FORMER star forward Nick Davis had a fair run during his 168-game AFL career, playing in one Grand Final with Collingwood and two with the Swans, including the Swans' 2005 premiership.

But if someone asks him about his football career these days, he rarely gets asked about the Grand Finals. More than 90 per cent of the time he's asked about his performance in the final quarter of the 2005 second semi-final against Geelong.

He said this week that it doesn't annoy him that his overall career tends to be overlooked because of his shining cameo at the death against Geelong.

"Maybe if I'd had a shot and kicked it out on the full it would annoy me," said Davis, who is now a runner for the Swans.

Instead it's become part of football legend that Davis had four shots, mostly difficult, and slotted them all.

The match featured few goals but it was so tense and hard-fought, and the finale was so gripping, that it's entered the pantheon of great finals.

Former Geelong forward Cameron Mooney said this week the atmosphere during the manic last quarter was "quite incredible".

"The noise was probably the loudest I've heard at a football game," Mooney said. "They went off their heads."

As it happened, the match was so good that all subsequent matches between the Swans and Geelong have paled by comparison - and it might always be that way.

If any match has the potential to match reach those heights, it's the match between the Swans and Geelong at the SCG on Friday night.

The winner will be mentioned in premiership calculations while the loser will face speculation about missing the finals.

There's a large gap between those two fates, but that's the feeling surrounding this match.

The fact that it's a rare game in Sydney on the first night of the round adds gloss to the occasion.

It was early in 2005 that AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou said he didn't care much for the Swans' strangle-and-charge style of play.

This style of many contests and few goals tended to produce close results. The Swans lost the qualifying final to West Coast in Perth by four points.

Geelong had an easier path, cruising to a 55-point victory in its elimination final against Melbourne.

Before the semi-final, Davis suffered two setbacks that might have taken his mind off the game.

Matches in Sydney on Friday nights were so rare that he'd forgotten how bad the traffic could be.

His journey from his home in Cronulla was so stop-start that he arrived in the Swans' rooms 20 minutes late.

Then during the warm-up he bumped into midfielder Paul Williams.

Williams had spent the week trying to shake off a corked thigh. Davis' errant bump re-injured it.

In the Geelong rooms, coach Mark Thompson was putting the finishing touches on his plan to match the Swans at their own game, with one-on-one football all over the ground.

Jarad Rooke was assigned to Brett Kirk while Cameron Ling took Adam Goodes. Full-back Matthew Scarlett had the sizeable job on Barry Hall.

The other plank in the Geelong approach was a fierce attack on the ball.

"It turned out to be a low-scoring battle," Mooney said. "Our defence was outstanding."

The Cats suffered a setback when captain Steven King injured his hamstring during the second quarter. Mooney was taken away from a key forward post and put into the ruck.

Goodes was told to run with Mooney in an attempt to shake off Ling.

The conditions were slippery. The pressure was unrelenting.

Geelong's plan to close the game down and force the ball wide was frustrating the Swans, who were not so good at taking their own medicine.

Geelong took a significant lead in the scheme of the game when it kicked three goals in the second quarter while holding the Swans goalless.

The Cats led by 20 points at half-time. It was five goals to two.

The third quarter produced more of the same. Both teams scored a goal.

Geelong led by 17 points at three-quarter time. It was six goals to three.

Swans coach Paul Roos knew his team had to take risks. During the huddle he called in ruckman Jason Ball and forwards Davis, Adam Schneider and Ryan O'Keefe.

He told Ball that, at stoppages, he had to hit the ball over the players at his feet. The forwards had to be ready to swoop on the ball on the outside of the contests.

In the opening minutes of the last quarter Geelong defender David Johnson, Davis' opponent, took a mark in attack and kicked a goal.

The margin was 23 points.

Swans captain Brett Kirk had worked closely with Davis as his mentor during the second half of the season.

As the ball was relayed back to the centre Kirk told Davis in vociferous terms that it was up to him to get one back.

Davis got his chance from a stoppage 40m from the Swans' goal. Ball whacked the ball over the contest towards the forward pocket.

Davis swooped on the ball and was running towards the boundary when, in a feat of rare skill, he curled the ball back on his right foot for a goal.

Soon afterwards, O'Keefe ran into space just forward of the centre circle and sent a floating torpedo deep into the Swans' attack.

Davis got a split and, with clever positioning, nudged out the flailing Joel Corey to take the ball on his chest.

His set shot from 25m out went through the middle.

The next stoppage was in the Swans' forward pocket. Ball swiped the ball back towards the centre of the ground.

The ball bobbled before Swans half-back Tadhg Kennelly grabbed it and spat out a handball to Davis, who was scooting around him.

Davis was still running away from goals when, with Geelong players bearing down on him, he kicked the ball over his shoulder for his third goal of the quarter.

The Swans now trailed by only three points. The crowd was going silly. The commentators were beside themselves.

With seconds remaining there was another stoppage, this time about 15m in front of the Swans' goal.

Swans players cleared out from the stoppage area, knowing that their Geelong opponents would go with them.

Ball instructed Davis to nip in below him. The ball would be plopped in his lap.

Davis sprinted in after the ball-up. The plan worked perfectly.

"He hit it in exactly the right spot," Davis said.

With Geelong defenders on his hammer, however, Davis was unable to take the ball cleanly.

He tapped it from hand to hand before knocking it up so that he could get a boot to it.

The ball fell sweetly on his boot. He guided it over the pack in the goalsquare.

The Swans had kicked only three goals in the first three quarters. Now Davis had kicked four goals in the last quarter.

The siren went with the Swans ahead by three points. They had pulled off one of the great finals heists.

Mooney said the Cats had panicked during the last quarter. "As soon as they got a run-on we went into our shells," Mooney said.

Davis said the victory gave the Swans the confidence to go on with the job.

They defeated St Kilda in the preliminary final and West Coast — by four points — in the Grand Final to give the club its first premiership since South Melbourne had won in 1933.

Davis played on until 2008 without ever quite matching his moment in the wet in 2005.

"I tried to kick four goals in the last quarter in every match after that but it never happened," Davis said.