AFL

Ben Cousins Recalls Epic West Coast Battles With Sydney In The Mid-2000s: “We Couldn’t Break Them”

Ben Cousins has recalled some of the epic battles West Coast had with Sydney over the course of their famous heavyweight rivalry with the Swans in the mid-2000s.

BEN COUSINS RECALLS EPIC WEST COAST BATTLES WITH SYDNEY:

“They were amazing,” Cousins said to Mick Molloy and Mark Geyer on Mick & MG in the Morning.

“They very much were a side that were similar (to the Eagles), they were built on hard work too.

“We knew that through the course of a game we may find ourselves on top, but we probably didn’t think we were gonna break them.

“That just wasn’t the way they were, and we sort of prided ourselves in a similar vein.”

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Cousins said that a remarkable element of the rivalry was the sheer evenness of the two sides.

“It was uncanny how they would always come down to probably less than a kick,” he said.

“It could go either way.

“We admired them, they were tough… It was probably a true reflection on how even both sides there that we got to win one and so did we.”

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Between the 2005 qualifying final and round 1 2007, the Swans and Eagles played six games for four West Coast wins and two Sydney victories.

The biggest margin in any of those matches was just four points.

Those six matches famously included the 2005 and 2006 grand finals, with Sydney emerging victorious by two points in the first premiership decider and West Coast winning the rematch by a solitary behind.

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Cousins also spoke about how it was to play in the Eagles’ elite midfield at that time, his time training with MG in Perth, and his stint on Dancing With The Stars.