Run machine Swan falls short of half-century
The Age
Monday June 1, 2009
Magpie midfielder has the stats scorers flat out and the fans counting at the 'cricket ground'. OLD-TIMERS still call the MCG the "cricket ground". In the last quarter there yesterday, a cricket-like dimension was introduced to football. Collingwood supporters cheered not marks, nor goals - for by then the game was well won - but Collingwood midfielder Dane Swan's possessions, willing him to a half-century.In the end, he and they had to settle for 48 not out. Port Adelaide, sensing something, manned him up tightly in the last few minutes. It was a hollow victory for the Power.The way the Magpie fans dwelled on Swan's numbers highlights the way statistics have come to dominate - and sometimes stultify - contemplations on modern football.Historically, they are classified with lies and damned lies; they are notoriously misleading. Suddenly, they are on the tip of all tongues. Last night, Collingwood coach Mick Malthouse affected to be unimpressed.But this day, the figures of the game were also its shape. In the first half, a dour and mistake-riddled affair in which the failure of half of the floodlights might have been thought a blessing, Swan's indefatigable feats of ball-gathering kept the Magpies in the contest.At half-time, he had had the ball 28 times. Not all his disposals were effective, but nor were many others at that point.On the stats sheets, the third quarter, when Collingwood blew the game open, was Swan's leanest. But this undersells him. For a start, Port was forced to detail Chad Cornes to tag him, freeing up others in the Magpie midfield.This was an interim victory; Port coach Mark Williams had chosen to clamp down on Swan, figuring that his kicking would not hurt it as, say, Leon Davis' might. He was wrong.Second, Swan's game is not merely about numbers. He exploits his aerobic capacity to run relentlessly to fill gaps, tidying up zones. At one stage, he guarded Port ruckman Dean Brogan, at another Domenic Cassisi.The crucial point in the game arrived eight minutes into the third quarter. Swan had picked off Nathan Krakouer's poor outlet pass and kicked a goal, John Anthony had added another to gain the Magpies the lead.But Port still pressed. Now it seemed Robbie Gray must mark, 20 metres from goal. But Swan, making metres of space, lunged without regard for personal safety and spoiled. Port had rushed forward, like a tide, but now everyone was out of position, and the ball was going the other way.Within seconds, the Magpies had whisked the ball to the surprising Leigh Brown, who goaled. Collingwood did not look back.On the back of Swan's sandbagging operation, others flourished. Scott Pendlebury and Shane O'Bree found plenty of the ball, Heath Shaw rediscovered his old faculty for surging deep into attack, Sharrod Wellingham played his most assured game and, most pleasingly of all for the Magpies, Brad Dick flitted to centre stage to play the sort of football the club had envisaged until a knee injury stole pretty much two seasons from him.As confidence grew, the mistakes that had blighted the first half dwindled. All this was in some way Swan's doing.Suddenly, improbably, a Collingwood team that has struggled to score goals in the past month had kicked its second highest for the season.More promises. Alan Didak kicked three, but tired and misplaced his timing, showing the effects of a month out of football. Cloke, Rocca and Medhurst are in reserve. John Anthony again showed the value of a straight-shooter; merely seven kicks netted him 4.1, and the one hit the post.At its most threatening, Collingwood's forward line consisted of this dead-eye, and Dick.The way the match changed complexion is best illustrated by the mood at the breaks. At quarter-time, Collingwood coach Mick Malthouse was plainly agitated.At three-quarter time, it was all clipboards and clappy hands, business as usual.In the last quarter, as Collingwood looked to consolidate its advantage, Swan had 12 more touches. All were poised; all advanced his team's position. He is the thread that has held this patchwork team together, the constant in a patchy season.Swan is an unfashionable, unspectacular, socks-down sort of footballer, with a trudging sort of gait, no obvious turn of speed, nor, say, Wellingham's powers of evasion.His strengths are more basic, but also more subtle, he knows where the ball is going, he runs ceaselessly to be there for it, he rarely wastes it, and he is for his size a strong overhead mark. By these ageless virtues, a one-time back pocket player has emerged as a prodigious midfielder.
© 2009 The Age
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