NEITHER a lap of honour for Barry Hall at half time, or skilled onball displays from Adam Goodes and Ryan O’Keefe, could provide the catalyst for the Swans to defeat Essendon at the SCG.

The Bombers led at every change and looked too fast and too skilled for the Sydney counterparts, increasing their lead at every quarter to eventually run out winners by 35 points, 15.17 (107) to 10.12 (72).
 
Essendon continued its outstanding record at the SCG, recording its sixth win in seven games at the venue.

The loss leaves the Swans two games and percentage out of the eight and they face a difficult match against Carlton at Docklands next Saturday.

Michael O’Loughlin kicked the first goal of the last quarter at the four-minute mark thanks to some smart play by Patrick Veszpremi to reduce the margin to 25 points, but Essendon replied quickly with Jason Winderlich kicking truly three minutes later and the margin was back out to 32 points.

As the Swans had only kicked eight goals for the match at this point, it was highly unlikely they were going to kick six unanswered goals in the last quarter to win the game.

The Swans tried valiantly all day and looked impressive in the first quarter when club stalwarts Goodes, O’Loughlin, O’Keefe and Brett Kirk were instrumental in both setting up and kicking goals.

But whatever the Swans dished up, Essendon was able to respond quickly.

Tayte Pears was resolute in defence and Brent Stanton and Alwyn Davey looked dangerous whenever they had the ball in their hands. Jason Winderlich also was solid picking up eight possessions in the first term.

Goodes started the second quarter off in fine fashion setting up an early goal and marking strongly. The dual Brownlow Medallist was back to his best, taking strong grabs and finding space,  but was somewhat of a lone hand as the Swans were outplayed by a more desperate and superior-skilled Essendon side.

The second quarter saw the Bombers start to show their ascendancy, with Andrew Welsh starting to find some space and set up many attacking moves.

Courtenay Dempsey was another proving a stumbling block for the Swans and although Heath Grundy was holding his own in defence, the Bombers were starting to find cracks in the Swans defensive zone.

Matthew Lloyd marked strongly a couple of times to finish the first half with two goals while O’Loughlin had four scoring shots for two majors. Ed Barlow had a good first half while O’Keefe was constantly in the thick of the action.

The Bombers outplayed the Swans in the third quarter, kicking four goals to two to establish a 25-point buffer at the final change.

 While O’Keefe, Goodes, Rhyce Shaw, Kirk and Ed Barlow were fighting hard, it was not enough to stop the run and the precision of the Bombers with Stanton, Welsh, Jobe Watson, Andrew Lovett and Dempsey asserting their dominance on the match.

Although the final quarter was fairly even, the final tally 374 possessions to 341 possessions did not indicate the better ball use of Essendon.

Sydney Swans    4.2    5.8    7.11    10.12 (72)
Essendon    4.6    8.8    12.12    15.17 (107)

Goals
Sydney Swans: O’Loughlin 3, Veszpremi 2, O’Keefe 1, Goodes 1, Roberts-Thomson 1, Barlow 1, Crouch 1
Essendon: Lloyd 3, Lucas 3, Winderlich 3, Dyson 2, Welsh 1, Lonergan 1, Reimers 1, Welsh 1

Best
Sydney Swans: O’Keefe, Goodes, Kirk, O’Loughlin, Shaw, Barlow
Essendon: Stanton, Pears, Lovett, Watson, Welsh, Reimers, Winderlich, Dempsey

Injuries: Sydney Swans (Jarrad McVeigh, hamstring, replaced in selected side by Mike Pyke)

Reports: Nil

Umpires: Matt Stevic, Simon Meredith, Troy Pannell

Official crowd: 30,924

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of the AFL or its clubs