The Sydney Swans delivered with a resounding 92-point victory over West Coast in Geelong on Sunday afternoon.
Most pleasing for the players was their ability to overcome the club’s previous two narrow losses and defender Harry Cunningham putting the dominant performance down to a lift in consistency.
“You really want to put four quarters in, especially when you played so well for the first three. It’s that ‘defend to the death’ mentality - the forwards started it with their hunt and their pressure up front, then our midfielders got to work, and the backs were able to play off that and it was great to be able to get that result," Cunningham said after the win.
"We’ve been working towards building a good brand of footy for four quarters and I think we were able to do that today. It was great to be able to come here to Geelong and get a good win.”
Callum Mills, who was a standout for the Swans with 35 touches, echoed Cunningham’s thoughts.
“It came down to our willingness to keep fighting right until the last quarter. We had a few defensive stoppages and we didn’t concede - we held in and credit to the guys for not letting them score in the last quarter. It was a huge effort," Mills said.
"We wanted to be able to bounce back from those poor performances in recent weeks. The reality is sometimes they do happen, but it’s the way you bounce back from them that’s really important, and today was a really good example of that.”
Despite running out at a ground more than 900 kilometres away from the SCG – the Swans felt right at home as fans from their South Melbourne roots turned out to cheer on the red and white.
“We’ve got a great heritage and great history down in South Melbourne, it was great to see some red and white in the crowd today. They were really vocal especially towards that second half which was great and it was pleasing to be able to come here and play some great footy in front of our home fans,” Cunningham said.
Sydney remain temporarily based Victoria as Sydney continues to deal with a Covid outbreak. Mills admits while it’s been tough to be away from family, players aren’t letting it affect their game.
“We just have to soldier on, everyone in Sydney is doing it pretty tough at the moment and we’re thinking of them. Hopefully today puts a bit of smile on their faces," Mills said.
"There was about 11,000 people there and they were awesome, really loud. Full of red and white which was fantastic. I’m so glad we could go out there and perform not only for Victoria and Sydney fans, but for everyone around Australia."
