Skipper, Dukesy, front and centre, holds the Kangaroo Brand Sherrin after last weekend’s scratchy. The Sherrin was donated by the Swannies’ first President in Saigon, Scotty Stacey,

Swannies superstar and chief football writer for Swannies.com has just prepared a review of last weekend’s match in Saigon between the Reds and the Whites to commence Season 2013.

The Sai Gon Reds have come from behind to beat a brave Sai Gon Whites outfit to take the lead in the first of the best of 5 series: 1 game to 0.

Before the match, National President, Phil Johns was quoted as saying, “The only thing ‘Thu Far’ about ‘Thu Duc’ is waiting till ‘Thu O’clock’ ‘Thu Play’”.

These words turned out to be true with a huge number of Swannies gathering for the first official scratchy of the season. Even Nick Moger made a surprise return and booted 5 goals. He hasn’t missed a beat since going missing last year. The Swannies’ favourite American, Michael turned up with a new friend and some of the Vietnamese University Students thought they were looking at Michael and Janet Jackson.

The Match

The match was dominated by the Whites early on. They got out to quite a big lead in the first half. However the Reds got themselves back into the match by kicking the last 3 goals of the half. The Reds went into half time trailing by 2 goals.

At half time a very controversial event happened. Swannies captain and gun player Dukesy decided to change teams to even up the numbers. In the first half the Whites had 14 players and the Reds only had 11.

The Whites knew they would find it difficult to hold onto their 2 goals lead without their star player. The third quarter was a tremendously tight battle. Both teams were scoring goals on the small Thu Duc Ground. At 3 quarter time the Whites still had a 2 goal advantage.

The Whites started the fourth quarter on fire. They extended their lead to 5 goals but with only 6 minutes left to play the likes of Dukesy, Nathan Milner and Revo started to come into their own. The Reds were able to kick 7 goals in 5 minutes. The Whites kicked the last goal of the match but it wasn’t enough to overthrow the Reds comeback.

There were many great performances in the match. For the Reds, Johnny Mac brought his girlfriend and showed her just what he can do on the footy field. He took a number of strong grabs and kicked a brilliant goal just before half time.

Ryan almost did enough to get his nickname of REVO back. He booted 5 goals and was unstoppable in the last 6 minutes.

Nathan Milner was solid all game in every position.

Dukesy was running riot in the last few minutes of the match.

The Reds also got Dukesy’s brother ‘John’ who is 6 foot 4 and a gun. Unfortunately for the Swannies, John was only here for the weekend and flew back to Australia on Sunday.

New recruit, Josh (also known as JD), who Moggy brought along, was solid all day and has now established himself as the best Swanny in the Vietnam Police Force.

For the Whites, Phil G was a standout in defence and was given HOS (Heart of a Swannie) for his performance. Whenever the ball went back, Phil was there to cut it off. He didn’t stop trying all match.

“New, new Josh”, who replaced “New Josh”, was brilliant in the midfield. He racked up a huge number of touches and won plenty of hard ball. He’ll be good for your supercoach team.

Just like his brother, Sean Milner was also solid all over the park.

Moggy was causing all sorts of problems for the Red defenders especially in the first half where he booted 5 goals.

Shagger was also a great target all match for the Whites. He clearly plays better when he doesn’t bring Miss Vy to watch.

Well done to all the Swannies who went out to Thu Duc.

Thanks to Rocket who once again did a great job umpiring a highly fought out and tense battle.

Also, special mention to Saigon’s first President, Scotty Stacey. When National President, Phil Johns, caught up with Scott in Australia, Scott donated a Kangaroo Brand Sherrin to the Club which Phil brought to the scratchy. Thanks very much, Scotty! It clearly demonstrates not just further evidence of awesomeness but that you can leave the country, but you can’t leave the Club. Honk!