Parker to lead way

FROM the moment Luke Parker played through the pain of a broken jaw as a 19year-old against GWS, it was clear he was cut from a different cloth.

Parker will make a timely return today when Sydney host the Giants in an elimination final.

The big-bodied midfielder is the latest in a long line of plucky Swans on-ballers to have followed in the footsteps of ‘Captain Courageous’ Paul Kelly, leading by example and setting very high standards.

There are many good reasons that Parker, who played a pivotal role in the Swans’ lateseason resurgence, shapes as Sydney skipper Josh Kennedy’s likely successor.

The vice-captain has twice been voted the AFLPA’s most courageous player by his peers.

Most pundits pinpoint the 2016 qualifying final as the moment when the rivalry between Sydney’s two clubs became genuine.

The ill-feeling was there from the Giants’ first game in 2012. GWS veteran James McDonald shirtfronted a blindsided Parker, earning himself a two-game ban.

‘‘He’s one of the toughest kids I’ve seen,” Swans coach John Longmire said at the time. “He copped a knock, didn’t whinge about it, got up, dusted himself off and kept playing.”

Scans later confirmed Parker had a broken jaw. He didn’t miss a single game because of the injury.

Jude Bolton, who mentored Parker when he joined the club via the 2010 draft, once remarked of his protege that “you could hit him over the head with a block of wood and he’d get up”.

Brett Kirk, another hardnosed midfielder who led the Swans to a premiership in 2005, can’t fault Parker’s superb work at the stoppages.

“He’s a tough bugger. He has an ability to play with injury and the way he plays is what finals demand,” Swans assistant coach Kirk said.

Parker’s contested marking and capacity to kick clutch goals is also part of the reason that GWS co-captain Phil Davis is wary. “He’s a formidable player,” Davis said.