Don't miss any of the news involving the Swans as we bring you everything from the newspapers around the country on Friday 14th August, 2015.

KIEREN Jack and Jarrad McVeigh are taking personal responsibility for Sydney’s recent form slump and are preparing to lead from the front when they take on Collingwood at the SCG tonight.

It will be the first time in 15 years the Swans and Magpies have met at the famous venue and the move away from ANZ Stadium for the match could be a good omen for the red and whites. They have lost 10 of the 13 meetings at the Olympic stadium including nine of the past 10.

The Swans’ chances of finishing in the top four are hanging in the balance after losing three of their last four matches and slipping to fifth on the ladder behind the Western Bulldogs. A win against Collingwood is vital.

“I put my hand up and I know Jarrad and the other leaders have,” Jack told The Daily Telegraph. “We need to make sure we’re leading from the front to set the tone for the rest of the group. We’ve been too inconsistent.”

IT’S advantage Collingwood in the selection stakes because star forward Travis Cloke is back after a three-week absence and Lance Franklin is still on the sidelines.

Cloke trained with teammates on the SCG yesterday to prove he has recovered from a calf injury for the vital match.

The Swans don’t have Franklin but do have two important inclusions in Mike Pyke and Gary Rohan, who come in at the expense of Toby Nankervis and Zak Jones.

A week after Ben Reid returned as a match-winner for Collingwood, his younger brother Sam shapes as a vital player for the Swans in ­tonight’s match at the SCG.

Brothers in arms representing the Wangaratta Rovers as kids, the Reids have blossomed into premiership players at opposite ends of the Hume Highway. And with superstar forwards Lance Franklin absent and Travis Cloke resuming from injury, the brothers will be called upon for influential roles in a match critical to both clubs.

Gary Rohan has declared he is ready to make his return from a lengthy lay-off after Sydney made a bold call at selection for their clash with Collingwood on Friday night.

The biggest part of the Swans’ puzzle is still missing, but two vital cogs in the red and white machine, Rohan and Mike Pyke, return to bolster the struggling grand finalists.

Their returns mean the Swans are missing only Lance Franklin and Ben McGlynn from their best 22. Optimism should therefore be high, but there is an added sense of urgency at Driver Avenue with the club in the midst of a worrying form slump a month before the finals.

COLLINGWOOD’S Travis Varcoe will run on to the field alongside 43 of his favourite footballers at the SCG tonight.

A two-time Geelong premiership player, Varcoe grew up in South Australia barracking for the Sydney Swans. And he still does.

When he was seven, his father Brian explained that one of the stars of the Swans team that would go on to play in that year’s grand final, Mick O’Loughlin, was his cousin.

“I thought, ‘Wow, that’s pretty cool’. Having one of your blood relations running around (in the AFL) that gave me something to aspire to and I’ve followed Sydney ever since,’’ Varcoe said. “Everyone has a soft spot for their childhood team, it’s just that when you play against them you still want to flog them.’’

The AFL has made some effort this year to turn back the hands of time for supporters. On Friday night, two of its teams will revisit the past as well.

Sydney's clash with Collingwood at the SCG is important enough in its own right, the Swans desperately trying to recover their top-four spot, the Magpies struggling to stay in contention for the eight.

But it's also a bit of a nostalgia trip, for the Pies particularly. Collingwood, arguably Australian football's most famous club, hasn't graced the SCG for more than 15 years, since round four of the 2000 season.

It's not exactly Collingwood and Carlton back at Victoria Park, but in the 21st century, which had only just begun when this fixture was last scheduled, it's about as retro as  football gets.

Football's most influential Indigenous boss says the AFL's response to Adam Goodes' booing ordeal was misunderstood by some, and should not have been judged in the prism of being first or loudest.

Jason Mifsud, who this week assumed a new senior advisory post in Indigenous and multicultural affairs, said a fortnight ago that he feared the jeering of Goodes this season, which Sydney and the AFL Players Association labelled as blatantly racist, could lead a future generation of Indigenous players to shun the code.

Thursday night football will play a pivotal role in the next AFL broadcast deal with the league looking to fixture 12 Thursday night free-to-air games from 2017, throwing a strategic challenge to the football calendar, which it could even bring forward to next season.

The AFL would go head-to-head for at least half of its home-and-away rounds on Thursdays with the NRL, which on Monday stunned the industry when it announced it had reached a four-year agreement from 2018 with the Nine Network worth $925 million.

AFL boss Gillon McLachlan has held talks with media chiefs in Sydney this week with the prevailing view that Channel Nine is no longer a player in the battle for televised Australian rules football unless it negotiates a one-game agreement with another free-to-air network.

The Nine NRL deal is worth close to double the amount Channel Seven is currently paying the AFL. The cash element of the NRL deal, a record for free-to-air rights in Australia, is worth an annual $160 million with Nine receiving a rebate of $25 million a year should it give up its exclusivity and share coverage with a pay broadcaster.