Brown, Davies guide Swans to strong score

THE Swans are in a position of strength after Joel Davies and Luke Brown (pictured) fired with the bat against the Magpies at Reynolds Oval. North spearhead Shaun Kingwell (2-33) created early inroads before Davies, batting at five, combined with Brown for a 169-run fourth-wicket stand. Davies’s audacious 115-ball 105 was punctuated by 12 fours and fives sixes, while Brown was far more circumspect in carving out 78 from 222 balls. Ryan Tench backed up his consecutive half-centuries in the seconds with a 50-ball 27. Tom Mathieson claimed Davies’s scalp before sweeping the tail on the way to 4-84, while Jack Hall toiled manfully for 2-84.