Rd 2 vs Geelong Cats @ SCG - Match Thread

[Ruck'n'Roll]

Surprised to see that only 35k showed for this game, just reinforces my suspicions about exactly what those membership number actually mean.
Amazing to see the pics of the whole playing surface of the SCG covered by Buddy's well wishers.
Disappointed to see see how many people had decided to leave the SCG altogether after Buddy kicked his 1,000th
Hilarious to see two Swans players photographed trying to do the same thing.

[Auntie.Gerald]

I50s can also be used just as much as a way of controlling the momentum of the game ie if the other team is on a roll and we want to control the field.....bombing it in to the forward 50 and applying high pressure defence is a very important lever to arrest the oppositions dominance.

Hence if I50s are high they can be when dominating a game but also when struggling to slow the bleed and you dont want to be under so much pressure in your back 50

[AB Swannie]

Surprised to see that only 35k showed for this game, just reinforces my suspicions about exactly what those membership number satually mean.
Amazing to see the pics of the whole playing surface of the SCG covered by Buddy's well wishers.
Disappointed to see see how many people had decided to leave the SCG altogether after Buddy kicked his 1,000th
Hilarious to see two Swans players photographed trying to do the same thing.

What is capacity? 39k? That would mean ~ 10% of seats were empty. I know of 5 people who had tickets but couldn’t attend due to isolating (myself included). I think people like me make up the majority of the empty seats.

[Ruck'n'Roll]

What you talking about AB?
The SCG says it's capacity is 48,601

[AB Swannie]

What you talking about AB?
The SCG says it's capacity is 48,601

Really? Wow. I stand corrected. I know that Ticketek only had single seats available to purchase on game day.

[Hotpotato]

The SCG looked pretty chockers from where I sat in the Brewongle (I’ve got a video) .
I was looking for an empty seat closer to the playing surface closer to the milestone, but couldn’t see one.
So I’d suggest a recount.

[Mark26]

Surprised to see that only 35k showed for this game, just reinforces my suspicions about exactly what those membership number satually mean.
Amazing to see the pics of the whole playing surface of the SCG covered by Buddy's well wishers.
Disappointed to see see how many people had decided to leave the SCG altogether after Buddy kicked his 1,000th
Hilarious to see two Swans players photographed trying to do the same thing.

What are your suspicions re: membership numbers?

[crackedactor 01]

BTW, take a bow Callum Mills - kept Dangerfield to 13 possessions while accumulating 29 himself!

Callum Mills has become an elite midfielder. What really impressed me is that the Swans also seemed to be in control. Whenever Geelong got close they just up the gears and pulled away again. I have not seen that since 2005.

[Aprilbr]

What you talking about AB?
The SCG says it's capacity is 48,601

The game was very close to a sell out. The reason why crowds rarely get into the 40k plus category at the SCG for AFL is because the Members stands are seldom at capacity. This is because many of these members are predominantly cricket fans rather than AFL. I just did some online research and the largest crowds for us at the SCG in the past decade are 46,000 against Essendon in a final in 2017 and 42,000 against Hawthorn in 2016. We have had nothing else above 40k in the past decade. The post-Covid world is not helping with crowds either as mentioned elsewhere.

[giant]

What a magical night! One of my very best sporting moments (and I've been blessed with a few) - so much fun and and so happifying to see Sydney out enjoying itself.

And easy to lose sight of the fact it was just a tremendous team effort - can't think of a single player that didn't contribute. The defence in particular was spectacular but kudos to the amazing Heeney, a brilliant disciplined performance from Mills and a mouth-watering display from the Chad.

And then there's the Bud - how lucky are we to get to watch this bloke run around every other week?

So many highlights following this wonderful club but that one is tough to beat.

[giant]

By the way, do you reckon Chad’s an excitable young fella who’s pretty happy about his spot up to Bud

Oscar on Twitter: "“I @@@@ing kicked it to him” #Buddy1000… "

Oh that is gold. Just love this lad.

[Thunder Shaker]

Surprised to see that only 35k showed for this game, just reinforces my suspicions about exactly what those membership number satually mean.

The ongoing pandemic may be affecting this for various reasons. This is also happening at other games.

Why do we have less f50 entries? For 2 consecutive weeks we had less than 50 f50 entries. With our line breakers and good kickers I would have thought we would have more entries. We were saved by our straight kicking. This strategy is probably not going to work in close games.

Inside 50 is not a very useful statistic on its own. It's what a side does with those inside 50s that matter.

Last night's game.
Inside 50s: Port Adelaide 58, Hawthorn 46.
Scores: Port Adelaide 7.14 (56), Hawthorn 19.6 (120).

Quality is more important than quantity.

Other games this round where the losing side had more inside 50s:

WB (51) v Carlton (49). Carlton won by 12 points.
Sydney (47) v Geelong (65). Sydney won by 30 points.
Essendon (56) v Brisbane (52). Brisbane won by 22 points.
Gold Coast (60) v Melbourne (55). Melbourne won by 13 points.

Other game:
Collingwood (54) v Adelaide (51), Collingwood won by 42 points.

Out of six completed games, five of the winners had fewer inside 50s, and the other game the winner had three more inside 50s but won by seven goals.

So inside 50 count is not a strong statistic for measuring performance.

[Ruck'n'Roll]

What are your suspicions re: membership numbers?

I'm not suggesting there's anything fishy about the total number of members reported, but just what those numbers really mean, what benefit does the club accrue?

When I first became a member there was a single membership tier. If there was an increase or decrease in membership it was pretty clear what it meant in terms of funds for the club and bums on seats at games. With the different types of membership options available these days, it's a lot less clear what that raw membership total means. We may be are trying to compare apples to oranges in some cases.

A 10% increase in members, with an increase in the overall percentage of non full season packages - could conceivably be of less value than a 2% increase, if there was an overall increase in the percentage of full season packages amongst the Swans total membership.

[Ruck'n'Roll]

The game was very close to a sell out. The reason why crowds rarely get into the 40k plus category at the SCG for AFL is because the Members stands are seldom at capacity. This is because many of these members are predominantly cricket fans rather than AFL. I just did some online research and the largest crowds for us at the SCG in the past decade are 46,000 against Essendon in a final in 2017 and 42,000 against Hawthorn in 2016. We have had nothing else above 40k in the past decade. The post-Covid world is not helping with crowds either as mentioned elsewhere.

Your observation that nothing above 40k in the past decade is the point really.

The Swans have been playing at the SCG for a long time now, and the SCG has many times the number of members than it has seats for them, so I'm not sure whether that observation still holds true any more. On the replay it looks like at a good number of non-AFL-averse people have entered the SCG membership. In any case the shots of the ladies and members stands in the replay show them as fuller than the Bill O'Reilly for example, at least to my eye.

So why didn't it pack out? Just in case it's unlear, I am not havin' a go at the club, Buddy, Sydneysiders, or indeed any sacred cow - just making an observation.

FWIW - 20 years ago the response to my post would have mainly been about the hilarious pic of Chad and Ollie trying to get back into the ground (4th line), I can't remember the last time I saw ROFL or LOL anywhere on RWO.

[Mountain Man]

I want to reiterate the value of McLean.

He is a contrast in role/strengths to mobile Franklin (and McDonald), the medium and small forwards; but at the game he was in multiple contests around the ground. I suspect his heat map would show that if anyone can reveal that.

He is credited with only 12 possessions, but again I suspect he influenced many more contests than that.

Finally his ruck craft seems to be on the rise - 7 HO and 2 frees for and 1 free against.