Welcome to the first episode of Rosco's Rivalries - thanks to Hungry Jack's.
Our inaugural club captain recounts our historic rivalry with the Sydney Swans.
Test your knowledge on our rivalry with the Swans and take our quiz - https://www.westcoasteagles.com.au/rivalry
Six games, a 13-point margin –total!
That was just ridiculous.
The West Coast Eagles-Sydney rivalry in the mid-2000s will never be repeated. Well, in this game, you can never say never, but that run of tight finishes is highly unlikely to ever be repeated.
Starting with the 2005 qualifying final at Subiaco Oval and finishing with the round one clash at Telstra Stadium (Olympic Park), those six matches beggared belief.
Incidentally, the seventh match in that chain wasn’t bad either, albeit a veritable blow out by comparison when the Eagles won the round 16 clash in 2007 at Subiaco Oval by 12 points.
In that six-match series, four of them were high-pressure finals and two were grand finals. Two epic grand finals that will likely take a bit of air time while the 2020 season is in hiatus.
The reason for the sequence of nail biting finishes was clear. Obviously they were two gun line-ups with a high level of accountability, great defensive structures and a collective will unmatched by their rivals at the time.
We begin reflecting on this wonderful rivalry, with the 2005 qualifying final which set for the tone for these last-man-standing, highly charged combats.
The build-up was enormous. People queued outside Subiaco Oval for more than an hour on the eve of the game to collect tickets they had purchased earlier in the week, after sitting on the phone or the internet for an inordinate amount of time.
It was the first home final for the West Coast Eagles in almost a decade and the club’s loyal fans, more than 43,000 of them, crammed into the ground.
Not since 1996 had the club hosted a finals series match and the city was in the grip of September fever as John Worsfold geared his troops for a high-stakes show-dow.
After a slogging first half, which saw West Coast lead by just two points, most fans expected the home ground advantage to kick in after the long break.
While the club’s star midfielders had won plenty of football – Ben Cousins, Chris Judd, Chad Fletcher and Daniel Kerr were prolific possession winners – converting that to something tangible on the scoreboard was proving elusive.
A marking option deep in attack was difficult to identify, particularly with Sydney pushing their numbers back. But as the Swans sought a different attacking mix of their own, they left Adam Hunter without an immediate match-up.
So Hunter, who played his formative years as a forward, was thrust into attack and he immediately made an impact, kicking two crucial goals.
Late in the quarter the Eagles swingman won a free kick deep in the pocket and his resultant kick drifted off-line. From the kick in the Swans went with a torpedo down the middle.
It cleared everyone, they swooped, ran it into the forward line and spotted up Adam Schneider about 30 metres from goal. He quickly took his kick which hit the target and had the Swans back within four points.
Twice more the Swans pushed forward in search of the match-winning goal. Twice Dean Cox drifted back and calmly took defensive marks which thwarted Sydney’s desperate bid for victory.
Two weeks later, the two clubs met again and in an emotion-charged result, Sydney prevailed by four points in one of the great, albeit disappointing, grand finals of the modern era.
Pulling on the heart strings of fence-sitting Victorian fans to support South Melbourne, Sydney (aka the Bloods) were the sentimental favourites.
We don’t want to rake over old coals; we all know it came down to the last surge forward and Leo Barry took a premiership-winning mark – albeit with a couple of Eagles in that pack held out of the contest.
The result was a four-point triumph for the Swans.
Match three in this stunning six-part drama, came at Subiaco Oval in round 15, 2006.
Seemingly in all sorts of strife at half-time, when trailing by 32 points – having kicked only three goals to main break – the Eagles found a way out of trouble.
Led brilliantly by skipper Chris Judd and the tenacious Adam Selwood, West Coast plotted a course to victory when it seemed it was enveloped in a maize from which there was no escape.
West Coast played an enterprising second half, breaking free of the Sydney shackles. Chris Judd was inspired, David Wirrpanda offered some exciting defensive rebound, Adam Hunter was supreme across half-back and Shannon Hurn produced his best game of senior football.
But perhaps the best indication that West Coast was not only on the road to recovery in this match, but across the season, came when Brett Jones sprinted 40 metres back from the centre square to lay a shepherd for Hunter, who was in a foot race with Barry Hall was exceptional.
The winning goal came in the closing stages when Rowan Jones, at the feet of a pack of players, somehow scrambled a handpass out to Tyson Stenglein who, from about 40 metres and off one step, snapped a briliant goal.
It propelled the Eagles to a two-point victory.
Game four game, for the second year in succession, was the qualifying final at Subiaco Oval.
Everywhere you looked it seemed the West Coast Eagles had won the game.
From a statistical standpoint, West Coast had around 50 more possessions than Sydney; they went inside the attacking 50 metre arc more frequently; they had more scoring shots. The only place where control was not reflected was the only place it matters – on the scoreboard.
That read Sydney 13.7 (85) to West Coast 12.12 (84).
In a game which created some remarkable parallels with the 2005 Grand Final, West Coast seemed to have done enough to win when Steven Armstrong kicked a late goal to give the home side a five-point advantage.
But in the dying minutes the Swans rushed the ball forward to a marking contest deep inside 50. Drew Banfield fisted the ball away from Ryan O’Keefe, but it spilled towards the goal line where Michael O’Loughlin swooped and kicked the most decisive and devastating of his four goals.
The Eagles rebounded and booked a return date with Sydney at the MCG for another crack at the club’s third premiership.
Ashley Hansen, Chris Judd and Ben Cousins helped the Eagles create early scoreboard pressure. It was a wonderful and dominant opening and the intensity was maintained until half-time when the Eagles took a four-goal lead into the break.
Hansen was a star at centre half-forward, proving more than a handful for Lewis Roberts-Thompson. Cousins, Judd, Daniel Kerr and Dean Cox controlled the midfield.
Hunter, Daniel Chick and Darren Glass held sway when rotating responsibilities between Michael O’Loughlin and Barry Hall. Hunter and Chick also pushed forward and were menacing.
Andrew Embley was lively, Chad Fletcher managed to get his hands on the ball and has delivered with precision.
A four goal lead was nice, but the Eagles knew Sydney would come. They were not disappointed.
Just seconds into the last term and Adam Goodes ran into an open goal, the Swans edged within a kick. It was the signal for this pulsating arm wrestle to reach another level. Each time Sydney edged the margin back to inside a goal, West Coast found an answer.
Late in the term Steven Armstrong kicked a great goal that bounced through from the pocket. Sydney responded with another. Then Daniel Chick smothered and blocked so that Hunter could convert from 20 metres. Sydney kicked another.
The last two minutes were frenetic. West Coast looked to hang on, Sydney strived to find a winning score. The seconds and minutes ticked by until, finally, Cox wins a ruck knock from a boundary throw-in. Game over! The Eagles are premiers.
The 2007 campaign started with the grand finalists going toe-to-toe once more.
On a night when Mitch Brown made his debut, the Eagles started brilliantly, owned the first half and looked to have Sydney’s measure at the Olympic Stadium.
But true to tradition, the Swans kept coming and despite having seven premiership stars missing, West Coast conjured a remarkable one-point victory.
It was always going to be a tough challenge with a number of front line players missing, but when Norm Smith medallist Andrew Embley and all-Australian ruckman Dean Cox withdrew on the day of the game, the task became even more daunting.
Somehow, though, the young Eagles found a way, mainly through the energy and courage of Kerr who capped off a brilliant effort with a lunging, match saving tackle on Swans star Jarrad McVeigh. It was deep into the game when the Swans were poised to drive the ball to the top of the goal square, which would have given them the opportunity to snatch an unlikely win.
HEAD TO HEAD
West Coast Eagles v Sydney
Played: 51
Won: 21
Lost: 30
Drawn: 0
Highest score: 19.14 (128) – Round 5, 1990 at Subiaco Oval
Lowest score: 4.10 (34) – Elimination Final, 2004 at Stadium Australia
Greatest winning margin: 61 points, Round 5, 1990 at Subiaco Oval
Greatest losing margin: 130 points – Round 16, 1987 at SCG
