#danerampe

What a crap footy season it has been! If you bleed red and white in the AFL it has been an annus horribilis. The Giant defeat to end slim final hopes left a bitter taste in my mouth. Sydney Swans halftime heroes and full time failures. Indeed, red and white tears stain my Swan’s scarf in 2025. Not even the return of Errol Gulden could turn this season around. Isaac Heeney’s Colgate smile, similarly, could not breathe enough fresh confidence into a losing campaign. Even the bloody Red Cross weren’t able to transfuse life into an injury riddled Dean Cox debut season as head coach.

Sydney Swan’s Floundering Footy Year Stained With Failures

We supporters are unused to the view from the bottom half of the AFL ladder. A couple of decades of unrelenting success will do that. Red and white is usually associated with victory. This year was an anomaly, an aberration. Do you hear me Dean Cox? Swans will rise above them all. There are, however, no guarantees in football or life. We need some new talent. Sydney requires an injection of something that is lacking from the current squad. Brute strength and a little bit of nasty.

Too Much White & Not Enough Blood Red Ever since the ‘no dickhead’s’ policy of Paul Roos, back in the day (which was wise at the time), things have gone a little too far in that virtuous direction. Football sides are made up of a variety of human beings and this needs to be respected. Sure, it might be easier to homogenise the team but every footy club culture requires the balance of all sorts playing with what they uniquely bring to the mission. The current Swan’s squad lacks that bit of bastardry. The savage animal thinly disguised in a footy jumper. There are too many clean skins living within the Sydney AFL side. Too much white and not enough blood red in the current identity. The old Paul Roo’s blue collar midfield ethos no longer exists to the detriment of the team. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDTDm6MT-hw&t=343s Swans Recruit Some Hard Men, Please Sydney Swans need to recruit some brute force, enforcer type AFL players to bolster the thin ranks in this regard. Finals and big games are won with hard men playing their hearts out. Lightweights will not get it done on the last day in September, as we have seen repeatedly. No matter how darn clever and talented these boys might be. It takes real grit in the trenches. 4 quarter efforts week in week out – all qualities missing in 2025. I don’t know if Dean Cox has got what it takes – we will have to wait and see. He requires the cattle to get the job done, however, and the paddock looks bare right now in this regard. Too many red and white tears stain my Swan’s scarf in 2025. On Their Way Out & Injury Prone Dane Rampe, Harry Cunningham, Jake Lloyd, Robbie Fox, Taylor Adams, and Joel Hamling are all on their way out. Age shall weary them. One more season at tops for any of them. Joel Amartey is, unfortunately, injury prone, as is Tom Papley in season 2025. Lewis Melican has been iffy in this regard over the journey too. Hopefully, Logan McDonald is going to come back strongly in 2026. Similarly, Callum Mills has missed much of the last 18 months and is a watch as to whether his body stands up going forward. These 10 players and their fates create plenty of room on the list for fresh blood to be injected into the Swan’s list. “SYDNEY coach Dean Cox has admitted the future of champion defender Dane Rampe remains up in the air as the Swans start to plan for 2026 and beyond. Rampe, 35, is out of contract at season's end and is hopeful of playing on for a 14th year, but his coach stopped short of providing those assurances ahead of the clash with Essendon on Saturday at the SCG.” - (https://www.afl.com.au/news/1377239/veteran-dane-rampes-future-unclear-as-sydney-swans-coach-dean-cox-plans-for-2026-and-beyond) Bigger Bodies & Snarling Types, Please There are some wonderful AFL players on the Sydney list, but they require something extra in the form of big blokes with deadly intentions. Enough of the Peter Pan let’s see some mongrel! Can we get a big bodied, fast, mature age recruit or two to fill the absence of grit? I, for one, am sick of seeing Swans run over by bigger and more determined opponents. The culture will need to change a bit to accommodate these requirements. If we are serious about ever winning another premiership, this is what it will take! “Halftime heroes and full time failures, the Sydney Swans turn toes up once again in Giant defeat. I don’t know what coach Dean Cox serves up at the halftime break but it might have been a lullaby because his players fell asleep. The GWS, well down after the first half of football at their home ground, came out post the long break and destroyed Sydney. Winning contests and running amok to kick multiple unanswered goals. Chad Warner was nowhere to be seen nor Isaac Heeney in that third quarter demolition. It reminded me of the game against the Gold Coast earlier in the year with a similar awful result for the Swans.” - (https://www.golfdom.com.au/swans-turn-toes-up-once-again-in-giant-defeat/) Too many red and white tears stain my Swan’s scarf in 2025. Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of The Stoic Golfer; Money Matters and America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump. ©GolfDom

The GWS Giant’s Captain Toby Greene is a grub. A notoriously dirty footballer who has been fined and suspended ad nauseum in the AFL.  In the most recent match against the Sydney Swans Toby Greene punched Isaac Heeney in the head when the Swans player was lying prostrate on the ground. How tough is that Toby? Greene has been suspended for a week for this offence. Now, however, footage of Toby Greene back-kicking Dane Rampe in the groin has come to light on Footy Confidential on Channel Nine. This is, obviously, a further serious transgression of the rules of the game. Testicular cancer is no laughing matter and such violent contact to this region can result from such trouble.

GWS Captain Toby Greene Is A Dirty Footballer

In the modern era, AFL footy has put the cheap shots and dirty play behind it. Toby is a throwback to another time, when there were fewer cameras focused on games. To have made such a player your captain is sending the entirely wrong message to your club supporters and the AFL. Toby Greene is no longer a young man in AFL terms. Immaturity of character cannot be used as an excuse anymore. Furthermore, once you have entrusted leadership to such a person the expectations are so much higher. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YupkPMi9T2U Giants Captain Letting The Side & Game Down Playing with passion is a much admired trait but there are lines which must not be crossed. Toby Greene’s performance as a footballer has been praised often. Indeed, he has been described as the heart and soul of the Giants. Black hearts are no good for anyone, ultimately. The GWS Captain will be missing from another important clash this coming week due to suspension. This is not an infrequent occurrence. The team was bundled out of the Finals last season and this was on the back of being in front in all of their games before getting beat. Dirty deeds done dirt cheap could be Toby’s theme song. The cost of his dirty deeds on the field may be higher than first imagined. “The fact that Greene has been charged 25 different times throughout his 230-game career means he is now averaging a Match Review sanction for every 9.2 appearances that he makes. Greene's 25 charges have tallied 15 games worth of suspensions, while his latest fine has pushed his financial sanctions to a whopping $35,600. Unsurprisingly, he had already broken the record as being the most fined player ever.” - (https://www.afl.com.au/news/1168186/skirmishes-slaps-flying-boots-greater-western-sydney-captain-toby-greene-tops-them-all-with-unrivalled-rap-sheet) Will Greg Swann Condone Toby Greene’s Behaviour? It will be interesting to see if newly appointed footy boss Greg Swann takes action over Toby’s kick to the nuts of Dane Rampe or will the AFL turn another blind eye to the excesses of a grub? The AFL is currently plagued by off the ball cheap shots as acts of machismo. These displays of brute bullying are, I think, supposed to confer psychological dominance to the team engaged in such acts and stem from the coaching sheds. They are, obviously, not merely unrestrained acts by individuals. No, they are coordinated behaviours encouraged by the coaches to unsettle their opponents. To the viewers they are dumb acts of violence that mar the look of the game. Toby Greene is a grub. “GREG Swann starts his new role at AFL House next Monday with Brisbane coach Chris Fagan warning to not expect "radical change" from the incoming football performance boss early on.” - (https://www.afl.com.au/news/1366646/dont-expect-radical-change-from-new-afl-football-boss-greg-swann-brisbane-lions-coach-chris-fagan-warns) “Halftime heroes and full time failures, the Sydney Swans turn toes up once again in Giant defeat. I don’t know what coach Dean Cox serves up at the halftime break but it might have been a lullaby because his players fell asleep. The GWS, well down after the first half of football at their home ground, came out post the long break and destroyed Sydney. “ - (https://www.golfdom.com.au/swans-turn-toes-up-once-again-in-giant-defeat/) Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of The Stoic Golfer; Money Matters; and America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump. ©GolfDom