shaker. It reminds me of where we used to be back in the dark days...I was there, just as I am sure all of you were too. Do you guys remember how good it felt when we actually won a game? It was like a Grand Final win...

Sorry, just a random thought there. Of course we are going to bounce back! We have a very talented team - I remember just a few weeks ago people on this forum arguing that we had the most depth in the competition...OK, maybe they got it a little wrong but still, we have some very talented blokes out there and they will pull it together very soon. That's when the victories will start rolling in. My measure of a good season is flexible...My number 1 wish is, of course, to win the flag. Failing that, seeing Big McEddies McLexus Magpies finishing bottom wouldn't be too bad hey?

[dendol]

the only thing better than us winning the flag and the eddies finishing rock bottom, would be to beat them by 1pt in teh GF!

Visions of grandeur i know. How about we win next week and take it from there....

[NMWBloods]

The only positive I can take from Sunday's debacle is maybe this will finally be a wake up call to the team. We have been playing ordinary football all year, but we have managed to get away with it until last weekend.

We lost against Brisbane, playing an ugly sort of football, but we rationalised it as the way to beat the premiers (even though we didn't do that last year) and a 2 point loss against them at the Gabba was "honourable."

We beat Fremantle, ignoring that both sides weren't that good, but a victory is all that is needed.

We had a shocker against Geelong, and only escaped because Geelong weren't good enough to win. Again a win hid our deficiencies and poor play.

We smashed the Kangaroos, despite a very poor start, and thought all was right with the world, perhaps ignoring a little that the Kangaroos were overhyped and fell away a bit too easily.

We lost to Melbourne, but occasional lapses happen, nothing to worry about.

We lost to Essendon, but we finished with a 7 goal last qtr and were ripped off by the umpires, so things are still fine.

Then finally Richmond, where there are no excuses.

Perhaps finally they can get their heads in gear and play good football.

But the worry now is though that there is more pressure on and higher stakes, hence less ability to just go out and enjoy playing football, which was one of the secrets to last year. First year coaches usually have that luxury and second and subsequent years are the real test.

[bloodboy]

I totally agree NMW. I think we have been doing this for years...hiding our crap form with a host of excuses. I know that the old Umpiring excuse has always been a favourite of mine. I think now we have to start thinking that these boys really are not playing up to their abilities and I think they all need a swift boot up the backside to get them back in to line...let's hope that boot came last Sunday.

[Plugger46]

Originally posted by Bleed Red Blood
Also p46 Micky as an inclusion will give us another option but Schuable is by far more important to the structure of the team we have enough scoring avenues without Micky.

Don't agree with this. Schaubs is important, but I'd prefer to have Micky running around. We will always struggle to win games consistently without him IMO. He brings others into the game, and kicks plenty himself. Several games last year, we wouldn't have won without him. He's quick, tall, great one-out and gives us that option at FF that we're severely lacking. All of the forwards will be better with Micky in the side as far as I'm concerned.

[Bleed Red Blood]

Originally posted by Plugger46
Don't agree with this. Schaubs is important, but I'd prefer to have Micky running around. We will always struggle to win games consistently without him IMO. He brings others into the game, and kicks plenty himself. Several games last year, we wouldn't have won without him. He's quick, tall, great one-out and gives us that option at FF that we're severely lacking. All of the forwards will be better with Micky in the side as far as I'm concerned.

We may have to agree to disagree then.

As acknowledged we have one of the best forward line's going round and all but Schneids and Micky are missing.

O'Keefe has done extremely well in Micky's absence and Hall is in very good form.So having another forward is not our problem.

If Schuable was in the bombers game he would most likely have taken Lloyd allowing Leo to play the attacking role we needed him to play that day.

Mick's high standard of dispoale would have been fantastic to have against the Tiges but he was most definitly not the missing link.

[stellation]

Originally posted by Bleed Red Blood
We may have to agree to disagree then.

As acknowledged we have one of the best forward line's going round and all but Schneids and Micky are missing.

O'Keefe has done extremely well in Micky's absence and Hall is in very good form.So having another forward is not our problem.

If Schuable was in the bombers game he would most likely have taken Lloyd allowing Leo to play the attacking role we needed him to play that day.

Mick's high standard of dispoale would have been fantastic to have against the Tiges but he was most definitly not the missing link.

I agree with BRB, she makes a lot of sense

I think that right now Schauble is more important to our backline than Micky to our forward line.

[Sid]

Dammit we need mickey and schaubs back. What happend to the team that almost beat brisbane in round 1...

We can win but i said that confidently about richmond.

[sharp9]

Our chances of winning???? Pretty good, at least as good as the Eagles who have been losing by quite a lot....even though they have a lot of talent around the park.

Most importantly our chances of winning are WAAAAAY BETTER THAN COLLINGWOOD'S!!!!!!

[jixygirl]

Originally posted by Bleed Red Blood
O'Keefe has done extremely well in Micky's absence and Hall is in very good form.So having another forward is not our problem.

Completely and totally agree. It would be great if both Magic and Shauble were both back, but seeing how our forward line is going adequately compared to other facets of the Swans' game, it would be better for Shauble to come back in. Like BRB said, Shauble would have freed up Barry in the Bombers game.

Also, I think we can win at Subiaco if our midfield steps up and plays like it can, and the players remember that theycan play well if they want to to boost their confidence.

[dread and might]

hypothetical. Jude and Goodesy have the confidence switch flipped to on.... all of a sudden we're a threatening team again. i am not suggesting this is all that needs to happen, but just to give it a different angle than the MOL return (dubious) and schauble who we know won't be back for another few weeks...

our midfield has been getting caned by teams that shouldn't really be caning our midfield, melbourne, richmond, essendon and now we come up against a team whose strong point (note the singular) is their midfield, on a big ground, needing to win before facing the Saints.....

i think it will be tight but I BELIEVE
now if the players could do the same.........