GIANTS NEW KINGS OF SYDNEY
PHIL Davis did what he has tried to do for years.
“Operation Stop Buddy” hasn’t always worked. But last night at the SCG the mission was executed with honours.
As the Giants won their way through to the competition’s last six, brushing Sydney aside with a relentless 49point win, Davis reached hero status among his club’s faithful as he shut down Lance Franklin like few have done before.
The Swans’ 30 points were their lowest score ever at the SCG and the worst in any final since Collingwood in 1960.
The GWS victory came in the face of a mountain of history which said they couldn’t beat their cross-town rivals.
The Swans had won the teams’ last three clashes, including this year’s in rounds three and 22. They were also 7-1 in previous finals at the SCG and had won their past four elimination finals.
Three goals from Toby Greene and two each to Jeremy Cameron and Harry Himmelberg did the damage up forward, but it was the defensive effort from Davis that made the win so emphatic.
Davis kept Franklin goalless and to just eight touches.
It was a showpiece of defensive craft from Davis who won almost all their one-on-one contests and varied his body positioning according to his distance from goal, playing in front when he was close and from behind when Franklin was further up the ground.
Davis’s dominance was so emphatic that Franklin’s first and only shot on goal didn’t come until the 20-minute mark of the third quarter.
“Phil has had a terrific year,” Giants coach Leon Cameron said.
“He’s stiff to not be in the squad of 40 for the All Australian team. He was great tonight as our co-captain and stood up tonight from the start.”
Franklin wasn’t helped by the groin injury he carried into the match and Sydney’s shocking inside-50 count (39-63).
Coach John Longmire confirmed after the match Franklin was close to being a late withdrawal.
“Yes, he was,” Longmire said. “But once you play you play. I don’t think that was the difference, he was always going to play.”
The shutout exposed Sydney’s reliance on the superstar forward as they were outscored by eight goals to nil from early in the second quarter to the last five minutes of the match.
“It’s a really young forward group,” Longmire said.
“We have some real youth up there and there is a big reliance upon Lance. We don’t want that to continue to happen and we want to change it.”