Longmire looks ahead
By Dalton Woods
He delivered his address in a typically humble manner before an audience of fans, sponsors, and club legends, including midfielder Paul Williams who was inducted into the Swans Hall of Fame.
“We come here tonight carrying the title of reigning premiers, but to be blunt, there’s not much more I want to say about that. To me it’s really last year’s news,” Longmire told the packed ballroom at Darling Harbour’s Convention Centre.
“In the highly competitive world of AFL footy, you can’t spend too much time looking back, and you certainly can’t stand still.”
The speech came on the back of several months spent touring NSW with the 2012 Premiership Cup, as well as an underwhelming pre-season.
There have been varied interpretations of these results: some say that the Swans have never taken the pre-season very seriously, while others attribute the mediocre form to a post-premiership hangover.
Longmire refuted such suggestions, stating that the team realises that “success is never a given … that you are never, ever entitled to it”.
Rather than considering their 2013 premiership prospects, the coach focused on “the one percenters”, like smothers, shepherds, and chases, from individual players, that “might not even count on the regular stat sheet … but to us they’re like gold”.
Longmire explained that their focus on one percenters was what made them so successful, as opposed to the big names like Lance Franklin that fueled Hawthorn’s efforts.
After setting a standard of 175 one percenters per game at the beginning of the season, the team gradually raised the bar until they aimed for 245 in the Grand Final.
“In the Grand Final, the players achieved 333 one percenters … over a third more than ever before.
“The effort of our 22 players that day was off the scale … you couldn’t have wished for more.”
Longmire concluded with a message of hope and expectation that the Swans will maintain a similar level of effort throughout 2013.
“You might ask why do players do it if it’s hard? Well, the feeling after you’ve played an important role for the team, and you know that 21 others have done the same thing, is the best feeling in the world.”
