Blood, Switta and tears encapsulates Saturday night and it was the exception to the ‘never as good or as bad as it seems’ rule. As a moment, an occasion and result, it was better than it seemed! Time to Restump Podcast the magical, emotional and successful night against the Hawks. 

It was a ridiculously hard fought, combative, nonstop four quarter contest with Brayshaw’s bloodied brain container, Sammy Switkowski returning to play one of his best career games and then the emotional tears taking its toll as we all struggled to say goodbye to Sonny. 

Whether they are meaningful or not, so many elements went into and came together to make Saturday night what it was. It had an elimination final feel for both clubs so there was already an overflow of anxiety and pressure and while it was absurd criticism after the Swans loss, no Freo player, coach or fan wanted to give the critics any hint of even fake validation by losing. The contest was incredibly fierce, we then had to come from behind in the fourth quarter, and finally we had Sonny’s send-off which couldn’t have been what it was, had we dropped the game. 

These may seem like insignificant points to many other team’s football supporters, but you get the feeling that you had to be a Freo fan to understand the enormity of it. Unless you’ve been through the deepest darkest depths of football fan despair, you can’t truly comprehend or experience the full scope of the exhilaration Saturday night served up. 

It’s difficult to deliver a high class and clean performance when the heat is on like it was, but the skill level out there under those conditions was impressive. The pressure was relentless and while it got the better of us early and we couldn’t get near the ground ball, we managed to again fight our way in, take control of the contest, and steer the ship home. Dare we say another maturing performance?

It was a well-rounded, ferocious one in all in, team-oriented display, built on a record 103 tackles. If we put that on continuous repeat, it’ll carry us a long way. 

We did only generate 15 scoring shots for the game, which was the equal second lowest on the weekend from all 18 teams, but it was an anomaly in regards to our recent form and our accuracy covered for it. 

We’re a day delayed because we had to let the goose bumps subside, the hair on the back of our necks set back down and wait for our inbuilt Sonny inspired water works taps to turn off. 

But we can’t wait to talk about this game in more depth and relive the occasion. So, like us, if you’re not ready to move on just yet, join us on the pod as we prolong the Saturday night magic and continue Sonny’s send-off party. 

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